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Genre: RPG

Format: DVD

Developer: Obsidian Entertainment

Publisher: Atari, Inc.

Mac Publisher: Aspyr Media, Inc.

Minimum System Requirements: Mac OS X v10.4.11, 2GHz Intel chipset, 1GB RAM, 6.5GB hard disk space, 128MB ATI X1600 or NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT, DVD-ROM drive, broadband Internet (TCP/IP) or LAN for multiplayer

Review Computer: 2GHz 20" Intel Core Duo iMac, 1GB RAM, 256MB ATI Radeon X1600

Network Feature: Yes

Processor Compatibility Intel only

Price: $49.95

ESRB Rating: T (alcohol reference, blood, mild language, sexual themes, violence)

Availability: Now

Demo: No

Official Website: www.atari.com/nwn2/US/

I discovered the joys of Neverwinter Nights a bit too late. Although I never played much pencil and paper Dungeons & Dragons, I greatly enjoyed Baldur's Gate and similar games. When MacSoft released the original Neverwinter Nights, I passed it off to Bill Stiteler for review, partly because Bill was better qualified to write the review, and partly because he really wanted it. I borrowed it from him when he was done, and I've been hooked ever since.

This is why I was thrilled when Aspyr announced they'd be releasing Neverwinter Nights 2. Although you can possibly still find the two expansion packs for Neverwinter Nights from MacSoft, and there is some downloadable content, it's great to see the Mac isn't getting left behind as the franchise grows. But, as Neverwinter Nights 2 indicates, growth isn't always for the best.

You see, Neverwinter Nights 2 suffers some growing pains, I'm afraid, exacerbated by the fact that they're not necessary. The graphics engine is improved, leading to greater detail when zooming in on the battles. This detail isn't so great that it explains the poor frame rates, however, and the ability to zoom in is simply not necessary. Because the battles are in real time, getting up close only means you're sacrificing the ability to view the entire battle arena just to see some fairly flat characters up close (only the spells are worth the up-close shots). So, you get some pretty bad frame rates even on decent computers for something the majority of players will never use. The bad frame rates are troublesome during fights, but just aggravating when you're trying to run around the maps. Zoom in too close, and you can't see where you're going. Zoom out too far, and the frame rates drop drastically as the game tries to draw the environment. As a result, you're stuck somewhere in the middle. When it all comes together, the game does look pretty good, but not so much better than the original Neverwinter Nights that all these speed problems are worth it.

Beyond that, though, Neverwinter Nights 2 is a fairly solid gaming experience that'll be pleasantly familiar to D&D fans, yet with enough additions to prevent the game from feeling old. After setting up your character (you can't import your character from Neverwinter Nights), the game begins with a quiet tutorial set at a local fair. Here, you'll learn to fight, cast spells, and generally interact with the environment (non-player characters, objects, etc.). You can skip this and get right to the action, but the tutorial is quick and does provide some background on your character. Of course, it's not long before the town is invaded, and you're sent out to discover why.

Unlike in Neverwinter Nights, the sequel doesn't confine you to hiring just one other character at a time to accompany you on your journey. Rather, various characters are introduced throughout the story, and you can decide to allow up to three others to tag along when dictated by the story. You get complete control over their actions while they're in your party, and, even better, over their inventory as well. In other words, your support characters can schlep around all those axes and thief toolkits you've found, and when you go to sell them to some merchant who apparently can never have enough thief toolkits, you get the cash. Controlling the inventory and behavior of four characters can be quite a chore sometimes (the inventory management system in Neverwinter Nights 2 has taken a turn for the worse), but the positives of multiple characters outweigh the negatives. In the original Neverwinter Nights, if you were a fighter, you'd generally want a magic user as your partner. Here, you can take along said magic user, but also throw in a thief to help you disarm traps and unlock chests, and a bard to help talk enemies out of fights or into revealing important secrets. Better yet, your recruitable characters break from the mold a bit, including even a giant spider that lives in the basement of your castle. Very, very cool.

The method of controlling your character isn't nearly as intuitive as in Neverwinter Nights, and the change seems to have come for no reason. There's really not a whole lot new being offered, so why the developers mucked around with this is beyond me. Gone is the ability to just right click on a character and pull up a wheel of options, replaced by archaic keystroke/mouse click combos. Learning them isn't a problem, but using them can actually break up the gameplay experience.

As in the past, how you play your character will help determine how the game progresses. It drives to the same climax no matter whether you're a lawful good fighter or a chaotic evil monk, but how you get there is all the fun. Alliances are forged and enemies created by how you interact with people and by what paths you choose, meaning you can go back through the game multiple times as different characters and get a different gaming experience, albeit within the confines of the same story. The people in your party must be logically selected, too, as characters won't get along and could even quit on you if they're radically different in their alignment.

Neverwinter Nights 2 utilizes the Dungeons & Dragons 3.5 rule set, which means nothing to me (there are rule sets?), but which apparently can be polarizing in the D&D world. Those of you who don't follow such things will at least want to know you can choose between 16 races (8 base races and 8 sub-races), 12 base classes, and 17 prestige classes that are unlocked as you progress through the game. Knowing how to level up your characters can be confusing considering all the options, so you'll either want to really dig into the manual or let the game recommend your selections. Doing the latter may not always work for your method of play, however. As a fighter, the game kept telling me I need to increase my parry skill. But parry is a skill you have to manually turn on, and I always forget to do that. Instead, I prefer to allocate my level points to skills that are always on and will benefit me without getting in the way of how I want to fight a particular battle.

The good news for hardcore gamers is that Neverwinter Nights 2 is huge. With the vast number of side quests to divert you from the main story, there's plenty of game to be played here. Although I've read complaints about the surprising linearity of the various levels, to provide a truly open world in a game this massive would've just led to total confusion. Also contributing to the smooth flow of the game, for better or worse, is the fact that the battles seem to be much easier than in the original Neverwinter Nights (or even the Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale games). In fact, numerous PC gaming sites recommend you crank up the difficulty to hardcore in order to get any real satisfaction from the game. Without that, it seems you're mostly just working your way through a story with numerous light battles getting in the way. If you prefer the story side, fine. If you prefer the fights, adjust the difficulty level accordingly.

The music and sound effects in the game are fantastic. In fact, considering that most people won't be able to see the graphics in all their glory, the audio may actually be more enjoyable than the visuals (aside from the spell effects, which, as mentioned above, are really cool at any graphic level). The voice acting is also pretty good, and there's plenty of it, but be sure to select a voice for your character that doesn't grate on your nerves, as you'll hear that voice a lot when fighting and exploring.

The big disappointment for hardcore D&D fans is that Mac users will once more not get the module toolset for creating their own adventures. However, Mac users will be able to use modules created on the PC. This, along with the online multiplayer modes, will give Neverwinter Nights 2 an incredible shelf life well beyond the scope of the large scale single-player game.

Neverwinter Nights 2 ends up becoming like one of those movies you mostly enjoyed, but that had one or two elements to it that just really grated on your nerves. I want to head over to Obsidian's offices so I can slap a couple people in the face for the ridiculous character control scheme and the graphics engine that has so much trouble drawing bland, then give hugs and bagels to everyone else for developing such a huge, engrossing game. Ultimately, fans of the Neverwinter Nights series and RPGs in general probably won't be disappointed with Neverwinter Nights 2, but may find they'd have a better gaming experience by simply playing through the original Neverwinter Nights or either of its expansion packs a second or even third time.