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[Review] Divinity: Original Sin: Roleplaying Depth and Adventure

SBFordSBFord Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129

Let me start right off by saying that Divinity: Original Sin is unlike any Kickstarter game that I have ever personally played before and I mean that in the best way possible. Throughout my experience with the game, I never once caught myself thinking, “Yeah, this works well…for a Kickstarter game.” Divinity: Original Sin is, thankfully, a high-quality product in all aspects and deserves to be judged among the upper-echelon of isometric RPG greatness, from Ultima to Baldur’s Gate.

Read more of David Jagneaux's Divinity: Original Sin - Roleplaying Depth & Adventure.

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Comments

  • FelixMajorFelixMajor Member RarePosts: 865
    Super excited to jump into this!

    Originally posted by Arskaaa
    "when players learned tacticks in dungeon/raids, its bread".

  • kharzankharzan Member UncommonPosts: 18
    And you got the review out whilst there is still the steam sale on...nice one :)
  • Nemesis7884Nemesis7884 Member UncommonPosts: 1,023
    is it "runable" on low end notebooks and the such?
  • Alka_SetzerAlka_Setzer Member UncommonPosts: 167
    I don't really understand how you can review the game this early. How many hours have you played the game and how far have you gotten into it? As far as I know the game isn't even released yet, still in the beta build until the download is made available so pretty much any negatives you say could be (most notably the "performance" issues) completely wrong for the release build.
  • BillMurphyBillMurphy Former Managing EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 4,565

    Originally posted by Alka_Setzer

    I don't really understand how you can review the game this early. How many hours have you played the game and how far have you gotten into it? As far as I know the game isn't even released yet, still in the beta build until the download is made available so pretty much any negatives you say could be (most notably the "performance" issues) completely wrong for the release build.

    EDIT: My apologies on going with the info listed on the game's site. But we have been in contact with Larian all along, and they were comfortable with us publishing our review today.  FWIW.  I am highly doubtful that the client that releases today with more VO will impact the score. And as others have said: taking money for a game means far more than "early access" or "beta" stamps. 

    See: HERE.

    Try to be excellent to everyone you meet. You never know what someone else has seen or endured.

    My Review Manifesto
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  • RattenmannRattenmann Member UncommonPosts: 613

    Originally posted by Alka_Setzer

    I don't really understand how you can review the game this early. How many hours have you played the game and how far have you gotten into it? As far as I know the game isn't even released yet, still in the beta build until the download is made available so pretty much any negatives you say could be (most notably the "performance" issues) completely wrong for the release build.

    The game is sold on steam, therefore it is a released product.

     

    It does not matter if they put a beta label on it or even early access. They started taking money, so they have to deliver and have to live with any feedback and reviews they get.

     

    Some Early Access games NEVER leave that state and stay on steam for over a year and more, without any patches or progress at all. There is zero reason to wait untill everyone and their mother bought a game untill you give a review.

    MMOs finally replaced social interaction, forced grouping and standing in a line while talking to eachother.

    Now we have forced soloing, forced questing and everyone is the hero, without ever having to talk to anyone else. The evolution of multiplayer is here! We won,... right?

  • LobotomistLobotomist Member EpicPosts: 5,963

    You can still get it on Steam sale for 20% discount. Hurry up

    The full game launches in couple hours too !



  • geremadygeremady Member UncommonPosts: 73

    The game officially releases today.

    It was delayed 10 days to put in voice-overs.

    To be seen how much that will prove the experience.

  • Nemesis7884Nemesis7884 Member UncommonPosts: 1,023



    Originally posted by Lobotomist

    You can still get it on Steam sale for 20% discount. Hurry up

    The full game launches in couple hours too !

    lol even with that discount g2a is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay cheaper (got it for 30 bucks)


  • SimonShagrathSimonShagrath Member UncommonPosts: 12

    Do want! If I get my payment tomorrow, I will definitely buy it :)

    Are the battles too hard, or fair?

  • Dimsum1337Dimsum1337 Member UncommonPosts: 60
    Looking forward to trying this out. 
  • ScalplessScalpless Member UncommonPosts: 1,426
    Looks like this could be at least as good as Divine Divinity was when it came out. And Divine Divinity was awesome.
  • rodingorodingo Member RarePosts: 2,870
    Looks cool but I picked up so many games from the steam summer sale that it will be awhile before I get to it.

    "If I offended you, you needed it" -Corey Taylor

  • furbansfurbans Member UncommonPosts: 968

    Originally posted by SimonShagrath

    Do want! If I get my payment tomorrow, I will definitely buy it :)

    Are the battles too hard, or fair?

