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Joined: Jul 2009
Location: Belgium
apprentice
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(I was going to add this to the "20 hour" topic but thought it deserved its own topic)

I've been playing for some 5 hours which I'd consider a "first impressions" (ironic since many FPS these days only last that long hahaha ) so here's a list of the good & bad aspects:

THE "FEELING" OF THE GAME

When I first started the game, I felt that there was something wrong. It took a little while to realise that this was due to a lot of animations feeling jerky: the water, smoke, etc. all felt like more than half its frames were missing. Larian already said they would add a slider to increase the speed for these animation though so hopefully it will get fixed soon. It's a bad first impression since you immediately run into a large stream where it's very obvious.

The controls are very fluent and the engine is very smooth. Your character is very responsive and while the jumping is a bit odd (especially when you try to jump on top of certain items), it's still good enough for me.

The shadows and LOD need some work though - shadows appear when you approach a tree which seems pretty jarring. The same goes with 3D models which get "dumbed down" (i.e. a low-poly version is used to decrease stress on your system) far too quickly. A statue, for example, went from looking good to very poor in just 50 feet.

Also, the grass looks very very odd in places. As if someone glued grass mustaches all over the place. This is caused by using strips of grass as sprites instead of actually make the grass 3D. Nitpicking it may be, but it spoils the otherwise great looking forests.

THE COMBAT
I love being a hunter in most games so I went for the bow. You can't manually aim though - you got to wait for the game to put a pointer above an enemy before you can even hope to hit them. This I find a bit disappointing since you can't "lock on" to an enemy. If another enemy moves closer, you'll automatically target him which can become frustrating. Having said that, the combat is pretty fun and if you're creative, you can outsmart your opponents which is always good!

So far, combat is not that hard if you play it smart: don't run ahead but draw them towards you.

THE MUSIC, SOUND & SPEECH
The atmosphere of the game is great and while the music is nowhere near the brilliance of that of Divine Divinity, it's more than good enough. While DD's music really added to the game, D2's music really accompanies it. Two different styles but both work.

The sound is good although I get the impression that the ambient noise is of higher quality than a lot of the "action" sounds which sometimes sound muted. I believe this is due to the use of stock sounds while speech and music is, of course, specifically made for the game (the pig sound I recognise of other games and I'm sure there's many others).

The speech is very good although this is no guarantee for the English version of the game! But unlike Oblivion, where every character you meet sounds like it's all the same person doing different voices, this really sounds like every character was voiced by a different person.

THE INTERFACE & CONTROLS
The interface is actually very very simple. It's fun to use and despite my limited knowledge of German, the quality of the interface means I can still quickly navigate it AND know what every icon means thanks to mini-clips that show what each skill does. This really is a nice touch.

You don't need many keys to play this game either. Some may find this to be a bad thing since it means not that many options but it's not that bad. I do miss the 'right click' system from DD though. Now I have to press "1" or "2" to use a skill which means moving my hands off the movement keys which is not ideal. They should have let you cycle the skills using the mouse wheel with the right or middle button using the selected skill. In the heat of combat, this would have worked better.

ITEMS, GOODIES, LOOT
For me, this is always important. I don't want an RPG where you always pick up the same 5 items. Like in DD, you can pick up tons of different stuff: plants, fruit, gold, gems, weapons, meat, pieces of armour, jewelry, books, spells, etc. The game is not stingy either and with my bow I can easily shoot all crates and barrels from a distance to uncover any nice stuff.

Also important to note: loot is RANDOM. Yes, even in chests and barrels. Not always of course but standard barrels and chests may contain gold first but on a reload, you can suddenly find gems or armour in there! It's a nice tough since it means you never know what you'll get!

THE LOCATIONS
This is hard for me to say because I just started out but so far, the game feels a bit too ... cramped. I'm always surrounded by virtual walls - mountains, cliffs, hedges, walls, etc. DD had a large open world to explore but so far, this is a lot more than the first Gothic which suffered from the same problem. I hope I'll get access to a more open world later (in fact, if anyone knows, let me know!)

Having said that, the locations do look good so far.

You can use shrines to travel between points and no, you don't need a scroll this time to use them although I did find a teleporter that asked for a password so I dunno what's up with that yet. But it's good you can use these shrines from the start.

-----------------

So there you have it. I hope this is of some use to you and I made sure not to spoil anything concerning the actual game smile.

Joined: Feb 2009
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Brief but nice first impressions.
I'm happy that the loot is random, so I'll be always intriged to know what I'll get.
Hopefully more locations are unlocked,so you don't get as many invisible walls.
I've never played previous Divinity games but hopefully I'll like the music in Divinity 2.


