You Should Play Neverwinter Nights 2 | Scuffed Baldur's Gate 3
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ส.ค. 2024
- This video review and essay covers Neverwinter Nights 2, a computer role-playing game created by Obisidan Entertainment. Long before Astarion made the entire internet thirsty, Neverwinter Nights 2 was one of the more technically broad ways to play Dungeons & Dragons on a computer. Does Obsidian's take on D&D 3.5e stand the test of time? Watch and find out for yourself!
I know it sounds like a robot wrote that copy but I swear it was me, actual human David Cole, without any assistance from a computer program. I'm just trying stuff.
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#neverwinternights #dungeonsanddragons #dnd #crpgaming #rpg #baldursgate3
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NWN 2 Fixes: github.com/nwn2fixes/player
Hello there! I have more time to make videos these days so there will be more to come VERY soon. Subscribe to keep up with what's coming. I didn't do an appeal in the video, but I'll probably have to in the future (realistically speaking). I hope you like this and maybe even the game who knows!
Ehh you're wrong about the whole story of Ember, the town that got slaughtered. The Githyanki never killed the townsfolk. They used their houses to hide and that was it. This was why Bishop was pissed with the townsfolk of Ember. Because they gave up their homes to the Githyanki without a fight. So they were all alive by the time you leave and the Luskans came in and slaughtered them. So the story does hold up
He is wrong about a lot. He clearly half assed his way through the game and paid no real attention to it. Especially when he started cheating.
I think nwn2 is quite underrated. The overal story is pretty standard heroic stuff, but the way it connects all these different substories and gameplay elements together is pretty impressive. The gith, the swamp druids, the undead cult, Neverwinter city politics, the Jarro story, the Luskan angle and the trial, the keep management, companion stories, the legacy of an ancient civilisation. Many of these elements keep being woven in and out of the story...it's very ambitious, so I can forgive some of the duct tape...
I also love how some of the companions stories continue throughout the acts. Many rpgs just give one companion quest with several steps to complete it and then it's done, never to be talked about again. DAO is a good example of this. Almost all of the companions get one quest, and once it's done, it's never really brought up again. In Nwn2, Khelgar has his monk quest which is a quest of self discovery that spans in Act 1 and 2, has his strained troubles with his clan we see starting in Act 1 that pays off with an Alliance with them in the third act. Elanee has her quest in the sky mirror and the struggle she has with her affections for the Kalach-cha and her duty to her druid circle which pays off in the third act too. It's just good stuff that gets sprinkled throughout the whole story.
I love NWN 2 Complete, because it has a Baldur's Gate-style campaign, an Icewind Dale-style campaign and Planescape Torment-style campaign all in one neat package. The best of Infinity Engine games running on Aurora Engine.
mask of the betrayer writing makes baldurs gate 3 writing "we have writing at home"
Giga based
True
to be fair bg3 story is ass, except the dark urge
20:55 The town was not “slaughtered by Githyanki”, what??? They were all taken hostage in their houses when Shandra Jerro came through the town with the other Githyanki sword stalkers. They were still in their houses as the Gith were setting up an ambush for the player character (you). So when Luskin went through and killed the entire village, that was the only time the entire village got decimated. They did not “get killed a second time.”
Also, Elaine is not the quartermaster. She was just one of the many villagers. The quartermaster was killed in the slaughter of ember. You can find the quarter master’s logbook on the floor of the village when you revisit it to investigate the slaughter of Ember. He’s lying dead on the floor by his house.
This dude either wasn't paying attention to the story or he is trying to be snarky and shit on it for a few cheap laughs. I'd put my guess on the ladder.
Alright dude… As a man whose played NWN2 and it’s expansions more than 8 times to completion over the last 13 years, all I can say is… you clearly have no idea what you’re talking about. Having watched this video all the way through, you keep making up things as you go along, or spiral into weird assumptions about the games development that you present as fact. You clearly weren’t paying attention to the game when playing, which fair enough, but don’t make up stuff when talking about how boring it was for you. If you’re going to critique a game or it’s narrative then get your facts straight.
