Neverwinter Nights 2: Storm of Zehir Discussion

[Stephen Amber]

While I think the music in MotB was excellent (More Ambient, and Dark <3), It would be cool to hear some more Orchestral stuff to add to the NWN2 music.

 

Much depends on the setting and what one is trying to establish in terms of atmosphere. The wholly stark and ambient tracks of Fallout, for instance, wouldn't work particularly well in high fantasy, I don't think. The forgotten realms with it's hoity toity wizards and fey folk demand an orchestra. With Respighi's "Pines of the Appian Way" you approach Rome, damn it, not Gator's Creek Georgia... The music has to match the setting.

 

An example: Troika's Temple of Elemental Evil. Though it had some high quality, ambient tracks they sounded sort of futuristic and Bladerunnerish to me, which lent an odd feeling to the entire game.

 

And, not to make another doh statement, such statements abounding on these boards, but you can't go wrong with Morgan if ambient is what you're looking for. Don't understand why Bethesda, and Obsidian for that matter, keep dicking around and don't give the guy gigs.

Edited August 11, 2008 by Stephen Amber

[Zoma]

And, not to make another doh statement, such statements abounding on these boards, but you can't go wrong with Morgan if ambient is what you're looking for. Don't understand why Bethesda, and Obsidian for that matter, keep dicking around and don't give the guy gigs.

 

Its cheaper to utilize In-house Audio magicians(Mr Brandon and co.) to make music than to hire an independent composer.

 

Personally when it comes to fantasy ochestra music for video games, Rob King is my preference with Heroes of Might & Magic 4 soundtrack being my personal favourite as well as what I think, his best work thus far.

[Stephen Amber]

Its cheaper to utilize In-house Audio magicians(Mr Brandon and co.) to make music than to hire an independent composer.

 

How would you know that? For one thing, it would sort of depend on the composer...

 

And, more importantly, do they have compositional skill on the level of Morgan or Solie? Remember that Atari spent 50k to hang a stupid NWN2 banner at E3 a few years ago, yet went on the cheap in terms of music, simply using the scores from NWN1. If they want quality they should be willing to pay for it.

Edited August 12, 2008 by Stephen Amber

[Zoma]

How would you know that? For one thing, it would sort of depend on the composer...

 

Because the cost of paying the expenses of Obsidian's musician gnomes are based on per monthly basis unlike an independent musician, is likely to be based on per song or even the length of the song(?). During this single month alone, the Obsidian's music gnomes are capable of composing various music not solely only for SoZ but other projects as well. This improves efficiency and output though obviously, at the trade off of some quality if you compare to hiring an independent composer.

 

And, more importantly, do they have compositional skill on the level of Morgan or Solie?

 

Alexandor Brandon's composition skill is recognised to have his own distinct style in comparison to Morgan and Soule. If I am to compare with their compositional skill, obviously each of them has their own strengths and areas.

 

Soule is good in creating clear and refined melodies in an ochestral arrangement, as shown from Morrowind's and Oblivion's composition as well as Dawn of War (Blood Raven's March).

 

Mark Morgan on the other hand succeeds in creating musical ambience that does not overwhelm the 'scene' that disrupt's the player's attention, but rather fabricing the stage and music together into a scene. Fall Out's music is as such, as well as PS:T. With an exception of the Nameless One's theme and its variations, the rest of the music are simply ambiences with lack of distinct melodies (Grace and Annah's theme for instance).

 

Finally for Obsidian's Alexander. I will admit I have yet to play much of the games that utilizes his music aside from Unreal Tournamen, Deus Ex and MotB. But simply by basing off his work on MotB, it is clear that he is a flexible composer capable of creating spot on ambiences for the scenes itself. This is only achieveable by the means of collaborating closely with the designers and playing the game first-hand to experience the scene first and create a music that fits it.

