Rhomal

Christians stole many pagan holidays. Christmas and Esater being the 2 biggest ones. xmas was orginially called "Yule" (sound familar), and easter was "Ostra", the christians were having a difficult time converting pagans so they tought of the idea of placing their holidays on the same days as the pagan ones, to help assimilate them. Most biblical scholars agree if jesus did exist he was born in the spring/summer time. But the pope made the holiday in dec on the same day as a major pagan holiday. Same with easter. Also while were on the topic St. Bridget in the catholic patheon, she never existed as a real person like other saints who are based on real people. She is the same pagan goddess Bridget from the scandiniva countries. The church back then when they couldnt stop her worship decided the only way to convert the pagans was to make Bridget one of their own. And so made her a saint in the catholic church. As a pagan/wiccan myself I find this on one level funny and on another disgusting.

If you know of a site do let me know.

Added some (I dislike this term) 'New age'-esque music last night, as well as a little type o negative and a couple tracks from IWD (having a difficult time finding iwd music) and a few more from bloodlines. I also added some tracks of Jeanette, the fairly popular NPC from bloodlines, speaking. I suppose I am easily amused, but I find it entertaining when you randomly hear Jeanette say "Here kitty, kitty, kitty" or "It's pleasure... I mean A pleasure to see you again" between songs.

Thanks for the kind words. I am planning on adding more music from various sources over the next few days. All the music is 128k or higher bit rate. So it prob has to do with the lower stream quality. To conserve bandwidth I keep the stream quality on the lower side. I may raise it but if so I will then have to cut down on the max connected users. Currently its set for 32. I may up the quality and lower the max users to 20 depending on the popularity. If you have any suggestions for music do email me/post on the site.

My ISP email server throws a hissy fit from time to time. I manually activated your account. Welcome EDIT: I have disabled email validation for the day till my email server issue gets corrected.

NWN 2 News iRadio Station now online! Logged in members can listen while surfing NWN 2 News via the radio tuner on the right side of the main page. You must be logged in to have access to the radio tuner. We have a selection of music from epic soundtracks such as Conan, LotR and Gladiator, Music from CRPGs such as BG and Vampire:Bloodlines and other such types of music. Enjoy!

A exclusive NWN 2 News interview with lead programmer Frank Kowalkowski is now posted in the NWN 2 articles section. We talk about his past industry work and his thoughts on the current industry dynamic. As well as a little about NWN 2 since thats why you peeps visit this site. Here is a snip: Did you go to school specifically for game development? How did you get into the field? I went to school to be a writer, then switched to physics before I settled on computer science as a degree field. I wound up in computer games after playing a lot of them, deciding I wanted to do this and

Videos of the battles being posted, a few new ones shall be posted every day. http://www.nwn2news.net/modules/wfdownload...ewcat.php?cid=4

The stats for the contestants are now posted in the above thread. The first round will take place this weekend. Results post the start of next week on NWN 2 News.

I have a AMD64 3000+ 939pin gig of pc3200 dual channel config (512x2) XFX 6600gt 128meg apg video Installed the patch right after the install from CD. Only been playing it for a couple days now but I have not have any performance issues.

> Rhomal: What difficulty did you play the original on? Normal > Some of those early missions can be damn tough on Very Hard. I am sure. I am refering tho playing it on the default difficulty for both. > What do you mean some of the VO is hammy/over the top? The voice overs/voice acting. A few of the actors over exagerated the accents or say silly things. > From what I've heard on the music is that a number of the tracks have been reused from Stronghold and Crusader. It sounds that way to me as well.

I would think that will be there - I simply forgot about it. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Acually the NWN 2 demo will be done by Atari at their annual pre-E3 show. Which takes place a week or two before the main E3 show. FYI

Also snuck Aerie in there too..

Did so with Viconia I am not sure if she is canon or not but a few ppl requested her.

indeed

Got it, playing it now... only on mission 4 but so far heres my thoughts: sound: no better or worse then the last game, which means a acceptable job on this level. tho some of the VO is hammy/over the top. score: 6 graphics: The 3D engine is excellent! Its amazing details and the camera is easy to navigate around with. I have heard reports (pre-patch granted) that with a mass battle even hunky boxes slow to a crawl. Since I have both the patch and only on mission 4 I cant really comment one way or the other thus far. But thus far very impressed with the new engine. score: 8 gameplay: Its MUCH more difficult this time around. I can recall the first game I really wasnt seriouslly challenged until mission 8 or 9. Here I am fighting for my life on mission 4. Also you come back at times to a previous keep/castle/stronghold. Thus when building your castle its not a one mission deal. You have to plan it out for future missions and expansion as you will from time to time return to a previous stronghold for a new mission. It certainly adds a extra element of difficulty/tactics. The story/plot of the 2 campaigns is interesting and keeps you entertained but wont win any awards. Other then that the gameplay is very similar to SH1 just more buildings, units and such added. score: 7.5 So far its a very good game overall and I suggest getting it *IF* you like a challenge. If you are not one for a tactical, thinking RTS then this game will prob turn you off. My 2 coppers

This is similar to the idea of the March Madness Basketball college playoff's that happen here in the states. But rather then sports teams, major NPCs from 4 settings (Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance and Ravenloft) are going to compete. They were randomly seeded and placed in 2 divisions. The winners of each division will compete for the title of Grand Master of all D&D Realms. For each quarter final we will post polls of the matches, and leave this the official thread on NWN 2 News open for discussion. This way via polls or posting you can voice your opinion and thoughts on who will win and root for your favorite. http://www.nwn2news.net/modules/newbb/view..._id=217&forum=1 Let May Mayhem Begin!

