Games for Windows & NWN2: What the Hell?

[Steel_Wind]

There once was a time when CGW was the most influential games magazine in the business. It had this guy called Johnny Wilson at the helm - and I loved it.

Like many of the people here, I was a subscriber.

Fast forward a decade and Johnny Wilson departed to go work for Wizards of the Coast (and Paizo for a time).

Games for Windows, nee CGW is still trying to be relevant...

And somone at this magazine just assigned a review of Neverwinter Nights 2 to someone who clearly doesn't even LIKE D&D.

Matt Peckham just slams this game in a worthless review, gives it a 5 out of 10. Its sin? Near as I can tell, for being a faithful D&D computer game.

"Call me crazy -- I guess I'm just finally weary of being led around on a pencil-and-paper leash and batting numbers around a glorified three-dimensional spreadsheet ..."

He could have said a lot about the game to criticize it - but attacking it for succeeding at what it sets out to do is just nutty.

Exhibit A: http://www.1up.com/do/reviewPage?cId=3154870

To Jeff Green: this review did not influence my purchase of NWN2. It did, however, greatly influence my future purchase of Games for Windows. Good luck with all that.

Seriously: how do you decide, as an editor, to assign a review of a game to someone who clearly dislikes the genre? What causes you to do that and offer up a review like this with a straight face?

There was a time when your magazine was the most influential in the business. It isn't anymore - not even close.

If you are wondering why - take a good long look in the mirror.

[mattpeckham]

someone who clearly dislikes the genre?

I'm really sorry it didn't work for you Steel Wind, and I hope you enjoy the game. But for the record, I'm a huge fan of the genre, if by genre we mean RPG, and if by RPG, we mean something that's still in motion and not some static thing that equals this-plus-that never changing. I gave Icewind Dale 2 an 87% for PC Gamer back in 2002--the highest score it received, if memory serves. And remember: 5 out of 10 = exactly average.

-Matt

[Bill Dungsroman]

I'm really sorry it didn't work for you Steel Wind, and I hope you enjoy the game. But for the record, I'm a huge fan of the genre, if by genre we mean RPG, and if by RPG, we mean something that's still in motion and not some static thing that equals this-plus-that never changing. I gave Icewind Dale 2 an 87% for PC Gamer back in 2002--the highest score it received, if memory serves. And remember: 5 out of 10 = exactly average.

-Matt
Uh oh.

[Steel_Wind]

But for the record, I'm a huge fan of the genre, if by genre we mean RPG, and if by RPG, we mean something that's still in motion and not some static thing that equals this-plus-that never changing.

-Matt

It's pretty clear from reading your review that - (For the record) - no - you aren't a huge fan of the genre.

You just think you are. And therein lies the problem.

[mattpeckham]

It's pretty clear from reading your review that - (For the record) - no - you aren't a huge fan of the genre.

You just think you are. And therein lies the problem.

I stand corrected by your stunning display of logic! ;)

[Gary Whitta]

*pulls up chair*

[Becoming]

Yeah Matt, don't tell us what you like because we know better!... You really gave it a 5 though? Ouchie.

[mattpeckham]

Yeah Matt, don't tell us what you like because we know better!... You really gave it a 5 though? Ouchie.

Not something I'm even a tiny little bit happy about. I love these guys. I want them to keep making games. Just not like this one. :P

[Vincent_GC]

Is this going to turn into one of those "7-9 is the only way to score a review" threads? I can see why it's called a dead horse.

Anyways, if you disagree with his opinion, well then, you disagree. So what? You like the game, so what if a reviewer called it average? That happens in a buisness solely founded on personal opinion and taste.

Props to Matt for standing his ground.

And saying a game is Faithfull to the D&D doesn't necessarily mean it's good.

Anyways, I can't say much else since I won't be able to write my review untill Sat.

[DennyA]

I can't speak for Matt, but the impression I get from reading this stuff and his comment is that he's a fan of RPGs, but doesn't feel that a PC D&D game should be aping the pen-and-paper version.

Now, given that the NWN series exists in part to try to be a faithful recreation of the "books and graph paper maps" D&D, I think expecting it to "take the genre forward" or not ape the paper game is unreasonable. It's like hating Falcon because F-16s are hard to fly.

Of course, the side issue is 1up's horrible new rating system. Under the CGW Classic rating system, Matt would have given this three stars, which wouldn't elicit the reactions of this "5," which despite 1up's misguided intentions here, comes across to people as "50%, or an F."

[Kalle]

Drats. On one hand, I have to respect the opinion of a man who's given IWD2 87% on the 7-9 scale. Seriously, I liked that game a lot.

On the other hand, I really looked forward to an NWN game that didn't suck. Now I don't know what to believe. Curse you Matt Peckham, CURSE YOU!

[Steel_Wind]

I stand corrected by your stunning display of logic! ;)

Ok. I'll go slow for you.

Your stunning bias for this review:

I'm a huge fan of RPGs = I clearly despise D&D

No possible incompatibilities surfacing to mind there?

[Vincent_GC]

Of course, you can always read other reviews from other sites and make a decision made from a broad base of opinions......

I hear gamerankings (http://www.gamerankings.com) or metacritic (http://www.metacritic.com) are ideal for this

[Lum]

I have to agree... the point of the review seems to be more that the reviewer doesn't like the D&D 3.5 rules system and wishes he were playing Oblivion. NWN2 is not Oblivion, and wasn't intended to be. It was intended to be a D&D game-slash-construction set.

There's quite a bit to ding NWN2 on (hideous hardware requirements, funky UI decisions, brain dead henchman AI) but basing a review of NWN2 on how D&D rules are old and crusty is kind of like giving Company of Heroes a 5 in a review (on a 7 to 9 scale!), dismissing it with "So, what's up with all these Germans?"

Reading a review of NWN2 and having the reviewer regale us with the shortcomings of pen and paper D&D isn't very helpful. It's like a review of a turn based wargame where the reviewer tells us how he really wishes he were playing Starcraft.

[Brendan]

I must say that I'm not a fan of this review either.

Peckham needs to review the game in its own merits. The first paragraph is irrelevant. He doesn't need to apologise for the rest of the review. He should have scrapped the first paragraph and started off with the last one since it is relevant. Having gotten that out of the way he should have told us a little more about the game itself. How does the interface shape up? Is the story more engaging than the original? Are the editor tools any good?

It is your job to tell us these things. This review is, however, a classic demonstration of how review scores are a crap concept. Maybe if you had given the game an eight and then mentioned giving it a five in the text if you are bored with the D&D ruleset would have been a better idea.

[mattpeckham]

I can't speak for Matt, but the impression I get from reading this stuff and his comment is that he's a fan of RPGs, but doesn't feel that a PC D&D game should be aping the pen-and-paper version.

That's pretty much exactly it Denny, with one amendment: shouldn't ape at the expense of sophisticated, progressive immersion. For instance, I once enjoyed the way Baldur's Gate broke it's world up into all those tiny little areas that took about a minute to walk across (the ones you ran around arbitrarily clearing out the FOW to find hidden stuff). But I wouldn't enjoy that now, and it wouldn't make much sense for me to say it was a good design idea today simply because it was good then.

-Matt

[spiffy]

I always thought DnD was about role playing.. the dice and numbers are there only as a system of regulating the decision-making of players.

If this NWN is about number crunching and not role playing, than it deserves a 5.. no?

[Lum]

I always thought DnD was about role playing.. the dice and numbers are there only as a system of regulating the decision-making of players.

If this NWN is about number crunching and not role playing, than it deserves a 5.. no?

Except the reviewer didn't comment on the quality of storytelling at all, save a toss-off line about poor NPC interaction, something that I haven't run into in my experience - and given Obsidian's pedigree, if they put out a game with crappy dialogue, I'd expect that to merit more than one snarky joke.

To be completely honest I've only put in about 2 hours into NWN2 since I've been playing FF12 (gotta keep up my Squaresoft fanboy street cred, yo), but a lot of the problems I ran into in those 2 hours the review didn't mention at all.

[Jeff Green]

To Jeff Green: this review did not influence my purchase of NWN2. It did, however, greatly influence my future purchase of Games for Windows. Good luck with all that.

Seriously: how do you decide, as an editor, to assign a review of a game to someone who clearly dislikes the genre? What causes you to do that and offer up a review like this with a straight face?

There was a time when your magazine was the most influential in the business. It isn't anymore - not even close.

If you are wondering why - take a good long look in the mirror.

I just did, and by GOD am I handsome!

[JamesP]

http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2006/20060905.jpg

[ydejin]

If NWN2 wasn't touted as a DnD game, then it might make sense to criticize the game mechanics as part of a review. Since the game is very clearly marked as an attempt to bring DnD to the computer, writing a review where the main point of the review is that DnD is an old dinosaur makes no sense. Customers purchasing NWN2 know going in that they are purchasing a game based on the DnD system.

This is a very poor review that focuses almost exclusively on the reviewer's personal preferences, without giving the reader much information on the actual game beyond the already known fact that it is based on DnD.

Overall I give the review a 1 out of 10 (on the 7-9 scale).

[HRose]

Matt Peckham just slams this game in a worthless review, gives it a 5 out of 10. Its sin? Near as I can tell, for being a faithful D&D computer game.
Ah, I'm in Italy so I'm don't know well game's journalists, but he is my favorite game reviewer along with Tom Chick.

He cannot be wrong ;)

(I wish I could read the review)

EDIT: Oops, I thought the review was on a paper magazine...

[deepruntramp]

I disagree with the review and also think it's a very poorly written. Of course he also gave Beyond Divinity a 4.5/5 stars on Gamespy's site, so I bet he just has no taste in RPGs at all

[flyinj]

Of course he also gave Beyond Divinity a 4.5/5 stars on Gamespy's site, so I bet he just has no taste in RPGs at all

Was that when Gamespy made all their reviewers rate on the "4.5-5" scale?

Woot! See what I did there!

[charmtrap]

I haven't made up my mind yet about NWN2, but if that's the quality of writing they're letting in gaming magazines these days no wonder their circulations are in the toilet.


The idea seems to be that we're meant to rah-rah about a superabundance of feats, spells, races, prestige (advanced) classes, and math-equation tickers full of the usual "I attack you with a +4 sword of --" booooooring. Fine, sure, dandy&but when is a "role" not a "role"? Simple: when it's a rule to a fault.


Such language!

[Schazzwozzer]

The review probably ought to have at least addressed how the game fares as a hack 'n' slash, Diablo/Icewind Dale sort of game, beyond decrying the rules for being convoluted. For the original NWN, the hack 'n' slash was pretty much the core of the game, after all.

Also, this line, "buh-bye storytelling and character development", seems unfair to me. I've not played the game yet, but is the game truly so bereft of these things? Does it not compare favorably in this area to, say, Oblivion or Fable?

Finally, while it's fair to criticize the game for chopping the game world up into relatively small areas (I agree that it's irksome and increasingly less forgiveable with each passing year), I think it bears mentioning that the game could not possibly fulfill the create-your-own-adventure goal of the series if it had gone with a huge overworld sort of system like Oblivion. It simply wouldn't have been practical, for a number of reasons, and the game's multiplayer would also have had to be reinvented.

I just did, and by GOD am I handsome!
That's pretty awesome though.

[roguefrog]

If this NWN is about number crunching and not role playing, than it deserves a 5.. no?

I doubt you have to number crunch at all in NWN2. That's an end-user controlled behavior akin to powergaming, min/maxing, metagaming, cheating, etc... This review does nothing for me. I want to know about the number of choices, if the gameworld reacts to your choices, if there are permanent consequences, how much mileage you can get out of skills, multiple paths, quest design, linearity, if combat is fun, challenging, and rewarding. Going off on a babbling tangent about it abiding to the D&D ruleset is fucking retarded.

[HRose]

Finally, while it's fair to criticize the game for chopping the game world up into relatively small areas (I agree that it's irksome and increasingly less forgiveable with each passing year), I think it bears mentioning that the game could not possibly fulfill the create-your-own-adventure goal of the series if it had gone with a huge overworld sort of system like Oblivion. It simply wouldn't have been practical, for a number of reasons, and the game's multiplayer would also have had to be reinvented.
I don't see the logic of this.

Being pratical is a quality of the tools, not of the technology used. I don't see how building a zoneless world can be significantly harder and require more time than the tiny maps that NWN uses. I see this mostly as a technological limit than a deliberate choice (and the engine is already bad enough even without a zoneless world).

[wildpokerman]

Yeah, we're really breaking out of the 7-9 scale lately. Someday someone will look back and think we lived through a golden age of gaming with all the 7-9 games if this keeps going.

[Matthew Gallant]

I don't see how building a zoneless world can be significantly harder and require more time than the tiny maps that NWN uses. http://www.truemeaningoflife.com/images/hungry_hungry_hamster.jpg

[Dave Long]

I think folks are saying it's a game design choice because Neverwinter Nights treats each adventure you go on as a module of its own. Things really aren't tied together because it's like putting up that Dungeon Master screen and running people through your favorite module of choice. It's not Baldur's Gate so much as it is The Keep On the Borderlands.

[Angie Gallant]

It really does come across as "I hate D&D 3.5 so I'll slam it over and over". There's some legitimate complaints in there, but they are buried under both the complaints about D&D and the style of the writing.

[EvilIdler]

I'm more interested in a review of the community and what the fans did
a month after release.

[Bill Dungsroman]

I guess I'm just finally weary of being led around on a pencil-and-paper leash and batting numbers around a glorified three-dimensional spreadsheet in a computer translation that should have synthesized, not forklifted.
Stop playing RPGs, boychick.

[caesarbear]

Matt, as someone who has done plenty pnp RPG, is a fan of cRPG, and is dreadfully tired of min/maxing and powergaming, thinking that there are definately better ways to roleplay, I still don't get your review at all. After reading it, all I get is "Gee, that guy doesn't like D&D." You end up making the article about you, and to be perfectly honest, it comes off as a grab for attention. I really hope that isn't the case.

[Doug Erickson]

I don't recall asking for IMMERSION from my AD&D RPGs. I play them FOR the rules. What's next, we judge dungeon hacks and Angband clones as poor because they don't feature airships and blonde-haired lady boys? Bitching that NWN2 hews too closely to AD&D 3.5E rules -- especially when the game was specifically designed to be a digital representation of them -- is like bitching that Madden emphasizes the NFL too much. The review should have told us how closely and effectively it implemented those rules, because that's what folks are buying it for -- and anyone who hates AD&D 3.5E doesn't need Matt to tell 'em it sucks all over again. Could it be that reviewers are abandoning critical thought in favor of genre stereotyping? Do all "RPG" titles need to have "immersion" as their major design goal?

