Customer Reviews

Dungeons and Dragons Classic Anthology

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This the ultimate RPG collection, one that contains only masterpieces and for a great price one can own six of the greatest cRPGs ever released!

All six are isometric Role-Playing games and (with the exception of TEMPLE OF ELEMENTAL EVIL) they are built on variations of the Infinity Engine. They also share similar gameplay mechanics. They are story driven (prepare to do a lot of reading when faced with dialogue options - something I missed in their latest successor, Dragon Age: Origins), and they offer almost an infinite number of customizations for your hero and his companions.
If you are hooked on graphics you should know that these games are no eye-candy anymore. However, we have all played or rather tried to play bad games with impressive graphics and know that a game does not have to offer the latest graphics to grab you, immerse you into its world and offer endless hours of escapist fun.
Because there are tons of reviews on the individual games (links provided), I shall only give brief descriptions of them.

BALDUR's GATE Saga: The Stone years. This includes Baldur's Gate I & Baldur's Gate II, each with its own expansion (this is how it is done, good games are followed by a single solid expansion - not a endless string of DLCs!).

ICEWIND DALE Saga: The Wood years. This includes Icewind Dale with its expansion and Icewind Dale 2. These games are very similar to Baldur's Gate and, although shorter, they are harder and require even more tactical thinking.

TEMPLE OF ELEMENTAL EVIL: The Metal years. Although this game sports the best graphics of the collection, it will require some patience because it is both built as an older Turn-Based RPG (although one can turn it to real-time) and introduces the first version of the character-action wheel (we would later come to see in the NeverWinter Nights games). It is an acquired taste but it does reward climbing the learning curve.

PLANESCAPE - TORMENT: The Bone Years. I consider this to be the best game of the collection - and I am a huge fan of the BG Saga. Planescape is dark and deep and bittersweet and beautiful. It is intelligent and imaginative and the music will enchant you. For ever. If I were to choose one game to play for the rest of my life, this would be it.

A collection of masterpieces not to be missed.

WITH MY HIGHEST RECOMMENDATIONS!

I first played all of these games when they were originally released. Gaming and graphics have advanced far beyond what these games have to offer, but if your like me and you enjoy great writing, a decently lengthy game for your money, and classic sword swinging, spell flinging action, you will at least moderately enjoy these games. I do not recommend them if you have to be able to see the facial expressions of your character, want every blood squirt to show in vivid detail, or can't stand waiting....for anything.

Pros:
1. Excellent top notch writing. Fun intricate characters that you will actually care about.
2. Non-linear gameplay (to a point).
3. Length of the game (you can get anywhere from 50-80 hours out of one game, with the exception of Icewind Dale 1+2). I can't stand shelling out 60 bucks for a game I can beat in 5-10 hours.
4. Engrossing storyline
5. These games have "the magic". You know when you pick up a game and you can't explain why, or how, but you can't stop playing? All of these games have it.... All of them...
6. They work on Windows 7! And yes I have played this version on my Windows 7 PC, it does work. Yeah!

Cons:
1. Graphics are far inferior to what is put out these days (it was top notch when they were released)
2. Speed. There is a lot of simply waiting for your characters to walk from point A to point B on the screen, and they walk slowly...

These games are classics and will always hold a special little nook in the gaming section of my metaphorical heart....

Excited to see this collection as I have long ago lost my disks.

Installed it immediately after download, headed over to Pocket Plane Group's website to download EasyTutu and varying other mods. While BGI and BGII are still enjoyable, there are many things that the mods fix. However, I quickly found out that this compilation install does two things:

1) It creates file directories differently than the original disks did
2) It DOES NOT install an essential file, bgate2.mpi

Without bgate2.mpi, EasyTutu failed to properly install, and due to the differing directories, game text fixes would not install.

So, while I'm happy to get the collection, I'm not able to play the games at their full potential.

First, this is a very good buy, especially if you've ever played any of these games before. Even one of these games is worth the $20, much less 6 games! And the Win 7 compatibility on top of that too!!

Unfortunately, there is a Runtime Error occuring when you download the "Heart of Winter" expansion to the original "Icewind Dale" game. Whenever you Create a Character and look at that char's Bio then click Done, or while Importing a Character, there is a runtime error. After some online research it seems that Avast Anti-virus is causing this, and it is a fairly recent problem. (Hopefully Avast will have a patch that fixes this.)

In the meantime to get around this error, you can either skip the Bio's when creating a character, disable Avast temporarily while creating your party (as this error does NOT happen in-game), or add IWD's file to the Avast system. This 3rd option is the best. The steps to doing so are: Click on your Avast icon > Real-time Shields > Behaviour Shields > Expert Settings > Trusted Processes > add in the file to be excluded, for example mine is C:\Program Files\Atari\DnDMC\Icewind Dale\IDMain.exe (your's may be different). Click "Okay".

It's a little annoying, but an easy process. After this, enjoy playing Icewind Dale & Heart of Winter!

