Zoma

Just like NWN's story to NWN2's story. The only link between them would be subtle references to the previous protagonists and atagonists.

Too much wil be lost with the PG-13 rating. Up to J.E though.

No one left Fallout or Dungeon Keeper alone. Meh. Another one amongst the frankensteins won't make a diff.

I guess with the statement of the reviews from both gamespot and IGN, its unlikely we'll see NXP3 due to the aged graphics engine. About time though. NWN3 with all the mistakes learnt from NWN2.

Could use the in-house Onyx engine for the graphics department. That's already half the work done. All Obsidian has to do is to focus on the logics and scripts. Of course, I hope Obsidian would focus on the engine instead of adding dozens of classes and races at one go. I prefer they simply add in the general race and classes with realistic amount of feats so that their zots can be focused on building a workable engine itself. The rests can be easily added in future expansions. To be honest, what I'm most terrified of is that the future franchises of NWN and BG will be headed to consoles for maximised profits! In addition, I read in an interview with MCA some time ago (Can't remember which one), he mentioned that Obsidian is unlikely to make games that involves toolsets since its very expensive and time consuming. So I guess NWN3's likely not to have any toolset?

****. And the next game to be licensed to the Chinese would be Syndicate. And next System Shock MMO. OMFG.

I think I played over 20 hours by now to form an opinion. I'm currently at the last part of the game and now taking a break due to the sudden jump of difficulty. For a guy who just marathoned over 8 hours in one day during the weekend, the spike in difficulty convinced me that I should take a break. I agree with many that the engine is outdated. The outdatedness can be felt strongly even when playing SoZ as you can't help but feel the engine is pretty restrictive despite being heavily modded to fit in the overland map. The unresponsive old engine which affected the combat of the game can be felt in the overland map itself: NPCs and Monsters not moving at times, your player occassionally teleports on the map while travelling and then back again, as though the engine is unable to keep up with the player's actions. In addition, the number load times involved does affect the pacing for those who may be playing the game with old computers. Furthermore, SoZ has a surprisingly high amount of in game crashes for me which occurs once in a few hours. That itself speaks much for the stability of the modded engine. I wonder if there is a possibility of memory leak in SoZ? The overland travel reminds me alot of the old school RPGs, notably the game Betrayal in Krondor in the manner of visiting cities or towns. Personally I wished Obsidian could spare more people from the art department and create an interface for the visiting towns similar to Krondor's where it is presented with a large painting and clicking on the part of the painting will lead you to the specified area. The implementation of skill checks in the overland map is a GREAT idea, making some skills passively useful instead of relying them on quest events only. I wish they could be more clearer in the effects of parley though, both in instructions and in presentation. The trade mini-game is surprisingly addictive despite its simplicity compared to say, Pirates! So I suppose Obsidian managed to hit the gameplay right since they managed to suck so many hours from me in this mini-game, often getting distracted from the main quest itself. However, I wish more could be done which would involved other trade or guild factions in the game that will interweave with your guild's activities. Party based chat system is one of the cool feature for SoZ. Each members of your party, depending on their alignment, Deity they worship, race and class introduces new chat or event options that another does not have. Alot of work was invested in this feature in both presentation and execution since there are so many variables to be set. This is a feature that Obsidian must be commended for its great implementation that makes a party based chat far more interesting and dynamic. Most dungeons in the game are small, with the smaller ones simply being random dungeon with loots which is quest unrelated. However, I kind of feel that more of the quest related dungeons can be fa more interesting. The good dungeons are like Umberlee's quest, which is both well crafted in visual(Stunningly beautiful) and technical design. Others simply involves clearing some anonymous hostiles which is disappointing. The main quest itself is shockingly short. I wished more resources could had been invested in this area and if it were not for the trade mini game and vast overland map, I would had completed the game in just under 15 hours. Unfortunately, the story is easily forgettable. I wished more effort was put into the main protagonists/atagonists' character since we barely knew her at all up to the end. The plotline revolving around Zehir is sadly lacking and we barely knew what god is it. More backstories should had been done for Storm of Zehir to make it more interesting. Icewind Dale's plot afterall was fantastic despite being a party based game. The music in the game is fantastic. Kudos to the music team that handled it. In conclusion, Storm of Zehir is a good game and the tools packadge along like the overland map or the party chat system brings so much potential to the modders. The gripes I have is that the main quest is disappointingly short and the trade mini-game could had been much more. Another unfortunate aspect to be brought up would be the outdated engine itself that still brought over the clunky unresponsiveness from NWN2. If Obsidian ever grants the opportunity to develop NWN3, I hope the overland system and party based system gets carried over and further refined to make the game even more immersive. Better do it with a NEW ENGINE this time since its clear that NWN2's production was full of fubars with the old engine being one of the factors.

Just you. For now maybe.