He is right about NWN2 OC having a fairly cookie-cutter hero's journey, and perhaps dragging on a little too long. Particularly when it's just fight after fight after fight. And while you can strategise, and tailor your equipment to each encounter (especially once you've got a Bag of Holding), you can only play through so many dungeons filled with the same enemies before it gets tiring.
And I say this as someone who has played the crap out of NWN, NWN2 and MoTB as both a kid and an adult, and in whose heart there is a special place for those games.
@@MBKill3rCat Those are fair critiques and true. It's a lot of the story critiques he had that made no sense. Either he wasn't paying attention to the story or he was just trying to be funny by making shit up and shitting on the game with stupid snarky jokes. Ember for example in the first act did not have the townsfolk killed by the Githyanki like he said only to be later killed again by the Luskan assassins at the beginning of act 2. Wtf is he talking about? He's just making shit up.
@@andrewvincent7299 Yeah, he definitely misunderstood that
The big spider: If you talk to him in the basement he makes a magical cloak for you.
I don't think shitting on the game is the best way to get young players to give it a try.
I am very glad you called out Friend Spider. One of my favourite little moments in the entire game.
Mask of the Betrayer remains one of my favourite storylines ever.
I do love this game, even if it was clearly held together with tape. It was my first true d&d game (after KOTOR) so I didn't have the same comparisons to make.
I enjoyed NWN2 main story for its fun characters, item collecting, classic story and robust crafting. I am very fond of rebuilding the keep and defending it from the walls.
Mask of the Betrayer was an experience. The ridiculously interesting characters, atmosphere and narrative themes were much more developed than the main campaign.
Overall, Mask made the game good. The end of the main campaign was such a downer that it became an Act II that came to a conclusion in Mask.
For all it's flaws, I still think NWN 2's og campaign has better writing than BG3. The characters were far less annoying and obnoxious. Some people might like playing a campaign that simulates playing a meandering murderhobo TTRPG game with obnoxious, game derailing "That Guy"s but I at least want my RPG games to have a coherent narrative.
Baldurs Gate 3 is overrated... Its been so dumbed down, because of 5th edition, that the generation that has no attention span, absolutely loves it... That tells you all you need to know
Sounds like massive cope.
@@forcebrand4678 How so? What exactly, am I coping with? You think I am, in any way, emotionally affected by a videogame? 😆 Seems like a tell.. The thought that one would need to cope, over a bad videogame.. Oof.. The more you kids speak, the more affirmation you provide..
Seems like forcebrand hit a nerve...
The ones with no attention span are those who designed 3.5. 5e is very far from perfect but at least it's not AS full of complete nonsense and objectively bad design.
Can one really call something a scuffed version of something else when there's nearly a twenty year gap between the two?
Well, this was a depressing watch.
NWN2, especially Main Campaign is an amazing experience. More so in coop.
Here, however, we have a whole lot of Misinformation, both about D&D with the whole "settings aren't canon." - wot?
But oh boy, you missed a whole lot of story bits. And just made up stuff to fill out missed story bits.
Didn't read skill descriptions or basic class features.
Exactly. This would have been a great video if he did his homework more and actually paid attention to the story and not blatantly make stuff up that was false about the game's story.
I heartily disagree with the notion that "Completion Time" is intrinsically tied to quality and I sincerely HATE phrases like "limitation breeds ingenuity"...
Also, if we want it or not, we have to take the monetary value into account because, at least new games, are very much an investment (and those prices will only go up, somehow we're still not at the breaking point, wtf is up with that anyway) and as I said above Length is not automatically inverse to quality and the same goes for price.
When two games cost 80 bucks each but one is 8 hours long and the other is 25 hours long, there is absolutely no guarantee or indication that the 8 hour game will automatically have the apropriate rise in quality and "impact" to justify the same price.
To make my point clear... 70-80€ are about 3 weeks worth of groceries for me... am I really gonna pay that much money for a single Dinner unless I verifiably know that it is genuinely that good and most importantly to MY taste? Sure, someone else may like that Dinner and thinks it's the best ever but how does that relate to me? Or do I opt for the grocery list that will provide me with at least a couple days worth of food even if that may be a bit bland but will securely fulfill my needs for a lot longer?
