Also people have good things to say about Neverwinter Nights 2, especially one of its expansions.
Thanks for the reminder. I keep meaning to try NWN2 again, as I think I only gave it one run-through and it didn’t grab me. I did play the first expansion, but don’t think I even bought the next. Perhaps it would strike me differently now.
That said, I wasn’t a great fan of the original Bioware-produced NWN either, though I loved the HotU expansion and as you say there are a number of fun mods, given that the game was so mod-friendly.
I confess I haven’t even tried Skyrim. I played about two hours of Morrowind years and years ago, and it put me off the whole franchise (again, not because it was bad necessarily, just very much not my cup of tea at that time). It might be time to put those old prejudices aside as well, and give the Elder Scrolls another chance.
I also played the remastered Final Fantasy VIII on my iPad recently which brought back some fond memories and I enjoyed hugely, but I can’t tell what it would be like without the benefit of nostalgia. I haven’t got round to the remade Final Fantasy VII yet but that’s another one on my list: FFVII was my first ever FF game and JRPG back in … 1997? 1998? but I haven’t played it for decades so can come to the new version with few preconceptions.
As I write all this, though, it’s pretty clear I spend too much of my time replaying old games and should probably make more effort to engage with new stuff!
"You may call it 'nonsense' if you like, but I've heard nonsense, compared with which that would be as sensible as a dictionary!"
Also people have good things to say about Neverwinter Nights 2, especially one of its expansions.
Thanks for the reminder. I keep meaning to try NWN2 again, as I think I only gave it one shot and it didn’t grab me. I did play the first expansion, but don’t think I even bought the next. Perhaps it would strike me differently now.
That said, I wasn’t a great fan of the original Bioware-produced NWN either, though I loved the HotU expansion and as you say there are a number of fun mods, given that the game was so mod-friendly.
I confess I haven’t even tried Skyrim. I played about two hours of Morrowind years and years ago, and it put me off the whole franchise (again, not because it was bad necessarily, just very much not my cup of tea at that time). It might be time to put those old prejudices aside as well, and give the Elder Scrolls another chance.
I also replayed the remastered Final Fantasy VIII on my iPad recently which brought back some fond memories and I enjoyed hugely, but I can’t tell what it would be like without the benefit of nostalgia. I haven’t got round to the remade Final Fantasy VII yet but that’s another one on my list: FFVII was my first ever FF game and JRPG back in … 1997? 1998? but I haven’t played it for decades so can probably come to the new version with few preconceptions.
As I write all this, though, it’s pretty clear I spend too much of my time replaying old games and should probably make more effort to engage with new stuff!
I played Neverwinter Nights 1 and its expansion and n modules and on couple of player drives ONLINE servers created with Neverwinter Nigths 1.
Played also Neverwinter Nights 2 and expansions but it was soon forgotten since NW2 was released in 2006 played had not time with it was not so good as MMO:S back then.
2004 World of Warcraft MMO November 23 release date 2008 Age of Conan MMO release was fairly good, but was soon buried because WOW released its most popular expansion: November 13, 2008 Wrath of the Lich King expansion and it was glorious 10/10 my rating for WOW gaming during that time and during that time WOW achieved maximum popularity over 12 million active players!
For me NWN 2 as a short experience it was released in wrong time in the glory of best MMO gaming time. While I played Neverwinter Nights 1 much more indeed then Neverwinter Nights 2.
A little window into my gaming right now, I've been ping ponging between finishing a playthrough of BG:2 I started a year ago, and finally playing my PC version of FFVII:Remake, I think all the stuff they preserved from the original is pretty spectacular. That and Choice Of game that just released, like I was trying to play an RPG at every tier of game production.
I never got very far into NWN2 myself, but I really liked the village segment at the beginning, it'll hang out with Icewind Dale II, games I'd really like to play, until I do.
I have to add this post about gaming addiction. While I have liked games before very much no other game has made me so much addicted as World of Warcarft MMO. It is not so fun subject you might think.
I had fulltime work and then got into November 13, 2008 Wrath of the Lich King expansion ---- It was to good to be true! No loading times between areas immersion was perfect. As a Druid you could transform to Panther or a flying predator bird perhaps it was hawk and fly among trees in WOW. Flying mounts also great movement perfect seemless world.
Excellent PvP battlegrounds! Excellent EPIC PvE Raiding! As pre step before raids do some Dungeons those are for 5 people while Raid size can be much bigger. No bugs ok system requirements flawless!