That review was pretty fuckin' uncomfortable to read regardless of its message. Between this review and Parish's UGnG nonsense, ZD writing is gonna give IGN a run for its money in the barrel bottom real estate market.

[mattpeckham]

Matt, as someone who has done plenty pnp RPG, is a fan of cRPG, and is dreadfully tired of min/maxing and powergaming, thinking that there are definately better ways to roleplay, I still don't get your review at all. After reading it, all I get is "Gee, that guy doesn't like D&D." You end up making the article about you, and to be perfectly honest, it comes off as a grab for attention. I really hope that isn't the case.

Well if it's a grab for attention, anyone care to trade? Because the only attention I'm bound to get for this is pain and misery, believe me. But nah, it's not about me. I mean, go read half of anything from Roger Ebert and tell me you couldn't make the same argument about his stuff, y'know? I think Tom got it exactly right awhile back when he said a good review is a personal reaction.

Wise man say: "The critic who tries to reflect the views of his audience is not a critic, he's a ventriloquist." :)

[deepruntramp]

Wise man say: "The critic who tries to reflect the views of his audience is not a critic, he's a ventriloquist." :)
But you're not a critic. Nothing you wrote was insightful or even pertinent, it was just a wordy, mucky blog entry on why fantasy RPGs suck.

[mattpeckham]

I don't recall asking for IMMERSION from my AD&D RPGs. I play them FOR the rules. What's next, we judge dungeon hacks and Angband clones as poor because they don't feature airships and blonde-haired lady boys? Bitching that NWN2 hews too closely to AD&D 3.5E rules -- especially when the game was specifically designed to be a digital representation of them -- is like bitching that Madden emphasizes the NFL too much. The review should have told us how closely and effectively it implemented those rules, because that's what folks are buying it for -- and anyone who hates AD&D 3.5E doesn't need Matt to tell 'em it sucks all over again. Could it be that reviewers are abandoning critical thought in favor of genre stereotyping? Do all "RPG" titles need to have "immersion" as their major design goal?

It's not that it hews too close to the rules at all, but that obsessing over them ends up being an uncomfortably large slice of the total gameplay. I knew coming out and saying that, I'd be facing a tough crowd (here more than anywhere). But don't forget that plenty of the other issues have nothing whatsoever to do with the rules, they just exacerbated the alienation I felt (this time, uniquely) making my way through all the D&D chrome.

and the style of the writing

Well, that's kind of big'un all by itself...

[foogla]

I doubt you have to number crunch at all in NWN2. That's an end-user controlled behavior akin to powergaming, min/maxing, metagaming, cheating, etc... This review does nothing for me. I want to know about the number of choices, if the gameworld reacts to your choices, if there are permanent consequences, how much mileage you can get out of skills, multiple paths, quest design, linearity, if combat is fun, challenging, and rewarding. Going off on a babbling tangent about it abiding to the D&D ruleset is fucking retarded.


Ding! I agree with this post.

[mattpeckham]

insightful or even pertinent

Waitaminute, are talking about my review or your post?

[deepruntramp]

Waitaminute, are talking about my review or your post?
If you can be this short and to the point in forum posts, why not in your reviews?

[Damien Neil]

Well if it's a grab for attention, anyone care to trade? Because the only attention I'm bound to get for this is pain and misery, believe me. But nah, it's not about me. I mean, go read half of anything from Roger Ebert and tell me you couldn't make the same argument about his stuff, y'know?

One of the things that consistently impresses me about Ebert's reviews is his ability to talk about a movie in the context in which it stands. I can't think of any genre that he rejects absolutely: Action, romance, comedy, drama, whatever it is, he's willing to take a movie on its own terms and judge it according to its own ambitions.

Furthermore, even when he gives a negative review, he pays attention to what went right. I can read a review of a movie that he disliked and come away from it with a sense of whether I might like it. Your review lacks that. It's too short, too wrapped up in your own reactions, and just too shallow.

You don't like the plot, characterization, or dialogue. Where are the examples? Where are the quotes that prove your point, the (non-spoiler) plot elements that fail to please? I have not the slightest idea what the plot of NWN2 is after reading your review.

What fails to work about the game mechanics? Yes, NWN2 is based on D&D rules. Now, either I'm familiar with D&D rules--in which case, I don't need your commentary on whether they're any damned good or not--or I'm not, and could use some more explanation.

What about the potential for user-created modules? The most significant portion of NWN1, and it doesn't get the slightest mention.

What about some sense of where the game stands in the canon of CRPGs?

I have nothing against your review on fanboy grounds. I don't like D&D, and I suspect I'll hate NWN2. The problem is, quite simply, that you review isn't very good.

[caesarbear]

I mean, go read half of anything from Roger Ebert and tell me you couldn't make the same argument about his stuff, y'know?
No, I really don't see that at all. Ebert, as far as my impressions go, reviews a film for what it is. I've seen him give high marks to brainless action movies that are done well and succeed at what they attempt, even though he states that he doesn't like brainless movies.

Wise man say: "The critic who tries to reflect the views of his audience is not a critic, he's a ventriloquist." :)
But why are you being paid instead of any random blogger? If you asked me to write a review for WoW by stating my views and only my personal reactions of it, I'd wipe my ass with it in words. I, personally think the current MMO style of RPG is nothing but a pointless grind and devoid of any chance for good storytelling. Yet that would be stupid and irresponsible because I also can recognize that while I may hate the genre, WoW is clearly the best at what it tries to be. Nobody goes looking for a review if they don't have the slightest interest in the first place, so pronouncing only my personal view serves no one.

I'm just not understanding what it is that you want to convey. I don't get what you consider the role of a reviewer. That ought to be something I can gleen from reading any good review.

[Bill Dungsroman]

Well if it's a grab for attention, anyone care to trade? Because the only attention I'm bound to get for this is pain and misery, believe me. But nah, it's not about me. I mean, go read half of anything from Roger Ebert and tell me you couldn't make the same argument about his stuff, y'know? I think Tom got it exactly right awhile back when he said a good review is a personal reaction.
Wow. Roger Ebert and Tom Chick. Way to lump yourself right in at the drop of a hat there, Chauncey.

Anyway, you missed the part where being articulate counts, something Sir Roger and Missus Chick have that you sorely lack. Your review is so poorly written merely from a grammatical and conceptual standpoint, I seriously doubt you gave much more effort to playing or understanding the game. You just wanted to cry Firsties. That's groovy, you totally did it Slugger, and now I'll never read one of your reviews again, because you're the internet equivalent of a quote whore as far as I'm concerned. Oh, poor sad you, weathering the slings and arrows of mediocritous misfortune. I may faint.


Wise man say: "The critic who tries to reflect the views of his audience is not a critic, he's a ventriloquist." :)
Dude, whatever, your lips are moving in either case and I want my money back. Bill say: "He who is deliberately contrarian and a shit writer deserves forceful butthump from Lowtax."


It's not that it hews too close to the rules at all, but that obsessing over them ends up being an uncomfortably large slice of the total gameplay. I knew coming out and saying that, I'd be facing a tough crowd (here more than anywhere).
Man, somebody wants an Internet Merit Badge.


But don't forget that plenty of the other issues have nothing whatsoever to do with the rules, they just exacerbated the alienation I felt (this time, uniquely) making my way through all the D&D chrome.
DUDE PUT DOWN THE AMPERSAND AND BACK AWAY SLOWLY. Game's too tough for you? Sweet. That means it's perfect for me, I'm guessing. I'm fucking sick of cheesy action-RPG-lites so obviously pushed out the door in a rush that leave me feeling hollow and unfulfilled, kinda like some online game reviews.


Well, that's kind of big'un all by itself...
Not really. I won't call you a comprehensively a shit writer, but that review? Fuckin' horrible.

[Hanzii]

Man, I thought Bill was harsh and went and read the review.
Bill's right. I would have used nicer phrases, but your editor should have demanded a rewrite.

But you do point out that for those who want to play 3,5 ed. D&D done right (like say, that new game, what's it called... oh yeah, Neverwinter Nights 2) this is an 8 or 9. So that's fair enough, but you do come of as incredibly biased and contrarian and don't argue your points with any depth.

[mattpeckham]

Not really. I won't call you a comprehensively a shit writer, but that review? Fuckin' horrible.

You're totally nuts Bill, but I love you anyway! :)

[Bill Dungsroman]

You're totally nuts Bill, but I love you anyway! :)

http://img220.imageshack.us/img220/3250/effyoott4.jpg

[Dave47]

Man, I thought Bill was harsh and went and read the review.
Bill's right. I would have used nicer phrases, but your editor should have demanded a rewrite.
Seconded. I don't like D&D rules, but I must agree that this review sucks. When you mention at the tail end of a review of a game based on D&D 3.5 rules that the game would score an 8 or 9 to anyone who likes those rules, you've totally fucked up the whole point of reviewing.

If you hate FPS games, you don't give Half Life 2 a "3" and say "It sucks, but if you like this genre you'd probably give it a 9 or something."

[J.theYellow]

Yeah, I think we can edit out the slur on 1up/GFW. This has Peckam's byline, it's his review, he takes the heat and doesn't seem to give a crap ... whatever.

I do question his editor for assigning him this review if he dislikes D&D this much, though. I wonder how the conversation could have gone:

"Hey Matt, you've got the Neverwinter Nights 2 review."

"*mutters* All right, but ..."

"But what? You like Arr Pee Gees. Just make sure the dialogue doesn't outright suck. Players always want to know about dialogue."

"... but it's Dungeons & Dragons ..."

"Are we going to have a problem here, Matt?"

"... No, I just think you'd be better off with someone that actually enjoys playing D&D."

"Well, I'd give you the Dark Messiah one, but Chick already shat all over it. So it's either Enn Dubya Enn Two or that Reservoir Dogs game."

"I hate you."

"Time to make the tappy-tap, Matt-boy."

"*sobs*"

[gnmarsh]

I'm not seeing the issues with the review. His review essentially is saying as toolset its great, as a game it's just ok. I wish someone would have written that about the first neverwinter nights before I bought it.

[CJ Martin]

I just did, and by GOD am I handsome!

...and Rome burned...

[Midnight Son]

So I leave P&R for a moment, looking for a quiet game discussion..... and find this! That said, D&D is yet another OLD and BORING franchise, like Star Trek and Star Wars, that should be put out of my misery. We need something new, something different, something sex-ay!

[Chris Nahr]

His review essentially is saying as toolset its great, as a game it's just ok.

He doesn't even mention the toolset, and barely speaks about the game beyond the level sizes and the fact that it's based on D&D.

That review was terrible. All it says is that the reviewer doesn't like the entire subgenre of D&D games, or maybe the statistical aspect of all RGP systems, or maybe his life and his dog. I suppose game journalists are always hard up for money, but if you just plain hate the basic concept of a game (and a completely inoffensive and fairly popular concept at that) the only responsible decision is to decline the assignment.

Come to think of it, the CGW/1up review of Titan Quest was nearly as terrible -- pointless kvetching about how the reviewer doesn't really enjoy Diablo clones due to his midlife crisis or something. Can't CGW/GFW afford any good RPG reviewers anymore? Or is this a misguided attempt at New Games Journalism?

[Chris Nahr]

I just checked my Zinio copy of CGW since I usually associate Matt Peckham with articles of much higher quality. Indeed, besides a few previews he had written the outstanding Silk Road article (games & development in China). Now I'm even more baffled by this review.

[Misguided]

This seems to be developing into a trend, as illustrated by the Enchanted Arms comic (a game I loved the heck out of). More recently, I've seen it with Touch Detective and Children of Mana reviews, oh..and a patently ridiculous review by Joe Juba of Pokemon Mystery Dungeon in Game Informer wherein he rakes the Mystery Dungeon series across the coals and proceeds to give the game a 3.

Speaking generally, I really think a game should be reviewed with regard to what it set out to be, not what the reviewer wanted it to be.

[FIDGAF]

I don't get it. In one thread everyone is bitching because in all the new games like WoW and GW the hit always happens unless it's blocked. Here, in NWN2, you actually have to roll a hit.

WTF Matt? Some of us older gamers actually enjoyed the D&D rule-set because it was more challenging. Things like HP means something in a system like this. NWN2 hits the nail on the head and you ripe it because it doesn't play like all the other RPG games that are out. It's not supposed to be the same and you should have realized that when you reviewed it.

That being said, I really don't feel you took that into account when you wrote that and it does feel like you're trying to compare apples and oranges. That's simply an unrealistic approach and makes the review slanted.

Jeff, make him write it again or have Tom do it. We want reviews that are well thought out and actually are un-biased. I don't feel that was the case here.

[Rob_Merritt]

Jeff, make him write it again or have Tom do it. We want reviews that are well thought out and actually are un-biased. I don't feel that was the case here.

And Jeff, now you know why the PR people do this. (podcast related)

[EviLore]

Respectfully, Matt, I won't call this the worst review from a major pub I've read all year. That honor goes to Chris Roper's IGN God Hand review (http://ps2.ign.com/articles/738/738253p1.html). But this is in the running for #2.

Maybe it's endemic to the current RPG atmosphere, where everyone wants to compare the games to Oblivion even if they're from a different side of the genre. Maybe it's acceptable to think that BG2 or Torment are archaic and best left in fond memories (gotta laugh at that one). Even if I were to grant you those, this is an entire review complaining about the d&d backbone of NWN2 when it could've been relegated to a single cliched line ("If you're not into D&D CRPGs, this won't change your mind, but if you are, it'll deliver.").

Oh, boy -- there's the portrait "plus" sign! Time to shuffle another party member (improved to four simultaneous) through the level-up grinder, which you can click "recommend" to zip past&but then, what's the point?

It's unfortunate that you think the genre should become a factory for Diablo and Oblivion clones, but it's even more unfortunate that some gamers will skip NWN2 after seeing a 5/10 from GFW.

[Rob_Merritt]

It's unfortunate that you think the genre should become a factory for Diablo and Oblivion clones, but it's even more unfortunate that some gamers will skip NWN2 after seeing a 5/10 from GFW.

Well considering Oblivion was hands down the best RPG in years, cloning it probably isn't a bad thing. NW2, I was excited because of who was making it, but being third person and D&D based were rather huge negatives already. With the other problems, its no longer a must buy.

