Closest you will get to Baldur's Gate 2 experience
I just finished NWN2 after almost four weeks of gaming. The game is much better than how it was critically received almost two years ago. The game has a lot of technical issues at patch 1.11. Other than that, it is a really good RPG experience and the closest you'll get to Baldur's Gate 2.
Let's get the cons out of the way first, the camera is the biggest issue of the game. Aside from the enemy, you'll constantly fight the camera which never seems to show you the meaningful battles. Sometimes when a new scene loads up, it just spins around your character indefinitely. Camera aside, the game is not very responsive when it comes to spells, skills, actions or just plain companion AI. There were many times when my allies did not do anything even with AI button turned on. The most frustating problem is the crashing to the desktop after moving to a new area, I guess that's why there is an in-game tips which say "save a lot and often".
The visuals are way below average, a game like Guild Wars which came out earlier than NWN2 has much nicer graphics. The cities and world are also too dense, which might explain the continuous battle with the camera to see your party. The sound is faithful to what I heard from Baldur's Gate 2 many years ago and the music fits the game well. The voice acting is pretty good, mostly present during important plots and key characters.
The story is one of the strong part of the game, it keeps me going from start to finish. The pacing at the beginning is a bit slow but the action picks up once Neverwinter is reached. I also like my companions bickering, reminds me a lot of Baldur's Gate 2. Back in BG2, I could literally breath the air Faerun, I didn't get the same feeling in this game. The game mechanic is very similar to the one from the infinity engine and I like queueing up the spells when attacking enemies.
In brief, if you want a really good RPG, Neverwinter Nights 2 delivers here. All you have to do is ignore its flaws and you'll have a really pleasant time talking, taunting, lieing and bashing your way through Neverwinter.
