Huge, Immersive Game with the possibility for endless improvement and customisation.
The graphics aren't mind-blowing. They are functional and some of the monster design and particle effects are impressive, but over-all they aren't anything to write home about. The same goes for the sound, with some of the stirring music themes being the highlight and the decent, but too sporadic voiceover being a problem.
What makes NWN such a great game is it's immense replayability. Of course, like most RPGs there is a great degree of character customisation, with many standard classes available. Playing the game with different characters, makes for uniquely different experiences. I do tend to play using the sheer brute force characters like barbarians and fighters so I don't know extensively about the magic characters, but I'm sure they are just as playable.
The single player game is very long and immersive, featuring many twists and turns, some of which are cliched and some are unexpected. Although, from a Noobie perspective, the nature of the story and its chapter based development was a good lead-in to the world of RPG playing. The monster and level design is well thought out and there are plenty of optional side-quests which alongside the main quest. There are also some memorable characters, particularly in the forms of the tragic Aribeth and the cheeky Tomi. With regards to items, there is a vast gamut of different weapons and armour available. However, I would have personally liked to see some of the sets and unique items, much like those in the Diablo series, as this would have made the campaign even more replayable.
Whilst the rest options and stone of recall make gameplay a little simple at times, there are plenty of increasingly challenging monsters, traps and puzzles to keep the player on their toes.
The Dungeon-Master option and also the Aurora toolset give users the option to fully create and customise their own worlds and also upload them to the huge NWN internet resource which provides friendly support and a huge catalogue of further user-created content which can be downloaded for further replayability.
NWN has given me 100s of hours of constant enjoyment, especially when played in conjunction to the expansion packs which have been released. I am eagerly awaiting NWN 2 to see how the universe can be expanded with all new graphics and other gameplay possibilities.