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And it's been disproved repeatedly as well. It may not, but even if the site convinces just one person to decide for and by himself/herself not to buy the game an accomplishment has been made. And there's no reason to believe that Bethesda's PR hype will be any better. Just look at some of the Oblivion pre-release interviews. No, it was created out of the desire to fight instead of simply giving up and letting Bethesda ruin the third installation of a great franchise. BTW, just out of curiosity, as a fellow MOO1&2 fan, did you also like MOO3 and did you suggest to any of your friends to buy it?

Heh, who's being biased now? I say we wait and see. Well, who knows, if Bethesda had marketed and eventually published the game that they now call Fallout 3 as a stand alone post-apocalyptic RPG completely separate from the Fallout brand, perhaps some of the hardcore FO fans might have even liked it.

That's not really the impression I got. Heh, no worries, they don't bite (well most of them anyway).

It's only natural to judge each game on its own merits, but in case of direct sequels a comparison with the previous game(s) is often unavoidable, simply because a large portion of the fanbase comes from buyers of the past game(s). Whether that comparison has any impact on the final score is, of course, up to the reviewer in question.

Simple, it could provide them with an alternative view of the game, with pure facts bereft of any deceitful PR lingo. IMO, a non-conventional spin-off game set in the Fallout universe (i.e. a Deux Ex style hybrid FPS/RPG) but called differently would certainly cause less fan outrage than a bastardized Fallout 3. The magic of numbers and the very nature of sequels often raise the people's expectations to great heights.

It depends. The fans were primarily concerned about the blatant ignoring of some major Fallout canon facts by FO:BOS and many reviewers noted that as well, referencing the fan outcry in the process. You generalize the Fallout fan base far too much. It's true that there is a more radical fraction but not all agree with such views. There are some people who even suggested DoS attacks against Bethesda's servers and spreading false propaganda about the game, but they were ultimately overruled by the more reasonable bunch in favor of the informational approach.

I said fan protests not fan reviews. A good reviewer should research a bit of the game's lore and history, in case it claims to be a continuation of a franchise, so that he might get a clearer overview. Is it the fan's fault that Bethesda's been so tight lipped about the game besides giving out ambiguous quotes like: "Well, turn-based combat and isometric view, that's just not something we do well."? When new official information becomes available I'm sure it will be posted as well. The difference is, it won't be sugar-coned.

What evidence do you have to support this claim? How do you know that said reviewers were not in the least influenced by various anti-FO:BOS protests? IIRC, several reviews sites had even referenced the overwhelmingly negative attitude of the Fallout fanbase toward that game. True, but doing something is always better than doing nothing.

You'd be surprised. I personally saw a bunch people on various other (non-Fallout related) forums getting pretty excited when someone mentioned that Fallout 3 is being made. After others pointed out what kind of a game they can actually expect the excitement levels dropped drastically. Because others can point it out to them in time with a single link. That's why a central, well designed and easily accessible site is needed. That's a pretty good question. While I certainly can't speak for the entire fallout fanbase, my personal option is that if Bethesda simply chose to make a non-canonical spin-off game based on the fallout universe and call it something other than FO3 most people wouldn't even bother protesting. However, if they call their game Fallout 3 people will have certain expectations and if those are not fulfilled then they clearly wouldn't be pleased about it.

I think one of the main goals is to create a central, straightforward and easily accessible information site about the game so that people who actually liked Fallout, but don't frequent the regular fansites and their internet forums, can quickly get a clear overview about what FO3 is going to be and not immediately run out and buy the game simply because it has the word "fallout" in its name. Perhaps, but having a centralized location can provide an easy reference point at which even non-hardcore Fallout fans can get detailed information about the game's actual content (minus any hype and other PR crap) without having to search through countless forum pages. Also, the site can show how strong the real Fallout fanbase is i.e. how many people out there actually want a true sequel instead of merely settling for Oblivion with Guns

Hmm, something interesting seems to be happening on the major Fallout sites at the moment. Apparently, NMA, DAC and RPGCodex are trying to unite and create an "anti-hype" site for Bethesda's FO3. The goal seems to be informing any potential buyers what it is that they'll actually get. As one of the idea's initiators said: It worked before for Interplay's FO:BOS and it could work again for Bethsoft's FO3. IMO, this is a good idea because otherwise a lot of people who liked the previous games but are not "hardcore" fans will simply rush out and pre-order FO3 right upon hearing it's being made, without getting properly informed about its actual features first. If done right, and in a non-hostile and informative manner, such a site could be a beacon for all Fallout fans who want a real sequel for their favorite game instead of a heavily watered-down version which caters to the lowest common determinator. I hope they succeed. :salute: BTW, anyone interested in joining up click here for more details.

There's an article on NMA about getting both games to successfully run on Windows XP.

BTW, here are some nifty fan-made plugins: Item Creation Wizard Creature Creation Wizard Shop Creation Wizard PowerBar I found these especially useful and there's even more could stuff on nwvault. Kind of makes you wonder why Obsidian developers failed to include similar tools when fans were able to produce them shortly after the game was released. <_<

