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Baldur's Gate on Valium

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 26 / 27
Date: February 15, 2003
Author: Amazon User

I wanted to like this game. I really did. I was so excited when I got it. It was one of the first games to use 3rd Edition Rules Ad&D, complete with an old-school turn based combat system. My excitement would quickly turn to disgust, though.

It becomes apparent that this game was rushed right when you first create your party. The characters look utterly bland and generic, and customizability is extremely limited (ooo, my mage can have either a blue robe or black robe). Conspicuously missing are the Druid, Bard, and Wizard classes. Why these were not included is beyond me, and takes away from the authenticity and depth of the game. Also, you are not able to choose your own feats. For those who are unfamiliar with 3rd edition rules, feats are special abilities that you gain upon leveling up that enhance your character. Normally, you can choose which feats to take, but in this game they're all chosen for you as you level up. Ridiculous.

Things don't get any better after that. You're immediately thrust into a battle upon starting the game. Battles are full-turn based, with one character taking an action, then the next, etc, etc. Combat is excruciatingly long. Character animations are slow...prepare to be bored to tears while waiting for fifteen zombies to slowly lurch across the playfield before you can take any action (and wait again the next time around). The most frustrating aspect of combat, though, is the miss rate of your physical combatants. It's not uncommon to go a few rounds with all of your party memebers hitting absolutely NOTHING. In a real-time game like Baldur's Gate, this isn't so bad, since everything is happening at once, but in a game like this, it can make what should be simple and quick battles take FOREVER. After about ten minutes of both sides swinging at each other like they were playing pinata, I finally kill the three or four orcs at the beginning of the game and am rewarded with about 20xp for each of my party members. It takes 1000 to reach level 2. Needless to say, leveling is painfully slow. Expect to play for hours and hours without advancing a single level, even early on when leveling should be relatively quick. In addition, to make things quite lopsided, you'll find troves of uber equipment, often in the first dungeon. My level 3 Barbarian was wielding a +3 Axe at one point, which is analogous to giving an Uzi to a kindergartener, and a practice any self-respecting DM would stay far away from.

My biggest gripe with this game is magic and magic-based classes. As I stated before, the Wizard class is completely absent from the game. While the Sorcerer is a great class in its own right, the Wizard adds an old school and authentic feel, and it's sorely missed in this game. Aside from that, what IS there isn't much to write home about, either. Upon looking at my game's manual, I was appalled at the paltry collection of spells available to spellcasters. NO level 9 spells, and few higher level spells, with no creative or innovative spells whatsoever. Spellcasters themselves also leave a lot to be desired. In short, don't pick a Sorcerer for your party unless you want to be lugging around a dead weight xp hog with the durability of tissue paper for a very good portion of the game. Early on, your caster will start with at the very most 6 hit points, and cannot wear any sort of armor. This means that if an orc decides to turn his axe on our robed buddy, he won't last much longer than a round or two. The said orc while also laugh mockingly with when the sorcerer tries to defend himself by shooting a pretty little red bolt at him which scratches the orc for 2 damage. The sorcerer can cast this same little red bolt 4 times before exhausting his spell reserves, making him even more helpless. He could always try attacking with his equipped weapon, but he may as well be firing a musket at a penny 100 yards away, while blindfolded. I know mages are supposed to be weak when starting out and come into their own at higher levels, but as I mentioned before, levels comes extremely slowly, so it will be a long an arduous path before your mage can actually do anything other than die. This was one of the main reasons I stopped playing in disgust, since I'm a big fan of magic users and they're practically useless for a good portion of this game.

In conclusion, an overhyped game that deserves to be forgotten. [Money] wasted that I'll never get back.

Worst gameplay ever?

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 24 / 25
Date: October 23, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Pool of Radiance shows every sign of being rushed to market despite obvious problems in the user interface and serious bugs. It's only redeeming feature is a turn-based combat system that is deeply flawed and the ability to save at any time which is very important.

Let's start with the boring and repetitive dungeons which look like they were expressly designed to antagonize the players. Long detours are required to travel between nearby locations. The automap is almost useless as it consistently shows openings where none exist.

