57 réponses à ce sujet

[Arkalezth]

Elton John is dead wrote...

And there's hundreds of modules and PWs to play in the original. I can't by good heart play a game that's patched by the community and support a company that doesn't care about their products by doing so.

But each to their own I suppose.

And who supports NWN1? Who creates those modules and PW? Not Bioware. NWN1 had its official patches, just like NWN2, I don't see the difference. Even if Obsidian had a new patch or something (it was hinted at some point), the lawsuit is still there. Personally, I don't have any of these problems you mention when playing the game, even without community add-ons.

As I said, I don't care if you play the game or not, but I wouldn't refuse to play a game just because the content is made by the community. If you have a problem and there's a fix for it, who cares about the author? Just use it, and move on. I wish every game had this amount and quality of unofficial content.

[MasterChanger]

Elton John is dead wrote...
And there's hundreds of modules and PWs to play in the original. I can't by good heart play a game that's patched by the community and support a company that doesn't care about their products by doing so.

But each to their own I suppose.

I think I understand why you would feel taken advantage of if a studio is able to get off easy because the community fixes their mistakes. I suggest to you two things to consider that may change your perspective:

1) Obsidian was always quite good about listening to community feedback and producing patches. At times additional errors were introduced, but those largely stemmed from trying to deal with issues that were identified by the community. Whenever Obsidian held back on fixing something, it was generally the community consensus that it was due to Atari being ornery, rather than because OEI didn't want to. In fact, Obsidian has repeatedly said that they would be thrilled to release more patches (and indeed have one nearly completed) if Atari were willing to pay for them. Even the errors at launch can be blamed on the unrealistically short development cycle--and this too can be blamed on the publisher, not the developer.

2) You ask why, if two games can be equally fixed by the community, you should support the one you see as more bug-filled. What I would suggest to you (and which Pain already suggested in different words) is that the two games can't be equally fixed. A game's ability to be modified is itself a feature of the game, not a side-issue.

NWN2 offers moddability on a level that I think you'd be hard-pressed to find anywhere else. You can modify the OC, sure, as Kaldor and others have done. You can make a slew of new races, classes, feats, spells, etc, as Kaedrin and others have done. You can entirely re-skin the User Interface. You can make new creatures, like Hellfire and others have done. You can make entirel new adventures in the toolset. Heck, you can even modify the toolset itself with plugins. And you can do stuff on a totally different level, as Skywing has done and is continuing to do, which may lead to a new game client entirely.

Some of these factors are indeed shared with NWN1. I don't personally feel the need to denigrate NWN1 to make NWN2 seem better. But I can certainly point to the direction that Bioware has gone since joining EA: less community involvement in customizing the game; it's DLC or nothing. While Bioware's new games may be slick, the fact that the community can't touch them means that success or failure rests solely with Bioware. Personally, I find that kind of model--a very one-directional one, from the developer to the community, not among the community--to be very boring.

[painofdungeoneternal]

Elton John is dead wrote...
 I can't by good heart play a game that's patched by the community and support a company that doesn't care about their products by doing so.

So to protest NWN2 being supported by the community, you are trying to ensure Atari does not get your money ( which you've already gave them since you are playing the OC ), and instead are playing NWN1 for which Atari again gets your money ( which again you've already gave them )?

I don't think Atari is going to get your message unless you have a time machine. The only ones you are hurting is the community which is actually supporting both NWN1 and NWN2.

[Eternal Phoenix]

painofdungeoneternal wrote...

Elton John is dead wrote...
 I can't by good heart play a game that's patched by the community and support a company that doesn't care about their products by doing so.

So to protest NWN2 being supported by the community, you are trying to ensure Atari does not get your money ( which you've already gave them since you are playing the OC ), and instead are playing NWN1 for which Atari again gets your money ( which again you've already gave them )?

I don't think Atari is going to get your message unless you have a time machine. The only ones you are hurting is the community which is actually supporting both NWN1 and NWN2.

I don't care about Atari. They didn't develop the game. I brought a used copy of NWN 2 and thus gave the money to the one who brought it from them.

Arkalezth wrote...

Elton John is dead wrote...