[EviLore]

Well considering Oblivion was hands down the best RPG in years, cloning it probably isn't a bad thing. NW2, I was excied because of who was making it, but being third person and D&D based were rather huge negatives already. With the other problems, its no longer a must buy.

Third person is a huge negative? Doesn't that limit you pretty severely when it comes to available video games (especially RPGs)? Or are you just that enamored with Oblivion's playstyle?

[GamingTrend]

Right or wrong, (and I'm voting wrong) I do respect you for coming in here and defending your work.

[olaf]

I dont mean to pile on but I didnt like the review either. I thought it was poorly written and edited (as an example why was forgettable 'forget-able'?). Style/technical complaints aside...

The reviewer sounded like he just didnt agree with the design doc for the game, to hell with its execution. IMO some of the biggest flaws of the finished product were barely touched on or not mentioned at all while some of its strengths were similarly ignored or mentioned as negatives.

[Mark Crump]

BREAKING NEWS: PERSON DISAGREES WITH REVIEW.

Film at 11. We now return you to your regularly scheduled post.

[mono]

It's like we're supposed to park half our brain in fea-ture mania and the rest in nostalgic slush, and somehow call bingo.

If I could even under-stand this sen-tence, I'd sug-gest that your brain would have to be parked in 5 overwrought phrases to call bingo.

[Rob_Merritt]

Third person is a huge negative? Doesn't that limit you pretty severely when it comes to available video games (especially RPGs)? Or are you just that enamored with Oblivion's playstyle?

No, I just perfer first person when it comes to rpgs. Grew up on Bards Tale and Might & Magic. I can get past it if the story and setting is good enough.

[fuzzyslug]

I'm not seeing the issues with the review. His review essentially is saying as toolset its great, as a game it's just ok. I wish someone would have written that about the first neverwinter nights before I bought it.

You know, the review was actually a pretty good review for what came in the box with the first one.

[Kevin Grey]

Well considering Oblivion was hands down the best RPG in years, cloning it probably isn't a bad thing. NW2, I was excited because of who was making it, but being third person and D&D based were rather huge negatives already. With the other problems, its no longer a must buy.

Then why were you so excited since the people who've made it tend to specialize in third person and D&D based games?

[Rob_Merritt]

Then why were you so excited since the people who've made it tend to specialize in third person and D&D based games?

Because at the time, those games were the best RPGs out. Those games didn't have the techinical and artistic issues that NWN2 seems to be having.

[Ben Sones]

http://www.truemeaningoflife.com/images/hungry_hungry_hamster.jpg

GO FOR THE EYES, BOO!

[Kevin Grey]

Because at the time, those games were the best RPGs out. Those games didn't have the techinical and artistic issues that NWN2 seems to be having.

Outside of the system requirements (which are steep), what technical and artistic issues is the game having? I haven't ventured to the official forums, but from reading the threads here and other boards, I'm not seeing too many issues.

The game is still >80% on Game Rankings even with 1Up's "50%" (yes, yes I know but that's how GR uses it for calculations) factored in, so the reviews are obviously overwhelmingly positive.

Based on your post of "hoping that NWN2 doesn't turn out good so I don't have to buy it" or whatever seems like you are just trying to latch onto whatever negatives you can find.

[FIDGAF]

BTW: I'm not trying to critize the review, but rather the way it was measured.

It comes out as "I like my RPG's like this and this doesn't conform to my preference exactly." So if there had been a little more reviewing of the game's content rather than complaining about the D&D rule-set it might have gone over better. That comes off a little cocky.

I think you needed to give this a chance before cutting it down. The game does as intended and the whole idea of a DM lends to the D&D experince, which incidentally uses dice to roll... Yup, real dice and all that nerdy shit.

Maybe you should have started with "D&D lovers rejoice, FPS folks save your money." Your preference for First-Person puts you more in the FPS catagory and you reviewed it from that angle IMO.

[Marcus]

Outside of the system requirements (which are steep), what technical and artistic issues is the game having? I haven't ventured to the official forums, but from reading the threads here and other boards, I'm not seeing too many issues.


Yeah I have had 0 technical problems while playing this game. I am actually surprsied I haven't run in to a bug yet.

[stusser]

Like all right minded god fearing americans, I disagree with the review. But...

All criticism is subjective. Matt truly didn't like the game, so what exactly was he supposed to do? Lie? Read other reviews, go "oh crap, everybody else gave it an 8, I should too!" No. He put his opinion on paper, which is all a critic is supposed to do. It's editorial's job to decide whether it should be published or reassigned.

[Angrycoder]

Its a pretty poor review. The reviewer is the star of that review not the game. You get very little sense of what the actual game is like, all you know is that matt sure as hell didn't like it. Top it off with a bunch of gamefaqs-esq snarkiness and armchair designer talk and you end up with a review that is more suited to a messageboard post rather than publication on a professional site.

PS - Ben Sones wins the internet.

[unbongwah]

I do find it amusing that a man who was so fond of Icewind Dale 2 - which is a rules-heavy plot-light fairly linear dungeon hack in constrained environments - dings NWN 2 for many of those same qualities. Yes, I get that Matt's point is "Can we please move the genre forward? Why are we still just getting more-of-the-same?" What worked five or ten years ago no longer entertains him today.

Near as I can tell, Matt's main complaints are: an overwhelming emphasis on D&D rule mechanics at the expense of everything else; weak / boring plot & characters; and small, stale environments (especially compared to, say, Oblivion's expansive world).

Unfortunately, those (legit) complaints are buried under mounds of rambling bitching about how he hates D&D rules whoring. He could've made those points with half as many words, then used the rest of them to talk about everything he didn't discuss: the plot (beyond "it sucks"), graphics, technical issues, etc.

I don't have a problem with Matt disliking NWN 2 for the reasons he gives. I just think he could've written a much stronger review if he spent less words bitching and more words, y'know, reviewing.

[Charles]

This thread is hilarious cause the OP should've just read the whole thing. He'd have seen this: "That five-of-10 is actually a hedge, by the way. For D&D fans who want to play an amazingly thorough PC translation of the system they're carting around in book form, it's proba-bly closer an eight or nine. "


I read the review and I think all his points are valid. A lot of them are similar issues I had with the original NWN.

So while he might overly focus on the ruleset, fact is that it really doesn't matter. What he said in the review about things other than the ruleset seem to justify the score.

[Skipper]

Respectfully, Matt, I won't call this the worst review from a major pub I've read all year. That honor goes to Chris Roper's IGN God Hand review (http://ps2.ign.com/articles/738/738253p1.html). But this is in the running for #2.

I disagree. The God hand review had Chris explaining in some detail what was wrong. He mentioned the controls, the interface, the presentation, the gameplay, etc.

This review, on the other hand, I stuggled to understand at all what Matt didn't like besides just the D&D franchise ported to a game. Couple that with the fact that it's so short there is no way it COULD have presented anything in detail, and you have a poor review. Matt I don't dislike you for it, I've seen better reviews from you. But really, please try to remember to give a reader more to go on than that. Some objective presentation of the pieces of the game. It would allow more folks to look beyond the score and focus on what they need, information to make a decision to purchase or not.

PS - Ben Sones, funniest line I've seen in a while. I miss Boo.

[McBain]

On a mid-range system, this game looks 2002 and runs 2009. All slagging on the graphics is entirely justified, IMO.

I'm amazed at how a game with such TINY fucking areas can run so unbelievably fucking poorly. With the detail cranked down. 20fps is considered good now? Suck a dick, Oblivion. Oblivion? Obsidian. I actually get 35fps in Oblivion with detail set to high. And I'm wandering around a fucking *continent* as opposed to a small linear path constructed out of tiles.

You tell them, Matt. You tell them good.

[Matthew Gallant]

The God hand review had Chris explaining in some detail what was wrong.
That would be great but for the problem of him being wrong.

[Lum]

If he HAD told them good, I suspect this thread would be much shorter in length.

[Destarius]

This was a terrible review. I've learnt virtually nothing to assist me about the game save for some rant by the writer; no examples on gameplay, specific problems with the game etc. If this game deserved a 5, we could all have used with concrete examples of bad gameplay. I agree with many of the views expressed here; this just looks like the reviewer did not like the D&D system with its plethora of feats, crushed it on that and some rather unelaborated criticisms, and then appended some lame "but if you like D&D it's an 8 or 9" at the end.

[Skipper]

That would be great but for the problem of him being wrong.


True but you gotta give the guy this. He expained in detail why.

[Ubiq]

This review reads to me like someone who completely missed the point about what's appealling of Neverwinter Nights to the fan of that game. The magic of NWN was not about huge seamless worlds or Action RPG combat. It was about being an old-school RPG with powerful tools that allowed players to create their own modules. NWN was a hugely successful product - it would have been a true disservice to the fans of the original to deviate so drastically from what made it successful before.

You want to know why all games in a genre end up being the same? It's because producers acquire the sentiment in this review, that (for example) all RPGs must play like Oblivion, instead of each RPG pursuing different strengths and weaknesses and providing different gameplay experiences. As a developer, this review fundamentally annoys me.

[jg93]

"To Jeff Green: this review did not influence my purchase of NWN2. It did, however, greatly influence my future purchase of Games for Windows. Good luck with all that."

+1

Terrible review. I hope Tom stops writing for them.

This guy exemplifies all that is wrong with game reviews and journalism.

[Angie Gallant]

This guy exemplifies all that is wrong with game reviews and journalism.

Oh please. There is a plethora of wrong that doesn't even appear in this review.

[roguefrog]

Maybe it's a review tailored for all the cRPG n00bs that played Oblivion.

[Jasper]

*pulls up chair*
Pass the popcorn?

[Doug Erickson]

Like all right minded god fearing americans, I disagree with the review. But...

All criticism is subjective. Matt truly didn't like the game, so what exactly was he supposed to do? Lie? Read other reviews, go "oh crap, everybody else gave it an 8, I should too!" No. He put his opinion on paper, which is all a critic is supposed to do. It's editorial's job to decide whether it should be published or reassigned.

Having an opinion about a game doesn't make you a videogame reviewer, which should be pretty fuckin' obvious since we're each not collecting $300 checks for every post we make in this subforum.

[FIDGAF]

"To Jeff Green: this review did not influence my purchase of NWN2. It did, however, greatly influence my future purchase of Games for Windows. Good luck with all that."

+1

Terrible review. I hope Tom stops writing for them.

This guy exemplifies all that is wrong with game reviews and journalism.

What's Tom got to do with this?

[AndrewPf]

What's Tom got to do with this?


It's a matter of principle, see!

[Dave Weinstein]

Having an opinion about a game doesn't make you a videogame reviewer, which should be pretty fuckin' obvious since we're each not collecting $300 checks for every post we make in this subforum.

Speak for yourself.

--Dave

[stusser]

Actually, having an opinion does make you a critic, just not a professional one. You need to be paid for that. Which he was... with filthy microsoft blood money!

[FIDGAF]

Principle? One bad review isn't cause to jump ship IMO. There's bound to be changes.

[Doug Erickson]

I probably woulda given NWN2 a 6/10 -- maybe even a 5/10 if removing the environment normal mapping hadn't so vastly improved my frame rates -- so I personally am not bitching about the score. I like NWN2's potential -- there's a great D&D game lurking under all the massive performance issues, gross quest bugs (I leveled my party from 6 to 12 from one quest bug alone, and coulda got 'em all to 20 if I'd felt like turning in a 200XP quest ad nauseum), and ghastly art direction. After all, Avellone pens a good D&D tale, and the cats at Obsidian really know what D&D means to the fans in terms of mechanics. At it's core, it's really BG2 all over again, and it's a shame that all the non-gameplay components are holding it back so drastically.

Those sorts of observations are what I expected from a review. It's STILL an opinion, since there's folks that love the art direction (what what) and don't give a shit about sub-30 frame rates or mind endlessly tinkering with graphic options. There's folks that don't mind the breaking of buff stacking rules, either, but Matt could have at least discussed how WELL he felt it implemented AD&D rules much as -- again -- Madden implements NFL rules. No-one's asking him to feign objectivity; they're just asking him to keep his opinions in the context of the game itself.

[Kunikos]

There's quite a bit to ding NWN2 on (hideous hardware requirements, funky UI decisions, brain dead henchman AI) but basing a review of NWN2 on how D&D rules are old and crusty is kind of like giving Company of Heroes a 5 in a review (on a 7 to 9 scale!), dismissing it with "So, what's up with all these Germans?"

CAMPANY PF HEROS SUX WW2 gamse rae for FAGS!!!111ONEELVEN LOL

5 Douchebags out of 10.

Personally I don't get why Oblivion's marks were so high all around (someone mentioned that the reviewer wanted to be playing it instead of NWN2). The combat is boring as hell, the magic system makes mages weaklings, archery is worthless, stealth kills are practically impossible as the level curve goes up, the leveled monsters are terrible design (hello, I beat the first Oblivion gate at level 2 and killed every demon in Kvatch at level 3) and if you pair it with the quest reward items that are hard set to be a lower degraded version of itself then you are handicapping yourself by doing quests that have item rewards when you aren't max level. Frankly there are so many critical issues with its gameplay systems, that even without taking into account the fact that they coded the graphical system in some of the worst possible ways (distant LOD meshes are FULL polygon versions, no reduction-- STUPID). TES4 doesn't deserve a 9 or even an 8 out of 10. I give it a 7 out of 10, especially since the Windows version doesn't even work properly out of the box with the Microsoft Xbox 360 wired controller. Talk about a lack of even trying. And zero post release support for modders, gouging users for additional add-in content (finally Knights of the Nine seems *somewhat* reasonable-- if only for the fact that it is being compared to $2.00 horse armor). I'm glad the community have figured out what they were actually able to (which is WAY more than Bethesda wanted them to be able to do-- such as adding in new weapon/armor/etc meshes via the Civ4 nifskope editor and copying animations from other things), because out of the box it was a total disappointment after all the worshipping writers did for it.

I probably woulda given NWN2 a 6/10 -- maybe even a 5/10 if removing the environment normal mapping hadn't so vastly improved my frame rates

I'll have to try this because the latest patch (1.01) killed my framerate (on a 1GB/FX55/7900GTO no less). It's most noticeable at the Fort for some reason. I tried changing various things like lights and shadows, bloom, etc and nothing seemed to help. I'm hoping they will fix this or there is a driver I need from Nvidia that will alleviate this particular issue. That aside, I'm enjoying the hell out of NWN2. I have a Bard 4 / Fighter 2 so far, going for two more levels of Fighter, two more of Bard, then 10 of Red Dragon Disciple (possibly not in that order, I think I'll pick up a few stat bonuses from RDD levels mixed in).