Thanks everyone.. you shall see the point of this soon

Sure.. any NPC from a book, module or sourcebook is fine. As long as they are at least a fairly major NPC in that game world. (ie no level 0 barkeep from some obsecure tavern)

I am going to be having what I consider a very interesting 'contest' per se over at NWN 2 News. But to get the ball rolling I need some feedback. I would like all those who read this to post their top 5 favorite major NPCs of the following classic D&D settings: Greyhawk Dragon Lance Forgotton Realms Ravenloft After I get several posts to put a list or more or less agreed upon most liked NPCs for each setting I will explain more. Thanks for your input!

First a disclaimer. I never played I or II, nor am I a SW fan. (I feel the SW setting is too cartoony, simple for my taste). Thus I have no interest in defending or not KotOR II. I feel out of fairness, I should post this story as it may shed some light on the topic for some of you who wish to listen with a open mind. I had a talk with a developer of Obsidian as I commonly do. KotOR II happened to come up, I inquired for no other reason I was curious what all the brew-haha was about. The developer said yes certain elements of the story got cut during production. Those are the unfinished/REM'ed out dialog and scripted events that people have unearthed. I asked, was this due to time. He said no, it was simply the fact during production they decided not to use those elements. And they stand by that the finished product as what they intended for the story in the end. He made the comment this happens all the time, ideas are made but in the end do not get used in the final product. Now I am sure people here will scream bloody murder over this, but again I have no vested interest in KotOR 2 so take that as you will.

I am sorry but all I saw was low poly graphics. I was not expecting Doom3 level of detail but something noticably better then the first game. I realize its trying to emulate 60's comics, but I didnt see it in the artistic style myself. I cant equate on a rational level the poor graphics quality and the style of the 60s' comics. (This coming from a former comic collector and comic shop owner). Certainly they got some of the feel right, like the POW! and such when you whack a bad guy.. but I didnt feel good with the end result as a whole. That aside, I will also add I did like the animations. They were very well done and smooth. Sadly they didnt put as much effort into the story or graphics as they did with the sound and animations IMO.

I bought the first game and LOVED it. Played it though several times with custom PCs. I was very much looking forward to the sequal. I saw good review after good review, so I was quite excited needless to say. In a nutshell the plot is Time Master is used to go back in time by some less then nice people to WW2 to change history. Thus FF must re-assemble and correct the change to history. The plot SEEMED very interesting and I thought it had potential. So I bought it, loaded it up and started playing. I got to about mission 12 and frankly I lost all interest in it. I have never had a game where by the half way point I just gave up our of bordom and non-interest. I tried my best to plow forward to see if I could rekindle the flame I had when I started. But alas I could not. In fact I uninstalled it, and I sold it back to the store I got it from for credit. I wish I could give a compleate start to finish review but sadly I can not. So I will give my impressions up until I stopped playing. Story: Started strong, but by mission 8 or so my care for the characters and the plot started to falter. By around mission 12 I frankly couldnt care less what was going on. I think it was due to several factors. First, the start of the story is badly rushed with less charactor development then I would have liked. Second the execution is IMO less then the first game, it didnt have the smooth flow of the first. Also it seemed the majority missions were some variation of FedEx or time limited style goals. That losses me after the x amount of time. What ever happened to just knocking some heads togeather and calling it a day? Not every mission has to be more then kick the arse of the bad guy. IMO the time limited and fedex goals should be sprinkled in to break up the 'stop the bad guy' missions not the other way around. Similar to the first game. Perhaps the story got much more smooth and the execution got better as things went along but for me I had no motivation to find out. Score (1-10): 4 Gameplay/Mechanics: Very similar to the first game which means a excellent interface/GUI and control. While it should have a mini-map which without does make things a bit more complex then need be. Overall the controls are very intiutive and well thought out. The game mechanics are more or less identical to the first game. Which mean they work for the theme/setting of the game. Score: 8.5 Graphics: I kept hearing about all these improvments to the eye candy for the sequal. So I was VERY disappointed when I played it. The character and ingame models/objects looked quite low poly, in other words, blocky. There was no lip synching. Nor did I observe any noticable/significant use of advanced DX9 effects. In fact, I am on the borderline if I perfer the first games graphic engine over this version to be honest. They did add some interesting elements like the much hyped 'see inside the building when you smash a wall'. But after the 6th time it becomes a faddish effect and you really dont even notice it. Overall very disappointing. Score: 3.5 Sound/Voice Overs: A very good selection of music quality and sound effects. (Though I will deduct a bit from the score for no other reason they recycled a fair amount of sound/music from the first game). If you liked the sound/music from the first game you will like the qulity here. No better but certainly no worse either. A very acceptable job sound wise. The voice acting can be taken two ways. Either fitting for the theme/setting or over the top, overacting/mellodrama. The VO has more cheese then a dairy farm. So either your going to like it or its going to get on your nerves in short order. I find it hard to beleive many ppl will be on the fence. At first I was taken aback.. but then it more or less grew on me and I am going to fall on the side of its fitting. Score: 7 My 2 coppers

You sure? After the release of NWN2, that will be two "established" games they've developed under their belt, and thus possibly giving them enough credibility to create their own IP. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> It's their own IP.

Taking a poll on what you think would be a good RPG to CRPG project for Obsidian to consider. http://www.nwn2news.net/modules/xoopspoll/....php?poll_id=18