And there's hundreds of modules and PWs to play in the original. I can't by good heart play a game that's patched by the community and support a company that doesn't care about their products by doing so.

But each to their own I suppose.

And who supports NWN1? Who creates those modules and PW? Not Bioware. NWN1 had its official patches, just like NWN2, I don't see the difference. Even if Obsidian had a new patch or something (it was hinted at some point), the lawsuit is still there. Personally, I don't have any of these problems you mention when playing the game, even without community add-ons.

As I said, I don't care if you play the game or not, but I wouldn't refuse to play a game just because the content is made by the community. If you have a problem and there's a fix for it, who cares about the author? Just use it, and move on. I wish every game had this amount and quality of unofficial content.

All games have bugs but NWN was playable at release unlike NWN2 which still suffers from many problems despite OE's patches.

The replies from the non-trolls are appreciated but I prefer NWN more and will go back to that instead. Even with NWN2's problems addressed in the fixes by the community, I feel it still wouldn't be able to compete against NWN but as I said before; just my opinion.

Modifié par Elton John is dead, 06 mai 2011 - 08:49 .

[Thorne_underfoot]

painofdungeoneternal wrote...

Elton John is dead wrote...
 I can't by good heart play a game that's patched by the community and support a company that doesn't care about their products by doing so.

So to protest NWN2 being supported by the community, you are trying to ensure Atari does not get your money ( which you've already gave them since you are playing the OC ), and instead are playing NWN1 for which Atari again gets your money ( which again you've already gave them )?

I don't think Atari is going to get your message unless you have a time machine. The only ones you are hurting is the community which is actually supporting both NWN1 and NWN2.

With the greatest of respect, the only person that EJiD is hurting, isn't the community.  it's him/her-self.  to have such a narrow view point as to not play a fun game merely because of where the components came from is only depriving the person who holds that view of a fun game.  Simple as that.

And I would point out, as has already been done, quite a lot of what NWN1 is today is directly because of community content.  If I recall correctly, several of the update patches officially put out by Bio contained significant community content. 

but hey.  To each their own.  If the OP wants to not play, don't play.  No skin off my nose.  And to troll here about it, i am sure that they will get a lot of responses.  More's the shame on that. 

All games have bugs but NWN was playable at release unlike NWN2 which still suffers from many problems despite OE's patches.

And, um...  Did you play NWN1 at release?  I did.  It was FAR from perfect.  And to some thinking, unplayable.  It took several patches to get things to stable workable status.  NWN2 wasn't (IMHO) any better or worse on that front.  and how is the stability at launch even relevant?  Both games are stable now. 

Modifié par Thorne_underfoot, 06 mai 2011 - 11:04 .

[Eternal Phoenix]

Thorne. I'm not trolling. I've presented an opinion that I knew some would disagree with. Some of you have persuaded me to give the game another go but I'll finish up with NWN first. I still have to finish the last expansion for that.

It gets quite annoying when people keep coming to this topic calling me a troll but have no idea what troll even means. This is the NWN 2 general discussion forum right? Correct. Having an opinion about NWN 2 belongs here.

Perhaps NWN2 will warrant some more of my time with these community fixes but even with them, IMO, I still think NWN will remain better in my eyes. It feels solid unlike NWN2.

Just my opinion though but as you can see, I'm no troll because you've persuaded me to give NWN2 another go when I have the time. Pehaps I'll get back to you all some time later this year if my opinion has been changed perhaps it will remain the same. We'll see. I'm still angry about how developers could think such a terrible camera is acceptable to release but if there's a fix for that. I certainly have no quarrel with that.

Though may many thanks go to the modders who actually fixed what the developers should have. They deserve more reward than Obsedian IMO. I know how much work goes into modding having done it myself and to fix glitches and bugs is frustrating. So here:

Modifié par Elton John is dead, 07 mai 2011 - 01:00 .

[Rex Radar]

@ EJiD

NWN1 was very buggy and unstable for many users until the 6th or 7th patch. I know as I was one of them. But Bioware and the community continued to improve it until Biowares patch 1.68-1.69 which left a much more stable game with many rule fixes (some of it adopted from the community). The community also created in addition to many playable mod/worlds/haks the CEP (now on third version) and PRC (no longer being supported, bu is avalible), both sited as near manditory content by many.