[Rob_Merritt]

Based on your post of "hoping that NWN2 doesn't turn out good so I don't have to buy it" or whatever seems like you are just trying to latch onto whatever negatives you can find.

Actually I was thinking about Superman and Viva Pinata. At the time NWN 2 was a given before the reviews (professional and otherwise)

[Rock8man]

My initial thought after reading the review was: "Oh crap, GoGamer has already shipped it to me and I can't cancel it".

I mean, seriously, the review brings back a lot of memories of me playing all the way through Baldur's Gate 1, and trying unsuccessfully not to get bored to tears trying to play through Chapter 1 of Neverwinter Nights 1.

But then I read the other reviews out there, including the one from Gamespot, which seem to have the polar opposite opinion about the game, and I didn't know who to believe.

It's at that point that I started looking through the reviews for examples. Gamespot specifically says that if it went into details about why the storytelling is so good, it would spoil the story. Fair enough, because then the reviewer goes on to tell us about how there's so many different subtle dialogue choices that affect how people feel not just in extreme terms, but in subtle ways that will add up. So there you have specific examples of why storytelling is good.

In Matt's 1UP review, he obviously had very little space. They must have given him a low word count to keep it under. And with that kind of restriction, you have to make a choice on what to talk about. I think Matt had a clear choice on who to talk to in this review:

A) The person who cares deeply about D&D rules, and 3.5E rules, and is probably going to like the game a lot because of how faithful a conversion it is.

B) A person like me who doesn't give a crap about how faithful a conversion it is. A person who just wants to know if the story is compelling, if the fighting is fun, if the gameplay is solid, if the characters are deep, etc.

And even though Matt says that for Person A the review is more like 9/10, he still spends most of the review defending and justifying his opinion to person A instead of talking to person B (me).

There's a line that says "buh-bye storytelling and character development" and there's a line about how bad the voice acting is, but those things are barely mentioned and never backed up.

So I'm just confused by Matt's choice in this review. I really do want to know why the storytelling isn't good, and more about why he didn't like the character development. I didn't need to read multiple paragraphs about how number crunching and D&D rulesets don't matter as much in a game like this. I agree! They don't matter as much! So just leave them aside, and spend the rest of your short review talking about more important things, damn it! :)

So now I'm on the fence. The 1UP review seems to directly contradict the other reviews out there so far when it comes to how good the storytelling is. But since the Gamespot review is so much better written and has examples, I'm leaning more toward believing that one, and not giving as much credence to the 1UP review.

[Kunikos]

Rock8man: I'm guessing the X-Play review will be more straight-forward for the everyman given their tendency for tonge-in-cheek humor such as making fun of nerds whenever they can and ripping on the obviously boned aspects of games. You should even be able to get it onto your iPod via iTunes, since they have a "podcast" which is just review clips.

Actually, having an opinion does make you a critic, just not a professional one. You need to be paid for that. Which he was... with filthy microsoft blood money!

I don't really get why Microsoft was so interested, since it's not like the magazine has ever reviewed Mac or Linux games. Seems like they just wanted to do the same thing they do with every aspect of their business-- buy a business that already does it if you can.

[RepoMan]

gross quest bugs (I leveled my party from 6 to 12 from one quest bug alone, and coulda got 'em all to 20 if I'd felt like turning in a 200XP quest ad nauseum)
What quest bug is that, exactly?

Munchkinism FTW!

[Kunikos]

What quest bug is that, exactly?

Munchkinism FTW!

1.01 Patch notes will let you know. Return to the starting town and talk to someone after you've found someone for her. Keep talking to her over and over. Zzzz.

[Jason McMaster]

THIS IS FUCKING MADNESS!!!



AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Doug Erickson]

I have a monster rig (4800x2/4GB RAM/7800GTXx2 SLI) and NWN2 chugs for the oddest reasons in the oddest places -- for exmaple, it ran the battle in West Harbor smoothly, but a stupid web spell when fighting bandits turned it into a slide show. It hovered around 20 fps with everything maxed at 1680x1050, but occasional scenes and spells would plummet it below 5 fps.

Finally, I dropped the aniso levels to "Linear" and removed the environment normal mapping and reduced shadows to "player only, no environment", and now it stays in a playable 30-60fps range. The change in visual effect quality is noticable, but hardly terrible. Still: what the hell?

[Kunikos]

It's called "we should have spent another couple weeks tuning the graphic rendering speed," and it reminds me a LOT of the certain areas in KOTOR2 that would completely hose the framerate.
And what the hell is up with no way to reset to defaults for autodetect in the Advanced panel? I'm glad that I read there is already work being done on a 1.02 patch, so I hope some of these issues will get resolved within the month.

[Chris Nahr]

Why exactly do you need 30+ fps to play a D&D-based RPG? Can't you set the combat system to an essentially turn-based mode, as in NWN1 etc.?

[RepoMan]

Ah, so if I applied the 1.01 patch then they fixed that? Oh well, could have used a few cheap levels....

[Doug Erickson]

personal preference. I really cannot stand playing games under 30fps, and I prefer 60. The lag in input and animation drives me bonkers.

plus I really don't like playing BG-esque games as anything other than real-time. pausing sucks!

[Dave Long]

Higher framerates for every game type really are important. With that rig Doug's running, I'd expect every game on the planet to be just like a console game with regard to framerate and overall snappiness of performance.

It's called polish, and many PC games unfortunately never have it.

[mono]

I haven't run benchmarks, but I'd certainly suggest hunting down the no-CD/DVD crack for a nice speed improvement.

[Bill Dungsroman]

Y'know windski ol pal ol sock ol bean, I was all up on your nuts yesterday vis a vis the Peckerham article (which is still a mess), but then my vast network of spies and informants clued me in on something that, quite frankly, made me upchuck on my jodphurs.

I was starting to feel a little ill for throwing in with a shameless whore for NWN like skeezerbear, so I re-read your OP and all that naughty talk about my nizzle Green got stuck in my craw and then it hit me:

This is your site, isn't it? (http://www.dladventures.com) Hmm, wonder why you're so all up in arms about this bad NWN2 review on 1up? You transparent loser.

And and and, you got fired from CGW, didn't you? Or never hired? Disgruntled former/never employee, IIRC. Do IIRC? I bet if I went back through the ages (ie Usenet), I'd find all sorts of posts by you slagging CGW for their price, their direction, you allegedly being buddies with Johnny Wilson, all sorts of things.

Peckham's article is still internet dross but you! You, man, you're a fucking fanboi. Collect youir K0NY Award on the way out.

[Kunikos]

Hi All,

My Rig,

AMD 4800+
2 GB ram
2 x 7800 GTX in SLI

Ok, at 1280 res with the ‘recommended’ settings, I was getting in the region of 10 – 15 fps outdoors.

I’m now at 60+ fps, by going into the NVIDA settings, tuning for ‘performance’ and turning the vsync to ‘force off’. With the shadows off, this went to around 30 fps. Then by turning the water effects off, it shot up to 60 fps and above.

Hope this helps someone.

Marc

I'll try the driver panel stuff later tonight and see if it works for me.

Also, to Bill: OH, SNAP.

[Skipper]

I think I need some of that popcorn now.

*Also pulls up a chair.*

[Matt Perkins]

/me takes a seat on Skipper's lap and shares the popcorn...


Yeah, that's an interesting development. Replies anyone? dla adventures man?

[Quaro]

I haven't run benchmarks, but I'd certainly suggest hunting down the no-CD/DVD crack for a nice speed improvement.

++

Can make a big difference depending on brand of DVD drive.

[Kunikos]

There is a new driver for Geforce (Version: 93.71) up. If you have graphical problems try it. It helped me a bit. Before it I could only play on Med Texture settings, no shadows and water goods.

Now I can play high and everything added with only a small bit of lag (going to remove water reflection and reduce shadows a bit, to run the game 100%)

http://www.nvidia.com/content/drivers/drivers.asp

Good luck to you all

More goodness. Try it out if you're on a green machine. :)

[charmtrap]

So, lemme get this straight: OP is an NWN fanboi, therefore the review is now non-shitty. Ad Hominiem FTW?

That was probably the worst-written, least-reasoned review I've read this year. How it got past an editor is the real question. NWN2 may suck, but not for any of the reasons the reviewer gave.

[Tom McNamara]

Does this thread come with a flowchart? Thanks!

[olaf]

I haven't run benchmarks, but I'd certainly suggest hunting down the no-CD/DVD crack for a nice speed improvement.
lol seriously? Do publishers never learn? Copy protection that makes game performance poorer, to the point of reducing customer enjoyment. Who would possibly sign off on that?

[Kunikos]

So, lemme get this straight: OP is an NWN fanboi, therefore the review is now non-shitty. Ad Hominiem FTW?

I do not this his post means what you think it means. Read it again, slowly.

Done yet?

Good.

In case you missed it a second time, he said the review wasn't very good AND that the motivation for making a whole new thread for this attack on the review could be because of a potential grudge with a former employer.

[Charles]

Y'know windski ol pal ol sock ol bean, I was all up on your nuts yesterday vis a vis the Peckerham article (which is still a mess), but then my vast network of spies and informants clued me in on something that, quite frankly, made me upchuck on my jodphurs.

I was starting to feel a little ill for throwing in with a shameless whore for NWN like skeezerbear, so I re-read your OP and all that naughty talk about my nizzle Green got stuck in my craw and then it hit me:

This is your site, isn't it? (http://www.dladventures.com) Hmm, wonder why you're so all up in arms about this bad NWN2 review on 1up? You transparent loser.

And and and, you got fired from CGW, didn't you? Or never hired? Disgruntled former/never employee, IIRC. Do IIRC? I bet if I went back through the ages (ie Usenet), I'd find all sorts of posts by you slagging CGW for their price, their direction, you allegedly being buddies with Johnny Wilson, all sorts of things.

Peckham's article is still internet dross but you! You, man, you're a fucking fanboi. Collect youir K0NY Award on the way out.

A+.

Fucking text limit.

[Kunikos]

A+.

Fucking text limit.

D-. You got a few points for noticing something golden, but your post is still fucking worthless. ;)

Is it just me or did other people not bother to renew their subscription with CGW way before their name change was ever announced anyway? Really, with blogs, online review/preview sites, podcasts and this forum the only use for these mags is some month old pictures to look at while I pinch a loaf.

[Tom McNamara]

Is it just me or did other people not bother to renew their subscription with CGW way before their name change was ever announced anyway? Really, with blogs, online review/preview sites, podcasts and this forum the only use for these mags is some month old pictures to look at while I pinch a loaf.

Well, there's still a large contingent of folks, the more casual players, who get their gaming info in print form. While online content is of course more timely, you do have to spread around your surfing habits to get a good feel for a game. A magazine has a periodic dose of content in a portable, concise form, and you can drop it on the ground and even light it on fire and still be able to use it. Plus you can refer back to it easily and take it with you to a store as a purchase reference.

It also doubles as toilet paper in a pinch!

[Kunikos]

Google Personalized Homepage lets me add the RSS feeds for my favorite game sites. I have one tab for individual's blogs, and another for news sites and multi-person blogs. I don't have to revisit the sites all the time, I just glance at the headlines to see if anything new shows up whenever I'm done checking my Gmail. Between Gamespot PC News, Joystiq, Kotaku, Destructoid, and Slashdot Games, I have it all mostly covered. I wish The Magic Box had an RSS feed, as that's the only one that I seem to visit manually these days.

The only print mag issues I actually look forward to are the ones that have exclusivity for a preview on an upcoming game that I'm excited about-- but those are few and far between. I would buy a copy of "Games for Windows" if they had exclusive news/content about Fallout 3, for example.

[SuperHiro]

I have a problem buying 5/10 as an "average" score.

[caesarbear]

I don't mean to rub this in the face of people who are having issues, but I'm running NWN2 on a two year-old system w/ plain vanilla 6800. Almost all settings are maxed and it's easily running over 30fps, closer to low 40s.

[flyinj]

I don't mean to rub this in the face of people who are having issues, but I'm running NWN2 on a two year-old system w/ plain vanilla 6800. Almost all settings are maxed and it's easily running over 30fps, closer to low 40s.

I find that extremely hard to believe. I'm running on a 3.4 P4, 7900GT OC and 2 gigs of RAM, and if I put most settings to max I get a framerate of 10-15 fps.

[RepoMan]

Does this thread come with a flowchart? Thanks!
http://unrealities.com/Flowchart.png

Some details omitted (mainly popcorn). Hope that helps!

Edit: PeckHAM, not PeckMAN. I was up until 3 am playing the fucking game OK? So shut up.

[Saxman_72]

I have a problem buying 5/10 as an "average" score.
You're right, on a scale of 1-10, 5.5 is the average.

[Matt Perkins]

I don't mean to rub this in the face of people who are having issues, but I'm running NWN2 on a two year-old system w/ plain vanilla 6800. Almost all settings are maxed and it's easily running over 30fps, closer to low 40s.
Yeah, no bugs in this engine. :P



Also, Repo, LOVELY chart. Completely captures the essence.

[caesarbear]

This is your site, isn't it? (http://www.dladventures.com) Hmm, wonder why you're so all up in arms about this bad NWN2 review on 1up? You transparent loser.
Oh, brilliant detective work Bill, especially after he told you (http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/showpost.php?p=717175&postcount=20):
I have to admit to being the Producer of the development team that created the exterior tileset depicted in the first shot under contract to BioWare.
and I told you (http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/showpost.php?p=718081&postcount=52):
The poster Steel_Wind, is spokesman for DLA, a content group that's produced the tileset used in Daggerford, a cloak system, and ridable horses, and he's still asked "Is that all?"
back in our favorite NWN thread.

Incidently, the OP posted here after reading about Matt's 1UP review on NWN2 General. (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com/forums/viewtopic.html?topic=508486&forum=109&sp=32) But I'm sure you knew that, since your internets skillz are so good.

So yeah you nailed him. Someone who likes NWN2 actually posted about a shitty review of NWN2. Definately worthy of another BillD mouth foaming.