Joined: Mar 2003
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The DD and BD music is available on Kirill Pokrovsky's website. Alternately, with the games installed, you can extract the music from DD, or copy the individual ogg files from the BD music folder.

Joined: Jul 2009
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thx for sharing your impressions. Did you manage to get AA working? if it weren't for this, I would have bought it by now.

Joined: Jul 2009
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Nope but I don't mind really. I run the game at resolution of 1680x1050 and that makes the pixels small enough not to be a bother. I'd prefer the smoothness of the game over the smoothness of the pixels anyway wink.

Joined: Feb 2009
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Originally Posted by Red Avatar
Nope but I don't mind really. I run the game at resolution of 1680x1050 and that makes the pixels small enough not to be a bother. I'd prefer the smoothness of the game over the smoothness of the pixels anyway wink.


The resolution does not define the size of the pixels wink That is called 'dot pitch' and if your screen is 22", the usual size for that resolution, your pitch is 0.28mm. What you have is moooooore pixels in the screen that dissimulate better the edges wave

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Well with a large screen you don't have to sit so close so the pixels are smaller :p that's what I meant. On my laptop, I end up sitting a lot closer.

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Ah, LOL! Sorry silly

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I plan to play it in 1024x768 or how it was.


When you find a big kettle of crazy, it's best not to stir it.
--Dilbert cartoon

"Interplay.some zombiefied unlife thing going on there" - skavenhorde at RPGWatch
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AA really isnt needed with a decent monitor.. I havent used that setting in a long time ( not worth the loss in performance for such little improvement ). But I cant live without AF though smile.

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I'm playing in 1920x1200 and still consider it an important option and don't understand why it was left out in a game like this.

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I think they released the Game in Alpha version because they need more Budged to reproduce EVERYTHING for the Xbox360 and PS3 version..
i really hope they manage and fix this Big bunge of Bug..

All objects are totally crap and the movement of Water , Animals and NPC is slipping and stuttering!

And @I Dont Need anything Guys its 2009 and not 1999
Someone will pay 50$ for those crap dont forget it ! smile


BTW AA is enabled when you set the AA ingame in options without restarting

Last edited by RoyalTS; 29/07/09 09:36 PM.
Joined: Jul 2009
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The stuttering is annoying but not that bad. From what they said, this is simply a setting. It resembles what happened in Oblivion if you moved away from people - animations were cut to reduce stress. There's a good chance it's simply a setting that can make it smoother.

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Originally Posted by RoyalTS
I think they released the Game in Alpha version because they need more Budged to reproduce EVERYTHING for the Xbox360 and PS3 version..
i really hope they manage and fix this Big bunge of Bug..

All objects are totally crap and the movement of Water , Animals and NPC is slipping and stuttering!

And @I Dont Need anything Guys its 2009 and not 1999
Someone will pay 50$ for those crap dont forget it ! smile


BTW AA is enabled when you set the AA ingame in options without restarting


Wow chill.
You make the game sound so bad.
I'm sure its not that bad.

Anyway theres no PS3 Version!
Its strictly PC & 360.


Joined: Jul 2009
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No it's far from. RoyalTS just seems to have his ultra black shades on and, frankly, if he finds the mild graphical flaws to be "totally crap" and "big bunge of bug", I think he needs to set his priorities straight what a game is about. The game itself is great and so far I haven't encountered ANY bug except for the mild graphical ones (which are not even bugs - they're an engine setting).

Joined: Jan 2009
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Anyone remember what The Witcher was like when it first came out? talk about stuttering.

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Originally Posted by v1ctor
I'm playing in 1920x1200 and still consider it an important option and don't understand why it was left out in a game like this.


I'm planning to play in 1024x768 and I still consider it an important option.



When you find a big kettle of crazy, it's best not to stir it.
--Dilbert cartoon

"Interplay.some zombiefied unlife thing going on there" - skavenhorde at RPGWatch
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Hi there. Thanks for your impressions!

Do you know if you can change your skills in the game (emm, it is called respec I think?)? I read that there is a lot of skills for different "classes" so it would be nice if you could change your skills for a fee.

I read that you can even change your character looks and even change sex, so I hope the same is with the skills.

Cheers.


Joined: Jul 2009
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No, skills can't be changed as far as I know. I'm not surprised by that - you could get yourself level 5 lockpicking and open all locks you can find and then trade the skill back in.

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Originally Posted by Cylon
Hi there. Thanks for your impressions!

Do you know if you can change your skills in the game (emm, it is called respec I think?)? I read that there is a lot of skills for different "classes" so it would be nice if you could change your skills for a fee.

I read that you can even change your character looks and even change sex, so I hope the same is with the skills.

Cheers.



Can't promise anything, but we are definately looking into this and already experimenting with some ways to add this hopefully in an uncoming patch.

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