Since you stated to not like commuinty support behind the games, how can you justify playing NWN1 over NWN2 based on that idea? Or do you play it without the great community created content.

They both are good games, that had good puplisher support, and continue to have good community support.

If you dont like the game fine.

But if you do see some positives with it and have a gripe/problem. Post them in away that will encourage people to provide a constuctive responce.

For example... I don't like the way the camera does X. Are they any hints/tips out there that can help me?

or... I find some of the graphics a bit too much for me and or my system, any suggetions?

or.. I find it a real pain to create new monsters/armor/items in my mod, is there a plugin that would make this simpler?

I do however agree with your assessment that the OC charators are lacking something. In fact I beleive a certain bard may have had a hate page at one point. Ther are some changes out ther for the OC's and they do offer more options, and in some cases extra dialog. But my suggetion is to download some more mods and/or join a persistant world that is to your liking.

[TMZuk]

I disagree!

It is true that the gameplay in NWN2 is clumsy and unwieldy, and the camera is annoying. However, as an RPG it is far better than NWN1, which to me was a huge dissapointment after BG2. The story is somewhat linear, but no more than many other storydriven RPGs, such as DA:O.

The companions are fun, the dialogue well-written, and on PC you can download some good UI mods, that improves the whole experience. There's an unfinished feel to some of the dialogue, and to Act Three as a whole, typical of rushed development, but still, I was entertained.

And then there is MotB! Perhaps the best RPG since BG2, and completely different. Dark and moody, even cruel, like a Brothers Grimm fairytale, with the occasional wicked and twisted humourous insert. Extremely well written dialogue, and some truly interesting puzzles.

While playing MotB I utterly forgot about the irritating camera and the other annoyances, because I was so utterly absorbed in the RPG.

Modifié par TMZuk, 07 mai 2011 - 11:37 .

[The Fred]

I think the reason you're invoking so much hostility is that you're coming onto an NWN2 forum to tell us that you think the game sucks - and what's your aim? To persuade other people to hate the game? You don't seem to be interested in fixing the game or making it better, since you've said you're done with it now regardless, so why are you here? Feedback is one thing, but getting into big arguements for the sake of it is pointless.

Elton John is dead wrote...
Even when fully patched, the camera is still an abysmal mess. I can't believe such a pathetic camera system could even get past the publishers.

Actually, for me at least, it was the patching which broke the camera, but it's actually easy to fix. In fact, it's not even broken, it just defaults to being set to hyper-sensitive.

...and the only likeable companion is the dwarf

Mmhmm, because Linu and Boddyknock from NWN1 really had deep and scintillating personailities? Don't get me wrong, I liked those NPCs, but they weren't very fleshed out. Equally, the NPCs from the NWN2 OC weren't by and large brilliant. That said, a lot of real-life people aren't likable, so why should all game NPCs be?

It's also already been mentioned that there are a plethora of great community-made modules out there. That's basically the point of NWN(2), so while the OCs are an important part of the games, playing the OC is like reading a given book. You might not like it, but that doesn't mean you won't like any book in the world ever.

...but the biggest flaw for NWN 2 that killed it for me was the toolset. It's like they took the beautiful Aurora toolset and destroyed it. For laptop users, you must install a community fix so that you can move the camera about.

I use a laptop. I do not use a fix. The camera moves.
There are a lot of different computers out there, and not everything works fine on all of them. If there's a fix which makes it work, then I'd say that's great. Admittedly, the toolset has its issues. It's not the most stable piece of software. It's also a lot harder to use than the Aurora one. However, it can do a lot more things. In the Aurora toolset, you can't leave a script to go and look up a tag or something without closing it and opening it again. You can't have more than one area open at once. Things like that meant that a lot of what they did with the Electron toolset was warranted. This means it's pretty cluttered, but it's a trade-off.

