Alright, I have a huge list of things to talk about. I've never had a huge interest in posting on these forums, despite the fact that I've played Divinity II, Divinity: Original Sin, Divinity Dragon Commander, etc, etc. I feel, however, that DOS II is in an early enough state that my feedback might actually matter.
So here is the long list (bear with me) - I wrote it in the back ground while I played so it is very stream-of-consciousness.
Things I'm going to gripe about and how I'd like to see it changed(nitpicks):
1. Display a chest to be either "empty" as part of its name instead of a tooltip, as the tooltip takes too long to pop up. It is just as fast to walk over and open the chest.
2. Seems to be some inaccuracy with UI and certain weapons. Weapons that say "1 AP" in the inventory on attack actually use 2 AP in combat, etc. I assume this is known, but posting it anyway.
3. Fire Totem summon thing... what does it do exactly other than act as a target dummy? I assume it is incomplete... at least I hope it is, and that it will actually attack later.
4. When a character is healed with a water spell after being on fire, sometimes their healthbar retains the purple coloration from having a DOT effect on them despite it being cleansed.
5. Interactable bodies do not highlight with the Info button [L Alt], it is really easy to miss lootable corpses because of this and thus miss key items. Especially when bodies get disintigrated or mushed by various spells.
6. The AOE UI bubble of Hail Storm does not reflect its actual radius. This causes a lot of accidental friendly fire. (It probably is not the only spell like this.)
7. Massive FPS drops when using the teleportation skill on items.
8. When playing single-player having to choose the response to something for 4 different characters is actually very annoying, especially when the prompt is forced. Having to say "yes, let's do this" 4 times is annoying. By the end of chapter 1, I always just spammed through the responses and didn't read any of them.
9. I really miss voice acting. :( Please get voice acting. I love reading, guys (Andrej Sapkowski is sitting beside me from earlier). But after your heart is pumping from intense combat, the last thing I want to do is read several pages of text and click through dialogue options for 4 characters.
10. The inventory really needs a sorting system like the first one had. Four hours in and I've got so much clutter in my inventory that it hurts my eyes.
11. The game rewards slaughtering everything far too much. It's also weird you can min-max by doing the quest for characters, then come back and kill them for additional XP with no real repercussions.
12. I hate how you kill guards and so forth and prisoners and civilians do not react to it. These people who were oppressing you are dead... and yet you just stand there?
13. There are a lot of awkward pauses in the music, and the fact that there is no dialogue makes it really noticeable. That said I really love those musical notes in combat. Combat music - awesome. Environmental music... needs more.
14. Teleportation lag gets really bad the further in the game you go and starts affecting character teleports too.
15. CTD if you leave an internet browser open in the background can occur if you enter combat. (probably needs more testing)
16. Currently I am not impressed with the character storyline, outside of the Red Prince. Look, Sybille, babe, I know you want to kill stuff, but surely there is more to you than that?
17. [big one] I dislike how character choices in DOS II are mostly hollow. The best choice is always the choice that leads to combat.
- Reason 1 - you get more XP and more items by fighting, even if that fighting comes after completing the quest that would allow you to complete it peacefully. (Oh, do you have nothing else for me? Well now you have my permission to die)
- Reason 2 - [note I wrote this before I finished chapter] diplomatic endings have a disappointing conclusion. For instance, the quest where you rescue a dragon: the dragon just flies off and promises that he'll just "know" when you need help. And yet he says he won't join you. Despite the fact that he keeps talking about "I'll never be able to repay how much I owe you." How about just joining the party, dumb fuck? (is what I want to say) Seriously, this is not a satisfying conclusion. It would have been a better conclusion if he just turned around, turned out to be evil, and attacked you with the phrase, "The Voidwoken send their regards." Then at least you could have a badass mid-game side-quest fight with awesome loot. Instead you get a disappointing promise that'll probably mean he joins in the final battle or some BS when you really don't want him [holy crap did I see the future - except it was even more disappointing, seeing as he did not actually join the battle against Alexander].
18. There are too many descriptions of actions and of characters. Isn't that what 3D models and animations are for? I also hate that I have to click through these descriptions whenever I need to buy something from a merchant. Yes, I realize he's a skeleton-wizard-dude, now let me buy his herbs.
