Divinity 2 (PC DVD)

The end of this decade was a small Golden Age for cRPGs. Oblivion, The Witcher, Fallout 3, Dragon Age, Risen, even the humble TORCHLIGHT revived the genre with fresh ideas and renewed vigor. And DIVINITY II: ERGO DRACONIS comes as the cherry to this cake.

If one remembers the (excellent) Divine Divinity, well gone are the days of isometric gameplay. Larian Studios started with a clean state and the result is a beautiful third-person action cRPG. The graphics are not cutting edge and yet they are gorgeous. Imagine what a cross between Titan Quest and Fable would look like today [by the way, ..."thank you" Peter Molyneux for snubbing PC gamers with FABLE II!].
The trees and flowers move slightly to the wind; the skies change in beautiful colors; the sunlight and shades play tricks to your eyes; the characters and gear are very artfully designed; and the fighting moves are impressive. If only the animation of the NTCs were better I would be talking about one of the best-looking cRPGs ever.

Nevertheless, what grabs you from the beginning is not the imagery but the story. The first PC game to introduce flying like a dragon was Drakan: Order of the Flame. But a dragon-slayer who can shapeshift into a Dragon and back? That's some table-turning.
What is more, character development runs parallel to your Dragon development, on different skill trees. Diversification may satisfy your curosity but do not specialize at your own risk: as you advance you better have some well honed skills if you wish to survive and fight yet another day.

In the best cRPG tradition, there are quick-slots, inventory and life/mana/stamina levels as well as a small local map. Other than that the screen is free of unnecessary clutter.
What is more, I particularly appreciated the music, subtle or emphatic where appropriate. The same care was exercised to the sounds of battle, from unsheathing your sword to letting go of an arrow. As to the English dubbing (the original game was in German) it was very nicely done.

Now some bad news. The game comes with SecuROM 7.x DRM but it requires no OnLine Activation so it is a mixed bag, barely making my tolerable limit (with a star withheld though). Be wary of the Russian edition however: that one comes with StarForce, an infamous DRM scheme (that simply refuses to die).

Patch 1.02 is already out and I heard it to be especially useful for Win7 users (I cannot speak from experience on this one, I am sticking to my reliable WinXP until Win7 SP2 is released). Nevertheless, after 20-25 hours of gaming I found no major bugs.

The graphics are exceptional, the world is vast and beautifully designed, the battles are absorbing and the gameplay immersing. All in all, an excellent game and a major addition to any cRPG collection.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

Divinity 2 is actually (confusingly enough) the third chapter in a series of games preceded by Divine Divinity (PC) and Beyond Divinity (PC DVD). These two games were entertaining (if unremarkable) 2D RPG games with a focus on hack & slash and a generally interesting storyline. Having liked the previous two efforts I decided to give the latest installment a whirl.

In Divinity 2, you take up the role of a Dragon Slayer - an elite warrior sworn to kill all Dragon Knights after they betrayed and murdered the messiah of the land, The Divine. Of course, not everything is what it seems. As you play through the game you will find yourself discovering the truth, picking up some interesting powers along the way, namely the ability to turn into a dragon, which is an interesting gameplay aspect. Although you don't gain this ability properly until about 50% of the way through the game, it adds a "shooter" aspect to the gameplay by opening up new aerial combat skills and a break from the usual quest-kill-grind gameplay of RPGs in general. You also gain your own base of operations in the form of a Dragon Tower, complete with your own trainers, minions and scantily clad dancer to manage as well as the ability to construct your own undead golem from various body parts you will find.

My first impression upon firing up the game was "was this seriously released in 2009?". I am not a Graphics-Whore so I was able to look beyond this, but as a warning to those of you who are, this game does not measure up to other recent RPG releases. The environments and dungeons can be quite beautiful to look at, but there seems to be no anti-aliasing support whatsoever and the character/monster models are extremely basic indeed. The in-engine cutscenes are quite low quality (especially the zeppelins which looks like sprites from Space Invaders at some points) and there is very little customisation of your main character available. When you start talking to the NPCs, you will notice approximately the same 4 character models are used over and over again. NPCs body language is also ridiculously exaggerated, so it will seem to you like the whole world is suffering from seizures when they are talking to you.

