Icewind Dale II is the sequel to Black Isle Studios' AD&D RPG, Icewind Dale, developed by Black Isle Studios (the core Icewind Dale team, most of whom also worked on the Fallout, Fallout 2 and Planescape: Torment). Although it's a sequel, you don't need to own or play the original Icewind Dale title before. The game has different story which takes place around 30 years after the events of the first game and your party of characters is a band of mercenaries that sails into the town of Targos in search of work, only to find the town already under attack by goblins...Oh yeah, time to earn your money!

Icewind Dale II is using the modified version of the BioWare's Infinity Engine, the same 2D sprite-based graphics engine that Black Isle used for Icewind Dale and Planescape: Torment and the same engine that developer BioWare created for Baldur's Gate (1998) and Baldur's Gate II. No wonder, the game generally looks a bit dated, though a newly revised interface, now visible only along the bottom edge of the screen, look pretty good.

Well, I have no plan to throw dirt at game graphics, instead, I will concentrate more on the differences between the first Icewind Dale and the second. The first thing I should mention is that Icewind Dale II finally uses the revised 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons rules. These rules bring new classes such as Monk (a master of hand-to-hand combat and unarmed in battle, the power of wisdom is your greatest weapon), Sorcerer (a natural spell caster, tainted by the blood of dragons, draw upon the raw power within to defeat your adversaries), and Barbarian (a merciless warrior of the north, call upon your greater strength, speed and rage to carve a path through your enemies), new races (3 types of Humans, Dwarves, Half-Orcs, Dark Elves (Drow)...) , new skills, feats, spells, etc. The implementation of 3rd edition rules is spotless, sub-races and their challenge rating modifications are also implemented properly, Feats, Skills (Animal Empathy, Intimidate, Bluff, Diplomacy, Alchemy, Arcane Knowledge, Hide, Open Locks), and Stats all rise at the right levels, with new ones opened up at the higher levels. But it's a pity that Icewind Dale II does not allow importation of characters from earlier titles.

Icewind Dale 2 is definitely much more difficult then the original game, the enemy AI is well written and combat is pretty challenging, sometime a little bit exhausting, so you'll have to use all of the abilities of your party members together in order to win most of battles. The fights still take place in real time, and you can still pause the game with the space bar and use special abilities via hotkeys.

Like its predecessor, Icewind Dale II is simply a great role-playing game, good follow-up game of Icewind Dale series, and also good last game to close the saga of 2D graphics. This game will keep you playing in your room for _LONG_ hours, so I would highly recommend it to any RPG or D&D lover.

Note: The 3rd AD&D rule is very easy to learn, even for people that never play AD&D role-playing game, don't be afraid to try it :P


Hardware requirements:
  Minimum: Intel Pentium II 350Mhz or AMD K6(R)-III/400Mhz, 64MB RAM, 8x CD-ROM, DirectX compliant video card, DirectX compliant sound card, Windows 95/98/ME/2000/XP, DirectX 8.0 or higher

Recommended: Intel Pentium III 500 or AMD Duron or Athlon processor, 128MB RAM, DirectX compliant video card, DirectX compliant sound card, 16x CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive, Broadband (Cable/DSL) Connection for multiplayer, Windows XP, DirectX 8.0 or higher.


Related links : Icewind Dale 2 walkthrough.