I already had the full BG collection, but that wasn't correctly installed on Windows 7. Now this set officially supports Windows 7. For the Baldur's Gate series I can confirm, that it runs well on Windows 7. Other reviewer had problem with mods, but I'm running the game unaltered. Have fun!

I have been a D&D fan for the last 16 years. I say this is a must have for people who enjoyed this series, but no longer have the game. This was an automatic buy for me. No problems with it so far on Windows 7 Home Premium.

How many times I've bought these sets seperately I can't say. It was many. Now you get get all the infinity engine games in one shot for 20 bucks. Hope it all works right technically with your OS. It is the only thing I would be wary of.

The games are legendary and need no review, Biowares entire reputation is rooted in its achievement with the infinity engine and Baldur's Gate 2: Shadows of Amn specifically. They've gone on to build some pretty powerful franchises but Baldur's Gate 2 has no equal (or successor) in gaming. It is the Mona Lisa, of PCRPG's and thats that.

Unlike the NWN set, this set is "complete" but you still will have to mod the games to get the most out of them. I would never play these straight out of the box anymore. Perhaps Bioware gets too much credit and the modding community deserves a little bit more, for the spit and polish at least.

While the only D&D game I have ever owned is the first Baldur's Gate (and its expansion pack), I was so impressed with that title that I wanted these other ones. So I bought this game anthology last week and got it in the mail two days ago. Let me warn you about this particular product.

First off, Atari has the rights to these games and has simply repackaged them for nostalgia purposes. If you think that these will all run on Windows 7 without any problems, then you might be like the many hundreds of us who cannot get some or all of these titles to work. If you want to contact Atari about problems that you are having, you WILL NOT get a solution from them. When I went to their forums section, people have been having compatibility issues since the game first came out in November 2011. It is two months later, and Atari still has not addressed a single person on the Forums, on any of their support sites, or issued any helpful information for people to follow up on. Simply put, if this D&D Anthology does not work for you, you need to get a refund, as Atari will not support it.

Second, if lacking publisher support wasn't enough, the games that come in this compilation are not exactly the same as the ones you might have played ten years ago. You cannot modify them, including patching them. What you see is what you get, and like I said: there is no further support for this product. Simply put, this is just Atari repackaging classic games for the hopes of getting more sales. Kind of like when the classic movies get digital overhauls or are now put onto DVDs instead of VHS. You might think that there are more features, but there are not. These are just ports. The ports of these games done by Atari here ARE NOT re-releases, but rather are coded for just popping in their CD, installing, and hoping that they work on your Windows 7 computer.

Third, and lastly, my experience after a few days haggling with this Anthology... I have read others write about installation and gameplay issues. My only issue so far has been twofold: (1) I cannot play Baldur's Gate I/Tales of the Sword Coast at all - it simply crashes after the initial movies; and (2) there are a few game-crash bugs in the character creation screens of some of the games, such as when I want to edit a character's biography. So for me, I basically got 7/8 of this package to work for me, which seems to be better than some folks. But I paid for 8/8. What really fries me is that Atari WILL NOT SUPPORT this package.

So take this as your fair warning: you want these games, but you might not want this package. I read a review here that said that this package works fine with Windows 7, yet it doesn't. Do a simple Internet search and find out all the problems people are having and what Atari WILL NOT DO to support them. It would be one thing if the package was buggy and Atari released a patch. That is simply not going to happen for this Anthology package. Save yourself some time and instead support companies and products that meet up to your expectations.

You have been warned.

*** EDIT: I contacted the Atari support team to see if they could/would help me. Simple problem: Baldur's Gate I crashes after the introductory movies. Atari's support team's response: run the game in Compatibility Mode for Windows XP and Run As Administrator. I told them that I was already doing that, but the problem persisted. Atari support team's response: I have damaged files and should request an exchange of product; case closed. They will not return my follow-up questions, and I am to assume that I was sent a damaged product? What if the exchange doesn't work? What will Atari's response be then: keep exchanging until you realize that we are not going to help you and you'll then stop e-mailing us...? ***

*** FINAL EDIT: I returned this game and got a refund today. No point in paying for something that does not work and will not be supported by its publisher. I am very grateful that Amazon is such a good company to work with. I also provided feedback on this product so that Amazon can research it and potentially stop selling it if refunds are starting to cost them. I spent my $20 on something else here at Amazon with my refund money. Sad story, but it has happened to a lot of us. Might be a good idea to just resist the temptation and try to find a game maker that doesn't cheapshot people like Atari does. Will be hard to find in today's industry/market, but I wish us all good luck. ***

Anyone who hasn't played these games needs too! These are the games that made the modern RPG what it is today. Be ready to forfeit the next several months of your life though because you won't be able to force yourself away from the keyboard.

All of these games included in this package are true gems and are a great value for the price. I had played Baldur's Gate and Tales of the Sword Coast many years ago and enjoyed them but didn't have the opportunity to play BG2 and the Icewind Dale series. These are must have games for anyone who loves great gaming, not just RPG's. The graphics are a bit lacking but the gameplay is as challenging as ever. Certainly worth $20.00 for Baldur's Gate and the expansion pack alone.