This is a fantastic game; very enjoyable despite its age. My only two complaints deal with the camera. Sometimes when your character walks too close to a wall, the camera zooms so far in you can't see anything, but you only have to rotate the camera a bit to zoom back out again. Also, not all camera settings are saved, so when reloading a saved game the camera angle and zoom distance are reset to defaults.

That aside, I would recommend this game to anyone who enjoys fantasy RPGs, and especially any D&D fans. It even makes some minor improvements on pen-and-paper D&D, such as a Lore skill which lets you identify magic items without a spell.

Ordered 2 copies on the 27th, got them the 30th, stoked!!!

I already own 2 copies of regular Neverwinter, so I was stoked to pick these up as it has the expansion, & some of the premium modules, plus you can get the CEP also, hours of fun for me & my lady!!!

Now I can have two friends over also to play on my extra Linux machines w/ my old copies!!! Double stoked!!!

I ALSO GOT CORRECT CD KEYS, I am figuring that issue is fixed by now...

Neverwinter Nights is, quite simply, the ultimate game. Unlimited opportunity for creativity, thousands of player-created add-on goodies that can be downloaded for FREE... hundreds of awesome online worlds available at the click of a button... what more could you ask, really? Granted, the game has a learning curve, so this is not for the simple folk. You will need to have a bit of determination and patience to become proficient, but the process is quite entertaining.

Start out by playing through the original campaigns, then move on to the online realms when you are ready. Endless fun!

If you love Dungeons & Dragons on paper, this is your game. You can game anytime of the day with excellent roleplayers from all over the world.

I've enjoyed NWN. I've only played as one character so far, but there's a lot of replayability there. However, I've been frustrated by the bad multiplayer interface, especially since I bought the game to play multiplayer.

Let me get this out of the way: I've had a lot of fun playing NWN since its release in 2002 (ish?), so if u want to delve into DnD action I can tell you this game is excelent.

Why 4 stars and not 5? I have the original boxed NWN plus the two expansions, and bought 3 Diamond licenses (like this one) to play over LAN with my nephews. Problem is, the activation keys on (all? most?) of the Diamond packs are busted, you have to e-mail tech support and they'll ask u to send a digital photo of the defective cd keys, only then they will mail new keys that work and let you install the game. It kinda kills the "shrinkwrap" experience for me.

Make sure to get the two expansions & all of the modules offered by BioWare, because you'll want to keep going.

I played this shortly after Baldur's Gate II, another favorite. BG & NK are both set in the Dungeons & Dragons world, so some of the names of places are the same. I expect that will happen again when I finaly get to play Icewind Dale or anything with "Wizards of the Coast" slapped on the side of the box. Even though the graphics are very different, sometimes I confuse what I did in Baldur's Gate II with what I did in NWK1.

PROS: Just play it & the pros will flood out all the cons listed below. Every level of every mod has special things to offer. The best pro of all is the lack of crashing & glitching. You've got your highly branched-out skill tree, a wide variety of classes, a variety of text options that effect both the story & your alliance, lots of unique loot, huge dragons, lots of henchmen & love interests who will talk to you & to eachother, unexpected plot twists, & the list goes on. In Hordes of the Underdark alone, you have the magic maze, the hall of mirrors, a backwards society of underground angels, a trip to the 8th layer of hell, & a smithy who can do the most awesome upgrades to your weapons. For an almost-decade-old game, the graphics are very good (provided you don't zoom in on the NPCs). Best of all, there are multiple possible outcomes based on the chices you make, so the game has a lot of replay value. The best thing ever though is the Premium Mods, which are very lengthy & have a lot to add & offer. For instance, Pirates of the Sword Coat offers zombie-pirates & adventures both on & under the sea. Kingmaker has a weapon that talks to you & upgrades itself when you level, plus you get to be a running mate in an ellection. I haven't even played all of them yet, but they're long enough to consume every waking hour of your weekends.