I noticed I began to feel ill and tired when I played 60 hours /week World of Warcraft MMO after Wrath of the Lich King expansion had been released. Well I reduced it to maximum 40 hours /week and again it felt great like a drug in gaming. Eventually I got bored on WOW MMO and when the silly Panda expansion was released I quit WOW MMO. Before that every WOW expansion had a cool theme.
I have to add this post about gaming addiction. While I have liked games before very much no other game has made me so much addicted as World of Warcarft MMO. It is not so fun subject you might think.
I had fulltime work and then got into November 13, 2008 Wrath of the Lich King expansion ---- It was to good to be true! No loading times between areas immersion was perfect. As a Druid you could transform to Panther or a flying predator bird perhaps it was hawk and fly among trees in WOW. Flying mounts also great movement perfect seemless world.
Excellent PvP battlegrounds! Excellent EPIC PvE Raiding! As pre step before raids do some Dungeons those are for 5 people while Raid size can be much bigger. No bugs ok system requirements flawless!
I noticed I began to feel ill and tired when I played 60 hours /week World of Warcraft MMO after Wrath of the Lich King expansion had been released. Well I reduced it to maximum 40 hours /week and again it felt great like a drug in gaming. Eventually I got bored on WOW MMO and when the silly Panda expansion was released I quit WOW MMO. Before that every WOW expansion had a cool theme.
You missed Vanilla - that was a Golden Age. After Lich King I was done, game was not for me anymore. There will never be an MMO as good as WoW Vanilla until AI starts developing games.
To stay on topic – and I’ll make no attempts at humour this time round – I really would implore everyone to check out Age of Empires 2 DE. No, I’m not an AOE 2 shill – I just coded their website. Also, I don’t have much time for games anymore, and we’re really in some kind of game-drought at the moment, but this game is truly a masterpiece.
The balance of the various units is well-thought-out. Everything is so squeaky-clean in terms of design and whatnot.
The AI, likewise, gets an intelligence upgrade each time you crank it up from standard to moderate to hard. It doesn’t get the cheat-upgrade, basically, which is more HP, more resources or what-have-you. It’s also a nice system-shock every time you move up to the next ‘difficulty’ – you’ll be beaten and think it’s unfair, but then realise it’s really just a smarter opponent who’s more cunning. Ie – on standard it won’t try to rebuild anything you destroyed. On moderate, it harasses you and rebuilds anything you burnt down. On hard, it’s just more forward about knocking you out of the picture.
The campaigns are ludicrously well-done – every level is somehow new, as I mentioned before, even though the assets remain identical.
Plus, it’s not like I’m pitching some wildly new genre to the BG3-heads, because isn’t all the Larian stuff ‘strategy’ of a similar kind?
The artwork is exceptional. And the effort they put in to the crumbling buildings when they’re destroyed is, I think, the best I’ve ever seen, in a game or a movie. It’s so perfectly detailed and satisfying.
Native languages used for each faction. The Portuguese monk is a personal favourite, with his lowkey authoritarian righteousness (don't even know what the dude is saying).
I have to add this post about gaming addiction. While I have liked games before very much no other game has made me so much addicted as World of Warcarft MMO. It is not so fun subject you might think.
I had fulltime work and then got into November 13, 2008 Wrath of the Lich King expansion ---- It was to good to be true! No loading times between areas immersion was perfect. As a Druid you could transform to Panther or a flying predator bird perhaps it was hawk and fly among trees in WOW. Flying mounts also great movement perfect seemless world.
Excellent PvP battlegrounds! Excellent EPIC PvE Raiding! As pre step before raids do some Dungeons those are for 5 people while Raid size can be much bigger. No bugs ok system requirements flawless!
I noticed I began to feel ill and tired when I played 60 hours /week World of Warcraft MMO after Wrath of the Lich King expansion had been released. Well I reduced it to maximum 40 hours /week and again it felt great like a drug in gaming. Eventually I got bored on WOW MMO and when the silly Panda expansion was released I quit WOW MMO. Before that every WOW expansion had a cool theme.
You missed Vanilla - that was a Golden Age. After Lich King I was done, game was not for me anymore. There will never be an MMO as good as WoW Vanilla until AI starts developing games.
Here is my Wow history in truth. I played in WOW BETA, but had miserable gaming computer old one and was saving money type so did not play it at start so did not play WOW when full release.
I started play World of Warcraft PRE Wrath of Lichking first time at that point first expansion Burning Crusade had been released which was cool it was about Demons.
