The story in Icewind Dale II is very linear. Most of the tasks you will
undertake are set in a carefully scripted order. There are some sub-quests
available that you can choose to complete or not, but for the most part you will
progress slowly and steadily through the game's storyline. Not that the
storyline is a bad one, it is not at all so, it's just that it should be
mentioned that if you are looking for wide-open, open-ended gameplay, you will
not find it here. On the other hand, you'll never find yourself stuck and
wondering just what you should be doing next to advance the story.
The game's designers added a lot of small touches to the game to make the
story and world more immersive, and RPG fans will certainly appreciate this.
For example, magical weapons and items often come with a background story
relating their origin. You certainly don't have to read about how a
certain flail obtained its name and +1 rating, but it's nice that you can if you
want to.
Like a lot of RPGs, you'll find your share of fetch and ferry type of quests,
but overall Icewind Dale II is more of a hack and slash oriented game.
The combat situations are nicely paced and vary in size from single encounters
to multi-waved onslaughts. Battles take place in real-time, but you can
pause the game at any time and give orders to your individual characters.
For the most part the enemy AI makes a quite competent foe. Enemy archers
will concentrate their fire, melee specialists will try to isolate the weaker
members of your party, and spellcasters select their spells wisely and for
maximum effect. The AI does have one shortcoming and that is in its
one-minded pursuit of weak or badly injured party members. Sometimes
you'll need to shuffle the party member back and forth to keep him or her out of
harm's way while an enemy tries its hardest to take on that party member in
combat. It can become so single-minded that it will ignore other members
of your party that hack at it or try to obstruct its path to its intended
target.
Control in Icewind Dale II is easy thanks to a well-designed interface.
With over 300 spells, and various skills and feats at your disposal, the
potential is certainly there to make controlling your party a nightmare.
However, all of your character's actions can be controlled from an interface bar
that sits along the bottom of the screen. You can place items such as
scrolls and potions onto this bar as well so that you can get to them quickly in
battle. Icewind Dale II will also allow you to specify up to 4 different
weapon sets that you can quickly switch between by a simple right-click on the
interface bar. You can have your party arm itself with ranged weapons, and
then quickly switch to melee weapons when the monsters reach your party.
The one drawback with this system is that shields can only be placed in one of
the weapon sets at a time. There is no way to hold on to a shield and just
switch weapons, and you can quickly encumber your character if you force him or
her to carry three or four shields.
The one area of control that is not well-designed is the pathfinding for your
party. If you click on a location to move to, often a couple of your party
members will decide to take the slow and scenic route. This can be an
annoyance when trying to enter a building as you'll have to wait for the
wanderers to eventually make their way to the doorway. It can be downright
disastrous when one of your party members wanders into a group of monsters and
you don't notice until it is too late to bring the rest of your party to the
rescue.
Since the game is built on the existing engine used for Baldur's Gate and
Icewind Dale, don't expect any improvements in the quality of graphics in
Icewind Dale II. The environments look good enough, but are a few years
behind today's games. The characters look slightly blocky and could use a
few extra frames of animation. The character portraits, however, are
gorgeous and go a long way towards breathing life into your character.
Ultimately, Icewind Dale II is designed for RPG veterans and particularly
those familiar with Dungeons & Dragons. The game comes with an excellent
and thorough manual, but at well over 100 pages it might be overwhelming to a
newbie. Jargon such as saving throws, AC, and hit dice might be a lot to
digest when coupled with the wide range of choices available for character
classes, skills, feats, and spells.
In The End, This Game Hath Been Rated:
86%. RPG fans will do well to pick up this gem and add it to their inventory
- its minor flaws do not tarnish its overall value. It might all be a bit
overwhelming to gamers new to RPGs, though.
System Requirements:
350 MHz Pentium II CPU; 64 MB RAM; 16 MB
Video RAM; 4x CD-ROM; 1.1 GB Hard Drive Space; Mouse.
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