... Frequently characters fail to take anything close to the obvious, direct route to their targets and consequently arrive there too late to take any further action. Often a character would walk through a cloud of death rather than take a shorter, clear route. However, the bad guys were just as stupid so I guess it evens up.

The targeting algorithm is equally bad. All the characters are animated (wings flapping, etc) and even when the cursor is stationary they will move in and out of the target zone of an arrow or spell depending on which frame of the animation is being shown. Not only does this cause a problem when trying to target the character, but it causes problems when trying to target nearby characters, too. The angle of view also prevents you from targeting characters when there is a larger character in front (from the viewer's point of view, not the character's point of view)...

The non-combat part of the targeting algorithm is also flawed. Quite frequently it was impossible to persuade the group to move to the desired location because of the angle of view (which cannot be changed). There are also artificial restrictions on how far characters can look and travel both in and out of combat.

You can arrange your party to travel in a particular formation. This feature doesn't work. I had my fighters up front, thieves and clerics next, and my magic-user at the back. So why is it my magic user always seemed to walk into a room first? I couldn't get my fighters into combat until the bad guys had killed the magic-user because the silly sod was blocking the door. I wish there was a way for my fighters to kill the magic-user first.

I lost several turns in each fight because the computer has a habit of ending your turns prematurely.

It's also unstable. During about 100 hours of play the system crashed or hung about a dozen times. It also pauses for up to five seconds at a time with annoying regularity. I would expect this from a FPS game, but not an isometric view. Diablo never hung once.

All in all, this loses to Diablo in every way except the turn based combat (in theory, anyway) and the ability to save at any time (which I really like).

Two thumbs down.

Game play issues

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 24 / 27
Date: October 11, 2001
Author: Amazon User

The graphics are decent and all but the interface / game play issues are pretty ugly and sad in my book.

Navigation just stinks. Even after mapping out an entire dungeon, you have to click every single screenful to move around. Waypoints or some other form of vast-distance travel would be SO helpful.

Combat - here I am with a couple of Lvl 2 and 3 weenies and I'm surrounded by a bunch of Arracat's and a Guard Arracat. I'm supposed to defeat these things?! Not fricking likely! I'm completely stuck and haven't been able to play the game. I can't kill 'em and I can't flee. Game over and I'm not about to start the whole fricking thing over.

Combat - I try to cast any of my touch-based spells such as Harm and my opponant is given an Attack of Opportunity and next thing I know my cleric/enchanter is spead eagled on the dirt.

Sneaking around - characters can't travel too far from the party leader. How's my rogue supposed to scout ahead and check things out for me? Answer=He doesn't! He's picks locks and finds traps and that's all. No sneaking, no backstabbing, no doing things that makes rogues a rogue and not a glorified lock smith.

Combat - it's SO easy to mis-click and next thing you know your Cleric, who is supposed to be healing your 2hp fighter is firing her sling at a Master Shadow. Jee, there's a swell idea. You can't save during combat and one mis-click can change the entire outcome. Combat is so damned slow so if you mis-click towards the middle or end of 20 minute skirmish, screw up the entire battle, you gotta reload and start over. Do this a few times and I'm ready to break my fist on my monitor.

Combat - experience comes *very* slowly. No, I don't want a five minute Superhero but I *do* want to be rewarded appropriately. Having a group of Lvl 1 and 2 characters take down two Orcs, an Orc Leader, AND a Spectre or whatever that thing is at the entrance of Myth Drannor is a damn fine trick but the congratulations, the rewards for performing this feat, is so incredibly minimal! 3e rules?! Bah! I sure ain't getting no 3e experience....

No, I haven't been able to exit Myth Drannor yet so I don't know what the rest of the game is like but so far the Game Play and Interface are pretty sucky in my book. If I had the option I would return this game and exchange it for something else, AFTER checking the game reviews.

No more will I listen to media hype and false promises. If I do then I deserve to have my 40 some odd dollars stolen from my wallet.

