Mask of the Betrayer Toolset Impressions

indio · Post by **indio** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 4:09 am

I'm enjoying the single player campaign well enough, but that's not what I want to write about. Suffice it to say, it looks better, plays smoother and has cleaned up many of the issues of the original release.

While I can scarcely believe Atari forked out enough money for Obsidan to make an expansion (GF has said this is one of their primary cash sources), what a relief that they have. For the ALFA builder, the expansion is a genuine bonanza of improvements and convenience.

New interior tilesets: Sunken Ruins is just sweet....it's an easy to use, 2-layered tileset. There's upstairs and downstairs, and it seems to work much more seamlessly than Shadow Fortress. The Estate Tileset fills a major gap where classy interiors needed to go.

Exterior Tileset: New textures.....dried cracked mud, cliff textures that won't stretch and distort the way most rock textures currently do when applied to vertical surfaces, nice desert and grass additions, and an excellent cobblestone. There are new Grass types....finally some decent flowers.

Creatures: There are a few new creatures, but not many you'd see in a typical low level campaign,.

Placeables: This is one area that has been considerably beefed up. Lots of new placeables, and some very useful one. Rocks with the same texture as the tileset cliff texture. Tintable to boot. A whole new set of buildings with a decent generic style for rural settings. Stylish, but not overcooked. And snow placeables for all occasions. There's now more wall placeables than can be believed. Thangorn will have a seizure.

Placed Effects: The best till last. Waterfalls, snow, splashes, butterflies, falling leaves, drips, sunbeams, blood....this is great news for any builder.

Single Gripe: No additonal Placeable Prefabs. There's no single more useful element for builders, imo.

w00t!!

Grand Fromage · Post by **Grand Fromage** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 6:37 am

What kinds of snow placeables? I've seen the snow covered trees and rocks but not much else. Screenshots plzzzzz, also of the estate tileset. I've heard of it but haven't seen it yet.

Swift · Post by **Swift** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 7:24 am

Shows how much attention ive been paying, i didn't even know it was out yet. Ill have to check out EB when i finish paying off my Hellgate London preorder.

Rotku · Post by **Rotku** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 7:29 am

Is it out in Australia already?

indio · Post by **indio** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 7:38 am

indio · Post by **indio** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 7:42 am

I organised an overseas mate send me a copy after hearing it was going to be out 3 weeks before its Aus release date.

But there are torrents, which I'm all for as long as you go and buy the thing after you download it.

indio · Post by **indio** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 7:55 am

And I forgot to mention...

They have doubled....seriously doubled the number of Speed Trees, including a full set of snowy trees.

Unbelievably good.

Rick7475 · Post by **Rick7475** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 10:06 am

Any new towers? I am getting really sick of stretching and resizing the same old ones over and over again ...

Hialmar · Post by **Hialmar** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 5:51 pm

Only four ones:
http://wwww.alandfaraway.org/Hialmar/Towers.jpg

Not sure how many there were before but I suppose it's the same.

Just received my MotB today from amazon.co.uk.
If you, like me, run a non English version of windows and got your toolset in that language after updating, just go to your NWN2 directory and rename the directory matching your windows language to something else (I renamed fr to _fr for example).

Also in order to get back all the sub-windows I had before, I used this tip:

Go to c:\Documents and Settings\<your>\Local Settings\Application Data\NWN2 Toolset\<language>

delete the WindowConfig(.xml)file, run the toolset and voila (yep I'm french), your windows are back.

Grand Fromage · Post by **Grand Fromage** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 8:20 pm

Snow, awesomesauce. How about the weather snow? Do you set it in properties like NWN or do you place the effect in the area?

indio · Post by **indio** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 8:59 pm

Placed effect. It looks great. Could happily double as volcanic ash too.

Speaking of doubling up...The butterflies, when I first saw them in game, looked like leaves blowing in the wind, which I stared at in awe. Didn't realise they were butterlies till I opened the toolset.

What we need are some autumn coloured butterlies.

Grand Fromage · Post by **Grand Fromage** » Mon Oct 01, 2007 10:51 pm

Does it cover the entire area, or a particular range of tiles around the effect?

indio · Post by **indio** » Tue Oct 02, 2007 2:11 am

Snow covers about 1 megatile I think.