I think it would be preferable if another WW2 game is made a generation later. For the past few years, I think most of the people are getting weary of WW2 games as a setting. The interest for WW2 games had been low for the past few years since the release of Saving Private Ryan movie being sole responsible for the surge of WW2 interest. Hence why Call of Duty 4's setting is a sudden jump towards modern military times to cater people's dulled taste for WW2 games. Another setting that I would be interested in being explored would be a modern fantasy setting similarly to the manga Hellsing. Playing as an organisation formed with the purpose of killing undead or supernaturals opens up possibilities of introducing strange characters or fantasy creatures struggling in the ever changing of our modern world while at the same time keeping their presence a secret. Personally I thought the thought of female hot elves dressed in a SWAT gear/Trenchcoats armed with sniper rifles shooting silver bullets blessed with holy water instead of bows presents a far more... sexier picture.

Another Easter: There's an orc by the name of Feargus Orc-heart in a cabin having a party.

Warhammer, Warhammer 40K, White Wolf, Arcanum (Troika's), Battletech, Heavy Gear, Call of Cthulhu ect. So many materials out there. If Obsidian managed to grow balls of brass after the release of AP and Aliens, they could look back to review one of the highly hyped but dropped IP during the Black Isle days: Torn.

Since the Deus Ex theme was composed by Alexander Brandon himself, I can only imagine what his reaction might be like towards the song

Ditto on the lock pick mini game. I think it could be presented in a much better looking form than the one in the video.

Coincidentally, I listened to Scarborough Fair before hopping back into my SoZ. There I ran into a pair of bards by the name of Shymone and Scarbunkle singing a song that is shamelessly inspired from Scarborough Fair. I LOLed We gotta make a compilation list of Easter eggs.

Cyberpunk juvenile nonsense. Wut? If you meant extreme futuristic, it doesn't have to go in that direction. Instead of taking Blade Runner as an inspired setting, a Ghost in the Shell setting would be lighter in tone since it still consists of familiar images and scenaries but the presentation itself is simply a guise to hide the modern advanced technologies like cyborgs, cybernetic implanted people that melded into it. Keeping the place unchanged from the modern days is simply a way for these poor cybernetic blokes to grasp hold of whatever humanity is left in them by holding onto the memories of the past, which isn't much.

According to manual: More details of what exactly intimidation does in-game or how long the AC penalty for bluff lasts would be most helpful.

I could be mistaken but I think it removes a few enemies from the encounter if it's successful. I know that I used it on a couple groups of bandits and didn't have to fight any mages in those encounters, but did on several other occasions. Isn't that the purpose of diplomacy parley though? Diplomacy being meant to reduce the number of enemies in the encounter.

Query: What does intimidate option for Parley exactly do? It says instill fear into enemies but so far it doesn't seem to cause any fear into any enemies I encountered, nor shows whether my intimidation is a success. So anyone has any idea how intimidation works in parley?

Its stated officially in one of the Dev diaries that budget goes like this: NWN2 > MotB > SoZ. As for the new engine, Onyx engine(Obsidian's In-house engine) might be suitable since its build around the idea of a squad based game so there isn't the need to rebuild certain game design foundations all over again.

Seriously, I have no idea how do console folks play L4D without getting ass owned. The zombies are anything but SLOW! With that kind of speed, I thought only people with PCs could actually shoot something as well as able to get far in Expert/Impossible mode.

Seems the funds for the expansion keeps getting smaller with every each. A dev diary stated that SoZ's funding was far smaller than MoTB's which results in an even smaller team. I'm not sure what further can be done with a much smaller team which patches itself cannot solve. I think it may be a good time to start thinking ahead for NWN3 instead, which involves an engine that could properly cater overland maps and also a much more responsive combat system that NWN2 may never be able to fix and an engine that supports today's technology like multi-threading for logic execution purposes. Man. Even Alexander Brandon said in the diary that NWN2's engine is soooooo old being six years that he's surprised the team managed to create new content like SoZ for it.

Man. How could I forget these old games: -Battlezone (Remake) Tanks in space set in the 1970s in the cold war era? Awesome. -Heavy Gear 2. HEAVY GEAR 2 dammit. Hot damn! Man. I recalled the first mission in the game set in the swamp which was simply a cakewalk, involving your squad stomping on puny peeps. The atmosphere of the swamp in the rain, the sound effects and explosions from missles that moves in a wavy motion resembling Itano circus. The militaristic music that sets a mix of dangerous and heroic tone. It was simply an incredible experience combined. Later on where stealth is actually integral in the gameplay, you have to tranverse the woods with your squad mates while proned, hoping the enemies nearby won't detect your presence. Slowly and deliberately your mechs sludge through the place to set up a proper ideal ambush. The atmospheric woods made the gameplay even more involved. Man, this is one of the sequels which is definitely 200% vast improvement over its predecessor in many ways. I want Heavy Gear 3. If its an RPG, its a definite ++.

Thief series Fallout 1 & 2 Farcry System Shock 2 Bioshock

Heroes for the Tyranides? That is a mind boggling concept.

I need the chill pills instead