Long awaited, huge disappointment

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 18 / 18
Date: September 29, 2001
Author: Amazon User

Having seen the advance screen shots of the game 2 years ago at E3 in L.A., I have long awaited the release of Pool of Radiance. I am an avid fan of the original game and series that took us to the Forgotten Realms. To say the graphics aren't stunning would be an understatement for they truly are. That is about the only thing I can say good about the game itself.

To describe it best would be Diablo on SLOW MOTION! Everything moves at a snails pace, including combat which is more tedious than it is worth - to boot, the game is mostly combat, little story told within and what is told is rarely spoken and hard to read. To bring up a menu for ANYTHING requires right clicking, then clicking on a subheading, then on the final choice and FINALLY on the monster, character or object you want to do the ability on. Ease of controls is something this game is not. Reading your characters health requires another sub command within a command, etc. Anyone who has played these games before knows that ease of controls is key to enjoying any game.

Characters walk slowly everywhere except in combat. You cannot move one character ahead of the party to scout around since you cannot be 10' from the rest it seems. Scrolling on a map only goes as far as the size of your monitor, no farther, despite having uncovered the area from the 'fog' previously. All in all, the controls are horrible.

Character generation is extremely limiting despite what the reviews say. There are no bards, no true wizards (only sorcerer), no subclasses within the class like the Third Ed. rules offer (not to mention Baldur's Gate II), no gnomes, no female characters unless an elf-human-or half-elf, lack of a good spell list (only the basics are covered), the average weapons, no ammo to buy for ranged weapons (unlimited supply? Realism counts to some degree now), etc.

It is a poor adaptation of the Dungeons & Dragons universe. Do not be fooled by the graphics alone. The third edition rules are touched on here and there but it is clearly not what any gamers would like or expect. For the first attempt by SSI, UbiSoft and Prima games to enter the D&D universe, it is a poor one at best. Stick with Baldur's Gate II and wait for the expansions in that series. Otherwise, there is Neverwinter Nights next year to look for. What an extreme disappointment this was. After just one day, I am already returning the software. Sad and a true disappointment..

What the buyer needs to know:

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 16 / 17
Date: October 03, 2001
Author: Amazon User

First of all, people may have different ideas of what constitutes an RPG, however they could probably all agree that it involves taking characters into a fictional setting and taking part in their growth through an immersive combat and interaction system. Unfortunately there's very little in the way of ROLE PLAYING in this game. The thin, linear plot offers no meaningful opportunities to play characters of varying alignments and backgrounds due to the game's nearly complete focus on tactical combat. PoR boasts of being the first game to utilize 3rd Ed. D&D rules. Some very important rules were indeed carried over, but you'll find that some of the best aspects are not under your control. Particularly when it comes to the development of your characters.

GAMEPLAY:
PoR takes place in the labyrinth ruins of Myth Drannor and its gameplay is very much of a dungeon crawl. These dungeons are rather simplistic in design with few features to distinguish one section from the next. While the combat can be engaging initially, it becomes very repetitive after several hours. Enemies during these turn-based rounds take their sweet old time performing an action and walk towards you at a snail's pace to even initiate combat. You'll fight hundreds of the same types of enemies of which there aren't a great variety, and earn a modicum of experience points as a reward. Reaching the next level of experience in this game does take a very, very long time, making such an achievement both relieving and tiresome. You will earn a great deal of gold and items over the course of the game, yet this will ultimately prove useless since you're given nearly no opportunity to spend this hard fought loot.

