Normally I would not make a big fuss about something as unimportant as the set of screens that make up the installation utility for a program, but Westwood put a little something extra into the Nox setup program. From the second a person starts copying files to their hard drive the story of Nox is already being told through a series of pictures and stories. By the time the actual game starts, the player is already well versed in the basic premise of the story, and the game is allowed to quickly (and smoothly) pick up from there. I have my suspicions that this method of storytelling through the install utility does slow down the installation of a rather small set of files, but the time actually seems to go faster with something to occupy the gamers's anxious mind.

Overall the story is sort of one most would recognize. Evil fights Good, Good vanquishes Evil, Evil comes back for revenge. As the Evil tries to go about doing whatever it is Evil does, it sucks in a man from our universe, into the Nox universe. The presentation of the story is where it presents itself in a unique manner. A somewhat subtle mix of humor manages to creep into the story which brings the game back down to earth a bit, giving it an appeal that tears away from the overused majestic quests found in a lot of RPGs.

Taking the role of the main character, the player finds themself hopelessly lost in a universe that barely resembles their own. In order to survive, a choice between three character classes must be made. After picking either the Warrior, Conjurer, or the Wizard class, the adventure begins. While each class has its own radically different set of quests, they are each created to teach the player to adapt to the chosen class' set of strengths and weaknesses. Every player begins at the apprentice level, and through the many adventures leads to 'Master' status.

As mentioned before, each class has their own set of strength and weaknesses. Nox goes beyond the traditional rules of thumb that seem to have applied to the warrior and magic classes in almost every RPG. While the Wizards are weaker, Warriors stronger, and Conjurers strike the balance, the set of abilities possible for each class are radically different. In fact they are so very different from one another that it totally changes how a person plays Nox.

The most familiar (and easy) class to deal with is the Warrior. He may be restricted from the use of magic, he is undoubtedly the strongest of the three classes and can wield the strongest weapons and some of the best armor. The Wizard being the extreme opposite of the Warrior class, uses a fantastic array of magic to ward off enemies as well as heal himself. The Conjurer is by far the most intreaguing class available. This class has the ability to summon and charm. These spells may not be as visually brilliant as a lighting spell, but the ability to summon ogres and charm the enemy to fight on your side can be extremely valuable.

Admittedly a lot of the spells are common place in any PC RPG, but Westwood has managed to divide all of these little tricks into a couple classes, which not only offers different ways to play Nox, but also adds a stronger sense of identity. I have always thought this is something games like Diablo were missing. Beyond health, strength, and mana stats there has to be more to what makes a character.

Nox's visual presentation isn't that astounding. It lacks a lot of visual punch to go along with the spells and actions the characters are supposed to be carrying out. For example if a Meteor is summoned and it hits the earth it looks like nothing more than a simple black object with speckles of red to simulate heat, hitting the ground. The impact of this spell is only apparent through how long the targeted enemy stands. The concept and ideas for each spell are really impressive, but a lot of them are rather uninspired. Character models are also a little small, and lack any real detail to express the imagination behind these creations. I think the main problem with Nox's visuals is that everything seems so small at times.

A note of attention must be given to Nox's interesting lighting effects. A line-of-sight system was used to implement rather realistic lighting effects within Nox's darker areas. It is honestly a little hard to describe but the overall effect of this is actually really cool, and I think credit should be given where credit is due.

A lot of work could have really been put into tweaking the control. The spells and items do not suffer from problems nearly as much as the simple exercise in directing the character around and speaking with Non-Player Characters. The imprecise movements of the character using the cursor can be downright maddening when trying to escape danger. Another example of this being an issue arises in towns as the player is forced to literally chase NPC's down to talk to them. Part of this is due to the fact that a person needs to be within a certain distance to initiate a conversaion, but the act of running is generally a pain.

The multiplayer modes introduced to the Action/RPG genre by Nox are a welcome addition. The traditional Deathmatch Mode has been included, along with Capture the Flag and this really odd soccer type game that is actually pretty fun. These modes seem to have been optimized for larger groups of players, while the one on one experience is something that suffers a little from map size and a slight imbalance in character classes.