Neverwinter Nights 2 Preview

As you sally forth to glory, there will be many unfriendly entities lurking around every corner, ready to wipe you and your company out. Obsidian Entertainment revealed there are as much as 70-80 different monster species in the game (like bone spiders, Minotaur etc.). Well, sharpen your axes, swords, and spears; tighten your bows and ready your spells, there will be plenty of killing and good old-fashioned RPG combat to come.

Damn, this swamp looks cool!

KO-ed in round 1.

Of course, one of the things that ensured the longevity of the NWN franchise over the years, was the constantly thriving community of mod-makers. Even so, a great number of players objected to the many aspects of Bioware's Aurora Toolset. That's why Obsidian put its recourses and energy into creating both a new graphics engine (the Electron engine) and a brand new toolset. This time around, mod creators will have access to numerous options in order to fine-tune their desired mods. After modifying lighting, colors, terrain, movement scripts and dialogue trees, players can see how it all works in practice. Also, as opposed to the earlier toolset, players don't have to rely on predetermined tile sets. With the help of the new toolset, it will be very easy to place trees, bushes, crates, barrels, and buildings across the landscape. Furthermore, altering terrain shape is quite straightforward and intuitive. Those who prefer toying with outdoor areas will find the whole system most useful, seeing as it offers a chance to determine the speed of day and night cycles; plus you can also position cloud formations, grass that sways in the wind etc. Indoor areas offer an equally satisfying range of tweaking options. You may meddle with shadows and light sources, and test the results in game right after. To flavor things a bit more, you'll get a chance to edit and customize your own special effects, creating a variety of visually impressive spells. It should open a whole range of possibilities for NWN mode-makers.

At this time, the game is very much in early stages of development, and Obsidian has its hands full with other projects as well. Many features are still being considered. The toolset, for example, has a huge amount of options, so a comprehensive tutorial will be in order if players are to understand how they can make the most of it. The developers are thinking therefore of including tutorial movies to walk users through editor's nuts and bolts.

Overall, there should be a considerably lengthy single-player campaign waiting for you in this one, on top of a very extensive editor and an equally potential multiplayer mode. At this point Obsidian is saying that the multiplayer will support up to 64 players, and possibly even more.

There are so many unknowns yet. Atari and Obsidian seem determined to keep many of the game's features under wraps. Personally, I'd like to see more enemies, as well as a peek at the inventory and skill system. In any event, we do know that they've invested a lot of time into enhancing qualities of the previous game while utilizing cool elements from KOTOR 2. We all sincerely hope that no matter how overwhelming this project gets, Obsidian is able to tackle all the challenges with outstanding results. God, how we hope so!