3. Not everyone wants to be a divine one. Not everyone wants to die to become the divine one. At least I wouldn't, because it sounds quite ridiculous. Zandalor could be member of black ring too... It would be perfect way to kill the divine one. And yet I couldn't say anything when they decided to KILL me. Could you stand there quitly if someone is going to kill you?
That's true. Not everyone wants to be the divine one but everyone wants to be a hero. And that hero doesn't necessarily have to wear a halo over his/her head. However, when choosing to play Divine Divinity, that's the exact choice you made (whether it was intentional or not).
I create fantasy games so I completely understand what you're talking about. I love RPGs that have a lot of choices. But sometimes I just like a game, like Divine Divinity, that makes some of those choices for me. Which was one of the features about the game that I liked. I knew where my character was headed at all times. There are some games on the market where you don't have to stick with the main storyline. Ones where your character's alignment is made by the choices you make and you can have as 'bad' or 'evil' a reputation as you want. But I didn't expect Divine Divinity to be that kind of game because from the beginning of the story you already know your character is going to end up ridding the land of chaos. And since NPCs respond to your reputation, it was simply a matter of how difficult a time I wanted to give myself (or my character, I should say) that changed the game's degree of difficulty (in addition to the actual game settings of "easy", "normal" or "hard").
I was most impressed with Larian's letter (from Swen Vincke) to the player in the beginning of the player's manual. The developers state their intent so clearly:
"When we set out to create 'Divine Divinity', we had one clear design goal: To create a game that is instantly accessible for the majority of gamers by providing simple and fun gameplay. At the same time, we wanted to maintain an enormous amount of depth for those among you who prefer to stand still for a while and reflect on what's going on. Or, put more simply: We wanted to blend the best of both hardcore and simple action role-playing games." They certainly hit the mark with their intent, IMHO. So, as I stated in a previous message on this board, it's hard to please every person in your targeted audience. But on the whole, Divine Divinity has a wide appeal. I would recommend this game to someone who has never played an RPG before and also to people who have played a significant amount of RPGs.
Faralas <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/mage.gif" alt="" />