As someone said, NWN1 had its issues. I remember it crashing on my old PC when I tried to run it, once, so long ago. Yes, NWN2 was rushed to release and really wasn't ready. However, they did the patching and fixed everything up. If you want, consider its initial release a pre-release beta, because that's basically what it was (though it shouldn't have been). Yeah, we can hate Atari for it, but the game works great now so I really don't see what punishing it and its community achieves.

It sounds to me like you have already made up your mind, so if a bad but fixable camera, uninteresting companions in the OC and bad animations (seriously? this is what makes people ditch a game?) are really going to make you shelve the whole game with its plethora of community-made modules and cool mods, then fine, but I really don't see a lot in what you've said is wrong with it that actually had any substance. I know some people have had hell with fatal crash bugs and things, but "animations are a joke"? Really?

[Happycrow]

1) Is it moddable.

(It's so moddable my PW has outgrown the freaking ADL)

2) Is it affordable.

($10 on steam)

3) Is it fun.

YMMV, we enjoy it, but we don't go trolling baseball fan boards to talk about why we should update to cricket, either.

[Haplose]

Elton John is dead wrote...

Haplose wrote...

kamal_ wrote...

You do better when you troll the DA2 forums with your "awesome" pictures.

Even if I partly agree with some of your sentiments, like Kamal I have to question the aim of this topic.
Like those utterly silly topics in DA2 forums....

Repeat it outloud with me: Yes, I have a problem. I'm an evil, notorious troll.

What topics? The Rexton Harimann thread? The "Your best character from DA2" thread which lists minor characters that have gained fame on here?

I'm sure there are more. But I meant the one I've actually been following not too long ago about 2handed warriors:
social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/305/index/7204728/8
And your stellar performance there where you totally ignore countless arguments and advices given to you by numerous posters, argue for 8 pages (before the late lock) seemingly only for the sake of it and finally revert to nice touches like putting photos of a bloody face in other people's quotes with comment :"Here's my beaten face:", calling people names, like "biodrone", when they make reasonable arguments... again with nice graphics....
Oh and let's not forget creating additional accounts just to have someone support you... though I cannot prove this of course.

I'd say we don't need such... entertainment in our quiet NWN2 corner.

[the.gray.fox]

Hm.
Reading that thread, it appears that things went downhill at the 2nd page.
Up to that moment the discussion kept civilized.
Sallul was the very first to open hostilities -- arguing over a picture. Besides, was it not off topic? But nobody pointed that out to him.

From there the discussion slowly derailed more and more -- partially fueled by the OP himself, who repeated his claims many times without taking anything constructive from the inital, good-behaved and helpful, replies he got.
We may say that was his primary fault.

With hindsight, the moderator should have intervened a lot earlier. A simple reminder to everyone to watch their words and manners would have done wonders.

Instead the OP quickly found himself vs the world. Under those circumstances it is easy to lose control and start seeing red.

I would thread lightly with the word "troll" -- this I say to everybody.
Yelling "troll" in a forum today has almost the same effect it had yelling "witch" a few centuries ago.
Got the hint? ;-)



----------------------------------------
Now, at the OP:

In all honesty I find your opening post (in this thread) puzzling.
I mean, what did you expect to achieve with it?
You expressed your personal dissatisfaction with this game.
Fine. But the point of it is...?

I refuse to believe you complained just for the sake of complaining. And you did it in a place where people are (mostly) satisfied with the very same product you complained about.
That really _is_ asking for trouble.

I invite you to give another try to the game, instead.
Maybe with a much different character. Maybe something you never tried before. You may get a better feel.

I do not know how fair it is to compare this game with the predecessor.
Bear with me and pretend they have different names, just for a moment.
Now, would you really consider NWN2 the sequel of NWN1?
They really only share two traits: D&D and the world of Faerun.
(Just like many other RPG games, by the way)
Not even the ruleset they follow is the same.

The same thing could be said for their toolsets. They are just different. Developed by different persons, for a different audience, and meant to satisfy different requisites.
The result could have only been the creation of a toolset much different from the previous one.

Do not think I am compleetly satisfied with this new toolset.
I myself could flood you a long list of complains. But would that help any, or contribute to anything constructive?
Certainly not.
Instead I adapt to the new situation and try to see what good is in it.
And looks to me there is quite a lot of goodness buried in there (at times buried quite deep, alright).
But you can not know until you try. So try.

