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Should I bother with Divinity Original Sin or go straight to 2?
- Thread starter Khrol
- Start date
I plan to play the first one, but all this talking about its writing is worrying me a little. I dislike when game characters try to make witty and humorous comments all the time (see Bioware style of writing), does the original Divinity have the same problem? I mean if it's like Terry Pratchett kind of humour I'm totally fine.
I played the first game based off the praise the second one was getting when it released last year. I played until the second area and dropped the game as I quickly realised it kinda all felt like just doing chores and there was no involvement from the party in the story and the fights were very samey by the time the second map came.
Does the sequel fix these issues?
Does the sequel fix these issues?
Go for D:OS 2. It's a masterpiece that requires no previous knowledge.
Funny enough i'm going to a talk tomorrow about the worldbuilding and story creation hosted by two of the writers of D:OS 2. It's sure to be interesting!
Funny enough i'm going to a talk tomorrow about the worldbuilding and story creation hosted by two of the writers of D:OS 2. It's sure to be interesting!
Playing D:OS2 with two friends now, we are having a blast! We cannot always find a time to play together though, I'm kinda tempted to play D:OS1 again in parallel or go for a Origin character run of D:OS2, but then I might spoil myself...
I'd say you can skip 1, but it's still a fine game and I'd recommend it. 2 is better in many ways though.
I'd say you can skip 1, but it's still a fine game and I'd recommend it. 2 is better in many ways though.
One thing not mentioned about 1: Pokrovsky's last soundtrack:
One thing not mentioned about 2: Its intense level of roleplaying, campaign building, and level creation. It's HUGE.
What chatter? *wipes sword clean*
One thing not mentioned about 2: Its intense level of roleplaying, campaign building, and level creation. It's HUGE.
What chatter? *wipes sword clean*
I've probably tried 3 times to play the first game, but always bounce off it after 5-6 hours (About the time you would wrap up everything in that first town). It feels so slow and plodding and beyond the combat, I haven't found a ton I really enjoy. Anyone have advice on how to better enjoy the first game? It really seems like something I should like.
As someone who is playing the second now and loving it I say: play the first if you have the time. I enjoyed the first a lot despite its issues and it's pretty cool seeing the call-backs to that first adventure in the second game. They would be lost on you if you haven't played it. The whole first section deals with a villain that you encounter in the first game. The second seems dramatically better than the first so far but it's better still with the context.
Straight to 2 its the best CRPG out there, and significantly better than D:OS in terms of roleplaying due to the GM style narration. That said the first one will still be worth a visit cause its also amazing, it just has a boring story.
Go straight to OS2. It's better in every way, no reason to spend 100 hours on the first and risk getting burned out.
First, nah. DS2 is a great game, and the B team shtick people like you keep spouting does a disservice to the developers who made a great game, that you just can't get over 4 years on.
Also. Dude was talking about Original Sin 2 in that post lol.
It's infused Pratchett-like quirks and juxtapositions, but obviously not as good nor as bitingly satirical as he
I didn't pick the game up originally because I thought it was going to be a fantasy Naked Gun (I saw Snowmen enemies on the back of the box), but it's just quirky fun and doesn't take itself too seriously a la Pillars and the like.
Just bear in mind, that there is a lot to do in the first settlement and it really kills the pace. Once you get going though, it's pretty good!
Clearly, the guy who made the controls had no idea what he was doing. Shtick is your way of excusing a level below mediocrity. There are aspects of DS2 that are fine, but there is plenty not very good about the game either.
Neither. They are saying bullshit.
In fact, several encounter designs in the first game are the best in the series.
The combat is actually good in D:OS 1 and 2.
Also, 2 introduces some improvements over the first, but also some noticeable setbacks in few areas (the armor system is flawed to say the least and the progression curve is frankly insane in some specific level-to-level jumps.
Real talk: these people are parroting this stuff becuase that's what some reviews said, but most of them wouldn't actually be able to tell you what exactly is "much better in every way", aside probably for production value (graphics).
Some mechanics in fact were regressions and the first one still offers some of the best encounters.
Completed the first game, On act 2 in the second game and we cant be bothered to go back too it. Just hasn't captivated us like the first one did. Must have been the lack of rock/paper/scissors.
Thanks, I always respect games that don't take themselves too seriously. Gonna definitely play the first one before the second.
havent played 2 yet but after all the praise i saw for the first divinity, i ended up very disappointed. apart from the combat system (which takes far too long for you to fully appreciate unless you go out of your way seeking for it) the game is tedious, poorly paced, poorly written and just not fun. the humour is more misses than hits and there's such a vast amount of things designed solely to waste your time (disguised as "options") that i wonder if they werent the dev intentionally mocking its players
cyseal (and outskirts) is top 5 worst areas in all rpgs i ever played, easily.
cyseal (and outskirts) is top 5 worst areas in all rpgs i ever played, easily.
Maybe, but as I said in my first post, if you want to play both, play them in order because it's hard to go back to the first once you've played the second. I really enjoyed the first game a lot, despite the unexpected lightheartedness of it, and the graphics and aesthetics didn't bother me nearly as much as some.