Your PCs won't be experiencing the varied and interesting dialogue choices available in such CRPG games as the Fallout, Planescape: Torment, or Baldur's Gate series. While you won't be interacting with many NPCs due to the lack of such side characters, what NPCs that do exist lack personality and serve as reminders of what little your own characters seem to have. While PoR has minimal roleplaying opportunities, the game does allow you to create your own character and attributes albeit with a point-based system (an optional rule from the 3rd Ed. D&D). Sorry, but you can't roll up your attributes and even the pregenerated characters the game provides for you will always have more points allocated to their attributes. Thus, it provides little incentive to create your own characters. And no, you can not even change the names of these pregenerated characters. You'll find that these small bonuses from the higher attributes play a vital role in the combat system. While many players will opt to severely sacrifice certain attributes to make other abilities stronger, for a warrior... for example, expect to be as intelligent as a roll of toilet paper, have the wisdom of an issue of Cosmopolitan magazine, and inherit the charisma of Mini-me. You're given a small role in your character's progression. 3rd ed. D&D implements feats and skills much like the Fallout series perks and skills system. PoR has added several of these skills and feats to their game, but you do not get to customize your characters by getting to select their skills or feats at all. Instead, the game chooses them for you. Therefore... a fighter, sorceror, rogue, etc. will be an exact clone of another. Fortunately, a few of these feats and skills are completely useless. Spellcraft for example has many uses in 3rd Ed. D&D. In PoR, it only gives you a chance to identify an incoming enemy spell.

This game started out as an ambitious project that promised features such as characters being able to interact with the environment for tactical purposes... pushing crates to block doors or climb atop tables to gain a height advantage over adversaries. No longer there. But there are several tons of chairs, tables, boxes, and rocks that you WILL have to smash or risk the possibility of missing a key or other vital item. However the likelyhood of a useful item being in one of these "containers" is extremely slim. Yet you'll really have no other choice.

The interface for combat is not intuitive. While you do get to make your own hotkeys, its procedure is inconvenient due to having to move from each tab screen to the next.

GRAPHICS and SOUND:
Many of the animations, particularly many of the spell effects, have been well designed and some of the monsters look very good. But items added to your character, especially boots and gloves look like they were drawn in with a red crayon. The backgrounds outside the dungeon look very good as well.
The synthesized music is dull and unvaried, however some sound effects for the fights are good. The sound department was not a focus anyways. The load screens give you some absolutely horrid artwork to stare at for the 30 seconds or more that it often takes.

REPLAYABILITY:
There is very little incentive to replay this game. It's extremely linear and while its tactical combat system offers more variety than a game like Diablo 1&2, the amount of time to conduct hundreds of these battles will make you question whether you'll look back fondly and remember any of them in retrospect. Some computer or video games you will remember with fondness due to certain poignant experiences within them. PoR doesn't have any such charm or creativity.

FINAL WORDS:
Technical problems are rather severe with this product. Among a few major bugs existing for this game, a couple of them are unforgivable. One is the extreme difficulty in installing the game onto partitioned drives (which many experienced computer users do have). The other is particularly dangerous to your computer. This one bug, while rare, causes your OS to be completely wiped. Check the forums ...for more specifics.

Some people may actually enjoy the lengthy and immersive combat, but it's hard to imagine how long anyone can keep it up. With hundreds of mundane battles with recycled enemies, it'll certainly test your mettle and patience to continue. You'll find that resorting to a few rudimentary tactical maneuvers is all that is required and that loses its appeal after some time.

There will be those who are of the extreme sort though who think of this game as the best or one of the best they've played ever. These are very sad individuals who are unable to make unbiased judgements regarding this game. Beware, the buyer. This game has caused many people frustration and anger. Even those who are able to play the game will need a guide book or go online to a forum to meet other existing players for hints on how to proceed.

A site called the Scrying Room is linked to the start menu if you're fortunate enough to be able to install the game. Fihnakis, the administrator there, has long promoted PoR and worked hard to support the game during its development. He's one of the most disappointed fans. ... returned my game recently. Thank goodness for return policies.

if I could give this game no stars, I would

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 11 / 12
Date: December 29, 2001
Author: Amazon User

because that's what it deserves. it was a crime to release this game because of all the bad decisions and bungled work.

let's go down the list...

this game claimed it used 3rd edition D&D rules, but the terrible implementation bore almost no resemblance to 3rd edition. here's a hint for the game developers: if you can't pick your feats and skills, and the feats and skills are gimped to begin with, it's not really a 3rd edition ruleset.

tedious, unimaginative gameplay. this game essentially consists of one dungeon that you have to run in and out of. endless backtracking and running through empty spaces you've already cleared.

an interface where it is maddeningly easy to send your character to instant death with one unfortunate click. play this game and I guarantee you will shout many times in hair-tearing frustration, "No, I didn't want you to go there!" and the priceless, "I didn't tell you to do that!"