Be thankful you _have_ a toolset, of all things. The trend with games today is to abandon user-modding, and schedule DLC releases!
Bye-bye user content. We will all play with closed boxes.
PC turning into consoles?... I will make sure to suicide before that happens.


Bottom line: be constructive and focus on the bright side of things.
Incidentally you will have a lot less to complain about.


-fox

Modifié par the.gray.fox, 10 mai 2011 - 11:06 .

[NWN DM]

the.gray.fox wrote...

Reading that thread, it appears that things went downhill at the 2nd page.
Up to that moment the discussion kept civilized.
Sallul was the very first to open hostilities -- arguing over a picture. Besides, was it not off topic? But nobody pointed that out to him.

From there the discussion slowly derailed more and more -- partially fueled by the OP himself, who repeated his claims many times without taking anything constructive from the inital, good-behaved and helpful, replies he got.
We may say that was his primary fault.

With hindsight, the moderator should have intervened a lot earlier. A simple reminder to everyone to watch their words and manners would have done wonders.

Instead the OP quickly found himself vs the world. Under those circumstances it is easy to lose control and start seeing red.

We only have one Moderator for the NWN2 boards (unfortunately), and DNO can't be everywhere, all the time.

I offered my services multiple times, but was ignored (not by DNO). 

So... we get these types of threads where the OP clearly isn't out to accomplish anything other than an eventual flame out, which invariably happens sooner or later.

Aside from that, I would agree that there seems to be little point in QQing in this manner.

[the.gray.fox]

NWN DM wrote...
We only have one Moderator for the NWN2 boards (unfortunately), and DNO can't be everywhere, all the time.

Of course. But you mean javierabegazo (not DNO). Rest assured I did not mean to accuse him of anything.
I talked with hindsight, which implies << it is easy to say that now >>

An early mod intervention could have changed things. Not sure. But likely. Just that.
Regardless, it is not my affair to understand why he did not intervene right away.
Could be for a number of reasons -- trusting that your posters can self-moderate, for once, not least of all.

-fox

Modifié par the.gray.fox, 10 mai 2011 - 03:09 .

[Kaldor Silverwand]

NWN DM wrote...
We only have one Moderator for the NWN2 boards...

The page lists 4: Selene Moonsong, Dunniteowl, Stanley Woo and Eurypterid.  Of the four I occasionally see a post by Selene in the technical support forum, but rarely anywhere else. DNO usually posts frequently but has been noticeably absent of late. Eurypterid is active on other boards, but absent from the NWN2 boards, and I've never even heard of Stanley Woo.

A sad state of affairs. I'm reminded of the saying I learned long ago, "When dwarves cast long shadows, it's late in the day." Seems appropriate.

Regards

[Arkalezth]

the.gray.fox wrote...

you mean javierabegazo (not DNO).

Moderators: Eurypterid, Selene Moonsong, Stanley Woo, dunniteowl

Of these, dunniteowl is, by far, the most active in this corner of the forums (judging by what I see, at least). I've seen post by Selene too, but most of them in the technical forum.

I'm no moderator, but I think pretty much all discussions here are civilized and we rarely get a troll or a locked down topic. That's one of the advantages of a smaller community, and one of the reasons why I dislike DA2 forums sometimes. Less people=less trolls.

[kamalpoe]

Stanley Woo is a Bioware employee. Mostly his past several months on the job has been locking down the "Dragon Age 2 kicked my puppies!" threads.

[Dorateen]

Kaldor Silverwand wrote...

I'm reminded of the saying I learned long ago, "When dwarves cast long shadows, it's late in the day."

What... the who, where? I'm not familiar with that one.

Long live NWN2 and the NWN2 Community!

Harumph!

[Kaldor Silverwand]

Dorateen wrote...

Kaldor Silverwand wrote...

I'm reminded of the saying I learned long ago, "When dwarves cast long shadows, it's late in the day."

What... the who, where? I'm not familiar with that one.

