Should I bother with Icewind Dale?
Abby_Zero
Member Posts: 68
I’m a huge Baldur’s fan from the old days. I played Icewind Dale when it came out and was underwhelmed with it compared to BG. The graphics were muddy and the story was thin. I did like it a fair bit. Now that I see Icewind Dale 2 is DEAD/will NEVER EVER BE MADE (which is actually really depressing to me 
) due to the loss of the original code computer-ey whatever stuff...
Should I bother getting Icewind Dale EE or not?
) due to the loss of the original code computer-ey whatever stuff...Should I bother getting Icewind Dale EE or not?
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If you're really missing the party interaction, check out Kulyok's IWD NPC mod.
http://www.pocketplane.net/iwdnpc
You won't get the character interaction, but you could mod that or make up the dialogue yourself. I like to do the latter. I think that may be why I like it better.
What does playing it “within Baldur’s Gate 2” mean out of curiosity
I got it by the way, I didn’t remember the portraits until I loaded it up lol
Really takes me back.
It seems harder to roll decent ability scores than BG.
I always loved BG better, but IWD is still decent.
Also, IWDEE is based on a mod, IWD-in-BG2 by DavidW and CamDawg (the latter now works for Beamdog). It ported the game to the BG2 engine (like Tutu and BGT did for BG1).
I WOULD RECOMMEND IT.
However. I find the story interesting and the build up to the climax enjoyable , even though you are given enough information to work out what is going to happen in the end, waaaaay before the actual end.
A few issues for me is that you do not have free abandon to wander where you like. A quest is completed and another area opens up. You create your own party, so you have less emotional attachment to (and yes, not being able to take a party onwards to another game hurts here as well), in comparison, to your sole character in BG or Planescape.
This, for me, hurts replayability. I am very glad I have played it. I felt elated and thrilled at completing it. It is a challenge. Yet I have very little desire to play again... Once you have climbed the spine of the world you end up looking for bigger mountains.
The awesome soundtrack, the beautiful areas... I know the story is where a lot of people find it flat, especially compared to BG/BG2. I don't think it's accurate to say one is better than the other, they're just different. BG/BG2 are very personal stories, as they revolve around who you are and the process of self-discovery. IWD is a lot more epic story, in the old-school sense, covering ancient grudges between the elves and the dwarves and old enemies plotting their long revenge.
@Anduin is right in that this hurts replayability--because BG/BG2 are so personal, your choice of character matters a great deal and can take you into a lot of different directions in subsequent playthroughs. The events in IWD will always unfold as they have before.
BG1/2 is almost exactly the same. Narrative driven 99% with illusion of choices.
but the most important difference between BG1/2 and IWD (and PoE for example) is that BG1/2 has not only a story but also a PLOT. Especially BG1 plot is excellent, unjustly outshined by BG2 plot (also great but not as good as BG1 imo - why I MUST go to the Underdark?? Irenicus? come again? stole something from me? what? my soul? eeeee....nice try. Heya, it was me! OK, I get it!)
Overall IWD with its more simple and I would dare to say reasonable game mechanics is more suited for new players. For veteran BG players - play without prejudice/bias and cut your anomens short.
IWD lets you create a full party of adventurers. No forced backstory. No reasoning. You just create a party and imagine why they're there, which IMO opens up more possibilities for roleplay.
Sure, BG also lets you create a party but the game wasn't created with that in mind, it was created just with charname in mind. And some of the Race/Classes don't even make much sense considering that you've lived in candlekeep your whole life.
The music is a million times better in IWD.
The ambiance and aesthetics are better too. The Spine of the World is gorgeous.
BG is better in that it lets you go out in the wilderness and explore, I'll give it that. It's a shame IWD never lets you just go out and explore. It's much more streamlined.
I disagree with those who say IWD lacks history/plot. It's not the main focus, but it's there, and I personally prefer it over BG.
I found myself much more immersed in the world of IWD than I ever did in BG.
All in all, this is mostly down to personal tastes. Just try it out. You might not like it more than BG, but you will definitely enjoy it. So will the events in BG.
EDIT: Ehhhh, okay. @ThacoBell made some fine points in his previous post.
Story and battles are the real big differences between BG and IWD. BG is much more story-based. The battles are short most of the times and you got to fight less monsters. BG II has more fights and harder monsters as well (like dragons and stuff). IWD has got a very linear storyline with just a few side quests, but its focus is on battling hordes of monsters. Another thing to mention: IWD has the much better soundtrack. The melodies are quite awesome. I've never had a game with a place you've got to return over and over again (like Kuldahar) where I could stand and even enjoy the music even after the tenth time being there. And IWD's story is not bad at all. It always keeps you moving forward, crawling the next dungeon, killing monsters and looting stuff.
If you don't like the battles or battle system, don't bother with IWD. If you don't like dungeons, spiders, undead and cold weather, don't bother with IWD. If you want a game of not keeping track with the storyline at all at some point, don't bother with IWD.
And I nearly forgot smething: most of the spells look much cooler in IWD. And there are a lot of them, I haven't even tried in like five walkthroughs of just the basic game.
But, the same is true of the Icewind Dale voice sets. I'm serious. Some of those voice sets are just as memorable to me, with whatever names I give them, as Jaheira, Imoen, or Minsc.
Take this guy:
"(sigh) Oh, all right, I guess."
"I'm a busy man! I got places to go, monsters to kill!"
"Whelp, it looks like I'm gonna have to go on a killing spree."
(Fun fact: I used this voice set for Belkar when I did an Order of the Stick party. Now I always read it in this voice when I read Belkar's lines in the strip.)
Or this woman:
"A little fire and lightning should liven things up!"
Or her:
"You would do well to fear a woman's wrath!"
"Queen for a day, is it?"
How about this dwarf:
"I'll wash me beard in your blood!"
Non-verbal guy:
"Arrgh!"
"Hrrrm!"
This good old wizard:
"It is a shame we must resort to violence."
Or this vain one:
"The learned should lead!"
Can't you just hear the lines in your head with the voice acting as you read them? The voice-acting in IWD is top-notch.
Also, little known fact: The narrator is David Ogden Stiers, who played Charles Winchester III on M*A*S*H and Lwaxanna Troi's first love interest on Star Trek: TNG.
Kudos also to the voice actor who played Archdruid Arundel, all of whose lines are voiced, and very well acted.
I never would've recognized him.
Back on topic: I think BG1 suffers from the exact same lack of NPC interaction that IWD has. It wasn't until BG2 that npcs actually became characters.
The really neat thing about Icewind Dale is - the lessons you learn playing vintage* Baldur's Gate don't always apply to Icewind Dale because the scope of the battles are different. Likewise, the reverse is also true. It's best summed up by Fezzik from The Princess Bride: "You use different moves when you're fighting half a dozen people, than when you only have to be worried about one." Solo and semisolo† fights are more plentiful in BG+TotSC so the overall strategy more strongly accounts for situations like Wizard Speed Chess or Amelyssan's puzzle battle. Meanwhile, in IWD you're fighting an army of Goblins, then an army of restless undead, then an army of Yuan-Ti, then an army of Elves, then an army of Salamanders, then an army of Drow, then an army of Barbarians...
*I specify 'vintage' because ToB leaned more toward IWD's scope to begin with, and SoD's scope is that of ToB but at a lower character level.
†Semisolo: A fight against a group of enemies, wherein the defeat of one specific one immediately finishes the battle in your favor. A perfect example of one is the Sarevok fight at the end of BG1
Adding this kind of interaction is one reason I love to use Kulyok's IWDNPC mod and Domi's IWD2NPC mod.