My brother was playing with me but I had more then one character that I leveled since I was the hardcore player sinking more time into it. When I and my brother hit level 60... we joined our Guild in runs that did level 60-70 Dungeons /Raids and PvP Battlegrounds. The levelup was also something I enjoyed and I loved also low level PVP example battleground for level 30-40 levels PvP.
Wrath of Lichking expansion release.
WOW MMO was slow levelup back in those days. In fact so slow my brother complained more and more it is TIME SINK and he does not have time for it. My brother quit WOW MMO when he was level 74 with his Druid he had only one character as more casual player.
I continued and enjoyed World of Warcraft MMO.
As for your take all is bad after Wrath of Lichking expansion? I enjoyed Cataclysm expansion and while perhaps not so good as Wrath of Lich King basically Cataclysm was cool it had a Werewolf race example and also Dragons and earthquakes, volcanoes that had changed the world.
The end of cool expansions for me: First expansion Demons. Second expansions Undeads, Cataclysm Werewolf race and Dragons you see a pattern here of cool themes?
Everything cool until World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria expansion came. What was even worse they made a big Panda playable race so I had to see cute Pandas running here and there and this was rampant there were people who wanted to try play the new race a cute big Panda. I quit soon after this expansion was released.
I do not doubt that it is good, but I do not want to get hooked now playing 40-60 hours/week. That can change when I go for early retirement in less then 5 years from now.
Well and saying the new release is better then the original back in the days when WOW was young is like saying apple is better then orange really. A question of taste.
Well and before anyone reads to much about my post when saying this: "Everything cool until World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria expansion came. What was even worse they made a big Panda playable race so I had to see cute Pandas running here and there and this was rampant there were people who wanted to try play the new race a cute big Panda. I quit soon after this expansion was released." I certainly do not want to kill Pandas in real life to extinction and I do not hate them. In addition all these so called pets in WOW that exists? I have nothing against them that is fine.
Well and do not come to me saying Cataclysm was not challenging PvE content. I remember Blizzard got complaints the Heroic 5 Dungeons were stonehard they felt more like challenging Raids. Well I did Cataclyms endcontent and Blizzard nerfed the challenge at some point. Hahaha and if you want to have challenge in Dungeons Dragons 5 system how about Solasta main campaign and do not use diplomacy kill Vampire Boss and all the Vampires when you are level 5 and do that on hardest challenge level. Oh that Drama my brother even screamed it was KILL or DIE all
To stay on topic – and I’ll make no attempts at humour this time round – I really would implore everyone to check out Age of Empires 2 DE. No, I’m not an AOE 2 shill – I just coded their website. Also, I don’t have much time for games anymore, and we’re really in some kind of game-drought at the moment, but this game is truly a masterpiece.
The balance of the various units is well-thought-out. Everything is so squeaky-clean in terms of design and whatnot.
The AI, likewise, gets an intelligence upgrade each time you crank it up from standard to moderate to hard. It doesn’t get the cheat-upgrade, basically, which is more HP, more resources or what-have-you. It’s also a nice system-shock every time you move up to the next ‘difficulty’ – you’ll be beaten and think it’s unfair, but then realise it’s really just a smarter opponent who’s more cunning. Ie – on standard it won’t try to rebuild anything you destroyed. On moderate, it harasses you and rebuilds anything you burnt down. On hard, it’s just more forward about knocking you out of the picture.
The campaigns are ludicrously well-done – every level is somehow new, as I mentioned before, even though the assets remain identical.
Plus, it’s not like I’m pitching some wildly new genre to the BG3-heads, because isn’t all the Larian stuff ‘strategy’ of a similar kind?
The artwork is exceptional. And the effort they put in to the crumbling buildings when they’re destroyed is, I think, the best I’ve ever seen, in a game or a movie. It’s so perfectly detailed and satisfying.
Native languages used for each faction. The Portuguese monk is a personal favourite, with his lowkey authoritarian righteousness (don't even know what the dude is saying).
Man, I haven't played AoE 2 in YEARS, probably decades actually. That makes me want to pick it up again.
Originally Posted by Terminator2020
~WoW stuff~
I've tried to play WoW before and I just felt that I was forced into the newest content when all I wanted to do was slowly play through the old stuff, slowly leveling, but that's just not possible. Sure, I can technically play the old stuff, but the rewards are meaningless. I really wanted to like WoW, but it's just not for new players, it really is only for WoW players now, or at least that was how it seemed to me.