I am not saying one is better than the other but especially shorter games have to survive a lot more scrutiny and must have a lot higher quality overall to be considered worthy...
Just because I can finish a game in a single sitting doesn't mean it will have more impact, be more memorable or have a better quality than its competitors... that entirely depends on the writing team (or lack thereof), while yes NWN2 main campaign is about as memorable as last weeks lunch, on the length slash quality flipside we have stuff like KotOR or Drakensang or both original Baldur's Gate games, all of which I fondly remember and replay every once in a while.
Some are definitely better with short stories, some are better with longer stories, some are better with flashy action-y style of writing and some are better at immersing you in the minute details of the world they crafted.
I know it’s a different genre, but I thought “What Remains of Edith Finch” was incredible. You could beat it in a hour or so.
Copyright was a mistake
To expand on the final stills not being satisfying as an ending:
In one of my playthroughs i did things that posed a problem with Elanee (druid party member) at some point, so she turned on me and i had to kill her.
So imagine the laughter when i finish the story and one of the stills tells me that Elanee didn't approve of whatever i did, went back wherever and continued to live, etc.
Probably my favorite real time with pause crpg, along with Pathfinder WOTR and Tyranny. Mask of the betrayer has some of my favorite storytelling. Also the customization level and the amount of special items makes it wonderful. I had no dnd previous experience and i felt like the rpg background i had was enough
Neeshka isn't saying more cause OEI ran out of time. A lot of features and story was left on the cutting room for because... they ran out of time.
Nwn 1 and 2 are both better than baldurs gay 3
The part about the DM having big ideas but can't execute it makes me feel called out :P
Okay I really like that line about the archaeologists but you've got a lot of inaccurate information in this video and you should probably redo or edited to fix those mistakes and I can promise you that the reason they exist it's because you don't want to pay attention to a spreadsheet and that carried over to you not paying attention to the f****** story
If he's an "archaeologists" then he is not a very good one with the amount of mistakes he made during the story's overview lol
If you're going to make a video critique about a game, you should actually pay attention when you play it. Getting basic story details incorrect definitely torpedoes what little credibility you had.
You should play Neverwinter Nights 2 for Mask of the Betrayer. Then, if you liked that, play Planescape Torment.
no. if he had trouble getting through the main campaign, he'd get slaughtered in MotB. not to mention the story is much more complex, and he's not the sharpest tool in the shed.
This was great! Really enjoyed this video, I expect for your channel to blow up with this quality!
Glad somebody acknowledged this existed besides me. 😂😁
Playing through 2 rn. I played 1 but I prefer 2 in every single way. I also find it to be easier than 1. I’m still new to dnd so getting into 1 wasn’t necessarily difficult, but some stuff is confusing compared to 2 where I felt things were explained more clearly.
Whilst the buggy launch of NWN2 can't be ignored it was also how the "official until there's a problem" forums of the day dealt with it. You had thread upon thread of people having problems upto and including show stopper issues and basically the response from community reps & mods was "Welp, sucks to be you. Works fine here." Infogrames (who were using the Atari brand at the time) did not give a single shit. IMHO it's one of the first examples of companies just throwing games out there in a broken state and realising they can get away with it.
Ironically the reason I'm so comfy with the Rouge Trader game is that it plays, pretty much, like NWN1.
I don't really blame Obsidian for the poor state NWN 2 was in when it released but more Atari who rushed them to finish the game. Obsidian was still a new company at the time and needed more time to finish the game.
Hey, I’m just watching the video and I’m about a quarter of the way through and I am really enjoying this!
Thanks for making this - I’m also more of a Story than a Mechanics person, so I’m super interested what you’ll say about MotB
this absolute goober had to fire up cheats in a game that has 4 difficulty modes and a button that builds your character for you.
NWN2 Persistant Worlds were where the majority of memorable gaming moments happened for me... ah, nostalgia
Your criticism of NWN2 and it's leveling, seems more like a criticism for D&D. D&D is about character building. You needed to "cheat" because you don't know the system NWN2 is built on. They offered you on character creation the option to pick prebuilt characters that will handle leveling for you. Honestly, you should probably stay away from D&D games since you refuse to learn the system, it will just leave you with frustration.
this is what 5e does to mfs
This is very painful. Just read the text dude it is not that hard. Also dnd 3.5 and NWN2 never required college level algebra.
