This game is wonderful. Customizing my character was very entertaining (and one of things I enjoy the most about RPGs, and the small side quests are numerous and interesting. There any many areas that serve no particular purpose other than to gain some XP doing quests. This, I think, is a weakness of the succeeding games in the BG series: there are not enough exploration options available. The possibilites of your party are nearly endless, since there are many NPCs, all of whom have their own strengths. However, there is little NPC interaction, which is disappointing. There are some annoying aspects of gameplay (which is what caused me to downgrade this game slightly), such as the fact that the characters are excruciatingly slow, and have a poor pathfinder feature, which leaves them w/ a tendency to go places other than where you planned. You will be challenged from the first shocking event to the final show-down...and you will enjoy it the entire way.