 

To conclude the comparison, Obsidian has a better advantage in utilising in-house composers for their games since the Audio department is able to work closely together with SoZ's project team. Editing is quick as well as rewritting songs if there are sudden changes in the design of the project. Basing on MotB's soundtrack, it is commonly agreed by many that its music is the game's strong point which speaks much of Alex's composing abilities.

 

Remember that Atari spent 50k to hang a stupid NWN2 banner at E3 a few years ago, yet went on the cheap in terms of music, simply using the scores from NWN1. If they want quality they should be willing to pay for it.

 

That was Atari's 'fault' you must place on, not on Obsidian. I concur it would be nice if Atari gave Obsidian 50K more to hire an ochestra for its music. Unfortunately, Obsidian could only utilise whatever resources were given to them by Atari which in NWN2's case, was 50K less.

[Starwars]

http://rpgvault.ign.com/articles/899/899068p1.html

[jaguars4ever]

"Party members on the other hand (ala BG, KotOR) can have scripts (!!)"

 

L0L but, no.

 

BG series joinables are HENCHMEN.

 

NWN OC joinables are EXPERT HIRINGS.

 

NWN SOU/HOTU joinables are a mix of HENCHMEN and PARTY MEMBERS.

 

Don't let BIO, and OBSIDIAN trick you with their delusional changing of actual D&D terminology.

Ach. They've already tricked me.

 

Volo, what's the difference between the three again?

[GreasyDogMeat]

While I think the music in MotB was excellent (More Ambient, and Dark <3), It would be cool to hear some more Orchestral stuff to add to the NWN2 music.

 

Much depends on the setting and what one is trying to establish in terms of atmosphere. The wholly stark and ambient tracks of Fallout, for instance, wouldn't work particularly well in high fantasy, I don't think. The forgotten realms with it's hoity toity wizards and fey folk demand an orchestra. With Respighi's "Pines of the Appian Way" you approach Rome, damn it, not Gator's Creek Georgia... The music has to match the setting.

 

An example: Troika's Temple of Elemental Evil. Though it had some high quality, ambient tracks they sounded sort of futuristic and Bladerunnerish to me, which lent an odd feeling to the entire game.

 

And, not to make another doh statement, such statements abounding on these boards, but you can't go wrong with Morgan if ambient is what you're looking for. Don't understand why Bethesda, and Obsidian for that matter, keep dicking around and don't give the guy gigs.

 

I think you are absolutly right about the ToEE music, with the exception of the Homlet music, which fit perfectly IMHO. I REALLY loved the town music, and would just have the party stand around listening to it. The battle music, on the other hand, did have a futuristic sound.

[Walsingham]

*puff puff*

 

If you liked the Neverwinter Nights 2 campaign, you can use the toolset to create your own adventures. And even if you hated it, you can make one that's better, like the talented folks at Ossian Studios who made the Mysteries of Westgate adventure pack (which will be available soon), or Rogue Dao, who are working on Purgatorio, a Planescape adventure.

 

Man I love this game.

[Deadly_Nightshade]

...what's the difference between the three again?

 

[Dark_Raven]

Volo don't know.

 

post 13,000 post 13,000

[funcroc]

GenCon Rundown of NWN2 Expansion - Storm of Zehir

 

 

 

 

 

New Races

 

As we suspected:

 

Gray Orc

Yuan-ti Pureblood

 

The Gray Orc models weren't in the build yet, but the Yuan-ti had scaley skin on the models, although those models weren't totally in yet either.

 

New Classes

 

As we suspected:

 

Hellfire Warlock - Prestige Class for Warlock (has some really cool sounding special abilities, to be revealed later)

 

Doomguide - Prestige Class for Divine classes (Kaelyn the Dove may have been a Doomguide of Kelemvor, although she didn't technically have the PrC when you gamed with her. Therefore, taking the Doomguide PrC guarantees that your character will have a really sexy voice.)

 

Swashbuckler - Base Class (covered in detail elsewhere)

[Llyranor]

Volo don't know.

 

post 13,000 post 13,000

Maybe she'll never post again! :sorcerer:

[Zoma]

That's one hellaluva awesome looking op title.