Great video on clunky RPG from my beloved setting!
Why the disrespect
I found it baffling. He recommends the game but spent a lot of time shitting on it
i did not have problems wit tes3 dice row
The OC campaign is definitely not the best and very generic, similar to the OG NWN1 campaign. However I feel BG3 devs took a lot of inspiration from NWN2, some of the events feel familiar and some of the dialogue too.
Who cares if it was generic. Everything is generic at this point. Even dark fantasy. What's important is how invested you get into the story with character progression and companions in which NWN 2 did a fantastic job.
stop! 3.5 was far better than 5... 5e is crap.
I enjoyed the thoughtful writing and mellow delivery. Reminded me of Noah Caldwell Gervais' fine work. Looking forward to hear more from you!
That's a lot of cope to justify cheating. Not only did you rob your viewers but you robbed yourself of the intended experience. The combat was not what bored you. It is the cheating that made the combat feel boring.
Neeeeeeshka, what a cooomer -______-
neverwinter nights 1 was the first game that I bought with my first paycheck. Im very fond of it. neverwinter nights 2 was a game that I played maybe only a single time start to finish and never agaim. it dont help that the game doesn't exist in steam, because I tend to forget games that are not on my steam launcher.
41:08 WRONG! You obviously were not paying attention when playing the game. You get to meet a spirit of a dwarf that tells otherwise its part of the main quest, so i don't know how you managed to miss that one! THEY ATTACKED FIRST OUT OF FEAR OF CORRUPTION, HENCE THE GUARDIAN TURNED ON THEM IN RETALIATION. If they just had left him alone and let him do his job Illefarn would still be around, but probably corrupted and evil! Which would have been bad news either way! This is DnD my guy, and most known facts in DnD are simply FABRICATED, OBSCURED OR UNTRUE!
PS: Looking at other comments and the amount of your so called FACTS that are simply wrong, have you actually played the game? More like you ether skipped the story or got some kid to play it for you, who also wasn't paying attention to the story! 1/10 PLAY THE GAME AGAIN, TO GET YOUR FACTS RIGHT!
Thank you. It really bothered me how many things he got wrong in the story and then presented them as fact and tried to make a joke out of it at Obsidian's expense when it was his incompetence that didn't understand or wasn't paying attention! The quality and production values of the video are good, but he really needs to edit the story beats he got wrong.
I only play NWN 2 because of two great Ravenloft modules from the vault. NWN 1 with all the community created modules is vastly superior in every single way. Both from the NWvault and the workshop. So much Dungeons&Dragons candy.
I remember this game being a pain in the arse to patch. The UI was awful as was the camera, the stutter was irksome and I found the story to be beyond dull. I never made it beyond the second act. It looks ugly too. User modules for the first game look much nicer.
The character creation was good though.
It's all a matter of opinion. I find my opinions are almost completely opposite of yours.
@@andrewvincent7299 Indeed it is. Also keep in mind that I'm personally more of a JRPG fan. My main interest in nwn, other than being irked at how poor the main campaigns are, is with the excellent A Dance with Rogues module, which I replay often. The Forgotten Realms setting itself I couldn't give two hoots about. So feel free to take my opinions with a pinch of salt.
@@aletheia358 That's fair. Your opinions aren't any better or worse than mine. I respect your opinion and happy you love JRPGs. They certainly are fun and the stories and gameplay mechanics can really be great. For me personally, I just LOVE classic western European High fantasy and love classic WRPGs. That's why I love Forgotten Realms and love the original campaign of NWN2.
The problem with the OC was that obsidian nearly made atari bankrupt. The engine was half finished and they were working on the overall campaign as well. That is why the writing feels so inconsistent at different moments. They didn't go back to tie up different points afterwards because the development time was already rushed. I loved the OC and the MoTB expansion, but you can tell what the developers were able to achieve with more time...
I don't know man, most of these complaints could be made about most games back then even the true "masterpieces", especially those made by Obsidian. Even the highly praised Morrowind in Bethesda's case.. I"m old though... I grew up with archaic gameplay and was accustomed to it.
