CAG Amazon rep loves us, and if you frequent there then you should've already known about it and bought it. if you don't... well that's what this is for. this is the game that Atlus also released for the 360, so some of you may be more familiar through that. if that's not familiar, then how about the recent Kingdom of Amalur? that game has a much more polished and better battle system, but Divinity II has a better... everything else that isn't combat. and as this is a WRPG, everything else is a huge part of what makes it great. game's far from perfect (balance issues, kinda lame battle system) but it's still damn good. sadly game doesn't carry native 360 controller support (despite coming out for the 360 - go fig) so either a) get used to keyboard/mouse, or b) xpadder away. game isn't perfect
reviews of this game? they'll pretty much agree with the above - combat is meh to bad, but the world, writing, and character building are damn nice. here's two:
Although the story contains far more sidequests than plot-driving moments, the writing is terrific and the voice acting superb, delivered in thick British accents with just enough dramatic flair to keep things light-hearted yet believable. The game has an almost Oblivion-esque level of exploration, with large, open areas to explore littered with quests and dungeons to discover. Even so, Divinity II is still focused and constrained enough that the plot never falls to the wayside for too long, keeping things moving and simultaneously providing new areas to explore. The Dragon Knight can even press X during conversations to read the minds of NPCs throughout the world, revealing valuable information that can be used to complete quests, find hidden treasure, or simply add more flavor to the tale. It's like a perfect amalgamation of what BioWare and Bethesda each do best, and exploring the land of Rivellon is by far the most appealing and attractive aspect of the game.
http://www.hookedgamers.com/pc/divinity_ii_the_dragon_knight_saga/review/article-635.html There are a few platforming sections in this game, which might seem a bit out of place at first but soon become one of the most enjoyable trials in it. Not that many RPGs have platforming puzzles these days, most opt for a more stationary test of intellect and problem solving skills but I am very pleased to state that this game employs a little bit of both.
When the dust of unpolished graphics, inconsistent voice acting and questionable design choices has settled, what you are left with is the story. The engaging plot and the colorful characters are more then enough to keep you playing for hours. The quests are very varied and entertaining and even the most unimportant side quest will give you satisfaction once completed. Many of them can even be overcome in more then one manner. Despite the unpolished in-game graphics, the cinematics that drive the story forward look superb and one cannot help but wonder whether the arts department could not have made the game look much better if they had just had a bit more time (or more ambition) to add a bit of bling to it.
The game world is filled with humor, some intelligent, some downright silly. A particularly memorable moment was when a skeleton I encountered at one point struck up a conversation with me. As the conversation went on, he suddenly fell apart due to too much existential thought. The writing on the whole is, save for a few inconsistencies, absolutely sublime and I hereby extend an open invitation to the writers behind this game to join me in a D&D session whenever they find themselves in Denmark.
was your machine made sometime in the past 6 years?
Windows XP / Windows Vista / Windows 7 Processor: Intel Dual Core - 1.8 GHz RAM: 1GB (XP) / 2GB (Vista/7) Hard Drive: 13 GB Video Card: 256 MB compatible DirectX 9.0c and Shader Model 3.0 (ex.: Nvidia GeForce 7600, ATI Radeon 1600 or higher) Additional Info: Direct X 9.0c (Windows XP) / Direct X10 (Vista/7)
...because it should run it. the processor's the least of your worries (that's junk), RAM is cheap and everything from the past couple years has twice that, and the vid card... well i dunno how it compares to the lol intel integrated chip.
other than that you could: 1) get a desktop. they're cheap now. upgrading if you already have one is ridiculously cheap too, unless it's so old that you can't even play a game made in the past 5 years on it or something (aka, you still have a single core). in those cases just keep the hard drive. <_<; still, you're fielding between 200-400 to get something solid running on the low end. 500 if you wanna splurge a bit.
2) if you insist on laptops, are in the market to upgrade, and have $400-600 to spare, fully recommend you get yourself a laptop with an APU A8 of some kind. APUs are pretty much the holy grail of AMD right now and their business model. if you aren't - or plan to wait - then things will get even better as the upgrade is going in later in the year and will be based off of their recent Bulldozer tech. should be notably better. not that they're bad mind you; APUs run the idea of taking your CPU and GPU then putting it into one chip (to oversimplify it). so your CPU = your vid card, and they've crammed legit vid cards in there that can run any game out there today. now sure, for a lot of tasks it'll be a bit slower than an i5 - the only exception to 'get an APU rule is anything involving extensive use of photoshop as AMD chips are notoriously bad at it compared to Intel ones - but not to any real notable degree. the much better graphical capabilities (see: lol playing Civ 5 on an integrated Intel chip), much better battery life (A8s tend to be around 6 hours at stock levels), much more adaptable chip (over/underclocking is easy and extremely safe - this will affect your battery life and machine's overall capabilities), and price (for what you get, you'd need to add in another $200 for a comparable dedicated vid card - though it'll cut the battery and raise the heat of the machine more in the process) pretty much fit everything most people would want.
even if neither of those, there aren't many chances you'll get to buy a quality DRM-free game for $6 outside of GOG and as of recently with Risen and Divinity II, amazon.