[Xard]

Now that screenshot is beautiful

 

I want to know MOAR about about Gray Orcs and Yuan-Ti Purebloods

[Pope]

I have a question regarding the new party conversation:

 

Whenever we need to pick a conversation option, will we need to select each character in order to see if anyone else has something different to say? Because if so, this could get tedious fast. It'd be easier if some sort of icon on the portraits indicated which of the party members has a different set of dialogue options than the party member currently selected.

Edited August 18, 2008 by Pope

[J.E. Sawyer]

Anthony Davis just put in a new party conversation UI that puts an icon on characters that have different options to select, so it will be easy to tell.

[Pop]

Finally for Obsidian's Alexander. I will admit I have yet to play much of the games that utilizes his music aside from Unreal Tournamen, Deus Ex and MotB. But simply by basing off his work on MotB, it is clear that he is a flexible composer capable of creating spot on ambiences for the scenes itself. This is only achieveable by the means of collaborating closely with the designers and playing the game first-hand to experience the scene first and create a music that fits it.

I know I've played a few games scored by Brandon, a couple of Epic games and the like, but his most celebrated work is probably Deus Ex. He created some good ambient pieces but the combat music was generally very "clubby", with driving, persistent beats.

 

The only concern I have is that his past work, as well as his recent solo material, has a very "compressed" sound, heavy on synths and synth instrumentation, strings and all that. Just listening to Deus Ex (and, uh, looking at it, I guess) you'd guess it'd be older than it is in actuality. But the MotB theme had none of that and it was pretty good.

 

I'm more interested in what he'll come up with for AP and (especially, since sci-fi seems to suit his style) Aliens. As a general rule I don't much care for fantasy game music unless it's unusually melodious or rhythmic. IWD and a few tracks off of the BG2 soundtrack, etc.

Edited August 18, 2008 by Pop

[Starwars]

I was in the NWN2 irc chat room the other day, and spoke with one of the Rogue Dao composers. He said they've done some work (all the RD composers) for the expansion, so it seems like there will be quite a few different composers doing work on SoZ. Pretty neat, I'm glad that Obsidian recruited some community members as well.

[Stephen Amber]

so it seems like there will be quite a few different composers doing work on SoZ

 

Not sure I like the sound of that. With game composition, it should be one voice giving the entire game a unifying tone and setting the theme. With too many different composers with differing tastes and styles you could end up with a weird al yankovic cacophony.

 

But at least they are composing new music and not going totally on the cheap as before, which was an embarrassment.

Edited August 19, 2008 by Stephen Amber

[Starwars]

I see your point, and normally I would actually agree. But I think the trade-off (if there is one) is worth it if they bring the community into it. It's a beautiful thing, and the the song from the Purgatorio trailer just rocks as well.

[Nick_i_am]

NWN2 already reuses music from a mess of other composers, so I don't really share that concern.

Edited August 19, 2008 by Nick_i_am

[samm]

NWN2 (nor 1) isn't very good sounding anyway *shrug* After PS:T and IWD1 (all sounds, including music) and IWD2 (only the voices), it seemed to me that BIS and thereafter Obsidian didn't show all too much attention to sound. NWN2 and MotB were still very good games, just for other reasons. So it doesn't really matter to me how SoZ will sound as long as it's bearable.

Edited August 19, 2008 by samm

[Stephen Amber]

But I think the trade-off (if there is one) is worth it if they bring the community into it.

 

I don't care who's into it so long as it's good. David John's community stuff for NWN for instance was good, but I'd not say he was at the level of Soule.

[Volourn]

"NWN2 (nor 1) isn't very good sounding anyway *shrug* After PS:T and IWD1 (all sounds, including music) and IWD2 (only the voices),"

 

NWN series music/sounds/voices > IE games.

 

Period.

[samm]

No. Possibly better than BG1 and parts of BG2 and the music and some voices of IWD2, but not the IE games in general.