]I have to add this post about gaming addiction. While I have liked games before very much no other game has made me so much addicted as World of Warcarft MMO. It is not so fun subject you might think.
I continued and enjoyed World of Warcraft MMO.
As for your take all is bad after Wrath of Lichking expansion? I enjoyed Cataclysm expansion and while perhaps not so good as Wrath of Lich King basically Cataclysm was cool it had a Werewolf race example and also Dragons and earthquakes, volcanoes that had changed the world.
I never said it was bad. I just said it was not for me after that. My therapist and I are working on less elitist language options.
Vanilla WoW was a singular MMO experience for a few reasons.
1. You earned all your equipment - you didn't get an Epic unless you busted your ass for it. That meant 40 man Raids, which meant you had to be able to work with others, accept criticism and get better. 2. There was no handholding at all. The Map generally didn't tell you where to go, if you got lost you looked it up on thotbot. You had to read stuff. 3. The game had a real sense of danger and challenge, and the risk/reward/loss balance was excellent. 4. The PvP felt like you were in an actual warzone - you get caught out in contested territory and no allies? Well you better hope they are carebears. 5. There wasn't a problem that could not be solved with friends and allies. 6. It made a space for solo play but there were clear and strong rewards for non-solo play. The game encouraged teamwork. 7. WoW Vanilla killed it when it came to building faction culture. People were loyal and invested in Horde or Alliance. Especially if you had to level in the Barrens. 8. The Barrens. 9. Barrens chat. Kek 10. The Dread Citadel Naxxramus - hardest Raid ever, less than 1% of players completed it. 11. PvP games that could last for days! Looking at you Alterac Valley! (Play for 6 hours, leave, sleep, come back to same game for 6 more hours) 12. Easy to play, hard to master. A lot of subtle complexity.
So going from that to even Lich King was just not a good fit for me. It became too easy to get Epics and there was less cooperation.
Oh and Classic is a very watered down version of Vanilla. Blizzard admits this. All raids nerfed. The landscape is much more friendly (less dismounting), and servers are huge. Its all GDPK guilds now. Transactional, empty relationships.
To stay on topic – and I’ll make no attempts at humour this time round – I really would implore everyone to check out Age of Empires 2 DE. No, I’m not an AOE 2 shill – I just coded their website. Also, I don’t have much time for games anymore, and we’re really in some kind of game-drought at the moment, but this game is truly a masterpiece.
Well you must be joking, because I think you said Age of Empires 2 definitive Edition. I looked at a video, even the weapon sounds are exactly the same from AOE 1 - which came out in 1997.
Is this a nostalgia thing?
By the way, I have it on good authority that the more you snip and argue with people in the forums, the faster the game will come out. True story!
Prompted by the recent discussion about voiced protagonists where it was brought up, I was thinking just the other day that I might try my first DA:I run for years and reinstalled it, only to run aground on character creation against the awful hairstyles. Why are BioWare so bad at hair when they’re so good at so much else? Not that I’m shallow … okay maybe I am. (And I know there are mods but even with those I can’t find a DA:I hairdo I like for my “canon†Inquisitor.)
I probably will get over myself and try another run at some time before Dreadwolf. I might even start at the beginning and play DA:O and DA2 as well, but even though it’s been a few years since I’ve done so, I’ve played both so much that I suspect they’ll still be too familiar. I do enjoy combat in the first two DA games way more than DA:I, though, so they’re probably worth replaying just for that.
I’ll also probably run another character through BG1/SoD/BG2 before August too, and like the relaxed feeling of playing these on my iPad. I also enjoy Civ VI on my iPad when I want to play games less intensely.
I’ll probably get KotOR2 for my iPad as well (KotOR was another iPad port I’ve already enjoyed), but only if it’s possible to apply the restored content mod (I think I’ve read we can, but haven’t got round to investigating properly). I loved KotOR2, perhaps even more than the original, but it really suffered from being rushed at the end and I know I’m far from being the only player who feels it desperately needs that mod to be satisfying.
I’ve also got an increasing list of RPGs I’ve started but abandoned, not because I think they’re bad but I just got distracted and they hadn’t grabbed me quite enough to pull me back in. I’ll eventually get round at some point to finishing DOS2, PoE2, Witcher 2, Solasta and Pathfinder: Kingmaker I’m sure. And then I can finally play Witcher 3 and WotR and experience for myself what folk have been raving about!