[caesarbear]

Yeah, no bugs in this engine. :P

Oh no, I don't mean to say there aren't any bugs. It's obvious that there are. It's just that it's not hitting everyone.

[caesarbear]

I find that extremely hard to believe. I'm running on a 3.4 P4, 7900GT OC and 2 gigs of RAM, and if I put most settings to max I get a framerate of 10-15 fps.
What I'm trying to say is that the issues might be more software/driver related than hardware related.

[jeffd]

D&D is absolutely about number crunching.

I always thought DnD was about role playing.. the dice and numbers are there only as a system of regulating the decision-making of players.

If this NWN is about number crunching and not role playing, than it deserves a 5.. no?

[Kalle]

D&D is absolutely about number crunching.

Agreed, D&D caters to people who like roleplaying psychopathic munchkins.

[Bill Dungsroman]

Oh, brilliant detective work Bill, especially after he told you (http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/showpost.php?p=717175&postcount=20):

and I told you (http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/showpost.php?p=718081&postcount=52):

back in our favorite NWN thread.

Incidently, the OP posted here after reading about Matt's 1UP review on NWN2 General. (http://nwn2forums.bioware.com/forums/viewtopic.html?topic=508486&forum=109&sp=32) But I'm sure you knew that, since your internets skillz are so good.

So yeah you nailed him. Someone who likes NWN2 actually posted about a shitty review of NWN2. Definately worthy of another BillD mouth foaming.

Yeah it was, wasn't it? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA you're so pathetic, Bro. You're so fruity and up NWN'2 DEEGEETALL ass you can't even fucking figure out what I'm saying. Way to avoid all caps this time you...you mouthfoamer.

Fanbois. Worthless. Look, I spelled it right. Definitely.

[foogla]

Agreed, D&D caters to people who like roleplaying psychopathic munchkins.

Also roleplaying and (mastering) Mary Sues (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Sue).

[Drastic]

I don't know; I think there's other rpgs that reward Mary-Sue-seekiness better than D&D.

Videogame-wise, you can make a strong case that Oblivion is much better suited to that approach, since it's not difficult to quickly develop a character who's walking perfection in every aspect simply by playing without any cheats. Come to think of it, maybe that's why it was so populated with hideously ugly people.

[Charles]

D&D is absolutely about number crunching.


No, it really isn't. But there are freaks out there who take it that way. The best D&D experience out there is with DMs willing to bend and break the rules as required to make for an entertaining gaming experience. I've never met a rules lawyer you didn't sink a game.

Think is though, you slap these stupid rulesets in to a PC game, and suddenly there's only the harsh reality that the ruleset as an abstraction of what you can and cannot do only works in a situation where you have a human brain behind it, mitigating the thorough soullessness of the rule system itself.

[jeffd]

Not necessarily. But anyone who says it's not about crunching numbers is in denial. LOOK AT ME IM NOT ONE OF THOSE LUSER ROLLPLAYERS I"M A ROLEPLAYER LOLOL

Agreed, D&D caters to people who like roleplaying psychopathic munchkins.

[Matt Perkins]

Charles

It doesn't have to be about number crunching, but you haven't to admit, more than any other system out there that D&D attracts the munchkin type.

Heck, the game as you roll and create your character (if you follow their steps) before you worry about a theme or idea for you guy. That's completely backwards and definitely doesn't help.


Yes, a good DM will make it a lot better and let the numbers not be the focus, but the game is setup to be based around numbers.

[deepruntramp]

http://unrealities.com/Flowchart.png

Some details omitted (mainly popcorn). Hope that helps!

Edit: PeckHAM, not PeckMAN. I was up until 3 am playing the fucking game OK? So shut up.
shit and bonerz loves all

[Lorini]

So what game is not about number crunching in the end anyway? Assuming you include probability assessment as number crunching, I can't think of any games that can't be eventually broken down to a set of numbers.

(Politlely) correct me if I'm wrong here folks :)

Lorini

[Damien Neil]

All criticism is subjective. Matt truly didn't like the game, so what exactly was he supposed to do? Lie? Read other reviews, go "oh crap, everybody else gave it an 8, I should too!" No. He put his opinion on paper, which is all a critic is supposed to do. It's editorial's job to decide whether it should be published or reassigned.

No, all criticism is not subjective. Criticism is not about saying "that roxxored" or "this was teh suck". Heck, not even reviewing is that simple.

The problem with Matt's review is not that he didn't like the game. Not liking the game is perfectly reasonable. The problem is that he did a terrible job of supporting his opinion that the game is a poor one, and that he covers the nature of the game in only the most superficial of fashions.

[jeffd]

Well, in the sense that "many RPGs use probability mechanisms to determine outcomes" you're right.

However D&D puts the number crunching front and center. As pointed out, the first thing the books tell you to do is roll up your attributes. The reward system is based primarily around killing things, which is a direct application of the mechanical system. In exchange, you level up and get more resources to use in the system to kill things.

That's not a bad thing per se (it's one of the reasons I like D&D in a video game; having a computer to do all the math for me lets me focus on what's important: killing things and taking their stuff). It's just a (IMO accurate) analysis of what D&D is about.

For games that aren't about number crunching, google for:
- Primetime adventures (still has a probability mechanic to resolve conflicts)
- Universalis.

So what game is not about number crunching in the end anyway? Assuming you include probability assessment as number crunching, I can't think of any games that can't be eventually broken down to a set of numbers.

(Politlely) correct me if I'm wrong here folks :)

Lorini

[Charles]

Yes, a good DM will make it a lot better and let the numbers not be the focus, but the game is setup to be based around numbers.

No, it's really not.

The numbers are an abstraction to put some structure in to a shared imaginative scenario. People have lost sight of this. Without the structure provided by the rules, everything would devolve to a "yes I did!" "no I didn't!" situation.

[caesarbear]

...you can't even fucking figure out what I'm saying.
Ok, first, was is your deal with me? I can't tell when your joking or not. Do you actually have an issue with me and if so, wtf is it?

And second, what are you saying about the OP? He came here to post about a review, to Qt3 the Virtual Ombudsman Department of gaming journalism. So?

[Cold Blooded]

Coming in late to discussion.

Has review been removed? Can't find it now.

[Matt Perkins]

No, it's really not.

The numbers are an abstraction to put some structure in to a shared imaginative scenario. People have lost sight of this. Without the structure provided by the rules, everything would devolve to a "yes I did!" "no I didn't!" situation. Bah! Bah I say!

Compare it to Vampire by White Wolf for instance. Sure, V doesn't have the level of rules D20 does, but it starts of your character creation without four steps to define the concept.

D20? 5 or 6 steps that define how your character works with the math. Weee...


Or in V the storyteller is the absolute master of the game, in d20, well, they are supposed to be listened to, mostly.

D20 creates a rules full environment with some roleplaying tacked on if you want, V creates a roleplay environment with rules so you don't play the he said, she said game you referred to.

It breaks down to this... you can play a full session, a full campaign of D20 without ever roleplaying your character at all. I know, I've played in those games. They aren't fun, unless there is a lot of drinking involved. Vampire? I guess if you were to bastardize the rules and ignore a whole host of things, you might be able to do it, but if you follow the system, you're pretty much required to roleplay.


That being said, I'm a HUGE D20 geek. I love the system, I love playing it, I love running it. But the system is hindered by it's math roots, not enchanced by it. I'd love to see D&D 4 put the focus back on roleplaying and still hve all the lovely rules we all know and love. As it stands, I have to do that when I run the game. I have to create my own character creation (for instance) rules (if I'm not playing with my normal group of peeps) so I can get roleplaying to come naturually and not have to drag it out of people doing only number crunching.


Some additional systems by Monte Cook (I forget the name, his system awash in magic) was much better for this, but since it was just a D20 overhaul, it was still limited by default.

[Kunikos]

Or in V the storyteller is the absolute master of the game, in d20, well, they are supposed to be listened to, mostly.

That's because in Vampire the storyteller has to do everything off the cuff and in D&D a lot more is governed by rules and rolls. The upside of Vampire is that a very good storyteller can run a very good game, assuming his breadth of knowledge about the World of Darkness includes enough to keep the players interested and feeling like they can actually affect their destinies. The downside of Vampire is that a bad storyteller can completely tank the game. On the flip of that, D&D with a good DM can be just as good as any Vampire game-- if not better because of a more clearly defined and probabilistically sound combat system. In Vampire, adding additional dice to a pool not only increases your chance to get X successes, but it also increases your chance to get botches. The modifier to a single dice roll in 3.0+ D&D is far easier as well. Who the hell wants to roll six or seven D10 dice, count up how many successes and failures, critical successes and failures, and use perks to reroll botches, etc? What a pain. In PnP Vampire even if you have a 10 strength and melee combination, you have the same chance to succeed as you do to fail. So why bother putting additional points into your traits/attributes/etc? (One caveat: My experience is with the last revision of Vampire, so if they've significantly changed this then well, I guess it aint as bad as it was)

.. and as for D20 DMs only being "listened to", well, I suppose that depends on who is doing the DM work. I've had some that are that bad and some that roleplay NPCs to levels far beyond what the players do for their own characters.

[Jeff Green]

Coming in late to discussion.

Has review been removed? Can't find it now.

Yes. It's been pulled after a long internal meeting between 1UP and GFW. We'll have a couple statements about it online soon.

Teh Friday Funtime Continuez!

[Saxman_72]

whoa.

[Troy S Goodfellow]

Yes. It's been pulled after a long internal meeting between 1UP and GFW. We'll have a couple statements about it online soon.

Teh Friday Funtime Continuez!

This is why I never want to be an editor. You guys have no fun.

Troy

[Kunikos]

The irony of people who complain about the review scale being from 7 to 10 out of 10 and then later complaining about a review score of 5 is deliciously palpable.

[Charles]

Yes. It's been pulled after a long internal meeting between 1UP and GFW. We'll have a couple statements about it online soon.

Teh Friday Funtime Continuez!


Isn't it nice to know that the vocal fanbois can crush an honest opinion about a game.

[Matt Perkins]

Kuni

Yeah, I'm really not touting one system over the other, just using Vampire as an example of how D20 could have setup itself up to be a much better roleplaying focused system.

As I said, I'm a huge D20 fan. Played numerous different systems in it, not just D&D (do NOT play D20 star wars :) ).

And the absolute biggest thing that makes a good game, no matter the system, is the DM. Hands down the absolute most important part.

P.S. - yeah, in my D20 games, I'm the master and lord of all. You HAVE to run it that way, imho. The PnP game is about the players having a good time, not the players arguing rules.

[Kunikos]

Isn't it nice to know that the vocal fanbois can crush an honest opinion about a game.

I wouldn't care less if it was a 5 out of 10 if he had bothered to explain in greater detail why he disliked certain aspects of the game. As it stands it's only marginally better than a GameStop or EBGames knee-jerk user contributed "review." I don't know if I should put some fault at the feet of the editors who clearly felt like he had to be given a small word count so they could fit more advertisements on the page layout and less transitions between pages (you think maybe people get tired of moving between pages because you have so few words on each page? nahhhh).

[Kunikos]

Yeah, I'm really not touting one system over the other, just using Vampire as an example of how D20 could have setup itself up to be a much better roleplaying focused system.

Both games are more or less what you make of them. I have yet to meet a DM who doesn't bend, break, ignore, or create their own house rules or systems to adapt to their particular brand of game setting. Also, "roleplaying" is only as good as the people participating. Inevitably there is always one person who cross-gender "roleplays" and just starts the spiral towards sexual congress with any NPC that smiles at them much to the discomfort of everyone else in the room, or the trying-too-hard -to-be-craaaaazy Malkavian, or the I'm-a-Total-Rebel (but I'm still going to stick around with you guys because otherwise I can't play the game) with a black jacket and mirrorshades.

[AndrewPf]

I wouldn't care less if it was a 5 out of 10 if he had bothered to explain in greater detail why he disliked certain aspects of the game. As it stands it's only marginally better than a GameStop or EBGames knee-jerk user contributed "review." I don't know if I should put some fault at the feet of the editors who clearly felt like he had to be given a small word count so they could fit more advertisements on the page layout and less transitions between pages (you think maybe people get tired of moving between pages because you have so few words on each page? nahhhh).

The word count was "small" because it was originally written for print, not online.

[Jeff Green]

It's not the score that got this thing pulled. ( For all I know that score is still valid. ) It's also not the opinion of angry fanbois that got it pulled.
It's the issue of tone/fairness brought up in this thread. And that was the fault of the Ziff Davis editors---meaning, among other people, me. I stand by Peckham. You can throw your rocks at me.

[Kunikos]

If you stand by it, why is it not up?

[Matt Perkins]

Both games are more or less what you make of them. Right, but it's my contention, as a DM and a player, and my normal group's thought too, that you'll find a LOT (A LOT) more munchkin types in D20, because the system focuses on that so much. Go any PnP gaming store (if they exist around you) and check out the different types of players that play the afore mentioned system. Of course, on the other hand, LARPers definitely gravitate towards WW games more, so make of that what you will. :P

[Charles]

It's not the score that got this thing pulled. ( For all I know that score is still valid. ) It's also not the opinion of angry fanbois that got it pulled.
It's the issue of tone/fairness brought up in this thread. And that was the fault of the Ziff Davis editors---meaning, among other people, me. I stand by Peckham. You can throw your rocks at me.


Can't speak for the rest of the fools in this thread, but the review addressed a lot of shit that's important to me, so I figure that the rating and the review were both extremely valid. That rules-lawyering doesn't bother some people doesn't mean you should've put a rules lover on doing the review. That would've been unfair to people who don't give a shit about the rules, and are just looking for a good PC RPG. I suspect there are more people who just want a good PC RPG than people who want a faithful reproduction of a limiting and restrictive ruleset.

[m3mnoch]

Time to shuffle another party member (improved to four simultaneous) through the level-up grinder, which you can click "recommend" to zip past&but then, what's the point?
um. so. can someone tell me why it is (oops... evidently "was") even a remotely good review when he's so self-contradictory?

"dude. number-crunching sucks!"
"dude. not crunching numbers sucks!"

even his bit at the end about how if you're the target market, you'll like it, but, if you're not in the target market, it's a "5." is it a review or isn't it?

wishy-washy-flip-floppy crap.

m3mnoch.

[stusser]

Because he fucked up. It should never have been posted. It isn't Peckham's fault, it's his for approving it in the first place.

