Icewind Dale 2
Ages: Teen 13+

Icewind Dale 2, like the last version, is another single player fantasy role-playing game. Using your swords, spells, songs and wits you lead a party of mercenaries to defend Ten Towers from the Orc and Goblin invasion.

If you played any of the games from Icewind or Baldur's Gate series you will not be surprised by Icewind Dale 2. All the mechanics and action are the same with a new story and art. The portrait art is again gorgeous and the game art is nice too, but may be held back by the limitations of the game engine. The biggest difference I've found is the amount of customization of every character in your party. Icewind Dale 2 is based on Wizards of the Coast's Advance Dungeon and Dragon Rules (a paper role-playing game), so if you're a micro-manager and understand, or willing to understand D&D rules, you will enjoy creating your own party. If you hate all that work then use the characters provided, otherwise you will be lost. A big problem is that there is not an 'in game how to' and no hints on what skills to get or 'in game' hints on how to 'level up' (advance) your character. For me this was o.k. because I'm an old school D&D'er and I have my own copy of the current AD&D rules book but for most people this might be a problem.

Sometimes old is good, and there is a lot to like about this game. Icewind Dale 2 is a solid good bug free game. It contains hours of game play with small missions throughout to keep you focused. Best of all, in many situations you can use different approaches to solve missions. For example, if you have a really charismatic Bard with high diplomacy skill you might be able to talk your way though a confrontation instead of fighting. But primarily Icewind is a sword swinging, spell throwing, fighting game where winning battles and finishing missions advance your characters. The fighting happens fast so you have to pause the action, decide what you want your characters to do, and then unpause. If you don't plan out your attacks by pausing you will find that battles go sour quickly. All this pausing can take time and I found it became a nuisance, especially with a party of six characters, all needing individual attention.

Women Gamer Factor

• You can create an all female group. You can't get much better than that!
• You get alternatives to simple head bashing; use skills of "diplomacy", "bluff" and "intimidate" to talk you way out of fights or finish missions.
• There are plots here, not great plots, but they are there.
• No gender bias here, similar to other D&D games, the women characters are just as strong and smart as the males so if you need muscle you don't need to make a male character. Talk about true equality!