OS1 (EE):
Combat - Turn based with an emphasis on spell/elemental combinations during the earlier levels. I found this to be pretty enjoyable, but also the importance of it exaggerated. Once you hit level 10 - 12 or so the combinations fall to the wayside for simply using your most powerful spells every encounter and combinations only really came into play if they came about naturally over the course of any given fight, they were no longer a priority. This made most fights play out the same. It got even worse once you had the master level stuff unlocked and could wipe out groups before combat actually even began. Overall, it was a change of pace and initially more tactical than what we had seen in a CRPG in a while. I also feel like magic users had the edge here, but not really by that much compared to the reversal that happens in the second game due to there not being a "fake health" system and the way CC works.
Characters - While the companions were competently written, not only was the selection light, some were much more interesting than others. The friendly NPCs were relatively standard stuff, although some of them, especially in the market area could have had their ambient dialogue cycles delayed quite a bit. Most of the dialogue in general seemed to have been written for laughs, or at least a smile. Sometimes it worked, and sometimes it became grating. Tolerance levels will vary on this. Hostile NPCs followed suit, although remained suitably darker in tone overall and very often reminded me of something from a Blizzard game, not strictly due to the aesthetic either (even if that played a large role).
Exploration - Again, it very much felt like I was roaming around areas that you would find in a Blizzard game. The main difference being the puzzles and hidden items; hazardous or otherwise. Just like with the NPCs, the environments fit pretty well with the enemies, and the music helped a lot in that regard too, but I never actually found the map layout to be outstanding, although there was enough variety to it for the most part with both the overworld and dungeons. It never felt so bland to be boring though at least.
Other - One thing that this game has over the second is its expansive crafting system. Some might like this a lot more than others, but for me it was a love/hate affair. I really enjoyed having the option to craft very useful items early on, as well as being able to craft some pretty powerful stuff late game, but sometimes it became too much. The game wasn't so hard that you couldn't dedicate points to one of your characters for smithing, but it also felt like that character was slightly underpowered for combat. To circumvent this you could always create a dummy smith to forge or repair items every now and then, but doing that just killed the pacing way too much for me and led to some cumbersome micromanaging. It seemed like character progression was tied to crafting more than it should have been too. You could find or buy powerful gear, but it was so spread out or tied to character level that you needed to supplement that with crafted items for a smooth experience.
Speaking of micromanaging; the inventory was a clusterfuck. I think they patched in a better sorting method, but it was still a mess, from looting items into backpacks, general inventory or them autofilling your toolbars. It often felt like I was having to clean house too much. Easily the worst part of the game for me. This might be one reason crafting was greatly reduced in the second, but that's just speculation.
The overall plot was nothing to write home about either and just felt like your typical, basic fantasy fluff. Light vs dark, chosen ones, creationism, ascension etc and the side quests more often than not (but not always) had a carefree, or at least cheerful attitude.
I think where the game excelled production wise though would have to be its music. It was outstanding, and usually added enough gravitas to balance the overt silliness the game could sometimes go overboard with, without being demanding or distracting. Probably one of the best CRPG soundtracks in a while.
OS2:
Combat - Similar to the first game, but with a major downgrade. Thanks to the Mass Effect 2 multiple health bar system, you now have to burn through the enemy's fake health to actually start damaging them. This also affects most spells in a big way because without specific talents, they can no longer apply their secondary effects upon impact (unless that impact removes magic armor and the leftoever damage carries through). This also effectively neuters crowd controlling spells (contrary to popular belief, they did not "break" the combat of the first game, since CC was a non issues after level 10 or so). On top of that, due to their added effects, or area of effect, spell damage was generally much weaker than physical damage for the AP until late game, on top of having relatively long cooldowns, which did not lower with stats, unlike with the first game. So until you had access to higher tier source spells, magic wasn't really all that great in smaller doses, and spell combinations that were so dominant early on in the previous game were fairly weak in this. They essentially took twice as long to achieve and really didn't amount to much. By the time most CC spells or combinations could activate, you could have simply killed most enemies with physical damage. This was slightly different on Tactician, but not enough to make it feel balanced in the slightest. To add insult to injury, magic suffered from partial to full blown resists of any given element, where physical simply hit. Even factoring in elemental weaknesses, magic was still in a deficit for efficiency and reliablity.
Proponents to this system like to say that it made the game "more tactical", but it really didn't at all. It just promoted either using a balanced team of two physical and two magical, four magical or four physical with a heavy slant towards physical. In the end you still had to focus burning down either their magic armor, or physical armor and hitting the same enemy with spells or abilities that ran counter to what another character was doing wasn't beneficial in the slightest. You could create some characters that focused in magic, but had a physical skill or two as a supplement and vise versa, but it was typically better to just keep your characters dedicated to one armor type.
In EE they tried to "balance" this disparity by introducing a higher miss rate with physical classes on top of increasing the physical armor a little all around, but I'm not sure it really made much of a difference. It didn't improve magic classes, and is only felt sometimes with physical. Physical still outclasses magic for most of the game, and it was especially bad if you went with a Ranger type class that used crossbows.