I read it on an esteemed colleague's whiteboard back in the early 1990's. Charlie Carhart's to be precise. His talent as a systems architect was unmatched by anyone I knew then or have known since. Scary brilliant. Always proving IBM wrong about their own systems by making them do things IBM said couldn't be done. I made sure I memorized anything I saw on his whiteboard. I don't know its origin.

Modifié par Kaldor Silverwand, 11 mai 2011 - 12:43 .

[NWN DM]

Kaldor Silverwand wrote...

NWN DM wrote...
We only have one Moderator for the NWN2 boards...

The page lists 4: Selene Moonsong, Dunniteowl, Stanley Woo and Eurypterid.  Of the four I occasionally see a post by Selene in the technical support forum, but rarely anywhere else. DNO usually posts frequently but has been noticeably absent of late. Eurypterid is active on other boards, but absent from the NWN2 boards, and I've never even heard of Stanley Woo.

It's one thing to be listed and something completely different to actually be active.

[JabbaDaHutt30]

Kaldor Silverwand wrote...

When I finished the OC I was pretty disappointed as well. I dislike the linear aspect of the game, which I felt was far more linear than it really needed to be. I disliked the rest-anytime-you-want system. I disliked the forced-companions. I disliked the killing and adding and killing of characters without the ability for the player to alter those things. I disliked the pop-back-to-life feature of the combat. I disliked the fact that you couldn't make your own party. In my mind I was comparing the game to Baldur's Gate, and it suffered by comparison badly. I didn't even bother to play MotB once I found that it had the same kind of linearity only at an epic level. I'm not a fan of either linear storylines or epic play, so it had no appeal. Instead I started using the toolset to create my own campaigns. The SoZ expansion fixed almost all of the things I disliked though, so I then spent time retrofitting as many of its features into the OC and MotB and released those. That wouldn't have been possible without the toolset.

Since NWN1 was even worse by comparison to BG than NWN2 was, I wouldn't expect you to have the same dislikes with NWN2 as I did, so it is unlikely that the things I addressed would mean much to you. But there are certainly modders who might agree with you and some of your complaints. For example there are modders who felt that the OC dialogue lacked enough romantic opportunities, so there is a mod that addresses that. There were several general complaints about the OC and MotB that I addressed in the Makeovers. People who feel that there aren't enough Prestige classes can use Kaedrin's PrC pack and experiment to their heart's content. Tony K addressed many complaints about the AI.

I suggest you decide which specific things matter to you and then check for custom content to see if it addresses those things. You may find solutions that do make the OC something that you would enjoy re-playing. And many of those solutions would also apply to MotB, SoZ, MoW, and the many freely available campaigns.

So you have many options. Griping and going back to NWN is certainly one option. I suggest though that you have only scratched the surface of what the NWN2 can be if all you have done is complete the unmodified OC.

Regards

Resting wherever you want is far better than having to go to taverns just to replenish your health. I don't mind the idea of resting in taverns itself obviously, but when it comes to not being able to recharge your health and spells after a fight right away... well, it just gets extremely tedious.

Modifié par JabbaDaHutt30, 11 mai 2011 - 07:22 .

[Arkalezth]

Limited resting isn't tedious if the module is balanced for it. It's not the case in the OC (too much enemies), but it is in most other modules. And right now I only remember one with a tavern-only resting system.

Modifié par Arkalezth, 11 mai 2011 - 07:30 .

[Kaldor Silverwand]

JabbaDaHutt30 wrote...

Resting wherever you want is far better than having to go to taverns just to replenish your health. I don't mind the idea of resting in taverns itself obviously, but when it comes to not being able to recharge your health and spells after a fight right away... well, it just gets extremely tedious.

One man's meat is another man's poison. Not being able to rest after every fight adds tension and a degree of difficulty to what can otherwise be an unchallenging cakewalk. Going into every battle fully charged removes any requirement for tactical planning in order to succeed. I can see how that may have appeal to some, but it has none for me.

[Arkalezth]

Not to mention the 5 seconds wait when resting. It may not sound a lot, but I hate to wait 5 seconds each time I rest, doing nothing. If you rest after every fight, you'll spend a lot of time waiting.