Since we don't have a thread about the toolset yet I thought I'd open one so that fellow builders can share experiences and the developer can take notice of any of our problems and suggestions. First, let me say that I'm a complete newcomer to the NWN2 Toolset. I've never used the NWN1 Aurora Toolset either but I have done some BG2 modding back in the day. Anyway, I'm currently experimenting with the toolset in preparations to eventually create a larger module and I've got some questions and a few suggestions: 1) Is there any way to create a potion which doesn't use an existing spell as a base? For example, I merely wanted to create an Antitoxin (it grants +5 alchemical bonus to Fortitude saves against poison for 1 hour when drank) but I was unable to do so without altering an existing spell script or creating a new spell. 2) Speaking of which, is there a simple way to create basic spells? For example, what if I wanted to create Snilloc's Snowball Swarm? It's a fairly simple damage dealing spell which scales with levels. Upon examining the toolset I failed to notice anything that resembled a "spell making wizard" (pun not intended) or something similar. 3) Which brings me to my first toolset issue - an utter lack of "wizards" which could to help novice builders with creating simple spells/scripts/items/creatures...etc. I understand that the developers are fairly experienced with the toolset and that they certainly have no need for such assistants but, IMO, a large majority of the first time builders would surely welcome a few user-friendly guides through the creation process. I hope Obsidian considers this and introduces some basic "wizards" into the toolset with the first NWN2 expansion. 4) Too little item customization possibilities. For example if I wanted to create a weapon which has a 5% chance of bestowing 1 negative level upon the target on each hit I'd have to create a new spell file with that effect and assign it via "On Hit Cast Spell" effect instead of being able to simply set the percentage of occurrence and along with the DC directly in the "Level Drain" effect properties. In general, item properties seem to be very limited in the way that they can be applied with regards to setting even the very basic parameters such as the save DC, the occurrence percentage and ignoring/applying Spell Resistance. I find this fairly strange because good old BG2 had a lot more options for item/spell customization and it only had fan-made third party tools. 5) Defining bonus types (as noted on page 21 of the DMG) seems to be beyond the capabilities of the NWN2 toolset. Currently, there seems to be no way to properly define which bonus type (i.e. alchemical, enhancement, size, morale, luck...etc.) an item or a spell grants. IMO, this is a fairly important aspect of the D&D game and I'd like to see it implemented with the first expansion as well. 6) Defining a creature's size category can't be done from within the toolset. Note that I'm not talking about a creature's on-screen size (that can easily be changed via scaling) but rather the D&D size categories. Seeing as how some creatures seem to be missing their size bonus/penalties (i.e. Goblins and Kobolds) this issue can easily become important if you plan to include non-standard sized creatures in your campaign. I hope a size field gets introduced via one of the upcoming patches or with the first expansion. Well, those are some of the more important issues off the top of my head. There are more I'm sure (i.e. various UI and camera quirks) but those can be rectified via plugins, at least to a degree. Anyway, from what I've seen so far, I think it would be unwise for me to start creating a large module until the first NWN2 expansion comes out. I hope the toolset is in a better shape by then. Until that time, I guess I'll just stick to experimenting and learning how to script.

Love the show, but a few little details kind of irk me. For example, I wonder if we're ever going to get a full explanation behind Baltar's "Inner Six" and Caprica Six's "Inner Baltar". The whole "I'm an Angel sent by God to help you." thing is getting kind of lame. <_< Speaking of which, why doesn't Caprica Six experience more of her own Baltar hallucinations/visions/whatever? From what was shown in "Downloaded" I was under the impression that pseudo-Baltar was subtly manipulating her into helping the humans i.e. the opposite of what Baltar's Inner Six is doing to him, yet we never saw her halucinate again after that episode.

Heh, maybe they want to delay those feats until the expansion so that they can boast with a larger number of "new" feats it introduces. :D It works fine for Rangers with Archery Combat Style, not sure if it's pickable by anyone else though. I don't think the DMG explicitly states what kind of damage Holy, Anarchic and Axiomatic weapons should deal so it's pretty much open to the devs to implement that as they see fit. Granted, my PnP knowledge is somewhat limited, but I think switching Holy weapons from Positive Energy to generic magical damage does make some sense since positive energy is supposed to heal living creatures and only harm undead. IIRC, Josh made a comment about that issue a while ago, before the game was released. Basically, they didn't have the time/resources to implement correct stacking rules for different bonuses due to Aurora's legacy limitations, so they simply made most stat bonuses non-stackable with anything but Barbarian Rage.

It's definitively doable. Some epithets present in the NWN2 official campaign already grant similar bonuses (i.e. Pathstalker and Explorer give you fast healing) as do some of the background traits.

I think Josh has a good reason for setting the cap at level 8 in the first instalment of TBH, possibly because he wants the entire trilogy to take place within the scope of the 20 core levels (i.e. no Epic stuff). If you desperately want more than three feats play a human or a fighter or even both.

Heh, I wonder why. " BTW, it's possible to access Megaupload from out beloved Baator but only in the early morning hours i.e. 4-10h am.

I don't know if that is such a good idea. There's certainly a lot of talented and willing people out there but professional voice overs also require professional equipment and direction in order to work out properly. Perhaps Josh could do it like Rob Bartel did with Witch Wake - after the original module becomes popular (as TBH undoubtedly will be) it could be re-mastered and released as a premium module with the addition of professional voice overs and music. I think a lot of people would gladly pay for that.

Heh, that sounds more like a dialogue sample for a Fallout game than typical D&D babble. :D I like it, and I think it's very well written.

The crisp looking graphics of the IE games were mainly the accomplishment of the artists who made them as most of them were hand drawn or pre-rendered 2D images. I imagine that the same holds true for the Broken Hourglass (as it's also based on 2D graphics) so it's not really the engine's fault.

Not sure about the first one (could have something to do with corpse looting?) but IIRC, you get Porcelain Mask by being indifferent to other people's problems. BTW, those icons look great.

Heh, to tell you the truth I never cared enough for the NWN1 OC to replay it, so I'm not really sure what effects the patches had on it. IIRC, in SoU and HotU the merchants didn't restock either.