Noceur

He should go back to reviewing Super Mario Cart or games like that. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> *Snickers* yeah, it's a shame they implemented so many of the D&D rules into a D&D game... it's nothing but trouble for the toolset users and PWs and stuff. I'm not a fan of D&D (or D20, that is, I suppose) but even I think that if they're making a D&D game, they should implement (and adapt) as many of the PnP rules as possible.

Judging by the feedback from those who have preordered NWN2, it is not true. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Well, I got the game today (through preorder). The company mailed it yesterday, so it'd arrive today, on the release date (for EU/scandinavia).

Hah! It hath arrivethed! Chaotic Evil LE... says it includes (in-game): "Blessed of waukeen feat (snip), two special items, access to a unique weapon and a magical golden aura that surrounds players' characters." I hope those items aren't chaotic evil... I'm playing good characters mostly (first play-through will be the epitome of goodness, asimaar paladin). I won't find out until later today though, cuz I must leave for work (then shop for a costume, the party is, as they say, On, tomorrow, yes). I must say, 'twould be funny to walk around with the ring saying Chaotic Evil XD

Aye, thanks! That is indeed correct (can't have em both on most cards), and indeed solves the mystery. And it definately looks like you've got HDR going on there. btw, do you know if you can even have bloom and FSAA without SM3.0? Might be because of certain engines being built certain ways, but in most SM2.0 games and earlier you can't pick AA if you've got bloom on. That would further detail the problem. EDIT: Actually, make that pre SM2.0... I'm thinking about games like Thief III and Deus Ex 2, and they're not SM2.0. EDIT2: Removed the imagine in my quote. Also, nevermind... Thief 3 etc use Pixel Shader 1.1 instructions, so it's got nothing to do with NWN 2.

I hope so ... I'd rather have some sniggitzin' merchants than the waukeen thingy, to be honest. What would've been really cool is if they'd included a special History with the CE, one for the Evil box and one for the Good box. EDIT: History meaning the Character background thingy.

Hey, wicked. Thanks. I may have to track down the limited edition one instead <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Hmm, it seems to work as a buff though... there's a thread in this forum section about it (as you know). Ah well, I won't know for sure until I get my lewt. EDIT: "The Merchant's Friend is the second bonus you get for preordering from EB/Gamestop or Best Buy." from some comments on Amazon.

Ah! CDON has finally shipped my NWN 2 CE box. ^_^ Will probably be here on monday (although, sometimes the post office decides to do their job, in which case I'll actually get it tomorrow). Darque: Yeah, the Blessed of Waukeen thingy. +1 on saving throws or summin. I also read something about special merchants and stuff, although there's different info whereever one looks. Regardless, you can't feel bad about which version you got if you watch this guy: Who Wants To Be a Millionaire Dude

Hmm, weird.. apparantly this bug* exists for Gothic 3 as well. Dare I speculate upon a widespread scheme? EDIT: *= Both the hard-chewed plastic and the disk space bug.

Anyway, seriously, I agree that AA should be pretty standard these days. Note however, that there are some rendering techniques that makes it impossible to use AA (due to doing/computing things in a different order) tied to how an engine handles light (Example: Deferred Lighting method). GRAW (PC) is an example of this.

Shouldn't it be the other way around? AA doesn't fix texture aliasing, but edge-drawing on geometry (and transparancy maps (but not clip-maps, I think, lollipop)). So the gain would be larger when zoomed out (less pixels drawn on complex meshes, meaning more jaggies). Perhaps you're thinking of bilinear, trilinear and Anistropic filtering? Those would work with the settings you described, they also filter textures.

Before release this (HDR) was asked, and the devs answered that HDR was very low on the priority list, so likely it's true. And no. It doesn't matter at all. The game, as far as I know (screenshots, dev talk), uses Bloom though. Bloom (or it's "HDR counterpart") however is a really small component in real HDR (but the one everyone gloats about). Either way, I don't think NWN 2 is a game that would benefit from HDR (other than the overshine part, which bloom does at less GPU cost). AA is something that a majority of people on forums demand for games. Myself, I don't use it that much... but some people are (apparant from their post) not able to see anything on the screen without having AA, get headaches, bleeding from nose and eyes and attacks of sudden rage (that they unleash upon the forum of the game that so victimized them). So judging by the experience of most people on the net, AA is needed for health (mental and physical) reasons. If, however, you've played games without AA and not suffered from above symptoms, then you may feel safe in the knowledge that a pixel will not jump out of the screen and stab your eyes to death (and beyond). EDIT: Although your worries should be sated by above posts, suggesting HDR is either in or might become implemented in further patches. And AA is apparantly there.