19. Not enough flirtation or actual roleplaying is possible. This is the main reason I hate the dialogue. As the Red Prince, I talk to another lizard lady who is talking to me about how awesome I am... then it just gets dropped and goes nowhere. Why can't I flirt with her?! Look, I'm not asking for you to actual animate or show a sex scene or something but I really want my character to actually be able to have sex with another character or, at least, interact with them on a level that does not have to do with killing, gaining items, or questing.
20. Apparently the Red Prince has a wife? That feels like something that would have come up earlier... especially if she is the reason he is in his current exiled position. (As someone who was cheated on, I probably annoyed all my friends talking about how slutty my ex-fiance months after it happened.) Being betrayed by his wife should be, I think, the first thing you learn about him, even before he mentions being a prince. I cannot see how that is not on the forefront of his mind, and would explain his talk of suicide when he is not the MC + it would make players less likely to kill him if they sympathize with him.
21. In order to get unique dialogue for each character, you have to have that character selected, then go talk to whatever NPC would give unique dialogue. Unique dialogue interractions should be automatic so you don't have to search for them and potentially never find them. How could I know that the random dwarf in the town's square has unique dialogue for Lohse? Unless I check him, and every other NPC, one by one, with all the party members, I'd never know there is a cool bit of dialogue hidden in there. Why not have NPCs with unique dialogue address the party PCs directly, you know, as if they recognize them or something?
22. I've heard you are creating more unique storyline characters... please don't unless you flesh out the ones you already have. I'd rather have four, complete, rounded characters than four one-dimensional characters. What does Sybille want? To kill lizards? Why? Revenge. What else do you know about her? Well... she really hates lizards... and loves killing. Did we mention she loves killing and hates lizards? When I first met her I thought her and the Red Prince's interactions were going to be awesome... now I hate her. She's like an Arya Stark without the family connection of being a Stark to make her more sympathetic.
23. Blessing the flaming pigs out of order bugs the game out, giving you no experience and not marking it as a quest complete. The pigs walk off screen and just disappear without any effect.
Things I already REALLY love but want expanded:
1. Whoever wrote Lohse's response dialogue did a really good job. It disappoints me that I can't, as the Red Prince, flirt with Sebille like I can with Lohse, or simply make sarcastic comments to chide her bloodthirstiness.
2. Sebille is described as extremely beautiful, when playing as the Red Prince, yet there is nothing - beyond that initial description and the first interaction - that would suggest he is attracted to her. I suspect that the initial description is a generic one, however, I find it interesting that the Red Prince could be attracted to her in particular. As, otherwise, I find myself questioning how and why the hell the two of them are sticking together. If the Red Prince is attracted to this elf who wants to kill lizards and treats her like a lady, flirts with her, whatever, it would make a lot more sense than the snooty attitude he currently displays. Right now I feel that the two would just kill each other (I mean, our characters already kill for much less than this). I think grabbing onto the idea of attraction is probably the best - make the narration of a scene unique to the character you are playing. Therefore Sybille is only described as particularly beautiful ("like a diamond") to the Red Prince, whereas to everyone else she is simply a skinny elf with a scar.
3. Good job with the dog speech. So far I find the pet pal conversations more compelling than the normal character dialogue. In the Braccus maze, I went out of my way to talk to the rat in there just because of how hilarious the animal interactions are.
4. Holy crap at the ability to marry the fire bug queen to the Red Prince. Hilarious. 10/6.5 Want to laugh that hard more often. Too bad it doesn't actually go anywhere and, once again, its better to just kill her anyway for the XP.
5. Currently the game is carried by how good the combat is. Currently there is too much reading, too little fighting. That makes me sound like an Ork, but it's true.
6. That lizard tail swagger is awesome. I love how the lizards move around the environment, how their tails animate when walking, fighting, etc. The lizards and the dragon are most visually appealing thing I've seen in your game yet. Someone spent a lot of time with that, and it shows.
Whew, congrats to anyone who read all that. I grant you a telepathic cookie for the accomplishment.