The player is not limited to one specific class, but can pick and choose from a number of skill trees. The quality of these skills varies, ranging from utterly useless to totally overpowered. Its a wise idea to pick a combat tree and focus on it though, otherwise you will find your character too weak and unfocused, leading to getting slaughtered by every boar/goblin/skeleton you bump into. Once I had finished the game once as a magic user, I didn't really feel any of the other skill trees were interesting enough to warrant another play through, so replayability value wasn't high for me with this game. The main questline is also quite linear. While some of your dialogue options and decisions can be very funny, they usually don't deviate too much from the good/heroic and evil/obnoxious options.

The music is generic and average for an RPG and I can't decide whether the voice acting is wonderful or terrible. Everyone seems to have a crazy regional accent from around various parts of the UK, which you will probably find either amusing or out of context. Occasionally there is some howlingly bad dialogue, usually from the games antagonist Damian, but on average the storyline and characters are unique, interesting and sometimes hilarious. Keep an eye open for the "Chicken Man" and the "Promiscuous Chest".

Divinity 2 is not a game that holds the players hand and sometimes you will find yourself running into enemies that can kill you with 1 attack and areas swarming with critters that drastically outlevel you. I enjoyed the added challenge of occasionally having to think tactically and hoover up every available experience point, but some players may find this very frustrating. The world itself is huge, and there are many opportunities to explore and quest while deviating from the main storyline. Thankfully the developers have included teleport shrines everywhere, so there is no tedious backtracking that has diminished my enjoyment of other games.

Fully patched and on a high-end system, I also experienced infrequent crashes-to-desktop and more annoyingly, a bug where I would get an eternal loading screen which meant I would have to Crtl+Alt+Del out of the game. Apparently this is a common problem from reading the game's forums. It didn't occur frequently enough to ruin my enjoyment of the game, but it is still very irritating. Also I experienced frequent slow-downs when accessing the menu and inventory screens, which made going into these vital screens a bit of an odious chore.

In conclusion, Divinity 2 is a game with a lot of little problems. If you are a patient person, don't care too much about having the greatest graphics, are into your old-school RPGs and don't set your expectations too high, you will get a lot of enjoyment out of this game, as I did. However, if this doesn't sound like you, I would recommend you stay far far away, otherwise you may find this game frustrating, archaic and unpolished.

First, in response to the negative reviews due to bugs and crashes, I'd like to say I bought this game in my high street store last week, installed it and so far it has run without any problems at all.

As far as the game is concerned I think it is one of the best RPG's I've played in a very long time. It's cetainly better than 'Risen' which was the last one I liked almost this much. I agree with previous reviewers and would say that the story is inventive and well put together and makes you want to keep on playing.

There are quite a few aspects of the gameplay that make this one quite fresh and original - you get your own tower (eventually) complete with minions to do your bidding. You can also collect body parts and have your necromancer make you a creature to fight along side you, which is quite cool. There are loads of weapons, armour, charms and upgrades to collect and the interaction with the NPCs are usually quite amusing and well put together. There are also quite a few good offensive and summoning spells, if like me, you prefer a wizard type character.

I must say I personally quite like the combat system, and the Diablo-esque spell/potion hotkeys make it quite an easy aspect to master - (there is nothing worse than PC games which are designed by people who think you can press as many keys at the same time on a keyboard as you can on an X-Box 360 controller......thankfully this is not one of them).

The game world is massive and is put together nicely - and of course you do get the help of an auto-map to keep you right.

I would thoroughly recommend this game to any RPG fan without hesitation - and probably to hack and slash enthusiasts as well as there is plenty of that going on too!