test content
Logo
What is the Arc Client?
Install Arc
The good, the bad and the ugly
aedania84
Member, Neverwinter Beta Users Posts: 17 Arc User
Hey guys
Just wanted to share my first impressions, and see if anyone agrees so far, or if it's just me
The Good
Alright, first of all, the good stuff.
Graphics: The environments and most of the characters look very nice. Walking around in Neverwinter is inspiring, and it feels like a real city. Something that most other games fail to achieve. Humans, Elves, Tieflings and Orcs look good in the game. Character design is very good, lots of ways to customise your character.
Active Development Team: Throughout beta the developers have been very active and helpful.
Names: No limitations to what name you choose. This is really neat.
The Bad
Storyline: The story is bad. Very bad. NW suffers the same curse as most MMOs. You just stop caring about the storyline very early. You don't really have much of a choice playing through it, and there's no room for roleplaying. Questgivers doesn't even look you in the eyes. They stare at the sky.
Fix: Get the character more involved. Let us have several choices so we can roleplay. Make questgivers more dynamic, and remove the voice acting altogether if you can't find proper voice actors. Quality over quantity.
Clunky Combat: Combat is not fluid in this game. You are frozen in place when you cast spells. Your options are very limited. Even after hours of playing controls felt awkward. That may be because I don't learn fast enough, though this haven't been a problem in other games.
Fix: Make it possible to use abilities while moving around. Or at least a few of them. Reconsider the controls altogether.
Class Design: Classes are very limited. Fighters can't use all sorts of weapons, and Wizards are left with little choice. Everything feels rushed. Classes will get boring fast as a result.
Fix: Stick to the class design from D&D. Choice is everything.
The Ugly
Voice Acting: I kept telling myself that it would get better during the first ten levels. It didn't get better. The voice actors are absolutely horrid. Most of them are obviously Americans having fun trying out various british accents. It's not only bad. It's absurd, and it destroyes the game experience.
Fix: See above.
D&D?: This game has absolutely nothing to do with any versions of D&D. There is no D&D feel to it. Concepts such as "feats" and "powers" are in the game, but they have nothing to do with the real thing. There's some dungeon crawling and traps, but it never feels like D&D. It's heartbreakening to come back to Neverwinter after having played Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2. I didn't expect a Neverwinter Nights 3, but I expected at least D&D.
Fix: Implement true feats to the game. D&D is about party play and character development. And choice. You are left with no choice in the game. The class design could be much better.
What do you guys think? Is it just me?
Just wanted to share my first impressions, and see if anyone agrees so far, or if it's just me
The Good
Alright, first of all, the good stuff.
Graphics: The environments and most of the characters look very nice. Walking around in Neverwinter is inspiring, and it feels like a real city. Something that most other games fail to achieve. Humans, Elves, Tieflings and Orcs look good in the game. Character design is very good, lots of ways to customise your character.
Active Development Team: Throughout beta the developers have been very active and helpful.
Names: No limitations to what name you choose. This is really neat.
The Bad
Storyline: The story is bad. Very bad. NW suffers the same curse as most MMOs. You just stop caring about the storyline very early. You don't really have much of a choice playing through it, and there's no room for roleplaying. Questgivers doesn't even look you in the eyes. They stare at the sky.
Fix: Get the character more involved. Let us have several choices so we can roleplay. Make questgivers more dynamic, and remove the voice acting altogether if you can't find proper voice actors. Quality over quantity.
Clunky Combat: Combat is not fluid in this game. You are frozen in place when you cast spells. Your options are very limited. Even after hours of playing controls felt awkward. That may be because I don't learn fast enough, though this haven't been a problem in other games.
Fix: Make it possible to use abilities while moving around. Or at least a few of them. Reconsider the controls altogether.
Class Design: Classes are very limited. Fighters can't use all sorts of weapons, and Wizards are left with little choice. Everything feels rushed. Classes will get boring fast as a result.
Fix: Stick to the class design from D&D. Choice is everything.
The Ugly
Voice Acting: I kept telling myself that it would get better during the first ten levels. It didn't get better. The voice actors are absolutely horrid. Most of them are obviously Americans having fun trying out various british accents. It's not only bad. It's absurd, and it destroyes the game experience.
Fix: See above.
D&D?: This game has absolutely nothing to do with any versions of D&D. There is no D&D feel to it. Concepts such as "feats" and "powers" are in the game, but they have nothing to do with the real thing. There's some dungeon crawling and traps, but it never feels like D&D. It's heartbreakening to come back to Neverwinter after having played Neverwinter Nights 1 and 2. I didn't expect a Neverwinter Nights 3, but I expected at least D&D.
Fix: Implement true feats to the game. D&D is about party play and character development. And choice. You are left with no choice in the game. The class design could be much better.
What do you guys think? Is it just me?
Post edited by aedania84 on
0
Comments
So some of what you want just can not happen even if cyptic wanted to do it, they could not, if WoTC said no.
Also the one thing this game has going for it is the combat system. Lots of mmo players like it better than WoW or GW2.
They of course come from a different background as mmo players first, they can take or leave D&D. It is the combat system they want.
This is not the game I want either. I think it sad that it gets billed as a D&D game. Same can be said for ddo.
In the end either you like the game for what it is or you do not. The game may get fleshed out more but basic changes to game play would make this a different game and that is not happening. The game D&D players want has not been made yet.
Some of the issues I have will be hard to fix I guess. I'm not done yet howwever. Gonna give it some more testing to see if I change my mind
If you are a fan of old D&D style, NWN is not it. It is 4.0 version. It is a "simpler" version of 4.0 (i.e. weapon limitation) but I think it is easier to code for a single weapon NOW and later expand it.
Please review my campaign and I'll return the favor.
That's fine, I thought, I'll report this bug to an admin and they'll surely fix it. Noooooooo.
They just told me to go do some Foundry quests and I'll "catch up" which is BS. If I lost ten platinum on some other game I'd expect them to somehow give it back to me. I want my two levels worth of exp back. Why can't they just do that?
What I don't get is that I was level 13 when I went to bed last night. Somehow the crash even wiped out a level I earned last night.
How can they ask me to go grind for several more hours to gain back that exp when the server could just crash again and make me lose ANOTHER two levels? I've even heard of people losing their entire characters, and while they've supposedly been given back, that doesn't help me or anyone else that's lost levels due to a glitch.
Grrr... Very frustrated with Neverwinter right now.
I understand your frustration, but it is beta after all. I think the game has bigger problems than this, to be fair
Really like the voice acting, if only because it continues while I'm walking to my next objective, instead of cutting off- don't feel bad about leaving an NPC before I've read his story.
Haven't played a true D&D game since Baldur's Gate 2, but I think the foundry will go a long way in keeping that kind of spirit alive, even if the mechanics don't.
I think what you like is the function, not the quality of the voice acting itself.. Am I right?