This is my second module (the first one being Asphyxia). Thanks for taking a look at Live Forever.
I'll be blunt; this is the best book you'll ever play. It has everything of nothing. Wall-of-text conversations. Flawed boss fights. A linear story. Woefully inept scripting. Poorly written dialogue. Hell, I haven't entirely decided what the story's about. Maybe it has something to do with a gem. Maybe a little bit about living forever. Or maybe it has nothing to do with either of those. Wouldn't that be ironic?
You'll have to see for yourself. Let me know what you come up with after playing. Maybe we'll solve the mystery, together. If that sounds like a challenge, then it absolutely is. =)
Good luck.
...
And yeah, I know. Quite the hook to get you to download, right? Mom always told me I was great with the sales pitches.
Thanks to OuterParadise for helping with some of the area design.
Great module. Wonderfull story. It is one of the modules which I played without break. _________________________ [img]http://www.gwchars.de/signaturen/Zhas_Seriso.png[/img]
Posted by Chymeraes at on06/14/11
Well ... this is a horrendously smug module but I loved it anyway. I though the writing was ambitious and, usually, amazing; the characterisation deft and I liked the labyrinthine referential/self-referential plotting. Oh, yeah, and also Oasis. There are a couple of minor bugs, here and there, the occasional misplaced apostrophe and a couple of typos but none of it detracts at all from a wonderful experience. Despite the tendency to self-punctuate what seem to be moments of profundity, I was moved. I thought the areas were gorgeous and atmospheric as well, and some of the boss fights gave me WoW-flashbacks but seemed to be pretty innovative. But those were just cherries on an an already fantastic cake. It doesn't seem like you've been active on the Vault for a while but: more cake please. I think this module is genuinely ground-breaking. Gah, I am not good at praise.
Posted by gumbee42 at 2011-05-2218:16:10
Spoilers: Maybe I should be more clear. I am in the elven tomb. We picked up the gem. When we get to the entry room, we have a little battle and the front door locks. How do I proceed?
Posted by gumbee42 at 2011-05-2208:43:23
Stuck I am in part 3 and trying to leave the ruins. I cannot see what to do. The front gate is locked and I can't go anywhere.
Posted by TheVanillaGorilla at on05/19/11
This is a great module for sure. Looks great , great story, great atmosphere, at times very intense and scary, but I'd have to agree that the repetition of dialogue altered in minor ways coupled with waxing nihilistic and alluding to Oasis's first U.S. release does not a high brow "smart" module/story experience fully make. Don't get me wrong, this module really IS a must have/must play for anyone with NWN2, it's just not as smart as your line in the categories section implies. I hope you didn't take that the wrong way though, It's a great work and worth the download and play-through for damned sure, and the atmosphere is on par with the Misery Stone and Trinity, with one particular inn scene being very intense. I was also very pleased to see the birthright setting used, and the gritty, brutal, and at times nightmarish atmosphere of the Birthright setting translated very well. In PnP days I always felt that this setting could be every bit as nightmarish as Ravenloft, and you conveyed that well. Good work!
Posted by firesnakearies at on04/28/11
This is actually the first community-created module I've played for NWN2, but I played dozens upon dozens of NWN1 modules. This is one of the best modules I've ever played, highly reminiscent of Stefan Gagne's brilliant works, and almost as good. In many areas, this was absolutely top notch. The environments and atmosphere, use of music and visual effects, mood, pacing, overall depth of storytelling, characters and dialogue, skillful writing, humor, attention to detail, and a number of very exciting and memorable unique battles with custom scripting - in all of these things, the module shines, and brightly. So many times throughout my playthrough of this module was I awed, immersed, thrilled, amused and very impressed. There were just so many excellent moments, both in gameplay itself and in the storytelling, so many points which made me really love the module. I don't think it was quite on par with Planescape:Torment, but it came closer perhaps than any other NWN modules I've ever seen besides Gagne's. Overall it was really well done, super creative, and very clever. And tons of fun! I loved the characters, the locations, and the fights. The whole experience was quite remarkable. The only thing that detracted slightly from my total love of the module was a feeling of some disconnect with the narrative, personally. I think the story itself got a bit lost in itself, due to what seemed to me to be an over-reliance on Oasis lyrics and the author's inside jokes with himself. It felt like the complexities of the narrative, especially toward the end, were being kept deliberately obscure simply to prove how smart and artistic the author was, rather than being written to engage and involve the audience. As the module went on toward its conclusion, I began to feel more and more that this was a story the writer was telling himself, for himself, and that I (as the outside observer of it) was not really meant to fully share in it. All of the Oasis lyrics sort of underscored that point, and trampled a little bit on the characterization and story itself. But this was a small and personal complaint, and hardly invalidates all that is excellent and well-crafted about the module. It did so much right, and was on the whole a wonderful, brilliant piece of work. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and rather expect to find that no other NWN2 module on the Vault quite measures up to it overall. 9.5 out of 10, very nearly a perfect masterpiece in my opinion. I would highly recommend it to anyone.
