Is the OC underrated?

[Legacy_Brannon]

               I'll preface this with saying that, yes, Bioware went on to tell better stories, but for a first go with an extremely complex computer game, I've always found the OC enjoyable. Aribeth, Gend, and most of the henchman have interesting stories, there is a lot of variety and I find (I'm currently replaying all the NWN 1&2 OC's in order) that the writing is better than I remember. 

I wonder if so many have bad memories of the original OC because most of us played it waaay back in 2002 before we knew how to build characters and use strategy, thus tainting the experience? Certainly things got better, and there are many community modules that top it, but I've always felt that the criticism of it has always been overblown.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Lord Sullivan]

               The Original Neverwinter Nights Campaign as always been pretty damned good.

While personal taste as always some part in if we are going to like a story or not, often
more then anything, some people will claim something is horrible, sucks, mediocre, etc...
simply because they expected something else from the game.

(i.e. Baldur's Gate Fans that thought NWN was going to be a Baldur's Gate 3)
So to them it doesn't matter if the OC is any good as none of the BG Fans have
actually played the game throughout. In fact most have commented never going
past the (uncompleted on their part) Chapter 1.

What matters @Brannon is that we and many others know the truth that the OC
rocks! '>
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Lord Sullivan, 27 décembre 2011 - 10:34 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_HipMaestro]

               It's an issue with very polar attitude potential IMO.

On the one hand, it serves as the precursor for just about all content that has moved forward from those beginnings.  the thing is: without a starting place, none of the quantum leap stuff would have ever happened.  It would still be waiting for some designer to build a D&D game around, right? *g*  So in that respect, it is unique and represents the genre very well.

On the other hand, it was always in a state of being corrected and refined, mostly from a technical standpoint... first by the original Bioware staff and then later by community-made patches and fixes.  This would lead one to assume it was a rather coarse representation of what was truly possible with the engine & toolset if addressed with more expertise.  That's one view, I suppose.

Critics should really evaluate it within the context where it was designed and released rather than with respect to what new innovations and advancements have provided.  If they would, perhaps they would come to the realization that its intrinsic value is far more significant than what an initial perception would avail.  TBH, many critics of the OC have never even played the campaign (let alone finished it!)  and base judgement on a 15-minute diddling period before they jumped on-line.

For my interests, I am pleased with the original product (i.e. the plague campaign) that was released and supported by Bioware and would have resented  to be forced to wait for its release (perhaps a year later???) until it was perfected in the way that detractors would prefer.  Our entire family still enjoys it occasionally even 10 years later after its inception... for what that is worth in this discussion.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Frith5]

               There are many elements of the OC that I find well done: mainly the writing/dialogue. There is some absolutely stellar and clever writing in that campaign! Bear in mind that short of going through the campaign mods in the Toolset (which I did while checking for typos during the 1.69 Betas), much of this dialogue could easily go sight unseen. I also appreciate the methods Bioware used for putting such a big campaign together. Sure there may be bigger story arcs out there in newer offerings by the community (only MAY be though), but the OC kept a consistent feel throughout, and don't forget all the scripting goodies buried in those .nwm files either.
I have often thought the OC got a bad rep early by dissatisfied detractors, and the rep stopped a lot of folks from experiencing it on their own with open minds and attitudes.
-JFK
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Brannon]

               I think it's probably true that Balder's Gate fans where the most vocal. Never having played BG, I didn't have that bias. I recently bought all the BG games from GOG and will eventually get around to play them.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_BelgarathMTH]

               I'm a Baldur's Gate fan and a Neverwinter NIghts fan. I wasn't aware of any disconnect between the two fan bases.

I've always thought the OC was a superlative gaming experience, and have never understood why some people seem to hate it. I still play it through from time to time.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Malifaun]

               I blame the chests.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_cds13]

               I liked the OC very much, the chests are insanely too many but nobody forced me to open them although I keep on doing that :-)
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_chaosapiant]

               I'm playing it again for the first time in 10 years...and i'm floored by how good it really is. Coming off the heals of BG2 was never in its best interest...but compared to Bioware fare nowadays (and I adore Dragon Age and Mass Effect) this campaign is huge, detailed, and full of great writing. The overall story is a bit bland, and Aribeth is voiced as over the top as I remember, but there are TONS of great moments in the sidequests. Charwood is still one of Bioware's greatest stories ever, along with the snowglobe.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par chaosapiant, 08 avril 2012 - 01:35 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_MingWolf]

               Yeah the story was a bit bland, but I quite enjoyed the OC.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Guest_Faerunner_*]

               I adored the OC when I was younger, though I might have been easier to entertain back then because I started playing it again recently and was surprised by how long, bland and dull it was.