[Kunikos]

Right, but it's my contention, as a DM and a player, and my normal group's thought too, that you'll find a LOT (A LOT) more munchkin types in D20, because the system focuses on that so much. Go any PnP gaming store (if they exist around you) and check out the different types of players that play the afore mentioned system. Of course, on the other hand, LARPers definitely gravitate towards WW games more, so make of that what you will. :P

I can understand, but as long as the DM has a pair of balls at all then they will tell them what they can and can't do and make sure that the playing field is fair for those who aren't playing Statmaster. Usually this can be in the form of taking the time to help supervise character creation with each person on a one-on-one basis, which can be especially helpful for those people who aren't intimately familiar with certain rules or optional rules that the DM will allow. For example, if I don't know the GURPS system and want to make a character for that GMs game then doing it on my own will go nowhere fast since I don't have the luxury to pour over every last table and detail outside of the game group meeting with my personal copy of every single sourcebook that the GM might have. :)

[Kunikos]

even his bit at the end about how if you're the target market, you'll like it, but, if you're not in the target market, it's a "5." is it a review or isn't it?

wishy-washy-flip-floppy crap.

I can see the attack ads now. Election season has spilled over from P&R!! OHNOES!! :O

[jeffd]

You guys are all blowing smoke everywhere but really missing a few points.

Yeah with a good enough GM Vampire can be awesome, and so can D&D. Talking about what a good GM can do with a game is pointless - a good GM will run a good game no matter what.

The only useful comparisons that can be made are by looking at what the game text says. And the game text of D&D says it's a game about using math to kill monsters and take their stuff. That's not to say it can't be used for other things (obviously it can), but as designed it's a murder and robbery spreadsheet.

That's because in Vampire the storyteller has to do everything off the cuff and in D&D a lot more is governed by rules and rolls. The upside of Vampire is that a very good storyteller can run a very good game, assuming his breadth of knowledge about the World of Darkness includes enough to keep the players interested and feeling like they can actually affect their destinies. The downside of Vampire is that a bad storyteller can completely tank the game. On the flip of that, D&D with a good DM can be just as good as any Vampire game-- if not better because of a more clearly defined and probabilistically sound combat system. In Vampire, adding additional dice to a pool not only increases your chance to get X successes, but it also increases your chance to get botches. The modifier to a single dice roll in 3.0+ D&D is far easier as well. Who the hell wants to roll six or seven D10 dice, count up how many successes and failures, critical successes and failures, and use perks to reroll botches, etc? What a pain. In PnP Vampire even if you have a 10 strength and melee combination, you have the same chance to succeed as you do to fail. So why bother putting additional points into your traits/attributes/etc? (One caveat: My experience is with the last revision of Vampire, so if they've significantly changed this then well, I guess it aint as bad as it was)

.. and as for D20 DMs only being "listened to", well, I suppose that depends on who is doing the DM work. I've had some that are that bad and some that roleplay NPCs to levels far beyond what the players do for their own characters.

[Jeff Green]

If you stand by it, why is it not up?

I stand by Matt Peckham. I think there were valid issues with the review in question, as did others at Ziff. But that's ultimately the editors' faults.

[Matt Perkins]

Agreed Kunikos, definitely. As we both said, the DM/GM/Storyteller/whatever makes the game, no matter the system, agreed completely.

[jeffd]

argh just re-read my last post and realized I came across as condescending and dismissive. Sorry! I blame the burrito I had at lunch; it was a real letdown and has left me surly.

In any event - my points do stand. If we want to have a useful discussion comparing games, we have to remove the GM from the equation. Any good GM will make for a good game; that's obvious and it's pretty pointless to say. When we evaluate a gaming system, what we should focus on are two things:
1) What is this gaming system trying to do?
2) How well does it do that?

For D&D, #1 is kind of hard to answer. The theory is that it's trying to simulate fantasy - but let's be honest, D&D fantasy is its own genre. If you look at a play transcript of just about every D&D game ever it's nothing like Tolkein, or Howard's Conan, or really just about any fantasy fiction out there. It's its own thing, and it's mainly focused around a tactical exercise. To wit - D&D is based around the players pitting their wits against the GM (and one another). You're rewarded for overcoming challenges that the GM presents you with; and your reward takes the form of experience (which gets you to a new level, which gives you more resources to overcome challenges) and loot (which gives you more tools to overcome challenges).

As for #2 - how well does it work - it's OK. There's better out there for that style of gaming, but D&D is pretty good. It's still got some wierd bits that are holdovers from its roots as a wargame in the 70's - but it's not as bad. Anyone who played AD&D will remember the HUGE list of weapons. AD&D literally probably had about 15 variants on the polearm, all of which were almost identical. Do we really need a system that distinguishes between a Bill-Guisarme and a Halberd? Do we even know what the fuck a Bill-Guisarme is?

[Sidd_Budd]

even his bit at the end about how if you're the target market, you'll like it, but, if you're not in the target market, it's a "5." is it a review or isn't it?

wishy-washy-flip-floppy crap.
While I don't believe the review was well-written -- mainly due to word count limitations -- I liked this part of Peckham's review. For a game like NWN2, you need to consider two groups -- fans of PC RPGs, and fans of D&D. These groups don't overlap completely -- I eventually pick up all RPGs, but I haven't played D&D since 2nd edition. I don't believe there is a single target market. I could care less if the game is only 90% faithful to D&D 3.5 rules, as long as the gameplay is engaging. D&D purists may think differently.

Peckham geared his review primarily to RPG fans, and included a modification for D&D nuts. I think that's an appropriate tone for a computer games site. Whoever reviews the game for Dragon magazine (if that's still published) should frame the review primarily for a D&D-loving audience, with general computer gamers as a secondary concern.

And props to Jeff, for keeping us in the loop (way beyond what an EIC would need to do), taking responsibility, and sticking by his writer.

[Bill Dungsroman]

Can't speak for the rest of the fools in this thread, but the review addressed a lot of shit that's important to me, so I figure that the rating and the review were both extremely valid. That rules-lawyering doesn't bother some people doesn't mean you should've put a rules lover on doing the review. That would've been unfair to people who don't give a shit about the rules, and are just looking for a good PC RPG. I suspect there are more people who just want a good PC RPG than people who want a faithful reproduction of a limiting and restrictive ruleset.
I'd rather you didn't speak for me Charles because I think you've gone insane, and not the happy-time Bill dickwaving insane, the sad-face Graeme Dice kind of insane.

Here's my problem with the review, beyond the horrific grammar and style: he says at the end if you, the player, dig on D&D adaptations, the game's an "8 or a 9." Soooo, what's the fucking score of the fucking game? 5? 8? 9? He invalidates his entire review with that closer. He's not sticking to his personal opinion, the one he seems to be so in love with, going against the grain and speaking TEH TROOF. He's pussing right out and essentially nullifying his entire review. He belabors some specifics about the game, some of which are legitimate. And yet...under a certain frame of reference...9!

You see? I'd be just as confused if he'd left out all the D&D rules hate and put in a bunch of other arguably legit critiques and gave the game a 9 straight up. See, here's the caveat: I don't think the game is a 9, either. And I love the retardedly confusing AD&D rules set. So Peckham strikes out twice, and it's my opinion that that is at least partially why Green yanked the review. It tells you a big pile of nothing. He gave NWN2 a 5-9. What kind of fucking score is that?

[Doug Erickson]

That rules-lawyering doesn't bother some people doesn't mean you should've put a rules lover on doing the review. That would've been unfair to people who don't give a shit about the rules, and are just looking for a good PC RPG.

Guess we shouldn't have hardcore NFL fans reviewing Madden, either. (How pissed would football fans be if I dinged Madden 2007 and rated it a 4 for "not being more fun like Blitz or Mutant League?") We shouldn't have people with at least a passing knowledge of and preference for real-world racing review Gran Turismo or Forza, either; "dude, it sucks; where's the alternate routes and massive crashes from superior arcade racers like Burnout Revenge!"

Look, NWN2 is a D&D game, and SPECIFICALLY caters to the D&D fanbase. The bloody logo is all over the box. It has tools for making D&D2 modules. It allows for online multiplay using the D&D 3.5E ruleset. THE GAME IS ABOUT D&D FIRST, and generic RPGing second. The audience is D&D NERDS, not overall RPG fanboys in general.

This is the same shit the drives me nuts when I see Nightmare of Druaga, Pokeyman Mystery Dungeon and other roguelikes get dinged for -- get this -- BEING ROGUELIKES. A lot of people LIKE ROGUELIKE GAMEPLAY and want to know how the game holds up AS A ROGUELIKE. Just because it has stats and elves and dungeons does NOT mean it is supposed to play like Final Fantasy or Oblivion.

I hate the stupid sop they throw at the end of reviews like that: "...if you're a fan of mindless dungeon crawls, add X points to the score." Fuck YOU! How about: "...if you're looking for a traditional party-based RPG, subtract X points from the score" -- a reviewer should have ENOUGH experience in gaming to tell what the inspiration, influences, and audience driving a particular design entail, and what the appeal is! If you can't tell Druaga is supposed to cater to roguelike fans; if you can't tell that a DW game is designed to cater to BEU and series fans; if you can't tell that NWN2 is designed to cater to D&D fanboys: DON'T FUCKING REVIEW THE GAME.

MAF pointed out a hilarious review of Vice City Stories on IGN that ends with the same caveat (verbatim): "Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories is essentially more of the same, for better or for worse. It's a nice leap over what we saw in last year's release of Liberty City Stories, but it still feels "safe" by many standards. The story is certainly sub-par and there are problems with close combat while armed with a firearm or when attacked in groups, but it still has all of the elements that makes every Grand Theft Auto game great. It's funny, doesn't take itself seriously, the gameplay mechanics are mostly great fun and the world is a fantastic place to screw around in."

The score: 9.0

Now, replace the GTA reference and the predictable series praise with Dynasty Warriors and the likewise predictable eye-rolling:

"Dynasty Warriors is essentially more of the same, for better or for worse. It's a nice leap over what we saw in last year's release of Dynasty Warriors, but it still feels "safe" by many standards. The story is certainly sub-par and there are problems with [strategic management] and the [combo-driven combat], but it still has all of the elements that makes every Dynasty Warriors game [tedious]. It's [laborious], doesn't take itself seriously, the gameplay mechanics are [the same old beat em up crap] and the world is [yet more ancient China] to screw around in."

The score would be a 4.5-6.0, largely depending on the reviewers mood. Yet this series is a million-selling series, and one many, many, MANY people love. How the fuck hard is it to find people who if not like than at least UNDERSTAND the appeal of a given game in a series or subgenre and have THEM review it?

[MikeJ]

In PnP Vampire even if you have a 10 strength and melee combination, you have the same chance to succeed as you do to fail. So why bother putting additional points into your traits/attributes/etc? (One caveat: My experience is with the last revision of Vampire, so if they've significantly changed this then well, I guess it aint as bad as it was)

I don't know how it worked in the previous version, but that doesn't seem to be a problem in the more recent version of WoD. You get a dice pool of skill + attribute (+/-)circumstances. An 8 or higher is always a success, reroll 10s for the chance at more. You don't subtract successes and the only time you can critically fail is if your dice pool is reduced to 1 (through modifiers) and you roll a 1.

It actually seems fairly clean, except you are probably still rolling too many dice.

[Kunikos]

The only useful comparisons that can be made are by looking at what the game text says. And the game text of D&D says it's a game about using math to kill monsters and take their stuff. That's not to say it can't be used for other things (obviously it can), but as designed it's a murder and robbery spreadsheet.

Your hyperbole poked my eye out. x_o

[Kunikos]

I don't know how it worked in the previous version, but that doesn't seem to be a problem in the more recent version of WoD. You get a dice pool of skill + attribute (+/-)circumstances. An 8 or higher is always a success, reroll 10s for the chance at more. You don't subtract successes and the only time you can critically fail is if your dice pool is reduced to 1 (through modifiers) and you roll a 1.

It actually seems fairly clean, except you are probably still rolling too many dice.

I was under the impression that a 3 or below constituted a botch and that a 1 was a critical botch, both negating their positive counterparts.

Yes, too many dice. My hands can't hold that many dice at once and they go flying off the table top when they land like a crazy game of marbles.

[Doug Erickson]

See, here's the caveat: I don't think the game is a 9, either. And I love the retardedly confusing AD&D rules set.

I love you, Bill. NWN2 is a mediocre game -- hardly a 9. It has many severe failings, and none of which were addressed by the review.

Also, why the HELL did the review NOT mention the toolkit and the online multiplayer -- two of the big selling points for the game and the features of greatest interest to its player community?

[Drastic]

argh just re-read my last post and realized I came across as condescending and dismissive. Sorry! I blame...

Internalized White Wolf text?

...the burrito I had at lunch; it was a real letdown and has left me surly.

Oh. Nevermind then.

[MikeJ]

I was under the impression that a 3 or below constituted a botch and that a 1 was a critical botch, both negating their positive counterparts.

That must be the old version.

[Kunikos]

They just released the DM Client as well, so I guess an addendum might be in order if fairness was valued at all. I'm not holding my breath. :X

I wouldn't rate the game a 9 either, guys. Too many problems with graphical slowdown and launch patching-- some people got version 0.95 according to the auto-patcher, I mean what the hell is that? Not only that but they still haven't released this "critical rebuild" patch that the auto-patcher continually refers you to. I really hope that all these wrinkles will get smoothed out because I think there's a really good game in there that some less masochistic (read: not a D&D fan) players will get turned off from otherwise.

That said, I think if you picked up Might & Magic 4 or Wizardry 8 and started complaining about how there were too many stats and fights involved and that numbers are for losers then I might think you were an idiot for at least not acknowledging the people who might actually like such a game. I'm not going to write a review for Madden 2007 and say, "Jesus this game sucks, I mean I hate football and wish this was soccer." That's essentially the difference between NWN2's treatment of D&D and Oblivion's hidden skill modifier level up system that you have to meta-game to not hamstring your character who likes to socialize in town more than shooting fireballs at oh-so-dangerous crabs.

[Damien Neil]

The irony of people who complain about the review scale being from 7 to 10 out of 10 and then later complaining about a review score of 5 is deliciously palpable.

Is anyone here serioiusly complaining about the score? Fuck the score. The problem is that the review stinks. Not because it trashes NWN2, but because it has crap grammar, no focus, no in-depth examination of anything related to the game, no interesting insights, and no balls.

