Neverwinter Hate

[Pielorinho]

Uller, I didn't expect NWN to come close to PnP gaming. I've been playing computer roleplaying games since the first Wizardry game came out (earlier, if you count Lemonade Stand). I was expecting an above-average CRPG.

And I think I got it, except for several major beefs.

It's too easy -- this is a design flaw IMHO, not a feature of CRPGs.
It's really railroading -- this is pretty standard for CRPGs, even though Planescape:Torment was much less railroading.
It's really buggy -- this is NOT a feature of CRPGs. Especially egregious is a bug that prevents me from advancing at all in the game; many people, judging from the support forums on the official NWN boards, are suffering from similar bugs.

Still and all, I liked the game pretty well until I ran into the bug. Once they patch the game to fix the bug, or once I've played the hell out of Warcraft3, I'll return to the game and finish it. But right now, the bugginess has left a sour taste in my mouth.

Daniel

 

[Uller]

Uller, I didn't expect NWN to come close to PnP gaming.

Then I wasn't really talking to you. A few have eluded (or even stated directly) that they hoped for a replacement to PnP games from NWN. Not going to happen...at least not for a decade or so.

From the sounds of things, the single player (or "official campain") is really substandard and that's too bad. I'd hope that Bioware would realize that while the really hard core gamers (both PnP and CRPG) would likely play mostly multiplayer, a very large portion of the market still plays games primarily single player. Yours truly among them...I play multiplayer games at work during lunch...at home, I generally only have 15-20 minutes at time to play a game and that doesn't work well for most multiplayer games.

A certain amount of railroading can be expected in any CRPG (or PnP RPG for that matter)...but you should still have lots of opportunities for side quests and there should be a variety of outcomes possible. Oh well...

I've been playing computer roleplaying games since the first Wizardry game came out (earlier, if you count Lemonade Stand). I was expecting an above-average CRPG.

Lemonade Stand...was that on the C64? I think I vaguely remember it...

And I think I got it, except for several major beefs.

It's too easy -- this is a design flaw IMHO, not a feature of CRPGs.

Maybe...but it depends on how it is supposed to be played. If the game is like most CRPGs where you can play, save, play, save, play, die, reload, etc, then it should be tough. But if it is meant to be played like a PnP RPG (with no chance to "go back" to a saved game) then it _should_ be a tad easier than your average CRPG.

It's really railroading -- this is pretty standard for CRPGs, even though Planescape:Torment was much less railroading.

I've played a few games that do a good job of not railroading you. What was that one from the early '90s?...Arena? Something like that. You could wander around anywhere in a rather large world and find all sorts of subquests and what not...I played it for hours and hours and completely ignored the primary mission...From the sounds of things, this could be achieved with NWN only if you have a DM willing to prepare the side adventures for you....

It's really buggy -- this is NOT a feature of CRPGs. Especially egregious is a bug that prevents me from advancing at all in the game; many people, judging from the support forums on the official NWN boards, are suffering from similar bugs.

Unfortunately, this is really SOP for the software industry. We save money by having substandard QA and using bug reports from users and releasing lots of patches to serve as our "QA". It is just cheaper that way, and since most companies do it, it is accepted by customers.

Every company I've worked for (5 in the last 7 years) has done this...

Still and all, I liked the game pretty well until I ran into the bug. Once they patch the game to fix the bug, or once I've played the hell out of Warcraft3, I'll return to the game and finish it. But right now, the bugginess has left a sour taste in my mouth.

Daniel

Probably over time, the bugs will be fixed and the game will be improved. Another reason why I'll wait until Christmas or so to get it.

 

[Tsyr]

but you should still have lots of opportunities for side quests

I don't know what game these people who complain about no side quests are playing... I'm only in chap 2, and I've probably spent 1/2 of my time doing side quests.

What was that one from the early '90s?...Arena?

Yeah, Arena... And it's sequal Daggerfall. Great games. The sequal to daggerfall was released a couple months ago... called Morrowind. Check it out. It's great. Single player only, and takes a hefty system, but the game is great. Just as non-linear as the earlier ones.

 

[Furn_Darkside]

Salutations,

My only real complaint about the game is the pathing. They have made so many of these type of games, and pathing is still a serious issue.

I played through with a sorcerer/paladin- and I got into trouble many times due to my familiar and henchman getting stuck in a doorway.

I understand that it is not an easy matter by any means, but why compound the problem by making maps with doorways with little sides that stick out- and rocks on the side of hallways.

It may look cool, but if pathing is a problem.. don't contribute to it.

FD

 

[LightPhoenix]

First off, I'll agree that the single-player campaign isn't that great - I quickly became bored with it some way through Chapter 2.

