That's not really surprising considering how much time Backers spend alpha and beta testing and tuning and improving that one area (we only had access to Cyseal after all) and Larian only took public feedback for Cyseal.. which explains why the game gets substantially less polished by the end. (The end temple would probably be the first thing we'd have slammed very hard had we known about it during alpha/beta)
Cyseal is also a nice example of what happens when a feature gets canned mid-development (schedules and time of day) that big village with many rooms and nooks with so much detail was only made that way to accommodate schedules, and when schedules were canned very late in development that area was as large and detailed as it was...
The other areas likely were never made for schedules, and it shows in how relatively barren and empty the 2nd area is. Though at least the area was pretty to look at...
I wasn't a pre release tester..Anyway, do you think this game is overrated a bit? I mean sure, Cyseal was a solid 8.5/10, but the rest of the game was a 5/10 at best imo. That Source temple was sooo boring! I thought Divinity 2 suffered from the same problem; the first half of the game was great, but the second half really sucked. All in all, this game doesn't deserve the current 8.9 rating it has on metacritic. Any extrapolations on why this game is gettting universal acclaim despite a horrid second half?
Different people different strokes I guess... to me it's a 7 out of 10 all things considered, and as Backer I really have no reason to overrate or underrate, I just rate what I backed and I am happy it even exists to begin with. But yeah, the polish really went haywire in the post Cysael areas, it's not just because that area has a huge amount of quests and a large assortment of very challenging fights but because the "golden steps" second area (ie, the snow-land) is 99% combat. And this is after all, what ye supposed to play after Cysael (I ignored it and just killed spiders and goblins to level up ,p) Now that I know what I know I would probably be able to end most engagements before triggering them too.. which is why I am really holding off my 2nd playthrough until Larian does something intelligent with the difficulty and crafting interface....
All fights after the giant cluster-hug... that was the hunter village end fight (which was amazingly fun, though nobody except 1 main dude that ended the quest survived it ,p) ended before the enemy had even 1 turn to move. Since spell range is larger than perception range of enemies. And if you know where enemies spawn, you can also very easily prepare the battlefield with barrels and area of effect stuff that leaves surfaces behind.
I also have a huge pet peeve with this game in that sneaking past engagements does not reward XP or is even a thing quests notice or check for. For someone like me who when games allow it will always go the "ghost" way this was a disappointment.... there is no non-lethal option either. You have to kill the void-dragon. Etc.. etc... too little choices and paths for my taste. Honestly after what the story told us, I was not really fighting for Cassandra anymore.... to me the void Dragon has a right to be pissed. Sadly killing her ends the game ;p
