As mentioned above the style and story of their previous title, Baldur's Gate, is borrowed from in Icewind Dale. The story itself exists in the very same universe of Baldur's Gate, taking place some years before. The worldly connection between the two games ends there; the story of Baldur's Gate will supposedly continue in Baldur's Gate II. The general look and feel of the various settings in the game is very well done. Black Isle may be using an older game engine, but the ability to render some really fantastic areas is obviously still there. Each area doesn't represent itself by pure visual quality; the atmosphere really works because of the fantastic musical scores that are unique to each area. The music can be epic, soft, full of tension, or fast, all pretty much depending on the current area/situation the player is in.

The story itself isn't anything as mind blowing as what was found in Planescape, which is actually another trait shared with Baldur's Gate. A character that seeks allies in quest approaches the player and when the quest is completed the game leads to another quest. The story ends up being pretty linear since the player begins the game with a custom set group of characters, which leaves the wandering would-be NPC team members of BG pretty scarce, if not nonexistent.

Characters are created using a set of base characteristics that are 'rolled' when the character is created. Players can re-roll statistics until they are happy with the numbers. Stats like strength, dexterity, charisma, intelligence, wisdom, and constitution make up the parts of every character. Some character classes need higher stats in certain areas, which means things must be thought of ahead of time when creating a warrior, mage, druid, ranger, cleric, or a thief. If a person really wants to get fancy they can create multi-class characters that take on the roles of multiple classes, sharing the experience between each. This option is more challenging but can really bring about the existence of some independant characters.

Another really neat thing about Icewind Dale is the export/import character option. This simply means you can save a character's state. At any point in the game, you can' export' a character, which saves the character and their equipment. This means players can use players where they need them in several loaded games, or quest for experience points in certain save point areas. If a person is stuck in an area they can import characters into the save game to assist, or export them to another game to gain experience to increase chances of victory in any situation. This has revealed a rather large loophole. A person can save a character with valuable equipment, load the character and have them give the valuable equipment to another character, then simply reload the same save state and that same piece of equipment will still be loaded. It isn't technically a 'cheat' but it works in the same respect.

Since characters are set and the quests are laid out by terms of cause and effect, Black Isle was able to create a new sort of dungeon crawler. During early production the general perception of Icewind Dale was that it would end up being somewhat 'Diablo-ish' if you will. Despite the fact the story structure lends to this type of game, the core depth of gameplay, what makes up every Black Isle game to date, is still there. This shouldn't in any way daunt the casual gamer however. The main idea behind a dungeon crawl is to introduce a fun PC RPG that is relatively easy to get into. Icewind Dale's polish and intuitive interface is a very large part of what makes this game easier to get into than previous Black Isle works.

The approach taken is a bit less direct than most would expect. Black Isle has tweaked existing elements, added extra combat, and introduced a much sleeker interface to create possibly the deepest dungeon crawl ever. For the most part the tweaks made to their existing PC RPG formula have succeeded. The interface is a vast improvement, with a lot of improvements that seem to be taken from their experiences with past titles. The other elements, more importantly the story, still feel like a part of the universe created with Baldur's Gate, and the questing elements have been given far more direction and lead a player much more carefully to the ultimate goal.

What could use a little work is the level of combat. It is really easy to notice Black Isle has kicked the level of intense combat up a notch, which creates some challenging dungeons but they can really be hard sometimes. Some situations require more than a few tries, and this could turn away a few. I give thanks to the pause feature, letting me plan my battles even when I am in the midst of ugly trolls. What really makes it all worth it is always at the end of each dungeon. At the end of each area lie new spells, weapons, and usually a lot of experience. Players get repaid quite well for their troubles, and that is what makes up for most of the strife endured during each quest. While the combat can be a little too intense for some, the appropriate amount of reparations are waiting at the end of each quest, and that alone makes each quest worth the players time.

Icewind Dale's multiplayer connectivity options are large in number, pretty much guaranteeing there is at least one one way to play the game online, provided you have a modem. The TCP/IP and LAN support is pretty good, but it is still good practice to have the broadband user host. I have had games of two or three people on a 56k, but anything above that requires something a bit faster. Of course this isn't uncommon for most games, Diablo II also has trouble hosting TCP/IP games on 56k modems and below. Mplayer also 'supports' Icewind Dale on their network but the support hasn't been fully implemented yet, leaving only a chat room available. This room can, at this point, still be utilized to gather adventurers for a good TCP/IP game, but for little else. Hopefully Mplayer will get on this.

Multiplayer games consist of one to six adventurers either beginning the game, or taking part in a saved game the host loads. This opens up another nice option. If a quest is really difficult the player can go online, recruit some friends, and load the game up with his friends able to assist in the fight. Much like Diablo II, TCP/IP games and the single player game can exist in the same universe.

I had sincerely been craving a really good PC RPG lately. The flood of real-time strategy titles left me wanting for a nice long PC RPG that would really test my skills. Icewind Dale doesn't quite reach the depth of Planescape: Torment, but it never intended to. It does make vast improvements on the existing Baldur's Gate formula, which makes it an example of the possibilities of Baldur's Gate II. I found myself hopelessly addicted to this pseudo-dungeon crawl, and I have a feeling it isn't just me.