Gripes aside, I think at least the second game offers more options for viable mixes of abilities for a type of multiclassing, even though it also removed some pretty useful spells from the previous game. I don't necessarily like the combat more than in the original, but it has enough going for it to at least make it close to on par, but for different reasons.
Characters - Vastly better written companions this time around not only with dialogue, but with their backstories. Like the previous game, some of them are more interesting than others, but the quality for all of them has been significantly improved. The overall world is slightly more grounded and even a little oppressive at times, and both regular NPCs as well as enemies seem to have more of an earnestness about them that was missing from the previous game. They also added a reaction system that IIRC was missing from the first game depending on whether or not you actually used one of the companion origins as your main character to open dialogue and some choices that would otherwise be absent.
Exploration - This seemed significantly improved to me, but much of that has to do with the huge upgrade in both graphics and aesthetics. It still had somewhat of a similar look as the first design wise (with alterations), but just overall looked way less like a cartoony indie game and somewhat more believable. It also helps that the game seemed a lot larger in scope, which also led to many more encounters with interesting NPCs and enemies in the wild. At the same time though, it seems like the game has some pretty bad pacing problems. I can't actually say that it's lacking in content, because it's not, but the way its divided just gives it an unfinished feel.
I don't recall my exact playtime in each area, but Act 1 was a decent size and I think took me somewhere close to twenty hours to do everything, which includes reading all of the books. Act 2 is where the meat is though, and may as well just be considered "the game" in and of itself. Due to the absolute massive amount of shit to do in Act 2, factoring in the length of the first act as well, the third and fourth acts just feel like blips on the radar and you can't help but think "That's it?!" It didn't help either that the fourth act in general suffered from what seemed like a rushed ending and rushed writing in general as though they ran out of time. It felt more like a coda than an actual ending chapter to me.
I have yet to actually reach the last two acts since the release of EE, but at least the last chapter anyway was supposed to have been massively rewritten and also had a few encounters changed around for the better. But if there was not much in the way of actual new content added, it will likely still feel minor compared to the first two acts. Again though, this isn't about the amount of content in the game, but just the way its rationed.
Regardless, I found myself enjoying exploration as a whole a lot more in this game over the first, especially with some of the various traversal abilities you can get. They also expanded upon an item you get from the first game that made traversal even more convenient (I'm not sure if this was specifically done to make four player co-op possible, but it made single-player much more enjoyable as a result) and they also added a respec option much earlier on, so you can experiment a little more this time around. Plus it's free.
I never bothered watching videos like this until right before EE was to be released; and while I also don't find every build to be particularly "optimal" (especially if you aren't using the Lone Wolf talent), this still gives you a pretty good idea of the various builds you can use and be successful with in the game.
Other - They seemed to have decided that either the crafting system from the previous game would be too overpowered in conjunction with the vendor carnival that this game has, or they added so many vendors to make up for the lack of crafting (that they didn't want to spend time developing). Either way, the expansive system from the first is gone for better or worse. This ends up lessening the inventory clutter a bit, but then you're also constantly picking up ingredients and wondering when you're going to be able to craft "the good stuff" (if you've played the first game anyway), but that day never comes and it was cut down to primarily potion, arrow and skill book crafting.
The overall plot was improved I think, but it reminded me a little too much of the first two Dragon Age games at times, and then returns to the theme of "the chosen one" and ascension from the first. Much like Mass Effect 2, the best writing is found with the companions and quests, not necessarily the main story, even though you find much of this while progressing through the main quest.
While the music of the first game elevated it (necessarily so I think), the music in this game is somehow even better. The game didn't need music of this caliber to shine, yet it has it in addition to what's already there.
Both games are good, but the second is simply better in most areas, and despite really enjoying my time with the first, I can't go back to it after spending so much time with the second.
But you know, opinions...
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Divinity original sin 1 is a great game, definitely worth the time. You are missing out if you skip straight to 2 imo.
Does this play differently on PS4 than it does on PC? By this I mean can I just move the characters freely with the analogue stick as opposed to sequentially selecting the place at which I want them to go?
The writing and humor worked against the story imo, 2 was much muuuuuch better when it came to writing and the characters/dialogue along with the overall story.
Pretty sure you can do both on the controller and switch freely(dpad toggle iirc). Most of the time you'll just use direct control with the stick, but there are situations you may want to swap to cursor control, like setting up certain pre-fight positioning or having your party auto walk to a specific point across a huge map without manually driving them, etc...
PC offers controller support too if you weren't aware.
Ah okay, thanks. I don't have a PC so I was thinking of getting this on PS4. Is there Pro support? Not that it's a big deal.
Yes, thank u 4 clearing that up. PVP and PVE wise i had by far the most fun with DS2. I agree that Demons Souls and DS1 (even Bloodborne and DS3) are better games, but DS2 gets too much hate and that's not fair. The problem with DS2 was mainly the level design and the hitboxes. The rest of the game is as magical as any souls game imo. I played it on PS3 en PS4 (SOTFS) by the way, so i don't know how bad the controls are on PC.
I loved the first, but 2 is so damn good...it's 200 hours of RPG perfection, not worth burning yourself out on playing both b2b.
