The reason why such visual degradation was not seen in the previous PS4 conversions of Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale and Planescape: Torment is because their pre-rendered backgrounds were timeless to an extent (and already seen in current-gen titles such as Pillars of Eternity and Tides of Numenera), whereas Neverwinter Night’s visuals are entirely dependent upon the real-time visual capabilities of the time (hence the earlier PS2 reference). Likewise, when you’re in the game, Neverwinter Nights hardly inspires from a visual standpoint as low detail character models and environments conspire with a perspective that allows you to see through and over the environment in a way that, well, you just don’t get these days because normally developers put walls and ceilings in place to prevent you from seeing ‘into’ the world, so to speak. The problem however, is that no other aspect of Neverwinter Night’s visual presentation has received improvements of this sort of caliber, meaning that rather then enhancing the game, they merely serve to emphasize just how dated it really is.įrom the start you know you’re in for a ride when the pre-rendered introduction kicks in, looking blocky, flaw ridden and stuttery in a way that simply does not look good on a 55 inch 4K television. As alluded to at the top of this review, Neverwinter Nights runs at 1080p resolution and 60 frames per second. Though alterations have been made to the UI and control system on account of Neverwinter Nights new PS4 digs (something we’ll get to later), the bounty of the technical improvements that this enhanced version of the game enjoys appear to be limited to screen resolution and framerate. A higher resolution and smoother framerate aren’t enough to keep Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition from looking dated. As such, it’s perhaps cynically easy to date Neverwinter Nights from a technical standpoint. Neverwinter Nights originally saw release on PC all the way back in 2002 a time when Sony’s PlayStation 2 console had been on the market for just over a year and a half, and was certainly a fair ways from realizing its potential. Ok, so we’ll start with the ugliness, but first – some context. If you can look past the shortcomings of the dated presentation and lacking polish, you’ll see why this is one of the most highly regarded RPGs.Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition PS4 Review An Almost Uniquely Ugly Looking Game That Conceals A Massive, Genre Defining RPG That’s a shame when Neverwinter Nights was a game that tried to capture more of the tabletop RPG vibe than previous CRPGs had managed.Įven so, there’s well over a hundred hours of some of the best-written RPGs of all time, and a ton of additional curated content. All of this can be played with online co-op as well, though on PlayStation 4 you’re missing out on cross-platform multiplayer and the Persistent Worlds, two player-run campaigns that are hosted online and support hundreds of players at a time. Alongside the original campaign, it has two expansions included, Shadows of Undrentide and Hordes of the Underdark, as well as a load of modules to play through. The one place where Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition really excels is with the wealth of content available to you. On the plus side, the radial menus the game uses for in-game actions actually work pretty well with a controller, even if it’s still a little awkward to keep track of where the things you want are, as there are far too many of them. When it is time to sell all your loot to a shop, what would be a simple drag and drop with a mouse becomes a finnicky ordeal with an analog stick. It’s not always obvious which option in a menu is highlighted, or which option will be highlighted when you try to change selection, occasionally turning menu navigation into a guessing game. That would be fine if you’re playing on PC with a keyboard and mouse as it was originally designed for, but here I am playing Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition on console with a controller in hand. The presentation continues to be an issue throughout, as the UI is exactly the same as it was 18 years ago. Sometimes you can even see the previous screen behind them rather than the customary black border. They’re blockier than Minecraft and stretched to fill the screen in an ugly fashion. Even the CGI cutscenes look poor, as they don’t seem to have been fiddled with at all.
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