    Unless they ramped it up with release from Beta, the game is in fact too easy imo.  Sure there was a learning curve and limited abilities early on but once you know good combos I was killing bosses in a few rounds and battles were a cake walk.  Granted some areas you want to avoid until later on but was really easy the areas I had access to in beta.  Maybe the difficulty really gets ramped up later on as beta was only 20% of the game.

     

    Granted I was going through with a full party and could limit myself to just the two main characters.  And I wasn't using any scrolls or summons and on hard difficulty.

     

    If you can get good combos going on it can make thinks much easier.  Like taking advantage of the bully talent or using stuff that creates synergy.  There is a lot of freedom that allows you to play different styles which I like.

  • DeathtognomesDeathtognomes Member UncommonPosts: 155

    It looks like the same UI from earlier Divinity games, while graphics were never an issue, gameplay was. They all started out too easy, later levels had problems scaling up. Also, at later stages (previous games) there were bugs galore and numerous patches.

     

    IMHO, this is an unfair review, unfair to us, you didnt actually play it. Must be nice to get paid to run your mouth about a game you never played, i.e., your word here means shite.

  • Alka_SetzerAlka_Setzer Member UncommonPosts: 167
    Originally posted by BillMurphy

    Originally posted by Alka_Setzer

    I don't really understand how you can review the game this early. How many hours have you played the game and how far have you gotten into it? As far as I know the game isn't even released yet, still in the beta build until the download is made available so pretty much any negatives you say could be (most notably the "performance" issues) completely wrong for the release build.

    EDIT: My apologies on going with the info listed on the game's site. But we have been in contact with Larian all along, and they were comfortable with us publishing our review today.  FWIW.  I am highly doubtful that the client that releases today with more VO will impact the score. And as others have said: taking money for a game means far more than "early access" or "beta" stamps. 

    See: HERE.

    It's not a huge deal to me personally since I already own the game and it's your call on publishing a review for a game that is essentially unfinished. While the score may not go much higher, as a consumer I would not know which parts of your review to trust since you are reviewing based on your experiences with the unfinished version (unless you guys were given the release build ahead of time or something).

     

    Imo you should have a disclaimer or make it clear that the review is based on experiences during the early access/beta period.


  • Originally posted by SimonShagrath
    Do want! If I get my payment tomorrow, I will definitely buy it :)Are the battles too hard, or fair?
    There are 3 difficulty levels to pick between.
  • RattenmannRattenmann Member UncommonPosts: 613

    Originally posted by Alka_Setzer

    Originally posted by BillMurphy



    Originally posted by Alka_Setzer



    I don't really understand how you can review the game this early. How many hours have you played the game and how far have you gotten into it? As far as I know the game isn't even released yet, still in the beta build until the download is made available so pretty much any negatives you say could be (most notably the "performance" issues) completely wrong for the release build.

    EDIT: My apologies on going with the info listed on the game's site. But we have been in contact with Larian all along, and they were comfortable with us publishing our review today.  FWIW.  I am highly doubtful that the client that releases today with more VO will impact the score. And as others have said: taking money for a game means far more than "early access" or "beta" stamps. 

    See: HERE.

    It's not a huge deal to me personally since I already own the game and it's your call on publishing a review for a game that is essentially unfinished. While the score may not go much higher, as a consumer I would not know which parts of your review to trust since you are reviewing based on your experiences with the unfinished version (unless you guys were given the release build ahead of time or something).

     

    Imo you should have a disclaimer or make it clear that the review is based on experiences during the early access/beta period.

     

    Id say the review is based on a product that costs real money NOW. If i can spend money on something, i like to check reviews wether i am wasting my money or not.

    It sure sounds nice for a company to sell stuff without "fearing" a negative review, and it sure as hell worked well for the most part (you are a good example of people falling for that trap).

     

    The "but the game is not finished!"-card only works if there is a set in stone release date. Unless that is the case a review is fair game as soon as the company takes my money, as i want professional information about a product as soon as i can spend my money on it. Not a year later.

     

    That being said: The review is kinda in favor of the game and a game usually does not get worse if they get more time. So this game is actually a bad example ;-) if the review was BAD as hell, id understand the doubts... but then again: Money is changing pockets here, so time for reviews.

    MMOs finally replaced social interaction, forced grouping and standing in a line while talking to eachother.

    Now we have forced soloing, forced questing and everyone is the hero, without ever having to talk to anyone else. The evolution of multiplayer is here! We won,... right?

  • Alka_SetzerAlka_Setzer Member UncommonPosts: 167
    Originally posted by Rattenmann

    Originally posted by Alka_Setzer

    Originally posted by BillMurphy



    Originally posted by Alka_Setzer



    I don't really understand how you can review the game this early. How many hours have you played the game and how far have you gotten into it? As far as I know the game isn't even released yet, still in the beta build until the download is made available so pretty much any negatives you say could be (most notably the "performance" issues) completely wrong for the release build.