CONS: The user-created mods that are still downloadable for this game are saddening. I wanted to change the way the body textures looked because they look too similar to the ones in Dungeon Siege 1. The NPC portraits & actual skins were 90% contradictory in appearance. I also wanted to do something about all the hoakey female voices; almost every woman talks like Storm from X-Men. Sadly, applying user mods to this game are absolute brain surgery compared to any other game I've ever added mods to. Couldn't even get most of the player portraits to show up & some claim that using the player-created portraits causes crashing. It's hard-to-impossible to get a same-sex relation from the love interest NPCs (which I usually force upon only my male characters), the variety of voices your character can have are not really ones you'd want, & there is little customization available for the characters (not that it matters once you get a helmet on). The think I hated the most was that sorceresses can't carry swords (Slayers was heavily inspired by D&D & their sorceresses could cary big swords). & lastly, the lack of variety in enviromnets, probably even moreso than in Baldur's Gate II & Morrowind.

Neverwinter Nights: Diamond Compilation Pack (DVD-ROM)
I really like the game and plan to purchase the expansions that were not included in the diamond collection.

I am a big fan of the Forgotten Realms fantasy setting and have been playing CRPG's for quite some time now. This is without a doubt one of the best RPG collections out there, providing multitudes of gaming options! and I do mean options. There is a seemingly limitless supply of adventure throughout this bundle, and I have yet to finish all of it! The bundle includes:

* Neverwinter Nights
* Shadows of Undrentide expansion pack
* Hordes of the Underdark expansion pack
* Game modules from the developers of NWN
* All patches and updates + toolset

I have played the original NWN and the expansion packs, and can say that they got progressively better with each. My main complaint about the original NWN was the lack of ability to control and have full access to your companions inventory. They corrected this in the expansion packs. So far my personal favorite and most recommended title in the package is the "Hordes of the Underdark" expansion pack. Its an incredible multi-faceted adventure spanning the underdark and Cania, the 8th level of hell.

The graphics and visual effects in the games are great, and even today provide some impressive eye candy. The games feature plenty of dialogue between NPC's, characters, and people of the Realms to assist in providing a true, in-depth RPG experience. Basically it boils down to this; If you enjoy CRPG's, and would like a fun, intuitive and challenging set of them to choose from, this set is for you. At <$20 it is unbeatable, as is easily worth more for the hundreds of gaming hours the package provides.

Got this on reccomendation of a friend; haven't spent much time with it, but its got potential.

I'm another dissatisfied customer who had issues with his CD Keys. Atari was kind enough to provide me with new CD Keys so I began the install and update process. The auto update feature threw an error and I had to download a critical rebuild. After about an hour and half of installing downloading and installing some more I was finally able to start playing the game. Low and behold I had yet another error. Certain character models in the game lack color and appear white. I emailed Atari and waited the 10 business days but they never bothered to respond. My PC specs are above even the recommended systems requirements so I doubt it's an issue with my PC. The Bio-ware forums discuss this issue (look for metallic textures) but the recommended fixes didn't work for me.

With a game that has so many problems it's led me to believe that the only thing Atari cares about is making money. They no longer offer phone support (in other words they don't want to be bothered talking with you) and they say they will respond to email in 7-10 days. They didn't in my case. I'm really disappointed in this game and suggest you spend your hard earned dollars elsewhere.

For the most part, all the fun aspects of the game have been said and hold true. My only complaints are the way the game runs. I have well over the minimum req's and a geforce 8800 GT OC 512 video card and the game runs kind of choppy/laggy quite a bit. Also some graphic glitches here and their through out the part of the game I've played so far. But for the price and what you get you can't beat it. I'd have given it 5 stars if I diden't have these small problems. (I haven't tried the latest patches yet though either)

In my opinion this is one of the best RPG platforms there are. The amount of Mods out there make this game have some serious replay value and I would recommend this to any RPG fan.

Hey guess what all you guys saying "Buy the game from Amazon, the cd keys are good if you buy it through them". I DID buy it from Amazon directly and HEY it has the same 3 same cd key problems other people have. And this just happened recently, so stop saying that Amazon has the "good working" copies when they don't!!!
I just wanted to clear this up since everyone is saying "Go through Amazon and get a good copy" when they are lieing.

(First off, let me just say that after reading all the negative reviews on here, I decided to order DIRECTLY from Amazon and was quite happy to see that this decision was the right one - opened the game and all three game codes worked perfectly! Now on to the review!)

