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Battles in Icewind Dale are handled much like the battles in a AD&D pen & paper game. First the participants of the battle roll dice to determine who has the first attack (initiative) and then they roll dice to determine whether they hit or miss (attack roll) this goes on until the round is over and then it repeats until everyone on a side dies. You can toggle an option, which determines whether you see the attack roll on and off.

The one thing that sets the games that use the Baldur’s Gate engine apart from other RPGs is that you are able to pause the game at any time to give commands to your characters. The commands are executed once you unpause the game, this is there to simulate the pen & paper game where you have time to think what actions your characters should take. You can also set certain options that auto-pause the game, such as when a member of your party gets hurt, falls below ½ health, etc.

The sound in the game is comparable to that found in Baldur’s Gate. All of the members of your party have a wide range of sounds, from battle cries to calls of retreat when they loose their morale. You are also able to import your own sounds in wav format to customize your character. The battle tunes range from being a bit mellow when you fight bothersome goblins, to loud compositions when you fight in a battle with a big boss.

Icewind Dale is a great game, although people who have played through Baldur’s Gate and Planescape: Torment won’t find anything drastically different, they will find a great game with plenty of action to keep them glued to their computer screens through these long summer months. Those who are new to both the AD&D world and computer RPGs will be able to pick up Icewind Dale and go off adventuring in almost no time thanks to the tutorial like section at the beginning of the game. Overall, Icewind Dale features all of the qualities that made Baldur’s Gate one of the best RPGs ever, and still manages to include plenty of new items to keep everyone interested for a long time.

Overall Score: 90%