Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity Original Sin - Beta When the game actually release?

You've been loading these forums with nonsensical immature whining since day one. Don't let the door hit you on the way out!

Yes, it was a rude outburst. Aside from that, he has a right to be frustrated - just look at the state of the game. Completely underwhelming - I'm not even talking about bugs of which there are many - everything from the stats, "class" system, skills, progression and leveling up is downright bad. There's nothing satifying about it and it makes little sense. Maybe most don't feel this way, but I'm having a hard time understanding what stands out about this game. Even the conversation aspects are underwhelming to me.

Before you say "this is alpha", try to remember that it's currently scheduled to be released this spring. That means 3 months, tops. Is Larian giving us a 1 year old version to test? Sure, it can be pushed back - but from what I've played it feels like it would take a minimum of 1 and a half years to fix all of the problems, mainly because I feel that they should scrap the current stat/skill/character progression and start from the ground up. It's absolutely horrible in it's current state.

I don't consider it a lost cause though, and I'm willing to wait a year or longer to see if the game improves. But for players who have been waiting, paying and supporting since... 2012? They are going to be frustrated.

Original backer chiming in here.

I was mildly frustrated at the last major update because it made the interaction with objects totally useless for me. However, I contacted support right away and got a response within 24 hours assuring me it was a known issue and would be fixed in a forthcoming hot patch. When that patch came and my situation was not resolved, I sent another email letting them know. Again, within 24 hours I got a response apologizing and letting me know that due to technical issues they couldn't get the fix in time but they would have it fixed for the next major update which is a week or two away at this time. My mild frustration turned to admiration at the speed at which they responded to me. Not just that communication either but previous ones as well.

Bottom line is, I trust Larian to do what they do. They have never failed to entertain me in the past (except for Beyond DD, but that was a whole different beast) and I don't doubt they're working their butts off to make this game the best they can. Heck, I've even gone as far as flowing them more money simply because I respect the lengths they're going to as far as keeping in touch with their backers. Now, as for the projected release date, I really am not concerned if they make it or not. What I want is for them to take the time they need. There is plenty of other games for me to play in the meantime and I'm perfectly content to do so. I will continue to keep an eye on the forums here, but will not speak ill at all unless they give me good reason to.

Edited because I hit submit way too soon. :P

Well I guess Stabbey dealt with that very well, just wanna add few things :
Larian warned this time that won't rush the game development just to fit the release date as they had to do with D2, so delays could have been expected
They indeed add quite a bench of stuff even if it is not really obvious (just have a loot at the patch notes...)
Talking about bugs and unpolish stuff, well I dunno if you're familiar with coding sometimes adding or changing even a small part of the code may have impact on the core program (understand here game mechanics) so yeah adding few stuff like new talent may create a tons of bug even with NPC interraction, this is why the game is still in alpha version but they are working on the game, if you don't see it well I suggest you stop rushing the game and take time to pay attention to the interface, spells etc...
about unbalanced well they have changed a lot of things in order to try to balance the game
and about boring, this is a personal opinion but I really like the world, the main story, the investigation and the side quests, of course it require that you talk with the other NPC, explore the world and stuff like that. A bit unusual for people used to play games with an arrow on the minimap showing them the direction of the next goal, and this is a problem Larian have to deal with : http://www.larian.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=483774#Post483774

Thank you Stabbey. I would have clapped if this had been a real life forum in which you did this, but unfortunately you will have to accept my delayed approval. I really like what Larian is doing and I'm glad to see them defended, because it seems to me like they have their vision and they really are refining it with feedback so we all win. They sell more, we see them profit and make more games, and we get a game we wanted more too.

The sad part is that Cromcrom does sometimes have good ideas and he isn't necessarily wrong. He's is not unique in his frustrations and his desire for a better game It's just that the way he expresses himself is far too over-the-top that it drowns out the good points and ideas he does have.



The game absolutely does need a lot of work and refinement. Even if the development cycle doesn't allow for weekly patching, Larian's approach of one big patch every three weeks may not be as helpful as smaller patches every two weeks. When I heard this morning that the patch may not drop until potentially April 7th - a full month after the last patch, I decided to stop playing until it drops.




