It Will Keep You Up All Night! (Neverwinter Nights)

Member Name: MurphyWildRover

Product:	Neverwinter Nights
Date:	15/04/03 (171 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Over 100 hours of play, Huge range of characters, Ongoing storyline with twists and turs

Disadvantages: You may become an antisocial freak, Beauty sleep goes down the drain, You live in a fantasy land of your own

Baldurs Gate, Baldurs Gate 2, Silver, Dungeon Siege, the Might and Magic Series, to name but a few of the great role playing games of PC history. These are all blown away in the glory and success of Neverwinter Nights. It just reeks of quality, imagination, effort and most of all it is there to take away precious sleeping time!

Buying the game cost me £30.00, because I'm a cardholder at Game, but it will have come down to about that by now as I got mine the week it came out. It is a three CD game altogether, requiring all three for installation. The installation took a good 10 minutes, as my computer only just fits the requirements for the game.

The background of the game stems back to the classic "Dungeons and Dragons" era, when fantasylands were sweeping nations across the world. It follows the rules of Dungeons and Dragons, and if you are not familiar with these rules, it does not matter, just as long as you are interested in fantasy, adventure and medieval/old age genres.

The storyline is totally original and takes many twists and turns, leading to an absolutely awesome finale, with a somewhat disappointing aftermath. I will only describe the first part of the story, as I do not want to ruin anything for new players. Those who have already played it will already know of the storyline.

You are a character (chosen out of your own tastes, which I will describe shortly), starting in the training school, in which you have practicing for some time. The training school is set in Neverwinter, which is ridden with plague (similar to black death) and is rumoured to be incurable. You start off in your chamber and after leaving there you do a little training and receive a "graduation" from Aribeth (a female elf, working very high up in Neverwinter. Suddenly enemies appear and a battle starts. The building is awash with goblins and evil priests. You battle your way through and eventually come to meet Aribeth once
more. She tells you that the animals, which could be linked to a cure for the plague, were in these barracks and have been stolen. It then becomes apparent it is your job to recover these animals.

How is that for an explosive start? This is not the main story either!! I managed to complete this after hours of play, and thought to myself "Wow, what a great game!? It turns out that is about 30% of the game completed! I was gob smacked! Anyway, let us move onto the bit you want to hear about!

The first screen has fantastic art, as just the background. It is of a bearded man holding a quill, a really nice touch for you to see when first loading up the game. Neverwinter Nights is composed of four different elements; Campaign (the story mode I have described above), the Toolset, DM (Dungeon Master) client and the Multiplayer option. The toolset allows you to create campaigns of your own, with statistics for enemies, items and quests. This is very interesting and some of the most intelligent and controversial gaming ideas I have come across. It is quite surprising as it gives full power to the player and almost creates a whole new "gaming station" for the player to create his own game! The DM client is very complicated. It allows one to control what happens in the game, to any and every extent. You can possess characters, changes settings, create enemies and all in real time, just at the click of your mouse! You can be a God and do whatever you please! Impressive or what?

The multiplayer option. This is where you can load up a saved character (a different option in game, to saving the game) and play with your pals online. You are able to play the storyline, gain experience or items or just explore levels you have not been able to get to before. The whole concept is very much about exercising your free will, because the whole game is about broadening gaming boundaries and allowing oneself to explore every possibility.

Sele
cting your character. Now this will all boil down to your personality and personal tastes. I, for instance, am a Dwarvish Fighter. I do not like chitchat and I want to get the job done, regardless of consequences. You may want to be a halfling rogue. Someone who is sneaky, and do anything in his power to kill a group of orcs without being seen once! A cleric would fight for what is right, and heal himself on the way there. You get the idea! The races include; Human, Elf, Dwarf, Halfling, Gnome, Half-Elf end Half-Orc. All of them have special abilities and "defects" (except the human, because we are just boring, right?). The classes which you can choose after the race are; Barbarian, Bard, Cleric, Druid, Fighter, Monk, Paladin, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer and Wizard. Giving you a large scope of what abilities and flaws you want your character to possess (all of which are made apparent to you when choosing your character). After this, you are able to choose abilities, skills, feats and alignment of your character. Again all of this relies on what kind of person you are. You can also choose what skin colour and how your character is dressed. As you go on the AI is outstanding, because your weapons/clothes change as you equip/unequip them!

During the game, it is possible to hire 'henchman', or companions, to help you during your quest. Theycharge you money, but become stronger and stronger just like you do. You control their actions and request things of them. They are quiet useful really!

As time goes on, and you defeat more and more enemies, your Gold Pieces and your Experience gradually increases. You can carry a certain amount of items, which you can sell/use depending on what you need. The Experience will lead you to a new level, and this leads to the learning of new skills and the strengthening of your character, in order to cope with the stronger enemies and bosses.

The graphics are just awe inspiring. Bioware have got not
hing to worry about here. The detail of each monster has been carefully crafted to every curve and colour. There is even shimmer from heat haze coming from torches on the walls. 3-D shadows are cast as well, depending on where the light is coming from. Of course the graphics will change depending on how good your PC is. On lowest graphic settings you do have amazing graphics, including 3-D shadows, but they could be better. On the highest, the animations and textures are absolutely outstanding! You could not have asked for any better!

The game play itself is smooth, crisp, flowing and fast. The battles are awash with colour and extreme interaction takes place. The hand-to-hand combat is to some extent "real" when you zoom in, the weapons collide and shields block etc. Objects become smashed in real time animation, as do doors and the unlocking/opening of doors too. No detail has been spared, except for the uniqueness of the buildings. Unfortunately, they may differ in size, but the all look the same. As do the caves and some areas of the Neverwinter Wood. Unfortunately when talking with characters, you have a little cartoon type picture of him/her in the corner of the dialogue box, which is very unvariable. This does come a crosss a little lazy and quite boring, as the potrayel of the in game graphics reflects poorly on the re-appearing cartoon image of certain races.

The sounds correspond very well to the game. Except, some areas of speech are either missing or non-existent. Either way, there is inconstancy, which needs some work on in my point of view. I know it would be difficult to cover the whole game, but the passing in and out of dialogue, does give the game a bit of a shoddy and there it has been unclearly thought through. The music on the other hand is very thrilling and gets you on the edge of your seat. It does tend to die down, but when an enemy is sighted *DUH DUM* you jump up at 3:00am and realise you are wasting your life!
!

On that note, you will waste valuable beauty sleep playing this mammoth of a game. There is at least 100 hours of play in this little beauty, but you can easily double that by accomplishing the in game quests and not just sticking to the storyline. Nowadays there are hundreds of modules for you to check out and test. These modules are mini campaigns, which have been created on the toolset (described above).

So, if you have a good PC, a good imagination, a good amount of free time to waste and a good 25-30 quid to spend, what are you waiting for? The game is only going to satisfy 11/12 years or older. The path in which you must follow is very simple, but how you get there must be strategically planned and followed up with great thought to get the most out of this game. Anyone who indulges in any type of fantasy (whether it be board games, Dungeons and Dragons or classic novels, such as Lord of The Rings), this game will get you thinking like your chosen character in no time!

Give it a go, but be warned there are known to be glitches, which do not ruin the game in the slightest, they just make you think about how it could be improved, which is a little depressing, I suppose! Then you realise it outclasses any other game in my opinion, so do not complain!

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