I've been avidly playing this game for the past month and a half, and am currently about halfway through chapter 3 in the original Neverwinter Nights campaign. I'm just completely blown away by the detail and immensity of this world. Honestly, I've been playing RPGs on the PC and PS1/PS2 for decades (I grew up playing the original Zork series, Telengard from Avalon Hill, the Ultima series, the Temple of Apshai series from Epyx, and pretty much everything from Strategic Simulations (SSI) and Sierra Online, on not only the PC but my original system, the Commodore 64.... and even though I've found a lot of good games out there along the way, this is the first game in probably a DECADE that I've been just COMPLETELY absorbed by.

So as I said, I've been playing a DOWNLOADED copy of this game for the past 6 weeks or so. Unfortunately having non-legit keys only allows you to play the local, single-player versions of these games... and though that's nice, this game really doesn't open itself up until you start going to the BioWare website, download CEP (a massive expansion that allows you to install a TON of addons), and then start diving into the multiplayer world of NWN. And wow... I must say, this is really one of the best games I've EVER played in my life! And for UNDER TWENTY DOLLARS?!?!!! That's seriously the single best deal of my life. Once you're on the BioWare website you literally have access to THOUSANDS of add-ons for Neverwinter Nights, enabling you to quite literally play this game for YEARS... if not decades. I recently stumbled upon one multiplayer server called Altharian Adventures and apparently some of the people have been on there since 2002 (or earlier?), constantly working to improve the adventures and just totally make the whole multiplayer experience worthwhile and rewarding.

Enjoy this game! AND IGNORE THE WORDS OF THE NAYSAYERS - BUY THIS GAME DIRECT FROM AMAZON.COM AND YOU HAVE NO WORRIES!

Neverwinter Nights is one of the best games ever made. Beyond what is on the DVD, there is a multitude of free content available from the community. Bioware is now working on the last patch (1.69) which will include even more new content.
The forums at bioware as well are very informative and helpful.

(Btw the poster with the DVD key problem missing - There is a post on the forums telling how to get the issue resolved.) Atari does do the support and owns the rights to the game as I understand, Bioware produced the game and owns the engine as well as the toolset.

The forums also have a posting on how to resolve issues with Vista, and more.

I got this from a bargain bin in a GameStop. I have windows Vista and there were no technical problems, aside from the fact that since I have a laptop, it was a little slow at times. If you people have problems, just look up the game on google and wikipedia, many have already developed solutions. Anyway, on to the game.

((Pros:)) Great graphics, fight scenes, it's just really fun to develop, empower and broaden your character with his or her experiences.

((Cons:)) Too much just running around. Trust me, you will go to your knees and Thank God when you finally find the Boots of Fastness or whatever. Plus there is a real lack of variety in the landscapes: Stone Building, Evil Stone Building, Gray Cave, Wooden Building, Grass, Town, Forest. That's pretty much it. Although all the major and sub-stories are great, it gets pretty boring and you spend about half those millions of Hours they talk about just running around the same damn trees and hallways you have been running around since the beginning.

The expansion packs help a little in this regard, (you get Brown Cave, Drow Inside, Snow and Desert) and add much more emotion and excitement to the story, too (Deekin rocks, he is the ultimate sidekick). But if you have played this far the repetitiveness of the scenes and gameplay detracts a lot from the fun--it is also a little too combat-oriented for my taste. And fun is what games are supposed to be, so I think you're better off with Baldur's Gate (assuming you have Windows XP on a computer somewhere).

So, Bottom Line:
Good graphics, fun story, but boring and repetitive gameplay.

This review is to confirm that the method described in other reviews for acquiring a quick response from Atari Support works - at least for me.

I just purchased this game at my local GameStop and, like many other people, I received three duplicate product keys. From here, I contacted Technical Support at www.atarisupport.com, and submitted my issue using their webform. Immediately after submitting my online support request I received a confirmation email from Atari Support.

Despite the confirmation email directing me not to reply to it, I replied with a brief recap of the duplicate key issue and attached scans of the following:

1.) the page from my manual that contained the duplicate keys
2.) the purchase receipt.

Within 20 minutes (seriously!), I received another email from Atari Support that provided me with three separate, working keys.