But even if the story is nothing to get excited over, it still has a certain... glamour or charm about it that's still missing from modern games. The dark medieval setting, sombre music, warm or soft lighting, excellent voice-acting and enjoyable companions give it a mood or atmosphere that draws you in even more than the best graphics or dialogue choices.

There's just something magic about the OC of Neverwinter Nights that (I think) no other game has been able to match before or since. And it'll always stay with me for that reason.
               
               

               

                     Modifié par Faerunner, 11 avril 2012 - 06:01 .
                     
                  

            

[Legacy_Eternal Phoenix]

               The story for the OC wasn't anything special but it wasn't poorly written and there were some amazing parts. I still remember the Charwood and Snowglobe locations and stories and then there's the siege on the army encampment in Chapter 3. I think some of the characters were pretty well written too and there were some memorable locations and boss fights as well. Sometimes the OC felt bland but other times it had atmosphere and felt really great especially with the dragon battles.

I'm no fan for the first expansion. I'd call that story bland and unexciting.

The second expansion though? AMAZING and I'd consider it better than Baldur's Gate and on par with Dragon Age: Origins in terms of companions and choices. There's some good twists in the story too.
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_simomate2]

               Well I loved the OC when I first got NWN, and still do! However, it did get tiresome after a while. It felt really repetitive. Like in the first chapter, you were just given a quest to find 4 objects, so then you just rushed into 4 differernt areas, killed everything inside, and returned each object to Aribeth. You did complete one or two sidequests, but there weren't many. Just full on hack and slash. (Though some might love just mindlessly roaming areas killing easy mobs again and again, who am I to judge?)

The bosses of the OC were pretty neat. Like the bug that switch between different bodies. The mummies were dreadfully annoying with their god damn immunities. Chapter 2... I think its the best chapter in the OC however, I wish I had some sort of target to focus on. Chapter 3, things started to feel a little rushed...

All in all, the OC wasn't the best thing I'd ever experienced... but it was still pretty fun.
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While I'm at it, I might add I disagree with "Elton John Is Dead's" opinion about SoU. I personally loved it! Now the story wasn't necessarily exciting, but I felt it focused on other things. It felt magical, fanatical. It was very comical and I loved it. The kobolds, Deekin, The orgre who thinks his drawven wife is going to grow to be his size.

Heck, as I recall, I even kidnapped a child and then killed its mother!
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_cds13]

               Still playing it and experimenting, I tried the OC at different starting levels; the prelude advancing level is someway a cheat since you advance too fast (you can come out with a 4th level character in the prelude if spellcaster) but the game can suit almost every level between 1 and 20. Some claim the random looting is not good but that is what I like in the OC. I'd say that EJID got it right on SoU at least for my personal point of view; played it from friends (I bought the OC for them and they rewarded me by letting me play the 1st expansion). If you could call the OC easy well SoU seemed to me too hard (usually I play spellcasters) but enjoyed Deekin and the dumb ogre too :-) Ashtara is my favorite NPC!

Excuse me Sinomate, what is the bug you're talking about? Just curious, thank you
               
               

               
            

[Legacy_Iapetus303]

               I thought the OC was rather weak compared to BG, but I still played it all the way through.  (And have replayed it several times, but not all the way through I don't think).

My main criticism was the general structure of the game.  In each act, you were put in a hub and told you had three or four macguffins to collect.  Conveniently there were three or four adjacent zones where you could had to go to find them.  Then, when you had them all, Bam!  Plot Advancement! (and no going back).  It made the game world seem rather artificial and, well, gamey, rather than an actual living world.  Everywhere existed soley for you to adventure in, and noone in the world seemed to be doing anything (apart from your party and the antagonists).

A better design, in my view, would perhaps have been to require you to collect two or three of the MacGuffins, while the other NPCs found the final one themselves.  (You are the hero, so its reasonable that you can retrieve three MacGuffins in the time it takes the rest of the cast to find one).

That would make the game progress a bit faster, give more replay value (and perhaps add more variety and planning, if it meant you couldn't get all of the useful loot in any one act), and make the world seem a bit more dynamic.


My other main criticism was that a lot of the areas/missions seemed rather bland (Charwood, the Snow Globe, and maybe one or two others I can't remember being notable exceptions). 


Oh, and everyone's inability to see through the most obvious traitor in fiction was frustrating, and the scapegoating of Fenthic made sympathy for Neverwinter rather difficult.