character generation. you got fewer points to make your own characters with than the pre-generated characters get. what ... madness is that?

the graphics are highly touted by a lot of reviewers, but this does NOT look like a game that came out three years after Baldur's Gate. they should have been able to do do better than this.

then there's the endless, laughable laundry list of serious bugs: corrupted saved games, inability to install on any drive but C, and its unfortunate tendency to HOSE THE REGISTRIES ON WIN 98 WHEN YOU TRIED TO UNINSTALL IT. all of these bugs, I believe, were eventually corrected with patches, but they never should have shipped a box full o' smegma like this.

only true hate and loathing could inspire me to write this long a review. I highly anticipated this game. I was really looking forward to it. and the game ended up a crushing, betraying disappointment.

I want my money back, and the several hateful hours I spent swimming in digital dreck.

Gameplay lacking but entertaining

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 20 / 29
Date: October 04, 2001
Author: Amazon User

I must have been lucky so far...I haven't suffered the crashes and installation horror stories I've been reading about.

Like most people, I have been looking forward to the first 3E D&D rules-based game... While I'm not crestfallen after having played the game for a day, I'm not blown away or very impressed. Character generation is a bore...while I almost agree with a point-based stat generator (keeps you from sitting there for an hour trying to get 3 or 4 '18s'), the lack of customizing in terms of feats and skills takes away the great versatility of the new rules. Why would my Monk need the Iron Will feat of all the other good ones available? The set skills are okay, considering that in most of these types of games you're only going to use certain ones anyway...at least you can multiclass...

Combat is tedious and the game lacks a decent hotkey system despite being able to map character actions to the F2-F12 keys and selecting options in combat is a frustrating affair... I'm really surprised that after all the complaints about movement in Baldur's Gate, ANOTHER D&D game would come out where you can't move directly and quickly from one explored area to another...there is absolutely no reason that you should have to walk ALL THE WAY BACK after exploring an area. This just wastes your time and makes exploring the huge dungeons more of a pain.

The writing is okay and the story is just like all other "role-playing" games out there...GO GET THE THING. GO GET THE OTHER THING. BRING THE THING BACK TO ME. KILL THE THING...and so on, ad nauseum.

I give the game 4 stars, reluctantly, because it is the first 3E game and from what I understand, they switched engines mid-development. But I'm appalled at the installation horrors that I've heard about, companies should be ashamed to do that to people.

With all its problems, I'm still enjoying the game, despite the poor interface and geologic level-advancement (nothing is worse than fighting for your life and gaining negligible experience). Perhaps with some patches the gameplay will improve and give this game some more credibility.

Oh my gosh...

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 9 / 9
Date: May 30, 2004
Author: Amazon User

I pop in the disc and select install. The game refuses to let me do a full installation because it says I don't have 1 gig of space free on D:\(When I clearly have 5 gigs free). So, I have to do minimal install. I then finish installing it and go to play the game, only to learn that it didn't install on D:\ drive. Apparently, I need to download a patch just to install the game to D:\. Wow, the creators sure messed up on something so fundamental. They must not have even tested the game because apparently, you can't install the game in any specified folder unless you download patch 1.1.

Then I go to play the game only to see my characters walking at 2 miles an hour. I start it up with a paladin, barbarian, and rogue tearing the place up while my mage sits down and rests. I then realize that my characters don't have their long swords equipped. This is odd because I just equipped those long swords. I look at my inventory only to learn that there is no long sword animation. I have the sword equipped but I can't see it because I guess the creators left that out or the minimal installation(which I was forced to use) must not have it. This pisses me off greatly. I then look around for quicksave. Where is quicksave? I have no clue. You can't customize your controls or something. I then give up on the game to play Icewind Dale. The games have the exact same stories, and Pool of Radiance has so many problems that I don't ever plan to play it again. Besides, if you do find a sword that does 585598250298 damage in the first dungeon, you know theres a problem.

How did this game make it out the door?