So buy Neverwinter Nights Diamond expecting the duplicate key issue. If it doesn't occur, great. If it does occur, follow the steps above and the issue should be resolved for you (in reading all the negative reviews, I couldn't find anyone else who replied to the confirmation email with a manual scan and a proof of purchase). Good luck, all.

Had I known this game wasn't compatible with window's vista, I wouldn't have bought it.

This is the Ultimate NWN box set. Everything you need to download and play the latest premium module from Bioware "Wyvern Crown Cormyr" (allows ride-able horses). Was a little worried about the bad reviews regarding three identical CD-keys but the copy that was sent to me had different keys for each game.

It's now been 45 days. I've emailed Atari's tech support 3 times. No real answers from them at all, just an automated "we got your email" message. I'll be returning the game for a refund. I will never buy another Atari game or product again.

The game as the other comments idenicate has 3 duplicate CD keys so you can't play the game.

Atari doesn't seem to want to help in a reasonable amount of time and they want you to jump through hoops.

The product should be RECALLED.

As much as I love playing the game, I am extremely dissappointed with Atari Support. Since the company is now in the hands of Europeans, phone support in the states is gone indefinately, and the only means of communication is via Email.

If you intend on buying the game, be sure you purchase the product from Amazon or an actual retailer such as EB or GameStop and not from a 3rd party retailer on here (just in case you have to return the product) Numberous copies of NWN Diamond have been sent to customer with duplicated keys in the manual. -->This is a known issue with Atari for over a YEAR!!<-- If in the case you do get duplicated keys, dont bother contacting Atari Support. Return the item, and get NWN Platinum. You may not get the 3 extra modules in the platinum, but at least you dont have to deal with the headache of contacting Atari Support. Trust me im going on day 12, with no answer... I sent them an email with the required images to show proof that I have duplicate keys and nothing.. If they will not give me my new keys then I will return my Diamond copy and get the Platinum Collection. The 3 extra modules can be bought through Bioware for a small price, but not really a big deal for myself.

And if anyone is wondering why I gave this game a 3 star fun rating... its not very fun if one can not play...

Based on Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition rules and Forgotten Realms, it's an epic game. Best 2002 RPG, highest replay value due to massively multiplayer online, Aurora toolset to build your own adventures, plenty of user made adventures and official campaign keeping you stuck to the screen for much more than 100 hours, not to mention persistent online worlds that makes you totally role play your character.
They could call this Neverwinter Nights: Ultimate, in my opinion!
11 starting classes and plenty of prestige class to enhance your character in the way you like to play, or the way you imagine it.
Community Expansion Pack brings you the best of the best for the best!
An infinite array of weapons, armors, new models, and tilesets.
Do yourself a favor. If you never tried it, or it isn't on your shelf, there's still a chance to cleanse your sin!

Drejeck

Good old Amazon. I was lucky enough to have read the recent reviews before I visited the local GameStop today, January 21st, 2008. After buying it, I opened it in the car to see if it had the incorrect CD keys inside the case - yup, they were all the same, as many have reported here. I immediately returned it for a refund, and won't try again.

dont do it!!!! IF you buy, get it only from AMAZON, not from someone who sells on their site. That way when you get hosed you can return it. Buy from anyone else and you bit the big one cause they wont take it back. this is garbage I will support NOTHING from atari again. I got this game for hubby, didnt ready reviews (my bad) cause it was not for me but a gift he wanted. There are 3 games on the cd in the pack and dumb atari only published 1 key code. no web sites are helpful, people just complain. .... atari returns NO calls and NO emails.
Someone needs to get the 3 codes and post them on the web or torrent. Since atari wont do the job we paid them for. Why is this not on product recall! Why do ANY shops continue to sell with the amazingly large amount of returns they have to fork out.

The game looks like fun, but I had the same CD Key problem that many other people have had. After a week of complete silence from Atari, ignoring my 5 support requests, I had no choice but to ask Amazon for a refund. Disappointing,because I really wanted to play this game.