MEH?! ... aww, crap. I should've ordered it from Webhallen then. I bet CDON won't ship my game until the third. ,_, Jorian: Yes, I believe the mythological greek dryads looked like normal women (at least that's how they were painted ca. 1400-1600, which of course, doesn't mean crap since back then people romanticised everything mythological). Of course, if the D&D Rules were to describe them as little blue fellows with white pants and white hats, then Obsidian would have to model them that way.

the driad isnt a driad, its a censored version, its fully wooden, and wood is naked... If you ever had/have the Monster manual 1 you know how a driad looks like, and thats not one of them <_< I am angry, don't make me write something i regret later. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Actually, I just checked the monster manual (Core Book III) and the dryad there is a woman clothed and showing LESS than the wooden dryad. EDIT: Of course, I just realized that you might mean 2nd edition monster manual or earlier. I personally prefer Drakar och Demoner's dryad, which is a swanky young lady showing as much as she possibly can (which is a stark contrast to the description of the dryad, where it says they try not to show themselves at all)... err, actually the wooden nymph of NWN 2 is actually better, considering that a dryad is a tree spirit or whatnot.

"did anyone else realize that ONE skeleton, the female gythanki, and the zombie are the only ones not clothed from toe to neck?" You mean like the bugbear, demons, dragons? Or the dryad?.. the dryad is very much clothed Not to mention the kobold. *titters like a girl-scout*

Nopes, CDON actually. Meh, from the place I ordered from I didn't get to choose wether I wanted Lawful-good or Awholemessah-evil. ;_; With my luck they'll prolly send me the Mostly Harmless CE box. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I ordered the Chaotic Evil version as well ... " <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Oh, hehe. Well seriously, I don't really care that much... I just wanted the game plus a little extra stuff.

Hmm, seems that "beardless gnome" can't be used as an insult anymore :/ EDIT: Actually, what the heck am I typing? The insult is "bearded gnome". Anyway, I think it's pretty clear they've tried to follow the Official art as close as possible.

Meh, from the place I ordered from I didn't get to choose wether I wanted Lawful-good or Awholemessah-evil. ;_; With my luck they'll prolly send me the Mostly Harmless CE box.

Todd Lockwood's elves from the 3.0 FR book do look androgynous... the males look slightly feminine (the joke of Faerun, btw), and Todd's elves look sorta like their male counterparts (albeit seriously swankier). Anyway, now that you've said that the elves in NWN 2 look ugly in your opinion, could we count that as your review of the game and move on? I wanna know what people think of other aspects of the game as well.

Haha, yeah... saw this review over at the Codex. Btw, I like comment no. 6. The game itself is, from what I've played, really good. If they'll fix the random crashes and stuff, I think I could really enjoy it.

Getting extremely excited now... this covers a lot of stuff I wanted to know about. And I really love that they've got a free camera, ala the Infinity Engine. Purrhurrhurrr! btw, why is being spoiler-tagged? EDIT: Dammit, now I can't concentrate on my job.

The Civ 1 palace improvements were awesome. Unfortunately I never played Civ 2 (probably because by that time I had played Master of Magic and no other Civ-like game could beat that). EDIT: Actually, of course they weren't awesome... they were just awesome in that game which was otherwise not that graphically verbose.

Kotor2. And I wonder how you could avoid it's bugginess. Okay; I didn't have crashes either... but did have a few gamestopping glitches and alot of the other mentioned issues. Not to mention the total lack of teammate AI <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I was all over KOTOR 2, and never once got a gamestopping bug. Must be in the order you do things then. Heh, never really thought about the AI, I usually gave everyone commands all the time.

Yup, Avernum 4. Dropped Gothic 3 for this baby. Of course, I'm just playing the demo... played for 12 hours or more and I still haven't finished it.

"Obsidian Entertainment and bugs, the subject causes for alot of fury. But, alas, Obsidian does it again!" I wonder if this guy is refering to KOTOR 2 or NWN 1 (which can't be right, since Obsidian didn't make that one)... I didn't have a single crash or game-stopping bug in KOTOR2. In fact, the only bugs I had where some looping convos, and one other dialogue bug. Oh, and that one planet that made the FPS drop (that you had to fix by clicking soft-shadows on/off or off/on).

My newest mistress to tide me over until NWN 2 arrives at my doorstep, all clad in mystique and plastic wrapping. :D Oh, and check out the normal-mapping on the swanky lady's thigh in screenshot 2.