Newsgroup: it.comp.giochi.rpg
Titolo: Alcune news su BGII: Throne of Bhaal (in English, sorry)

All good things must come to an end and Interplay's RPG masterpiece,
Baldur's Gate, is no exception. The epic Dungeons & Dragons adventure
which began two years ago will come to an end this Summer when
developer BioWare releases the Baldur's Gate 2 expansion pack, Throne
Of Bhaal.
To find out more we sent our man in the States to the BioWare office
to talk to Ray Muzyka, BioWare's CEO, about what we can expect from
Throne Of Bhaal and what the future holds for the Forgotten Realms
franchise. And while Ray's back was turned, our intrepid reporter
managed to steal some exclusive new screenshots for you to look at
too. There's no security too good for us here at PC GAMEPLAY.
PCG: How does Throne Of Bhaal differ as an expansion pack to Tales Of
The Sword Coast?
RM: Tales Of The Sword Coast was a different kind of expansion pack in
that it was quite separate from the storyline - it wasn't connected at
all. This is much more closely connected to the storyline. While you
need to own BG2 in order to play TOB, you need not have completed it.
TOB has two parts: an add-in section, and an add-on section. The
add-in is a huge dungeon called Watcher's Keep, which can be played at
any point. It's a really cool thing, we think it's the best dungeon
we've made in any Baldur's Gate game.
PCG: How long will it take to finish Throne Of Bhaal and what can we
expect from it?
RM: In keeping with the other games in the series, this one lasts a
long time - about 30 to 50 hours. About half of that game time is
spent in the Watcher's Keep dungeon and half covers the city of
Saradush and the continuation of the Child Of Bhaal saga. One of the
things we're trying to do is make this the best game in the Baldur's
Gate series, taking everything we've learned, everything that Black
Island has done with Icewind Dale and Planescape [both games used
BioWare's Infinity engine], and trying to make a game that's as good
or better than those things is our goal.
PCG: Tell us something about the new experience cap.
RM: There's an experience cap of 8 million points, or the 40th level.
[BG2 had an experience cap of 2,950,000 points, and players finished
at about Level 20]. We're doing this for the hardcore players who try
to do everything that can be done in a game. The average player will
probably get up to the 30th level, if they do everything. There'll be
lots of room for replay. Most people will not reach the cap.
Ray then broke off to show us some of the new items and spells that
are found in the Throne Of Bhaal. These were:
Machine of Lum the Mad: A bizarre machine that lets you create random
events by pressing switches and pulling levers. 
Whirlwhind Attack: A powerful attack that lets characters finish off
first level creatures very quickly. 
Dragon's Breath: A high-level mage ability that causes ancient red
dragon to come out of the ground. 
Globe of Blades: A high-level cleric spell that turns the caster into
a walking Moulinex and damages anyone that comes close. 
Storm of Vengeance: Another high-level cleric spell that produces a
tempest of biblical proportions which comes together with storm
clouds. Fire and acid rain down and lightning strikes. Low-level
characters get slain right away and any that remain get poisoned. 
PCG: Why is this the last chapter of the story? Do you not want to
create any more games?
RM: We owe it to our fans to finish the story. The fans who played at
the beginning will want to see it to the end.
PCG: In the Hollywood model, the audience for a sequel is usually less
than that of the first movie, as people drop off. Are you keeping
people from the first version?
RM: TOB probably has a good chance of getting new people. You don't
have to have played BG2 to play this. You can start automatically at a
high level.
PCG: Why would fans want to see the story concluded?
RM: D&D is level-based, so you eventually reach a level where the
monsters get easier and easier to fight.
PCG: Is this the end of the road for the Infinity engine?
RM: Not necessarily. We have new engines in development, obviously,
with Neverwinter Nights we have our 3D Omen engine and with our Star
Wars role-playing game we have the Odyssey engine. With MDK2 we had
the 3D Omen engine. I guess there's a trend towards 3D, but the
Infinity engine has done pretty well.
So there you have it, the best Baldur's Gate game ever and that's
official. 
Baldur's Gate 2: Throne Of Bhaal should be on British shores come the
end of July.

 end of July.
Bene bene, deve arrivare prima di NWN altrimenti se lo gioca lui.
^_____^
--
Ciao - Pibaro
pib...@libero.it
ICQ n. 57584065
Planescape: Torment. Italian translation project
Supportate il nostro progetto, se sapete l'inglese o
sapete qualcosa di programmazione e volete darci una mano
contattatemi in e-mail


C'e' anche in HoW
Vorrei anche far notare questa cosa:
PCG: Why would fans want to see the story concluded?
RM: D&D is level-based, so you eventually reach a level where the
monsters get easier and easier to fight.
La vera risposta sarebbe dovuta essere:
RM: Interplay lost the D&D licence in favor of Hasbro/Infogrames, so
we are not allowed to make any more Forgotten Realms games...

 we are not allowed to make any more Forgotten Realms games...
Si, l'avevo notato anch'io, tra l'altro se non ricordo male ad un certo
punto il discorso diritti viene anche fuori, ma lui glissa completamente.