Most RPGs back then are long winded with archaic combat that seems overly boring in 2024 They're made 20+ years ago....
You're also missing the main point of these games by focusing on the quality of content . It was all rather hastily put together in an overall sense, to add to the module list.
The main point was PW's and expanded user content. That's where these titles shined, the idea truly was quantity. Mostly through small MMO esque role-play communities taking place within multiple D&D settings on player run/created servers. SOme even used non D&D ips like Hyboria (conan), you simply got a ton of content with titles like this . That's what made them worthy purchases.
To people who grew up with 80's and 90's gaming, these games were more than acceptable, even game changing, though they may seem like "crap" now.
Trying to compare them to games made 20+ years later is rather pointless, even approaching them in a 2024 mindset is silly. Games were just archaic back then comparatively. And in titles like this, the actual bread and butter of the title is no longer there (PWs)... Although there is still plenty of single player content to find and download. These games are multiplayer focused as well, play with a friend for the better experience.
I am so plagiarizing that line"I'm not an archaeologist"😭👋📱☠️🧟👀👀🤤
Second comment for algorithm summoning purposes, because this video is worthy of it
Yes! The narrator for the Rocks Fall Everyone Dies ending is in fact Brian Mitsoda! I’m guessing he was the only one they had around the office given that he’s not a professional VA lmao
Thank you so much, that's very high praise and I really appreciate it. I'm working my way through your Knights of the Old Republic 2 video now. I want to binge it but just have not been able to make the time yet. Your production value is fantastic. I'd love to pick your brain sometime on narrative design!
@@ColedOne For sure - feel free to give me a yell any time, I'm around on discord, same username as on youtube
all it tells me you aren't a real gamer.... if you didn't grow up on this game kick rocks talking about it
Bro, the video and content quality certainly deserve many more views.
Not when he either flat out lied about the main campaigns story or wasn't paying attention. He got his facts wrong several times. The production quality is good but the research is bad. I somehow suspect he shit on this game just for cheap laughs.
Dude knows how to make a video❤
Cringe alert
Only disappointing thing i can say, it`s not the 3.0 ruleset but 3.5 for Neverwinter Nights2 and that`s the only part i ever hated about 2, especially the level cap sigh.....
It's far better than BG3. Trust me.
Exactly. BG3 is considered 'great' because gaming quality is so shit right now that anything that is good seems great by comparison.
@@andrewvincent7299 Why all you saying this? How good are Neverwinter 1 and 2 compared for example with Fallout 1 and 2?
Haha no, BG3 is a coding masterpiece and the best D&D experience ever made even if the 5th edition is nerfed. NWN2 is simplistic blend nonsense and inferior in every single way. NWN1 is better with all the community created modules
@@andrewvincent7299 No, BG3 is amazing because its the most complex authentic D&D experience ever created on a pc in terms of programming. Its a coding masterpiece. Even better then classics like NWN and BG 2. If we look back 25 years BG3 is the best Crpg of them all even if the 5th edition rules is a nerfed D&D. Btw, we live in an age of great isometric crpg from Larrian, obsidian and Owlcat and even if you compare BG3 with those rpgs its still the best. Thats what gamers really want. The way you talk you sound like a simpleton who doesn't realise how complex BG3 really is in terms of choices , paths and the home brewed mechanics
@@Wen6543 They are simpletons with a terrible taste. I looked up Kainlarsen channel and its just bethesda nonsense and the generic Dragon age lol. Kainlarsen like simplistic rpgs so BG3 is probably too overwhelming for him. BG3 is vastly superior in every way. Sven is a genius DM
I hated character movement in NwN2. Hated it. Uninstalled before too much had been played.
I played Neverwinter Nights 1 before starting Neverwinter Nights 2, The tutorial section and control are already betrayed me.
Bye bye nn2
I got it off from an old complete disc.
King of shadows and his evil thingys. Yeah, this is where the game lost me. Obsidian didnt even try to make something intresting. Its so blend and boring. Mask of the betrayer is awesome and the only reason to play this forgotten game
Did you not play the part where you go to the ruined Illefarn city and find out who the King of Shadows was and what his motivations were? Finish the game before you make ignorant claims.