I hate the sad, pathetic defense of lazy reviewing: "You're all just a bunch of fanboys!" No. Screw that. This is not a story about the brave reviewer telling it like it is and being shouted down by the unwashed, mouthbreathing fanboys.

[caesarbear]

...That would've been unfair to people who don't give a shit about the rules, and are just looking for a good PC RPG. I suspect there are more people who just want a good PC RPG than people who want a faithful reproduction of a limiting and restrictive ruleset.
Yeah, but the review didn't succeed in saying if was a good if you don't pay attention to the rules or not. IMO, it's a good RPG despite being D&D. I'm rather annoyed by all the munchkin character threads in every forum I read, but still I think NWN2 is looking like a good RPG. The review slams story and characters without giving anything as to why. Now, there are certainly negatives with NWN2. It isn't a step towards a more involving cRPG. It's relying on the conventions of older cRPGs and that worth points off in my book. The engine is essentially an update of NWN1, so that a number of the odd quirks and annoyances still exists.

Yet, while characters in general can be fit into categories we've seen before, it's the execution of character involvement that should win some positives for NWN2. That's the kind of thing that is important to gamers looking for a good RPG without having to worry about rules, and Matt's review didn't have any of those kinds of things. Whether or not overall NWN2 makes a good RPG is of course Matt's critical opinion, but saying 'character and story suck', just doesn't cut it.

[jeffd]

Kunikos: The old White Wolf system worked like this:

- you had a dice pool of D10 based on attribute + ability. You had a "difficulty" set by the GM. Every die that rolls equal to or higher than that difficulty was a success. Every die that came in below was a failure. A difficulty of 3 was about as low as it went, for something trivial. A diff of 10 was massive.
- Additionally you could have a required number of successes. So you might be Diff 7 3 successes required for "success" at the task you were trying to perform.
- Any die that came up "1" subtracted from the # of successes you had. So if your difficulty was 7 (standard) and your roll came up 7 8 3 1 you have one success (the 7 and 8 are successes but the 1 takes away).
- If you have no successes and still have a 1 you "botch" and something awful happens. Botch mechancs are stupid and hateful. So if on that same roll you rolled 4 8 1 1 you would botch.

In "Revised" they changed it so that you only botched if you rolled a one and "no" successes. So 4 3 1 1 would botch, but 4 8 1 1 was a simple failure.

This ended up becoming an enormous mess. Sliding difficulty + variable number of successes (plus possible penalties to your die pool) made it basically impossible to actually figure out how your character would do at accomplishing some task. It also gave the GM a ton of resources to use to prevent character success, if that success would be inconvenient to the "story."

WOD 2.0 is much better. You still have a die pool, but the diff on all rolls is 8, and you only ever need 1 success to succeed. Penalties and bonuses are expressed only in dice pool terms (e.g. -2 dice for something pretty hard, +3 for something very easy).

[Kunikos]

Jeffd: That's certainly easier but I'm still partial to a single dice roll. I guess to each his own, I know plenty of people who don't shy away from a game of dominoes just because you have to do math.

[jeffd]

It's hyperbole but it's true. Look at what most of your stats are. Hell, one of the primary derived stats for every class is the "base attack bonus," which is only useful in combat.

Look at what you get XP for - you get XP for overcoming challenges, typically groups of monsters. It's a fun bit of hyperbole but it's basically true - D&D is focused around murder and robbery. :D

Your hyperbole poked my eye out. x_o

[Kunikos]

I hate the sad, pathetic defense of lazy reviewing: "You're all just a bunch of fanboys!" No. Screw that. This is not a story about the brave reviewer telling it like it is and being shouted down by the unwashed, mouthbreathing fanboys.

I think the reviewer would love to think that's his role here. Some of these guys have a regular O'Reilly complex about their reviews. You're entering the "No Spin Zone!"

[Kunikos]

Look at what you get XP for - you get XP for overcoming challenges, typically groups of monsters. It's a fun bit of hyperbole but it's basically true - D&D is focused around murder and robbery. :D

It isn't murder if it's in self-defense or in the name of justice. Liberating their possessions after the fact is just preventing waste. :)

[LesJarvis]

The retraction (http://www.1up.com/do/blogEntry?bId=7589456&publicUserId=5380367).

[Kalle]

It isn't murder if it's in self-defense or in the name of justice. Liberating their possessions after the fact is just preventing waste. :)

Two words for you:

Loot tables.

[Kunikos]

I love how Mr. Green spins this as it not being the writer's fault for poorly constructed criticism. I think it's pretty clear that you aren't "standing by" him at all, otherwise the post would still be up. I have to wonder what Mr. Peckham thinks of all this.

[Kunikos]

Two words for you:

Loot tables.

One word: optional.

Feel free to tell your players there is no loot, or make shit up. "Oh, he had a moldy ham sandwich and a wine bottle cork in his bags, and a flyer that reads: 'Come see the exotic elven dancers of Barnum and Faely!'".

[Doug Erickson]

Mister Peckham made it pretty clear he knew his review would be controversial -- hell, it's clear he didn't like the game yet actively anticipated that many folks (presumably D&D fans) would consider it to be at least halfways decent. I doubt he's surprised at all by this reaction.

[Kalle]

Of course it's optional, hell, so is every rule in an RPG. They can be distilled down to improv theatre if you feel like taking it that far. My point is that D&D caters to a type of game that is focused on combat, loot and dungeon crawling.

[Jeff Green]

I love how Mr. Green spins this as it not being the writer's fault for poorly constructed criticism. I think it's pretty clear that you aren't "standing by" him at all, otherwise the post would still be up. I have to wonder what Mr. Peckham thinks of all this.

It's not "spin," Kunikos. It's the truth. I didn't write the words he wrote, so, yes, the text of the review is Matt Peckham's. But it is the job of the editors to make sure that what's get printed is fair and accurate. I think this review needed another edit before it went out. That's my fault. I stand by Matt in that I think he has written great stuff for us in the past and I know he will for us again. Matt can speak for himself as to how he feels, if he likes.

[m3mnoch]

I don't believe there is a single target market. I could care less if the game is only 90% faithful to D&D 3.5 rules, as long as the gameplay is engaging.
a-buh?

we're talking about nwn2, right? not oblivion?

so, you're saying that a game broken into "modules" with a "dm client" and a toolset for "creating your own modules" using "d&d 3.5 edition" rules doesn't have a target market?

Peckham geared his review primarily to RPG fans, and included a modification for D&D nuts.
right. obviously. that's why he spent the article talking about rules and d&d instead of plot or, god forbid, role-playing.

no.

he couldn't make up his mind about who he wanted to gear the review towards. that's why it stunk. that's why it was wishy-washy crap (not so) cleverly disguised as "i'm gonna take a stand, dammit!"

you can't put useless caveats in a review. the review needs to be either about the game or about d&d. (and, if it was about d&d, he should have published it over at rpg.net or something) if it was strictly a review on the game, then, i'd buy the "targeting rpg players in general" argument. but, it wasn't. it was a (poor) review of how he thought d&d rules did/didn't (couldn't make up his mind there either!) fit within the confines of the game. not the plot. or characters. or anything even close to role-playing.

he WAS talking to the d&d-heads and he was trying to go all whiny-ngj on "why can't we just break out and innovate?"

innovate on what? d&d? or the video game? pick one, man. then, when you're done with that, pick a position.

Wise man say: "The critic who tries to reflect the views of his audience is not a critic, he's a ventriloquist." :)
so. wait. i thought in his review, (i'd quote it but it's obviously gone) the last paragraph was essentially this:

"if you are THIS audience, you'll like it. if you're the OTHER audience, you won't." how is that not pandering?

m3mnoch.

[mattpeckham]

I have to wonder what Mr. Peckham thinks of all this.

I stand by my editors 100%. They're some of the very best in the business, period. Disagreements aside, we move onward and upward.

Respectfully,

Matt

[caesarbear]

A lot of bystanding going on.

[Dawn Falcon]

Okay, I've had an account and lurked here for, oh, a long time. But I gotta comment on this.

My problem with NWN2 is this (oh, and I saw someone playing it on 2k earlier, if anyone was wondering if that worked)... I can't TELL if there's a good game there or not.

By the time I've finished fighting the camera, the party system, the horribly slow engine and the lack of combat feedback, it simply dosn't feel fun. I'm hoping this stuff's going to be addressed, because if I was to rate it *NOW* I'd not be giving as good as 5/10. I'm also not very happy with the game's.... flow, let's call it. NWN1 just seemed more controlable. Sure, you only had one character, but I was able to stack tasks in that quite easily. I'm not that IS fixable, and that's what worries me longer term. (When they've fixed FPS, come up with another camera view that works, etc.)

Yes, I think most of this will BE fixed. But...as I said I'd hold off on the review. And revisit in a month. Which is NOT what I wanted it for. (internet-less period of a few days comming up).

[Sidd_Budd]

I don't believe there is a single target market.

we're talking about nwn2, right? not oblivion?

so, you're saying that a game ... using "d&d 3.5 edition" rules doesn't have a target market?
No, I actually said that NWN2 doesn't have a single target market. Of course D&D fans are a primary market; I just believe that the developers wouldn't mind crossing over to general RPG fans who don't have D&D experience. You selectively quoted me to emphasize your point. But then you end up arguing with something I didn't even say. Here's an example:
we're talking about oblivion?
I can't believe you missed this. We're talking about Neverwinter Nights 2 -- not Oblivion. Did you misunderstand the topic of the review?

See -- misquoting and dropping words just sets a bad tone -- just ask Kerry. Anyway, we both agree that it was a poor review, although we may differ on the reasons. No sense arguing semantics, especially with someone who was disingenuous with representing my initial position.

[Doug Erickson]

They could at LEAST have let you invert the camera controls, or map them to ASDF. I hate pushing left to swing the camera right, and vice versa.

[Midnight Son]

I miss the days of looooong complete CGW reviews. Back when there were magazines.

OT: Games for Windows won't have any console stuff, right? Wouldn't make any sense, given the title.

[tim edwards]

It's not "spin," Kunikos. It's the truth. I didn't write the words he wrote, so, yes, the text of the review is Matt Peckham's. But it is the job of the editors to make sure that what's get printed is fair and accurate. I think this review needed another edit before it went out. That's my fault. I stand by Matt in that I think he has written great stuff for us in the past and I know he will for us again. Matt can speak for himself as to how he feels, if he likes.

Ooh. Tough crowd, ultra-tough situation. Smart words though. Much respect, Jeff.

[m3mnoch]

I think this review needed another edit before it went out.
i think it's cute and charming and all that you feel like you can deflect the ire from your writer to you -- effectively diffusing any fireball that was occurring. yay for you!

however, you are taking the blame now? okay. deal.

so -- why did it go out?

how do you think this negatively or positively effects your readership's faith in you as an editor? does your very audience now perceive your magazine as sloppy and useless because of this "first time for everything?" are there going to be more "first times?" are you going to get your ziff-davis boss on here now to "stand by you?" do you get "brave brownie points?" does peckham need the help? after all, he's standing by his editor too.

not that i think the issue is big enough to fire anyone or get worked up into a spittle. everyone has bad days. i'm just being antagonistic towards that social phenomenon of shielding and misdirecting attention from your direct reports to yourself.

m3mnoch.

[Kunikos]

I stand by my editors 100%. They're some of the very best in the business, period. Disagreements aside, we move onward and upward.

I wasn't aware that the computer game magazine industry had its own version of the Blue Line.

It's not "spin," Kunikos. It's the truth. I didn't write the words he wrote, so, yes, the text of the review is Matt Peckham's. But it is the job of the editors to make sure that what's get printed is fair and accurate. I think this review needed another edit before it went out. That's my fault. I stand by Matt in that I think he has written great stuff for us in the past and I know he will for us again. Matt can speak for himself as to how he feels, if he likes.

So is there a newly revised edit of this review coming soon to the spot where the old one used to be?

[Skipper]

Jeff - Much respect for the first ... retracting a review to ensure that it meets the high 1UP/GFW standards for reviews.

Matt - Lets be honest, I had NO problem with the score, nor the scale used. I've already purchased the game. I have buddies that read 1UP reviews though and if they see a crap score, I'd rather them see why, like "the way the character development plays out is bad, and here's why." That way they can make a purchase decision on it. It's obvious from your posts here that you actually have that information, it just didn't come across in the review. No biggie right? Easily fixed with a probable expanded word count and more detail on the "why."

Either way kudos to both of you. It takes a lot to post here in defense, and to retract something like that.

Also Jeff, I held a pic of you up to a mirror and surprisingly you look a lot like a gnome warlock.

[m3mnoch]

No, I actually said that NWN2 doesn't have a single target market. Of course D&D fans are a primary market; I just believe that the developers wouldn't mind crossing over to general RPG fans who don't have D&D experience. You selectively quoted me to emphasize your point. But then you end up arguing with something I didn't even say.

that better?

so. are we talking about a target market (singular) or target markets (plural)?

you see, cut-quoted or not, the gist of your paragraph was "target market" in the singular sense. and, what i was saying was in the singular sense. i'm sure a game like fifa would love to get some decent play over here in the states, but calling it a target (aka primary) market? uh -- no.

everyone can agree that it was a horrible review. why was it horrible, tho? that's the tricky part.

oh, and you get mad points for the "boob" thing. i laughed my ass off.

m3mnoch.

[Jeff Green]

I'm not sure exactly what you're mad about or want from me. m3m.

Do you want me to say Matt Peckham's a dumbass and he's never writing for me again? Do you want me to fall on my sword and quit? Neither of those are going to happen.

I think I have made it very clear. Once again: It is the editors' jobs (on any publication) to ensure that what goes into print is fair and accurate. The particulars of why it went up aren't really the main issue and have to do with our own internal system, deadlines, checks-and-balances, etc etc. (As an aside, this is actually for our February issue, while the January issue is just barely hitting readers now.) Had it had more time, the article in question would probably not been posted in its current state. But, see, I'm not trying to or offering excuses. I am saying quite clearly that we fucked up by posting it.

This is not deflection. Go ahead and hate Peckham if that makes you feel better. But the blame and responsibility for any article is always ultimately the editors'.

And as to whether people are going to respect me more or less now or think our mag is "sloppy", or as to whether there will be other mistakes down the line: I've been doing this (at this mag) for ten years. Ten years before that at other publications. I do not believe I am done making mistakes. Some people respect me, other people compare me to Nero. Such is life. I'm gonna keep going forward, keep learnin', and keep trying to do what I do.

