Icewind Dale: Enhanced Edition

Let me get this out of the way: this was my first and last enhanced edition from Beamdog. Although easier to set up and slightly more stable, there are a lot more bugs compared to the originals -- including one where THE WHOLE SCREEN FLASHES RANDOMLY. The fact that a native Linux port runs about the same as the original in WINE is a joke. On to the game itself. It's strange trying to explain IWD. It really is just an Infinity Engine dungeon crawl, but that seems too simple. Imagine the level-by-level exploration and the low-level game mechanics of BG1 alongside BG2's linear story. And you get to make your whole party, so there's no banter or character quests. It's... Strange, and it honestly doesn't really work. The game lacks a clear identity, both in terms of narrative and gameplay, from the get-go. The result is a strange hodgepodge of gorgeous level design, brutal combat, and bone-chilling atmosphere. Winds howl as you hurl flaming pots at ice trolls on snowy precipices. Flames crackle as you plod around the secret underground Yuan-Ti temple. All for... Some gem or something. "God, how many fetch quests can they give me?" you'll ask yourself. A lot. About 60 hours worth, it turns out. So who is this game for? Not newbies: the combat is far too difficult for a new player. Not people who love good stories: there barely is one -- and it's all exposition. Not people who love exploration: the game is linear. But this is Infinity Engine. How bad could it really be? It's the classic DnD character creation, the classic spellcasting system, the classic multi-classing system, and who could ever forget Our Lord and Savior Saint THAC0? The game is worth buying and worth playing through -- after the Baldur's Gate series and Planescape. It's an interesting experiment that will test your knowledge of the ruleset for veterans.

Beware going in that your party needs to be optimized to basically the fantasy equivalent of a commando breaching team. Min/max all the stats, dual or multiclass your thief, start mages off with a few levels of fighter, keep pausing to summon and cast crowd control debuffs and AoE spells, etc. For higher difficulties, EVERYONE in your team needs a casting class AND fighter or ranger, except the Shaman and Sorcerer.

When compared to Bioware games in the similar era, the graphics and general playability of the game do not disappoint. I missed this title growing up and when I saw it come back onto GOG, snatched it. Having played Torment, Baldur's Gate, and Baldur's Gate 2 through all the way I had expected the game to be similar. It's a good game, but not really in that same playstyle as these others I've mentioned. Instead, I can more easily compare this game to is long-past predecessors built by SSI like Treasures of the Savage Frontier or Dark Sun Shattered Lands. The gameplay is far closer to these. You build out your own party of up to 6 characters and the story development doesn't really delve very deeply into your character's past or motivations. It also to a certain degree would match a similar experience you might have playing a store-bought D&D module where it isn't specifically tailored to the characters your players have made. Because the graphics are isometric and far more advanced, you get experience that is far more appealing to the eyes and vastly superior music, vocals, and sound effects. This game is also alot more combat-centric and less of a dialog heavy game so if you didn't really enjoy Planescape Torment, for example, then you might really enjoy this game. The combats are quite tough so save often!

Whereas Baldur's Gate feels like a game out of the storytelling 90s, where every character has an individual story--and those stories drive the plot of the campaign from level 1 to level 30--Icewind Dale feels like a game from the 80s. In those days, it was "cool" if you showed up with a backstory for your character. It showed you were serious about the game. But that backstory wouldn't impact the campaign beyond your character's own decisions. And, while there might be dozens of pages of backstory in the DM's head, it was never going to filter down to you as a player except through the occasional bit of exposition. That is Icewind Dale. Sporadic exposition that functions as punctuation around chapters full of bloodletting and looting. Another throwback to those halcyon days of story-free gaming is the dramatic shifts in challenge level. You might fight through a dozen rooms of orcs only to find a room inhabited by a dragon. In the P&P game, those rooms were often seen as a chance to show common sense and run, however. In Icewind Dale, these rooms are instead capstones...boss fights that must be overcome to advance the plot. Fighting the same battle a half dozen times in the name of perfecting "tactics," which usually amounts to enough lucky die rolls to make enough saves and enough attack dice to kill the enemy before they kill you. The story is compelling, and the Infinity Engine is in top form. Moreover, I LOVE what Beamdog has done with the place. But, at its core, this is still the same old dungeon crawling epic, where you become the canary in the story's deep, unlit coal mine, hoping not to expire for lack of plot as the cave threatens to let out on bare graph paper at any moment...

Rather than the masterpieces of art Planescape and BG are, this one feel more like the kind of adventure you have when you sit around a table with a DM and your friends, minus the friends in single player mode. Overall a fun game, at least beamdog learnt from the FUBAR with their added OCs in BG and didn't add any to this. For future reference you can get the original edition of IWD. To do this you go to the game in your shelf and left click on it. Above the big blue gog galaxy download button there are three dropdown tabs, system, language and more. Go into more and there will be an item called SERIAL KEYS, click on this and you will be shown a link. Copy and paste this to a new tab and you can use this code to add the original version of BG1, BG2 and icewind dale to your owned games.