I recently bought 15 copies of this product for our college. We use the NWN toolset for game design. Our school already owned 15 copies of this game so this would bring our number of copies up to 30. The first batch of 15 which we purchased over a year ago were great. The recent batch we purchased used the same serial number for all the games in the package. Only about half of the serial numbers worked for all the games; we used the old serial numbers with the new batch to enable the students to use the all the games included on the DVD disk. If this had been a single purchase we would have been out of luck. You might want to consider buying a used copy rather than the new product.

the title says it all, Just like D&D this game brings out the true RPGer in all of us, with detailed story plots, mercenary character development, and even the use of other story modules. Its a game that can be play for hours at a time for days and days. Only downside I found is that the farther you go, the difficulty doesn't increase as fast, so it allowed me to invelope myself in the plot more

I just wanted to chime in, despite the previous review reporting differently I ordered NWN from Amazon on January 4th, 2008 - and I received the game with all 3 CD-keys being the same.

While it may be fixed for some, not the case for me. I'm currently waiting for a response from Atari support.

Regarding the cd keys: I bought two copies of this game through Amazon and received them on 1/03/07. Each copy came with 3 separate working cd keys on pg. 2 of the booklet and they both installed perfectly on their respective computers. I read the wary reviews about the missing/bad cd keys before purchasing, although it seemed strange to me that they would still be selling copies with bad cd keys over a year after the problem initially arose. I'm very glad I went ahead and bought these; I haven't had a chance to play extensively yet but the game, including all the expansions/modules, thus far appears to work exactly as it should without errors. I might have just been lucky, but I didn't figure it was much of a gamble; Amazon is excellent about returns.

Regarding the game in general: Since I'm not an avid gamer, I don't think there's anything special that I can contribute in this review concerning the game's D&D content. The game may be old, but it's still fun. Definitely a great buy for those who don't have beefy graphics cards. I found this game while looking at older games that would be able to run on my two PCs, one with a 32MB ATI Mobility Xpress video card, and the other with an NVIDIA GeForce 6100S integrated video card. So far it performs very well on both running at 1024x768. I mainly bought this game though for its multiplayer capacity. You have the option to host or join games either over the internet or through a LAN. Also, it's free to host or join games over the internet, which is cool.

Overall, for as expansive as the game is, this inexpensive D&D-based RPG gives you a whole lot of bang for your buck, and I strongly recommend it.

This is the finest neverwinternights game I have found yet, and the purchasing procedure was simple and efficient I definitely will be purchasing more items from amazon.com

Many copies of this game were shipped with missing or defective CD keys. Often three copies of the same CD key are in the manual--a combination which does not work. This is an Atari issue not an Amazon issue. Atari tech support is awful but they can be coerced into giving you new keys. Take a photograph of the manual and the disk showing the defective keys. Start a tech support ticket with Atari. They will send you a confirmation (that says do not reply). Reply anyway (as they will likely never write again) and include the photograph of your manual. This may work. If it doesn't, you may have to include the addresses of the Atari board members and other email addresses culled from Atari web pages. This certainly works and I have had to do it twice when the other methods did not work. Good Luck! Be nice: it's not one person's fault.

I bought this game and the geniuses at Atari printed the same product key for all three games, instead of a different product key for each game, effectively rendering this game useless. I spent 3 hours trying to install it only find under the online FAQ that apparently Atari shipped a lot of these games with either no product keys or the same product key replicated three times. Bioware and their cursed product key!! Anyway, this game is buyer beware! I sent an E-mail to Atari requesting new product keys, if I don't hear from Atari in a few days, I'll be returning the game to Amazon and I'll let Amazon deal with it.

I've played this game before and it's a great game, but if I can install it, it's just a shiny drink coaster.

THE GAME WILL NOT RUN ON YOUR COMPUTER.

The Diamond edition that I bought here had a known error -- NO CD KEYS. I've tried support at Bioware and Atari, to no avail, and am now returning the item. DO NOT BUY THIS ITEM! Without the CD keys, you have a useless disc in a pretty box.

See the link below -- dated 2006 -- regarding this issue:
http://nwn.bioware.com/forums/viewtopic.html?topic=490294&forum=49

It has been months of E-mailing customer support trying to get new CD keys as those sent with the game were defective. All I have gotten was the automated E-mail informing me they recieved my message. I am going to ask for my money back and never purchase anything from this company ever again. They seem to be trying to get people to buy multiple copies. The reviews says the problems are fixed are plants or idiots, or both. If I could I would give zero stars. Bought in November 07, it is now January 08 and still no help.