    EDIT: My apologies on going with the info listed on the game's site. But we have been in contact with Larian all along, and they were comfortable with us publishing our review today.  FWIW.  I am highly doubtful that the client that releases today with more VO will impact the score. And as others have said: taking money for a game means far more than "early access" or "beta" stamps. 


    See: HERE.

    It's not a huge deal to me personally since I already own the game and it's your call on publishing a review for a game that is essentially unfinished. While the score may not go much higher, as a consumer I would not know which parts of your review to trust since you are reviewing based on your experiences with the unfinished version (unless you guys were given the release build ahead of time or something).

     

    Imo you should have a disclaimer or make it clear that the review is based on experiences during the early access/beta period.

     

    Id say the review is based on a product that costs real money NOW. If i can spend money on something, i like to check reviews wether i am wasting my money or not.

    It sure sounds nice for a company to sell stuff without "fearing" a negative review, and it sure as hell worked well for the most part (you are a good example of people falling for that trap).

     

    The "but the game is not finished!"-card only works if there is a set in stone release date. Unless that is the case a review is fair game as soon as the company takes my money, as i want professional information about a product as soon as i can spend my money on it. Not a year later.

     

    That being said: The review is kinda in favor of the game and a game usually does not get worse if they get more time. So this game is actually a bad example ;-) if the review was BAD as hell, id understand the doubts... but then again: Money is changing pockets here, so time for reviews.

    I did not fall for any trap. I liked the idea and the team behind the game, therefore I donated money to the kickstarter to help them along with their plan.

     

    They put out the review an hour or so before the official full release. Without a disclaimer stating that their review is based on early access/beta gameplay everyone will assume they are reviewing the "release" version since the review appeared the same day. Your reasoning for wanting a review as soon as you can spend money on a product is completely invalidated by the fact that they waited until release day post the review of the early access version. I'm not making excuses for the game being unfinished (because at this point it doesn't matter, the game IS finished now), I simply want it to be made clear that they're not reviewing the official release version of the game but rather a beta build regardless of how insignificant you may feel the term beta is.

     

    It doesn't matter if the review is in favor of the game or if it was a 9/10 score on everything, the fact of the matter is those scores are for a version they played that was incomplete and people will use that review to make their decisions. Honestly, this just seems like they wanted to be the first people to have a review out so screw actually playing the release version and reviewing that, we'll just rate it based on playing the unfinished version and no one will question it. I feel it's intentionally misleading not to have a disclaimer and a bad practice. The only time beta was mentioned was on the second page in one of the paragraphs for the polish section. Maybe I'm just overblowing the situation, but I still don't think it's right to post the review on release day and not have it prominently mentioned at the start of the review.

  • NadiaNadia Member UncommonPosts: 11,798
    Originally posted by Alka_Setzer

    I feel it's intentionally misleading not to have a disclaimer and a bad practice.

    The only time beta was mentioned was on the second page in one of the paragraphs for the polish section. Maybe I'm just overblowing the situation, but I still don't think it's right to post the review on release day and not have it prominently mentioned at the start of the review.

    true - there is no disclaimer

    but the reviewer did say it was beta version in the scoring ratings

  • davc123davc123 Member UncommonPosts: 458
     is 100% better then d3 but is better then POE?
  • jpnzjpnz Member Posts: 3,529
    Larian studios is on the par with Bioware for me. Which is 'here is my wallet when's the release?' Looking forward to this one!

    Gdemami -
    Informing people about your thoughts and impressions is not a review, it's a blog.

  • shakermaker0shakermaker0 Member UncommonPosts: 194
    Great review. Enjoying the game so far, feels like very much like a successor to Ultima 7 in many ways, ie, moving objects, playing with environment. It's essentially an old school CRPG with some newer elements thrown in, with a decent story to boot. If you're an isometric fan, I can't see a reason not to try this game out.
  • stayontargetstayontarget Member RarePosts: 6,519
    Bought this game a few day's ago and its quite good.  If you like games like Baldurs Gate, Icewind Dale, or NWN's then this game is for you and a must buy.

    Velika: City of Wheels: Among the mortal races, the humans were the only one that never built cities or great empires; a curse laid upon them by their creator, Gidd, forced them to wander as nomads for twenty centuries...

  • JorendoJorendo Member UncommonPosts: 275

    For the people who ask questions how he was able to review this game while it wasn't out yet and didn't play the release version. That is common practice in the game industry. Many of the reviews you read of games that get reviews on day are based on the review copies journalists get. Now he played the early access. Things might not be working completely yet or new problems arise on release, but that's how it often goes.

     

    Not to defend this review, but it happens more often then you think.

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