Difficulty:

Hard

Time Spent:

10 to 20 Hours

The Bottom Line:

"Solid"

Most of the successful RPG's get an expansion pack too. so the same thing happened for Gothic II with Night of the Raven.
NOTR has a difference with some other expansion packs. unlike many of them which add a new campaign and story after the events of original game, NOTR tells a story parallel to the events of Gothic II. you have to start a new game to get the advantages of NOTR.
NOTR adds some new things to Gothic II. the most important of them is a new storyline and a new world which is named Jharkendar. Jharkender has a really good design and between the other two worlds ( Khorinis and valley of mines ) it's the best one. but obviously, it's smaller and doing everything in it can take 15 hours at best.
The story in the expansion pack is about a new Beliar's minion who has a strong weapon in his possession named Claw of Beliar. this new servant is Raven ( hence to the title ) , one of the ore barons in the valley of mines and as always, our hero has to stop his cause.
As already said, Jharkender has a beautiful design and since the world is small, designers paid more attention to details. the northern part is a desert , the western part is a coast which pirates inhabit in it, the center and southern parts are lush jungles and the eastern part is a big swamp which is a home for bandits. NOTR's main goal was to make the game harder. the most important thing that has been done is that for increasing your stats, the number of learning points for every 30 point gets increased by five. for example, increasing your mana by five points requires five LP at first, but after it reaches 30, increasing it by five points requires 10 LP. after it reaches 60, increasing it by five points requires 15 LP and so on.
This is an effective change which stops players from reaching high stat points and then becoming strong unfairly.
Of course, there are new additions named stone tablets which increase your stats if you read them ( and if you learn the language of the builders ) and with the potions that increase your stats ( although their effectiveness is lowered ) you can still manage and become powerful if you explore a bit and find these items.
There are also some other small changes and additions like new characters,quests and high quality soundtracks , HP regeneration for dragons ( you can't hit & run anymore ) , shrines of Beliar which praying in them gives you money at the cost of your HP and Mana, a new way to enter each faction, new spells and weapons and so on.
NOTR is one of the best expansion packs ever and it's so good that if you played through Gothic II, it deserves to be played again from start only because of the new additions and changes of NOTR.