I also picked up Disco: Elysium in the January Steam sale, so looking forward to that!
Given all the existing games mounting up on my to be played list, I’ve not really been paying much attention to additional new games other than BG3. Dreadwolf and Mass Effect 5 will also be auto-buys for me, but info seems pretty thin on the ground so far so I’ve been trying not to torture myself by thinking about them too much.
You're right about the hair, it's mostly awful in vanilla. I tend to mod my games a lot and normally use hair mods in DA games.
My favorite DA game is DA2, despite it's flaws. Female sarcastic Hawke is my favorite protagonist.
"We are all stories in the end. Just make it a good one."
ATOM RPG Trudograd. A post-apocalyptic RPG inspired by such venerable classics as Wasteland and Fallout, but with a Soviet coat of paint.
It just reminded me of the bowl of goat's milk that old Winthrop used to put outside his door every evening for the dust demons. He said the dust demons could never resist goat's milk, and that they would always drink themselves into a stupor and then be too tired to enter his room..
Prompted by the recent discussion about voiced protagonists where it was brought up, I was thinking just the other day that I might try my first DA:I run for years and reinstalled it, only to run aground on character creation against the awful hairstyles. Why are BioWare so bad at hair when they’re so good at so much else? Not that I’m shallow … okay maybe I am. (And I know there are mods but even with those I can’t find a DA:I hairdo I like for my “canon†Inquisitor.)
At least according to the leak, Dreadwolf will have better hair!😂
]I have to add this post about gaming addiction. While I have liked games before very much no other game has made me so much addicted as World of Warcarft MMO. It is not so fun subject you might think.
I continued and enjoyed World of Warcraft MMO.
As for your take all is bad after Wrath of Lichking expansion? I enjoyed Cataclysm expansion and while perhaps not so good as Wrath of Lich King basically Cataclysm was cool it had a Werewolf race example and also Dragons and earthquakes, volcanoes that had changed the world.
I never said it was bad. I just said it was not for me after that. My therapist and I are working on less elitist language options.
Cataclysm expansion in World of Warcraft MMO had harder Epic Dungeons then Wrath... expansions and the challenge is very hard to demand ok gears ccore is normal.
I think it is normally people get kicked out if gear score is not enough good beacause if the raid team is not strong enough the PvE bosses might kill everyone and the Raid will not be success.
It has happened to me also that rarely sometimes I get kickded out if example we win 2 Boss but then on 3rd boss we die again and again Well then leader kick out those with less gearscore that is normal and ok.
You know long time ago when Neverwinter Online MMO was released I as free player earned the best mount and had gear score something between 15k-20k. I had a friend the "poor "one I he was not so hardcore player as me and his gear score was something between 8k-9k and he did never buy the fasters mount he buyed instead a cheaper mount. Neverwinter ONLINE MMO is buy to win you can also get fastest mount and better gear score with money pay to win. Anyway for one easier Dungeons I was often leader with my friend and then sometimes some sigh player with 4-5k join us. I tell him/her you can join us your gearscore is to less for this Dungeons. I have done this really many times. Sometime if our other player have very good gear score perhaps then I do not kick them. Do not get fixated about my gearscore above. That was early after full release less then 1 year passed I later got much better gear score but eventually quit Neverwinter Online MMO.
Gear score is in my opinion perfect to check.
Example of Elitism that makes no sense to me: WOW raid years ago an old youtube video by Asmongold: Asmongold said something like that ok you have ok gear score but now everyone in this raid does show me that you have earned this special mount do it now! Asmongold checked players that switched to that special mount Asmongold demanded.. well you have that mount but wait 2 players are not near here?! Asmongold rided and found the 2 players that tried to hide and then he laughed and said you can not be in this raid and kicked them out. I mean that makes no sense to me at all that mount would not help them in that Raid this was more modern WOW long time after I had quit.
Asmongold has posted like a more then 1000 youtube videos I believe and generally I have nothing against him funny leftist call him racist that is not true he is indeed white man and yes white lives matter accept that. In fact despite that one bad video I would say my opinion about Asmongold is sligthly postive though would not call me some hardcore fan of Asmongold or anything like that. Perhaps he has even deleted that old WOW post years ago but that is example of Elitism in WOW that makes no sense to me demand all have earned some special mount that would not help in any way in the WOW Raid.
It is not that people are Evil and demand that is why gearscore is good enough. It is so that the PvE monsters WIN and kill all! Below hours of gameplay in attempt to finish Elite hard PvE Raid:
