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NWN - Hordes of the Underdark in Stores
morcego writes "BioWare has done it again. Another expansion pack for Neverwinter Nights has been released. This time, it's Hordes of the Underdark, in case you haven't been following. Reviews are already available, including it being rated 4.5/5 on GamesDomain.
Atari (the publisher) also have a press release about it."
More camera control...finally Small level compared to previous expansion or original module, but still fun... Mostly a developers/builders set of tiles/creatures.. One of the funnest games (NWN) I've played in years...
The expansion CD does not have a native Linux installer yet, and the binaries necessary to play this game on Linux haven't been released yet. Their ETA is "early next week", when they release the 1.60 patch for Windows users to get the games in sync. So if you're going to rush out and buy this expansion, don't expect to be able to play it immediately, as it will not work just yet.
I for one welcome our new Hordes of Underlords
There's no official Mac version of SoU, but it's possible to install the latest update for original NWN, then copy the SoU data files into it. I wonder whether this will also work for Underdark?
Personally, I thought NWN was a great game, and Hordes of the Underdark looks like a worthy expansion. I'll certainly be getting it - I loved the original, and it is one of the only recent games to provide a native Linux version (I run Gentoo, so it's either Winex or native Linux for me) I'm happy and proud to support Bioware provided they keep producing Linux versions of their games. I know they were a little late with NWN, but at least they were true to their word, and if we show them there is a demand for Linux games they will surely take notice and improve their linux support even further.
where does bioware get their quality from? their KOTOR is just amazing. (although i can't compare it to any other RPG, since it's the first one i've ever played)
it just goes to show that quality can still be found in new games, as opposed to crap we find in sw:galaxies, enter the matrix, or deus ex 2.
my hat's off to bioware...
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There is a camera hack for NWN, but it has not been updated to the latest versions.
Nwvault camera hack page.
smeat!
"Let's not bicker about who killed who." Monty Python
I really enjoyed Neverwinter's game engine, and found it expounded upon all others, but storyline still hasn't evolved beyond 'pick the response which you think will lead to another exchange between this character'
They throw Alignment in there, and then give you 'good' and 'evil' roles to play, which consist basically of:
Good? Offer to do everything for free, see most of the game.
Evil? Push for a bit of profit in every encounter, get shut out about a third of the time. Miss that much of the game.
You'll find me buying the expansion pack where player's choices are the axial decision in gameplay, not the plot-designer's.
NWN by itself is an average game. What extends it as one of the most amazing games of all time is it's unprecedented "hackability". Nordock.net is an excellent example. It started as a small module written for the friends of the creater, Marc. It's since grown into a three server, persistant world with a user base of several thousand. There are typically 10-20 people in-game at any given time. This makes the game much more friendly, IMHO, than commerical MMORGs; there are much less powergamers and more role-playing. Plus they have about a dozen DMs, most of which are really cool and regulary run spontanious quests.
If you want to give it a shot, here are the server addresses:
nordock1.nordock.net:5121nordock1.nordock.net:5122
nordock1.nordock.net:5124
They all share the same character vault, so you can play on any of them.
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That is a debatable point since the ammount of actual role playing going on in MMORPG's like Everquest is actually quite minimal. In truth, the whole MMORPG paradigm is just not suited to telling an involving story. It is especially unsuited to telling a story where the player gets to play someone particularily interesting as opposed to yet another "adventurer" out to whack a few snakes and move on to higher levels and bigger snakes.
MMORPG's are certainly highly addictive, but so far, have not really progressed much beyond being a skinner's box wraped up in some fantasy and garnished with ample opportunity for socialization. (not entirely a bad thing) Single player RPG's, on the other hand, are a lot like interactive novels. Games like NWN that provide robust development tools to end-users are essentially interactive novels which encourage fan-fiction.
MMORPG's and games like NWN both have their distinctive niches and, while they may be based around the same sort of fantasy universes, are completely different animals which are both unlikely to go extinct anytime soon.
Not only that, but I believe the company has totally raised the bar for computer game standards. An auto-updater is included, support for Mac and Linux, standalone servers, tons of downloads on their server (they even host a fan-made movie), etc, etc.
I hope they come out with more mods, or at the very least keep improving on a really fun game.
I wasn't too thrilled with the "official campaign," (but I'm something of a game snob), but the module creation ability *really* mades this game. I even made a Roguelike module for the thing (though it required a lot of working around of Roguelike-unfriendly design assumptions, and I haven't had time to work on it much lately).
Also, I hear that the Hordes of the Underdark finally lets your characters advance to epic (over 20) levels. *That* is cool.
Beware though, unlike the other two releases, the official Hordes Campaign cannot be played in multiplayer mode, so as far as i'm concerned the coolest part of these type of games, Roleplaying, isnt possible in this release (not in the official campaign anyway) If you check the bioware forums you'll notice alot of pissed off people posting.