Bugs happen, and they get corrected as soon as possible. Some are major (the toolset corrupting saved mods, the chapter 2 bug), some are not so major. I don't think they did as good a job on testing as they should have though.

Climbing, swimming, riding, et cetera aren't problems with the engine - it would have required a significant increase in the number of character models needed to be made - and would have delayed the game significantly longer. And while I'm sure someone will come along and say "I'd rather wait for an unbugged game", your waiting doesn't put food on the designer's tables. They put as in much as they could in the allotted time. But eventually the higher-ups said, alright, have it done by June, we're shipping then.

Dagger, what ever gave you the idea that the toolset wasn't supported by BioWare? Should I even mention the number of BioWare folk who post on the Custom Content, Scripting, and Toolset forums? Get your facts straight. BioWare has always been of the position that it would be the community that makes the game, and the single player campaign was only an example of what could be done.

 

[Lazybones]

I think the distinction is that the publisher, Infogrammes, has stated that the toolset is an "unsupported add-on." Bioware, the actual designer, has been 100% behind the toolset and in fact has just released a patch to fix the toolset corruption problems.

 

[LightPhoenix]

I think the distinction is that the publisher, Infogrammes, has stated that the toolset is an "unsupported add-on." Bioware, the actual designer, has been 100% behind the toolset and in fact has just released a patch to fix the toolset corruption problems.

Actually, from what I understand, Infogrammes thought the guy who e-mailed them was talking about the beta toolset. As far as I know BioWare and Infogrammes both support it.

 

[gregweller]

I think that if you approach this game with the attitude that 'of course, no CRPG can ever approach PnP games' then it will never work for you. There will always be people that will say that computers or software won't develop sentient behavior even after it does (read Ray Kurtzwiel' s 'Age of Spiritual Machines). I think that what the real issue here is emergent behavior. This game has only been out for a couple of weeks, and besides modules coming out by the score, people are already hacking the engine to add functionality that was never originally intended (implementation of arrays in the scripting language, for one thing, 'pack-animals' for another). When you put something with this much potential into the hands of (already) a million plus people, just wait and see what kinds of things people will create using the software. I think that a lot of people have turned PnP gaming into this nostalgic fetish-object. I have a sign over my desk at work that says 'Nostalgia is the irrational desire for limitations'. I think that says it all.

 

[Luke]

This is pretty much a first step towards D&D roleplaying on networked computers:

- the plot behind the single player game doesn't hold a torch to Planescape:Torment.

- There are pathing problems, as when you're own party leaves you stuck in doorways. This was fixed between BGI & BGII. Presumably it'll happen in NWN as well...

- A genuine first-person perspective camera option would have been really great.

- the monster/AI is fairly brain-dead. The toolset doesn't support allocation of "attitude profiles" with "interactive memory" that allows you to simply place creatures that will automatically respond to things you do in a semi-intelligent way.
Whilst the toolset has a flexible scripting language, there's a *huge* amount of effort required to lift general concepts like monster AI.

- Those hoping to find their pnp experience translated to the networked computer will be waiting for a long, long time - even after voice is standard. Playing in a modeled 3D world is great, but hugely inflexible compared to what the imagination can offer. Stop and think about how long it took Bioware to construct the single player modules. Check out the conversation editor for it using the Toolset.

That said, I *love* this game, and I really appreciate what Bioware has done!
A huge amount of money has been poured into the development of this first step, and possibly only it's success will see future further development.
The amount of effort required to do what they've done in the toolset for us is staggering (I do RPG development).

This was an extremely brave development on several fronts:

- They designed and started this project before the hardware capable of running it existed!!! That's a *huge* commercial risk.

- Nobody else has come even close to taking such a massive first step for us.

There's no question that the Bioware development team probably wanted to continue improving before releasing, but there are commercial realities that have to be faced. After all these years of very expensive development, you *have* to get some kind of commercial return before you continue to pour more money in.

 

[Tsyr]

Genuine First Person was an issue some people complained about with Dungeon Siege, but the same thing applies. You don't really want it, as the game is made right now. I'm sure Bioware could crank out a hack in 10 minutes to give you genuine FPP, but remember... there is no sky... there is not top to trees in the forest... there is no roof to caves...

Besides, have you actualy stoped to look how out of scale you are with the surroundings? Buildings are huge compared to you. Doors dwarf over even humans. It would look really strange in FPP.

If Bioware had designed the game from the ground up to support FPP, that would be one thing... but they didn't.

As for pathing... remember the one key difference between this and BG... Static, pre rendered environments that will always be the same. This allowed (I suspect) them to add things like nodes and pre-set pathways in the game, much the same as how 'bots in Quake 3 navigate. Not so with a free-form-ish game like NWN.