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The King Wang. Listen up Urinal Cake. I already have something that tells me if I'm too drunk when I pee on it: My friends. - Colbert.
On a scale of Diablo to Planescape, how's the balance between hack & slash and roleplaying?
EDIT: Oh, and since it's obviously a sequel (or is it the third- was this one or Ego Draconis first?), how much would someone like me who hates jumping into an ongoing story part way through be annoyed if I started with this one?
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"I'm Commander Shepard, and you're standing in the biggest library in Citadel Space. Look me up."
Because I asked questions that were, on further investigation, already answered in the links
But Hey, if you want to provide your own opinions:
1) On a scale of Diablo to Planescape, is it more hack-and-slashy or Role-play-y? 2) Since it's a sequel (which, as I found out after checking, is an updated version of Ego Draconis, not another sequel that didn't change the number for some reason. Although it is the third game because of Beyond Divinity, but that's apparently a spinoff or something... never mind, irrelevant mental meandering), are there likely to be lots of references to events I haven't seen, which would really bug me 3) How good is character customisation, both physically and in terms of abilities?
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"My name is Ezio Auditore da Firenze, and like my father before me, I am an accountant" Nothing is true. Everything is tax-deductable
Is this game compatible with a 360 controller? I mean, I know I could mess with configurations but I'm wondering how out-of-the-box it is compatible with one.
-- GameFAQs isn't going to be merged in with GameSpot or any other site. We're not going to strip out the soul of the site. -CJayC
...oh. well there's that. and i'm one of the weird ones who still hasn't played D2. despite owning it. backlog hell is where it's at. still, i understand the genre - it's got enough clones out there that i've played. here's a youtube review that might help clear things up.
alternatively - and this is a bit biased - someone who's a fan of the genre did post their thoughts on the game over on the dev's forum.
otherwise my short answers here go: 1) i'm not sure diablo's a good comparison to use for it. while the game is certainly linear, it's also extremely open ended. the action is better and more frequent than say, NWN, but it's also got a feel that's much closer to planescape than you'll find in most wrpgs due to the world, writing, lack of hand holding, and history. i've got a good backlog in this field and it's not my go-to genre either so i'm not the best to talk about it (NWN2 i completely forgot what i was doing, haven't played the ME games as i'm just waiting for the series to be released in a 'complete' form, need to get around to playing Risen, didn't like Morrowind...), though from what i've played it definitely lives up to more of a case of being like the older wrpgs in that it mixed things up. seeing how one of the devs loves Ultima 7, makes sense.
2, thankfully the game seems to be pretty much isolated. and yeah, it's got the expansions that Ego Draconis had in it too so it's an all in one deal there. everything you need to know about the game's inside the game. which is good considering nobody's played the first one. <_<;
3, the customization's pretty great, however the use in combat isn't so great, nor are the weapon types. there isn't much that changes your armor's appearance sadly, but if you're talking about abilities? you can pick any class tree's ability at any time and any skill in the game at any time. so for that, you're pretty good to go. you aren't gonna really find a game that allows you to play around with your character's abilities through the game that easily. physically though, 'meh.' nothing to really write home about sadly, though there's a ton of equip options.
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The King Wang. Listen up Urinal Cake. I already have something that tells me if I'm too drunk when I pee on it: My friends. - Colbert.
My laptop is less than 6 years old and absolutely could not run divinity 2. If I could, I would take a photo of wanglicious and write "do not believe his lies" on the other side of it.
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You beat yourself up with your past. Don't blame yourself, blame the world. Blame God. Blame me.
wow. is the intel intergrated chip that bad? jeez, i was hoping this would be doable for those but that's disappointing.
BUT STILL. PRAISE FROM SIR GANON, walking proof that this is worth it! even if you can't play it now, drm-free = might as well be yours. put it on a USB, play elsewhere. ...for some 100 hours or so most likely. basically, if you jack your friend's computer and tell him 'look man, divinity 2 was drm free' he'd understand. hell, he'd thank you for the chance to play it with no need of steam, securom, or anything except the installer which he'd promptly be given... in exchange for another 20 hours.
and good to see others are around and have played! dat script.
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The King Wang. Listen up Urinal Cake. I already have something that tells me if I'm too drunk when I pee on it: My friends. - Colbert.
nothin' wrong with them if that's what you like. Vegas 2 is one of them yeah. deal being set up is to have them be $5 each, but also part of a B1G1 Free sale, so net 2.50 each. just heavy on shooters from what we know.
but Divinity 2 has less than 24 hours to go.
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The King Wang. Listen up Urinal Cake. I already have something that tells me if I'm too drunk when I pee on it: My friends. - Colbert.