The more I play DOS, the more I'm inclined to agree with the OP.
There are small things, like inventory management (if my backpack opens UNDER my main character sheet once more, I'll strangle someone). Like perma-weather (it always rains at the lighthouse), no day/night cycle (I love having usable beds, I'd like to take a nap in one, but WHY?) and food that is basically crappier healing potions. Like the pyramids returning to my inventory whenever I port to Homestead.
There are more annoying things, like constant immersion breaking. Yes, by all means, let's mention Dragon Commander again. WTF Larian, seriously. I get that you need to make money, but it doesn't mean that Bellegar needs to outright say: GO AND BUY DRAGON COMMANDER. I had to do a double-take when I saw it. Lame jokes and modern idioms don't do you any favors either. Are we saving the world or are we having a piss about it all? I get that Divinity has always been a bit tongue-in-cheek, but surely we could do without obvious slapstick like Zombie Jake in a tophat, crawling out of his grave to trade with me whenever I knock. One minute I admire him for actually RESISTING a raise undead spell, the next it seems like the bugger has adapted nicely to being a zombie.
Then there are big things. Like, Larian needs to print this out and hang it above every desk:
LACK OF QOL FEATURES DOES NOT AN OLD-SCHOOL RPG MAKE.
LACK OF QOL FEATURES DOES NOT AN OLD-SCHOOL RPG MAKE.
LACK OF QOL FEATURES DOES NOT AN OLD-SCHOOL RPG MAKE.
LACK OF QOL FEATURES DOES NOT AN OLD-SCHOOL RPG MAKE.
LACK OF QOL FEATURES DOES NOT AN OLD-SCHOOL RPG MAKE.
Like the switch puzzle in the Black Cove; I don't feel clever for solving it, I just feel like I wasted a lot of time and the designer was a giggling seven-year-old. Like the Diablo-esque itemization, may it burn in hell forever, it might work in Diablo and Diablo clones, but not here. Like the saddest character customization menu in the recent history of games. Like MMO-worthy nerfs (blank elemental scroll recipe today, Lone Wolf and Glass Cannon tomorrow probably, something else that you hung your entire build on the day after).
Don't get me wrong, as far as currently available single-player CRPGs go, DOS is a solid competitor. I am having fun with it, and it offers the most satisfying magic system in recent memory. But I'm afraid that there are enough things wrong with it to not justify all the googly-eyed accolades it has received thus far. If future patches deliver more improvements than nerfs, perhaps things will change.