Jeff

[Kunikos]

Works for me. If it's any consolation I'm still considering buying and telling people about the Dragon Age feature in the new GFW issue.

[m3mnoch]

not that i think the issue is big enough to fire anyone or get worked up into a spittle. everyone has bad days. i'm just being antagonistic towards that social phenomenon of shielding and misdirecting attention from your direct reports to yourself.

you missed that part, i think.

those back-to-back questions are mostly rhetorical in nature. i'm speaking to the point about how easy it is to just step in and "erase" a mistake when your boss steps in with some flippant "first time for everything" kinda jibe. sail deflation and all.

sort of how most of your (both you and matt) previous posts (the mirror thing, for example) are trying to be funny as a defense mechanism.

and, i know your history. i actually remarked in some other forum about how you rightfully belonged on that silly top 50 list that came out a bit ago. but, to fall on your sword? or fire matt? heh. and i thought i was being the dramatic one.

whatever. you two are just pebbles in the stream to me. do what you want.

m3mnoch.

[TomChick]

whatever. you two are just pebbles in the stream to me. do what you want.

At least their shift keys work.

-Tom

[JoshV]

He could be poor, its not really fun to make fun of those unable to afford new shift keys for their keyboard =(

[m3mnoch]

He could be poor, its not really fun to make fun of those unable to afford new shift keys for their keyboard =(

/sniff

no. it's not that. i only have one hand. and it only has one finger.

you guys are mean.

m3mnoch.

[Aeek]

I'm a huge fan of RPGs = I clearly despise D&D

No possible incompatibilities surfacing to mind there?

no Rocket Propelled Grenades in D&D = resolves all apparent contradictions.

[Case]

whatever. you two are just pebbles in the stream to me. do what you want.

m3mnoch.

I thought you were a leaf in the wind?

[m3mnoch]

I thought you were a leaf in the wind?

crap! that's how it goes! i always get my metaphors all kinds of backwards.

... wait. no! reed in the wind! that's it!

damn. no. give me a minute here. it'll come to me.

m3mnoch.

[AndrewM]

I wasn't aware that the computer game magazine industry had its own version of the Blue Line.

So, sort of a Green Line in this instance?

[Rob_Merritt]

http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3154916

The 1UP Network review of Neverwinter Nights 2, authored by Matt Peckham, has been officially retracted from 1UP.com and will not appear in the January issue of Games For Windows: The Official Magazine.

Now Jeff will be accused of taking a payoff from Atari. (actually it is already happening at 'TEH' shack)

/edit: PS (note I'm not accusing him of that just to be clear. Just wanted to point out the no win situation he was in.)

[m3mnoch]

Now Jeff will be accused of taking a payoff from Atari. (actually it is already happening at 'TEH' shack)

well, dammit. that's stupid. i suppose it's time to rally around jeff and matt. especially since i don't think any of us had an issue with the actual score given.

m3mnoch.

[stusser]

Of course it was a no-win situation, it all started with a mistake. All that's left is professionally handling damage control.

It's the same thing I tell all of my DBAs. When you make a mistake, and you will make a mistake eventually, own up to it right away, put all hands on deck, and try to fix the situation with total transparency. If you try to sweep it under the carpet, you will come to regret it.

None of us have finished the game. I don't know if I disagree with his score or not, yet.

[fuzzyslug]

At least their shift keys work.

-Tom

And they aren't assholes.

m3m, what are you trying to accomplish by taunting the editor of the review? I can't tell if you are throwing a hissy fit because he stepped in late to correct what he believes is a mistake or if you are somewhat pleased that the sad words that once faced your wrath are no longer available.

What are you looking for? A personal apology? A cookie?

[Kevin Grey]

The retraction (http://www.1up.com/do/blogEntry?bId=7589456&publicUserId=5380367).

And once again Jeff Green proves what a class act he is. (that certainly is not meant as sarcasm, since this stuff isn't always clear on the internets).

[Damien Neil]

I love how Mr. Green spins this as it not being the writer's fault for poorly constructed criticism. I think it's pretty clear that you aren't "standing by" him at all, otherwise the post would still be up. I have to wonder what Mr. Peckham thinks of all this.

A good manager takes responsibility for his employee's failings, and gives them the credit for their successes. There are all too few good managers in the world, but Jeff Green is clearly one of them and a class act.

My hat is off to you, Jeff.

[Angie Gallant]

They could at LEAST have let you invert the camera controls, or map them to ASDF. I hate pushing left to swing the camera right, and vice versa.

Do you mean in NWN2? Cause I totally remapped those controls to my liking.

[stusser]

Not to act all contrary or anything, but he's the EIC of a major magazine and all he did was act professionally. It wasn't his employee's failing, it was his. As the EIC, managing overall quality of the publication is his primary responsibility. The buck stops there, above him are executives who have little to do with day to day operations.

[m3mnoch]

What are you looking for? A personal apology? A cookie?

you missed the point maybe?

not looking for anything. making a comment on how he diffused the situation. not questioning if it was the ethically correct thing to do -- of course it was. and, technically speaking, it has nothing to do with jeff but more to do with theories of crowd manipulation.

just pointing it out how easy is it to mollify the mob.

well. that, and proving i'm an asshole, i guess. but that's irrelevant. tho, feel free to picture me as a steaming, keyboard-pounding monster roaring with rage and anger over some corner-case review.

m3mnoch.

[Bill Dungsroman]

you missed the point maybe?

not looking for anything. making a comment on how he diffused the situation. not questioning if it was the ethically correct thing to do -- of course it was. and, technically speaking, it has nothing to do with jeff but more to do with theories of crowd manipulation.

just pointing it out how easy is it to mollify the mob.

well. that, and proving i'm an asshole, i guess. but that's irrelevant. tho, feel free to picture me as a steaming, keyboard-pounding monster roaring with rage and anger over some corner-case review.

m3mnoch.
Who the fuck are you? Why should I think about you at all?

[metta]

well. that, and proving i'm an asshole, i guess. but that's irrelevant. tho, feel free to picture me as a steaming, keyboard-pounding monster roaring with rage and anger over some corner-case review.


Easily done.

[m3mnoch]

Why should I think about you at all?

heh. i can't figure out what's funnier. the fact that you quoted me to say "why should i think about you at all?" or that you are irritated with the fact.

back to the topic at hand, maybe?

m3mnoch.

[Keith]

I don't understand the gushing way-to-stand-up-for-writers response to the editors' actions here.

Standing up for your writer in this situation would involve *not* pulling the review and publicly stating that "the text of the review did not live up to our editorial standards" and "did a disservice to fans of the RPG genre."

In fact, the highly unusual action of pulling a review, accompanied by a statement that in essence says "this review was simply too shitty for our magazine," strikes me as quite the opposite of standing-by-your-writer.

[Warning]

back to the topic at hand, maybe?
The hand with no fingers or the hand with only one?

[Doug Erickson]

Do you mean in NWN2? Cause I totally remapped those controls to my liking.

so help the retarded: where do I find the menu to reset the keys? Sure wasn't under any of the four option tabs, and Lord knows I looked.

seriously. Reversing the horizontal camera axis control would make the game significantly more fun for me. Help!

[m3mnoch]

The hand with no fingers or the hand with only one?

busted!

heh. okay. you got me.... if you look back, i think there are some double quotes in there somewhere too.

m3mnoch.

[Angrycoder]

At least their shift keys work.

-Tom

The were also able to get their 'e' keys working when they registered their handles on this forum.

[Mehrunes]

so help the retarded: where do I find the menu to reset the keys? Sure wasn't under any of the four option tabs, and Lord knows I looked.

seriously. Reversing the horizontal camera axis control would make the game significantly more fun for me. Help!

The controls tab only appears when you go to the options screen from the main menu. It's probably there.

[Doug Erickson]

oh. well. color me mollified.

[Angie Gallant]

The controls tab only appears when you go to the options screen from the main menu. It's probably there.

Yep. Go to options from the main menu. The fourth panel is the keymappings panel. Double click the ones you want to change.

[flyinj]

Yep. Go to options from the main menu. The fourth panel is the keymappings panel. Double click the ones you want to change.

Awesome find! This game just gets better and better.

[HRose]

So the review is being redone by someone else or being avoided altogether?

If it was me I would let him rewrite it, complain more about technical problems, explain better the critics and keep the exact same vote at the bottom ;p

[Bill Dungsroman]

So the review is being redone by someone else or being avoided altogether?

If it was me I would let him rewrite it, complain more about technical problems, explain better the critics and keep the exact same vote at the bottom ;p
Thank God it's not you.

[HRose]

I like *especially* how he writes. But I agree with others that he focused too much criticizing the rules aspect and didn't explain well enough his reasons to dislike the game.

I see his review not so different from Tom Chick's review of Dark Messiah. The difference is that Tom Chick gave a less partial opinion on the game and explained better his reasons.

I don't think the problem was the tone itself (which, again, I like) but the fact that it sounded harsh without motivating it thoroughly and in a convincing way.

[FIDGAF]

Holy shit, what a thread.

OK, I really think you folks need to give them a chance at straightening this out. I've read a lot of reviews from these folks and it's RARE that something like this happens. Mayhap Matt was the wrong person to review the game, maybe he had a bad day, whatever. Jeff retracted the review and they're "fixing" what everyone bitched about so take a step back and let them resolve it.

Personally, I want to hear, from a person that plays D&D AND from someone that doesn't if that's possible. Maybe Tom and Bruce should play it (With Evil Jeff or Matt as their DM, hee hee) and let's hear everyone's take on it. The game is supposed to be a D&D game so rolling is part of it. This is no different than a board game where you actually roll those white things with dots on it, you know, dice.

Some other issues I've seen in this thread:

1) Performance. The min system requirements seems meek enough but people with decent systems are having problems with frame rate. What's up with that? Tell us.

2) Boring. Is this another boring hack and slash game or does the content make up for it? How's the new dialog tree working?

3) The DM client. Let's hear about if it makes the game better or worse.

4) How's the camera angles and controls? Did they improve the user interface? Can you customize the user interface at all?

5) Mods. There was a ton of mods for the original NWN. How's the new toolset for mods and is it better than the old one?

6) ETC. whatever I missed.

Please review it for what it is. We all know it's supposed to be a D&D RPG so cutting it down for being a being a D&D RPG doesn't really do anything positive. Is it true to it's form? Don't compare it to GW or WoW or Oblivion, it's a NWN game. Graphics-wise that might be fair but not the game play itself.

These are the type of things I read a review for and I'm sure a lot of others would be interested in these topics.

Matt, I've read your reviews in the past and I have to think you must have went to work sick that day or something because you're usually not that far off the mark.

Jeff, It takes big balls to admit a mistake, I think you just went up a few notches in the respect department with everyone.

Nobody's perfect so let them get their shit together. I'm sure there's a few changes going on with the mag that are invisible to us so cut them a little slack.

[Chris Nahr]

The godfather of New Games Journalism himself has deemed NWN2 worthy of eight out of ten quatloos (http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=69595). That's a fairly detailed review that should answer some of your questions.

[Dawn Falcon]

FIDGAF,

(sorry, to be clear the following's a quote from a friend)

"I spent most of my time fighting the camera. And it does nasty things when (as you must), you change between the characters.

Then there's the whole issue with control. In BG2, you could group select and tell characters to attack an enemy, and it all worked pretty well, your casters wouls stand at the back and you'd tell them which spells to throw... well, in NWN2 you can't group select, the AI has a tendency to go for 1vs1 duels (and trying to correct that gets you hit with a mass of opportunity attacks) and controlling spellcasters is annoying... half the time they seem to interpret "cast spell on", as "go melee", and if their target dies before they throw a spell, they can do some crazy things.

And rather than the big glowing damage numbers (with the deacent pullback you could get on the NWN camera), there are small red ones, and you miss them half the time because the camera's looking at the nearest wall. Again.

Add a jerky experience with everything at minimum on a 2400 / 2GB / X800 (although ironically the frame rates under my XP install were SO bad I tried it under my main 2k one and it works better, despite "not being supported" under 2k...). It's not so much the frame rate (which isn't THAT bad), but the fact it really does seem to have a bad control lag. (Perhaps that's something to do with the fact that rather than simply stacking orders ala NWN, it uses a system more like KOTOR...but a LOT more clumsily)

All this means I can't find any FUN in the game as it stands, and I just can't play a game which feels like a chore these days. Im going to put it away and see if they fix this stuff in patches.

For reference, I like D&D games, did some voice scripting work for a few BG2 mods (which died, unfortunately), played a lot of NWN modules, have done parts of several D20 RPG's.... I have NOTHING against the game system (okay, there are a few things I consider silly in 3.5e, and I'm not going to mke a Warlock character. Those are bluntly quibbles, though)"

[Matthew Gallant]

FIDGAF,

I spent most of my time fighting the camera.
Did you do the God Hand review for IGN?

[Dawn Falcon]

I make games, not review them. At least for the last several years.

[hong]

The godfather of New Games Journalism himself has deemed NWN2 worthy of eight out of ten quatloos (http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=69595). That's a fairly detailed review that should answer some of your questions.
Quote: "This is essentially Baldur's Gate."

Heh. Given that BG captured my imagination more than any other computer game in the 10 years beforehand, that seems not a bad comparison.

[Matthew Gallant]

I make games, not review them. At least for the last several years.
Well, hellooooo Mr. Fancypants.

[Dawn Falcon]

Well, hellooooo Mr. Fancypants.

So sorry I'm now willing to spend an hour playing with slider bars to get something which MIGHT be less painful for the camera, and dosn't adress the other issues at all. And the camera control is something Obsidian is looking to patch. So...

[olaf]

Are they looking to patch it? Where did you read that? I mean I can believe it because it sucks ass but then again how did it get released in the first place?

I want a mode that delivers exactly what you get, camera and control-wise, if you play WoW with the camera set to 'smart'. Right button turns the player and the camera. Left button is complete free look for camera only. Both buttons held down run the character. This might impact the right click menu pop up (but maybe not, I dont know the technical details) they have but I would at least appreciate it being an option.

[caesarbear]

Most people complaining about the camera seem to wish it was WoW's camera. Well it isn't, get over it. It's really not a bad camera, but it does take some personal adjustments and some getting use to. There are things that could be fixed, but don't expect radical changes. This camera system gives you lots of options. You've got to fiddle with them, yeah, how horrible, but you might find something that you actually like about it. Me personally, I'm glad it's not the WoW camera.