BD has the unfortunate feel of a 'business plan' filler rather than a mainstream effort. In other words it feels like something that was cobbled together to keep the cash flow going while the work continued on the main effort - Divine Divinity 2. Judged that way, I guess it's not too bad - certainly I've felt more ripped off by other games that promised more and delivered less.
That pretty much sums it up.
Many companies put out "in between" games that have much smaller budgets. Clearly the developers had a cut off point for BD that strictly limited the time and money spent. The game not only has all the issues of bugs and lack of polish but it seems like a less ambituous effort all round.
If it wasn't for the Divine Divinity connection I'd see this as just another minor RPG that I played once and forgot. But having played Divine Divinity straight through twice when I bought it, and still finding it fun to re-do every few months, I naturally had higher expectations for this one.You can't blame the developer for sticking "Divinity" in the title to cash in on the success of the original game, but some unfavourabe comparisons are probably going to be inevitable.
I may or may not finish Beyond Divinity - it does seem a somewhat mediocre and half-done project compared to Divine Divinity - but I've played many other RPGs that also weren't too brilliant and haven't felt like it was much of a big deal.
The true RPG market isn't that crowded, so many fans will buy most of the ones that come out. I think that by the time Divine Divinity 2 comes out I'll certainly be prepared to give them another chance at matching the standard of the first game. But I also hope that it's getting more overall effort and resources than this one got. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />