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 10 / 11
Date: September 30, 2001
Author: Amazon User

This game is, without question, one of the worst games I have ever played. I first tried to install it on my Windows 98 computer. When the installation failed and I had to run their uninstall program, somehow it completely hosed my registry and ruined my computer, preventing it from booting up again! Then, when I finally got it working on a Windows 2000 computer, numerous video, sound, and gameplay bugs ruined any sort of enjoyment I was getting out of it. The last straw was when I tried to save the game and the game crashed but also corrupted several of my previous saved games!

Even if the game were completely bug free, it's not a very enjoyable game to play. Combat is tedious, characters are not very customizable, and the interface isn't very intuitive. It's certainly no Baldur's Gate or Diablo.

It's a shame. I was really looking forward to this game after having spent some happy hours playing the original Pool of Radiance and the subsequent gold-box games many years ago. I really wanted to like Pool of Radiance 2, but believe me, you'd be better off spending your money on something else....

TAKE ACTION!! No more 1 star games, please!!

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 8 / 8
Date: October 03, 2001
Author: Amazon User

This game is a disaster. Not only does it not capture the flavor of the DnD 3rd edition rules (primarily the ability to almost limitlessly customize each of the character classes), but the graphics are poor (except for the magic and creature animations, which are pretty good), combat is repetitive and tedious (it's sort of like a turn-based Diablo)-- You know what? The list goes on. There's been an awful lot of bad reviews of this game all over the internet. Don't buy this game. This seems to have been a rush job, and no amount of patching can fix the problem. I was SO looking forward to this game, and my hopes were dashed once I finally got to play it. I tried, I really did, but it's just a sorry excuse for a computer game that was foisted on an eager audience, which to me and many others says that UbiSoft doesn't really give a rip about their customers. What happened to the Quality Assurance team? Did anyone who worked on the game actually play 3rd Edition DnD and if so how could they let this happen?!?! I played the game for three days and it drove me nuts!! I'm tired of computer game companies releasing GARBAGE and then expecting us to pay for it by putting up with it by shelling out money, putting up with their lame excuses, and even (for the most part) giving them the benefit of the doubt and downloading tons of patches over and over. No more. Unless you enjoy being treated like this, I suggest you TAKE ACTION!! Read the following letter, posted by a Mr. Crowley on the Pool of Radiance homepage, then DO SOMETHING!! If you agree, DON'T JUST SIT THERE!! Take action. It's our responsiblity as consumers.

Dear Fellow Gamer:

This post may not apply to this particular site's game, but it does apply to you as a consumer and buyer of gaming software.

Ubi Soft and Stormfront Studios have recently released a game entitled "Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor". It appears that the game is bug ridden and in many cases, unplayable in its initial release form. In the worst case, it has caused people's Operating Systems to fail. We, the purchasers of this game, would like to recommend that, at the least, you refrain from purchasing this game until the manufacturer can assure that this product will work safely at least, if not well, on all computers.

So what, right? Weren't planning on buying this one? Well, that's ok, we understand... but there's a deeper issue here. Ever buy a game that needed a patch JUST TO RUN? Ever wait for a game with excitement, only to have hours of frustration trying to get the thing to run? You're not alone. There are far too many products like that released on a yearly basis. Issues that could be fixed with better Quality Assurance teams. Products that were rushed out the door. Games that don't run well unless you have a Supercomputer.

The reason that these companies can continue to behave like this is that we, as consumers, continue to allow them to. Buy the game, it doesn't work, we wait for the patch to fix it, install the patch, play the game, and then let them off the hook. No apology from the issuers because of the technical issues, no repercussions to their bottom line, no further mention of your time wasted, your frustration, or your inconvenience.

How long, as a segment of the US economy, will we wait until we hold producers to a higher standard? To make them do a better job. I'm not talking bug free releases, I'm not delusional. But shouldn't the game you buy AT LEAST RUN? Be able to start up and play to a say 95% performance level? Without having to reinvent your machine?

Stay tuned... we're mad over here. We may not let Ubi Soft off easy for this one (they do have lots of titles you might be familiar with).<... .

Thank you in advance for your time,
Your Fellow Gamers

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