look
linearity doesn't make an RPG bad.
Linearity, better put, can make or brake a game.
If you get a too restricted feeling its bad.
however linearity can be used to keep a game interesting and driving the player onward.
Knights of the old republic and NWN are both linear games (in KOTOR you can go to different places as you please, and return to previous locations as long as you aren't banned from there or it was blown up. but that asside)
However I do think KOTOR manages its linearity better than NWN. Firstly it doesn't cover everything around the player in a dense fog and the locations are more sprawling and alive and thus more interesting.
Both games try and make everything less linear by giving out sidequests.
Personally I think they sidequests in KOTOR were much more interesting.
Except for some quests in NWN (like the one where you have to defend the 'barbarian') the quests are rather average.
They are 'morrowind'-quests. with that I mean that they are of the 'fetch this' or 'kill that' genre.
As I said it isn't always like that (the 'barbarian trial' and the 'village trapped in time' quests) but usually they are.
The sidequests are much better presented in KOTOR, in my opinion.
while walking through tatooine a man will bump into you and tell you you dropped a message. you can distrust him and refuse the message, or you can accept the message, find the man mentioned in the message and become a bounty hunter (giving the player access to some unusual items, i believe)
There is a quest in KOTOR similar to the 'barbarian trial' quest in NWN.
In this quest a friend of a companion of yours is in a prison on a neutral planet on charges of killing a sith.
You must investigate and later on defend him.
But at one point you will see that the man you're defending is quilty of something.
You can then plead guilty by showing the evidence, or withhold evidence and make the other side seem 'more guilty'.
this isn't a run-off-the-mill quest.
then there is also a romeo and julia like quest with 5 different endings.
I just didn't get that feeling in NWN, the sidequests just weren't appealing.
Unlike in KOTOR and BG you knew most quests would just have you killing some monsters or guards.
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