Posted by Arkalezth at on04/28/11
I played this module about a year ago, but forgot to vote. I've played for the second time, and what can I say that hasn't been said already... The ambient, dialogue and characters were among, if not the best I've seen in the game, and yes, official content included. Combat makes sense and is well balanced for Normal IMO (played a Ranger, normally I play on Hardcore but I changed to Normal in act 2, when fighting the spiders). I found no important bugs, but *SPOILERS* When picking the gem and meeting Aelies, Blood keeps crouching and rising all the conversation long. It's only a little annoyance, but it distracts the attention from one of the main moments in the plot. *END SPOILERS* I hope this is not your last module, for this or other games. I think I can say this is one of the best experiences I've had playing NWN2. It's different to just about every other module out there, near perfect. So I give it a 10.
Posted by _MAU_ at on11/19/10
Well I had to stop before the end (though judging by my play time and the one promised not much at all before the end) due to a game breaking bug that I saw others complain about too (can't exit elven tomb due to door refusing to unlock). Since the author appears to be not checking up here if the vault log in date thing is any indication I doubt that'll ever get fixed and I'm not gonna bother spending the time trying to figure it out when I know *bleep*all about the toolset etc. It's a shame since the mod's otherwise definitely in my top 10. I saw people cry about the difficulty but apart from the very end which I can't comment on, it was actually very nicely balanced as long as you're not really bad at this game. For a change you can't just stoneskin your fighter and go make a sandwich while the AI destroys everything for you. The only potentially tricky spot is when you have to solo for a tiny period where you might get*bleep*d if your char is really weak, but considering my swashbuckler/scout got through that on very difficult I doubt there's any nonmoronic build that can't make it if you set the difficulty on easy for it. I really wish more authors spent as much effort balancing combat as nicely as was done here. Even though the mod is (correctly) described as more story oriented than a hack and slash, it's one of the best combat experiences out there, and also very good on the story side.
Posted by Gattamelata at on11/02/10
From the readme: "I hate high level play, and I sure as hell am not balancing for it." No offense, but you didn't seem to bother balancing for low-level play, either. I had planned to wait to rate the module until I had finished playing, as requested. However, I'm unable to progress beyond the elven banshee/gargoyle point, because every time I beat them, the game doesn't progress. My fallen companions don't get up, I can't rest, and the spirit named "???" is just standing there next to the altar or whatever. I lack the skill with the toolset to diagnose the problem, so I'm giving up. I'm giving it a 7.5. I liked some things - starting as bandits, for example, I considered to be a refreshing change of pace. I enjoyed the low-magic, low-resources feel to the world. I thought the story, at least as far as I got, was compelling and interesting. I enjoyed the idea that I was playing out a sequence of memories embellished with storytelling. I found the conversation-heavy nature of the story to bog the module down considerably, though. Watching a bunch of uninteresting, trite, and seemingly insignificant conversations was really tedious. I saw before my game stalled that some of the conversations were being replayed later, but I didn't find that spooky or profound, just annoying. I thought the sequences where the ghosts pull you into the spirit world were very, very well done. Your skill with this sort of scene transition and npc manipulation increased vastly since Asphyxia. I also liked the bits with the elven statues in the ruins below the village ("Look out behind you" and such). Overall, I preferred modules like The Last of the Daanan and The Maimed God's Saga, but judging by the other comments here, there is no shortage of fans of your approach here. I definitely liked Live Forever better than Asphyxia, which I wound up abandoning early on because it was too open ended to maintain my interest.
Posted by PaulBlay at on10/28/10
Good module, very professional looking, and an interesting story. There were quite a few glitches though, and some of the fights were _way_ too tough for me. Has anybody played this through as a rogue without having to cheat in some way? I think it must be pretty much impossible.
10 - A Masterpiece, Genuinely Groundbreaking 9 - Outstanding, a Must Have 8 - Excellent, Recommended to Anyone 7 - Very Good, Deserves a Look 6 - Good, Qualified Recommendation 5 - Fair, Solid yet Unremarkable 4 - Some Merit, Requires Improvements 3 - Poor Execution, Potential Unrealized 2 - Very Little Appeal 1 - Not Recommended to Anyone
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