If history has taught us anything about "Early Access" games, it's that they don't change. Even when they are AAA titles produced by a renowned studio (Hunt Showdown anyone?).

So let's be serious for a minute and look at the current state of the game. There is 1 act completed, and the devs are at work on completing acts 2 and 3. This is where 99% of their time will go. Do you really and truly believe that the THOUSANDS of feedback pieces slammed in this forum over just the last two days will really be taken into consideration? Get realistic. The game we are seeing now is the game we are going to get.

The atrocious myriad of bugs, UI issues, and lack of proper tooltips with an encyclopedia are HIGHLY UNLIKELY to be changed. And the biggest shame here is that the game is actually very fun, perhaps one of the best RPG's that I've played in some time. But Larian prematurely released this title in a very poor state, and a significant number of players are likely just going to not bother with the game or ever come back. Hence the danger of releasing a wildly unfinished product.

Using the term "Early Access" to justify the embarrassing state that the game is in is NOT an acceptable excuse.

I can only hope that everything I've said here is wrong, and Larian will actually polish this game up beyond my expectations.

This feels like an extremely pointless post.

Larian made some pretty major changes in Divinity two based on feedback. They listened to their player base hugely between Original Sin one and Two. Have some faith this is a company that released numerous free content patches for years with its other games.

They also have had to work more remotely and are just getting back to Studio. I have a feeling there is much more to come. new companions, classes and spells is all things they have confirmed as well as multiclassing. Give them time I bet you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Hopefully this is your final post

Bruh, Larian used this exact same model of Early Access for their two previous games, and both times it worked splendidly and the games changed dramatically for the better over the EA period. So yeah, how's that for "history teaching us anything".

EDIT to add: Early Access is a tool that can be used either badly or well. And Larian have pretty decisively shown that they know how to do Early Access right. But some people can't grasp this, because to them Early Access is just some big amorphous boogeyman and they are incapable of considering each case individually.

Pointless post is pointless

When the Steam forums attack.

Just about these 3 things:
1. I haven't found a major bug yet in 20+ hours, but I restarted 4-5 times with different class till level 3 or so only. All I've seen some UI parts getting stuck like the stealth check symbol and had to restart, but those are minor issues. I'm sure there are bugs, mostly in multiplayer, but I will use single player only (or just rarely maybe a coop in 2 after release).
There are no "atrocious myriad of bugs", it's very stable and doesn't feel like early access, except missing features and of course could use more polish.

2. I don't know if it's the most fun but I really enjoy it as it is. Even if there won't be anything else, this was time well spent. I can say this very rarely about a game.

3. Of course is a premature release, that's not a secret at all

I seems that history taught you absolutely nothing.
You are talking rubbish.

Larian has a very good reputation for listening to users, and not least - actually paying attention to their forums.

Let's be serious, the OP hasn't played any of the DOS 1 & 2 early accesses. And so he doesn't know how Larian handles EA.

+1 to that

Let's be serious, circus noises

I found it. This is definitely it. This is the post of the day.

You pointing to a few bad examples by other companies proves nothing, this games isnt being developed by those companies, this game is being developed by Larian and thhey have a good track record for handling EA well. They have been very frank of what it means to take part in this EA so if you have bought into something you didnt understand because you couldnt be bothered reading information that was there in plain sight, thats on you. That makes you a bad consumer, it doesnt make Larian a bad company.

This is interesting. I didn't play DOS EA. What did they change?

Did they change game mechanics? Clearly they didn't change the armor system in DOS that apparently was heavily criticized.

I think there's a lot of balancing to be done regarding jump, shove, dip and cantrips for instance. I haven't played 5e but I looked it up and don't like the changes in BG3 so far. It seems 5e is better balanced and less silly.

I am also very curious about this. The OP made a very unproductive post but I think a list of how DOS2 changed from early access to full release would be really valuable for the community. There are a number of fundamental changes being suggested that I am skeptical about, but I don't have much to base that thought on. Can anyone provide a list or general overview of meaningful gameplay changes that Larian has made based on early access feedback for their other titles?

I don't recall any real opportunity for feedback for Divinity II. Did you mean Divinity: Original Sin 2?

+1

from what I saw, Larian listen to fans and will make pretty major and sweeping changes based on feedback. This post is unfair to them.

"Larian listens to fans" is fairly debatable.
Larian very often decided to stick to their guns no matter how unpopular their decisions were, only to come up sometimes later admitting "Yeah, it sucked, we were wrong about it".

That said, it's also bullshit to say that this build will be the same as the final game. DOS 2 had plenty of changes, improvements and addition since the EA originally launched.

I think there is a type of player for EA titles. I also think the industry has abused the EA system on Steam. EA is very much a beta build. All the core elements are there, but there are absolutely bugs, unintended consequences, and missing supporting systems. Larian has been very good at this cycle. That said, I do think some of the suggestions are unrealistic such as the elemental ground effects and interactions.

That kind of "highly dynamic" environment is Larian's claim to fame with the OS franchise, and I can only imagine it was a particular selling point to Wizards in their pitch. Same with the elevation changes. That said, there are a TON of 5E enhancements that can be made without rewriting core rules (game rules, not engine rules - those could be very different things) such as restricting spell access, tweaking DCs and modifiers, and so on.

So, is this "the final" game? In many ways absolutely. Motion capture, plotlines, dialogue, and so on I wouldn't expect to change much, if at all. But, in many other ways, it's not, and I'm sad the abused EA program has given considerable legitimacy to this kind of pessimism.