To be honest, I haden't played any of the Divinity stuff before, I did not partake in the Kickstarter and I did not have D:OS on my list of "must play" (which due to very special taste is as short as 1 or 2 titles per year). Then last october, I found myself with a bit of spare time and nothing else to do. So after arguing back and forth a bit I finally went out hunted down a physical copy, installed it ... and was immediately hooked :).
Yesterday, I finally finished, sadly before getting a chance to try out the Linux version. Hope that'll change for the next installment ...
Anyway, I totally loved the graphics style, the vibrant colors and the fact that you could switch the camera to a top-down view.
The turn based combat was almost always fun, although sometimes a bit unbalanced (or maybe I just did not always have the right trick up my sleeve). Toughest fight must have been the ghoul at the lighthouse. The Death Lord also required 3 attempts, whereas the final boss went down without much resistance at all (played everything on normal difficulty). In general I loved the hand-crafted encounters and that enemies were not respawning.
The companions were the one point where I would have wished for something else. I did not like Madora at all, and I also didn't want no stinkin' thief in my group either, so Wolgraff was also not an option. I couldn't really get warm with Jahan either for a long time, though at least I did like his attitude towards animals. But he did prove himself irreplaceable after gaining a few ranks of leadership (and being the only healer), so he could come along. I totally changed my mind about him as his story concluded, so he wasn't all that bad. I did like Bairdotr most of the lot, but unfortunately my main character was already proficient with the bow and so she wasn't a good match. In the end I had to replace her with one of the hirelings (Nerea, as I needed an earth spell at one point). She always was a couple levels behind (at the end she was 19, whereas the rest was 21), but trained in earth magic and witchcraft, she was a great addition, and didn't look too shabby either ;-).
So yeah, some more friendly, likeable companions would have made the whole experience even better. OTOH, I didn't have to feel bad for leaving anyone behind. But a few more choices would have been welcome!
Combat and companions aside, I also very much enjoyed the story and quests. The writing was great (played the German translation, no complaints there) and there were so many funny, witty and thought-provoking moments to be had. No generic standard RPG fare at all!
The single most epic item were the Smelly Panties. My main hero kept wearing them the entire game, only occasionally and reluctantly replacing them when requiring a boost to his crafting skills ;-).
To make a long story short, I had a lot of fun for probably a 100 hours, if not more, and am very much looking forward to whatever comes next. Thanks for all the effort that went into this!