Part of Cromcrom's disgruntlement with the game was that he didn't seem to like any of the mechanics behind it at all. Will the entire system be scrapped like you and he want? It's possible, but I suspect that it's more likely to be refined than completely scrapped at this stage. They'll never please everyone, and trying to reinvent the wheel for a year would certainly also frustrate players.

i might be alone (or only part of a small minority) but i would not mind waiting another 6 or even more months for the game to be released.

1) there are enough alternatives to play until release
2) a finished game late is better than unfinished game too early
3) there is no point in "flaming" or being upset. the game will not be released earlier b/c of that
4) i personally trust in lar's "perfectionism" and his promise, that he won't release the game until it is done
5) larian listens to the community and its suggestions. but new mechanisms, changes etc. take time to implement#
6) i am a little fanboy ;-)

D:OS is certainly not the pinnacle of game design so far, but I really disagree with the sentiment that it is 'unsatisfying'. I've finished the alpha several times over, and I had fun every time. I enjoy finding new equipment, improving my stats and generally building my character in this game. It was satisying to come back to the lighthouse boss and beating him after getting my ass kicked the first time. It sounds like a very basic thing, but it's rare in games nowadays.

I think you can definitely criticize the mechanics from a theoretical and technical point of view, and I'm not an expert on the matter, but for me the game passes the important litmus test of being fun in a visceral sense. I definitely get that itch if I haven't played in a while.

I also fought the lighthouse boss twice. First time I ran when I realized he would continue to rez the wolves. Lucky to have that "teleport to town" button!

Well I'm happy for you, but I'm the opposite as far as character building goes. I don't really like anything about it--

-I don't like buying skills from merchants
-I dislike having a single stat point at each level up
-I very much dislike the random "every 3rd level you get a talent point and sometimes every 2nd level if we feel like it, but on level 5 you don't get a stat point, and if it's a thursday you don't get a stat point but you get 1 talent point and 1 ability point" ridiculousness
-I'm annoyed at how talents are basically an extra stat point. Just give more stat points and get rid of talents if you aren't going to make them different.

Because there are so few points gained each level, it feels pointless to level up at all - aside from having 'enough' HP for the next encounter. Whoopee. One point feels like next to no change. It all feels VERY unsatisfying to me.

I have also commented elsewhere that I thought ability points should be scaled differently and have more of them to distribute, and I agree about buying skills from merchants.

I like the combat quite a bit, but yeah, some of the character building is just bizarre at the moment for me.

Same here.
They have family and friends : this is life.
I didn't know the Divinity serie before the kickstarter campaign : I will finish DD soon, and it's great.
I trust Larian
Go on as you did !

forgive the silly question so best case scenario is the next update happens at the end of March or more likely the beginning of April?

They usually release the updates on Friday so best case would be the 28th but it could be pushed back a week (which I don't doubt since this update is supposed to be a whopper)

So i'd just assume April 4th and just be smacked in the face with surprise if it gets released earlier.

I love getting smacked in the face with surprises.

I think he only resurrects the wolves once each.




1) The "buy skills from merchants" thing is certainly unusual. It's rare to see that model. In terms of realism, is it that much more out there than skill points from out of nowhere? Maybe not. I do see one advantage to it though: Instead of being limited by a set number of skill points available, your gold supply is the resource for buying skills - and gold is usually plentiful in these games.

3) The word "stat point" is unclear. Do you mean Ability Point or Primary Attribute Point? Right now, you get 1 Ability Point per level from 2-5. Starting at level 6, you get 2 Ability points per level until 10 or 15, after which you get 3 Ability Points per level.

You get one Primary Attribute Point every even-numbered level, and one Talent Point every odd-numbered level.

2) If you meant "Primary Attribute" points, this is probably a matter of preference. I think the idea is to make each point really count so you have think about what you want to do with that point right now. If you meant "Ability" points, then I kinda agree (see below).


4) They are going to get rid of the +Ability Talent points, actually.




I agree with this. I am sitting on a huge pile of gold because there's no point in me buying spellbooks, because I don't have enough ability points to meet the requirements for the skills. There's no point in spending money now on things I can't use.

I'm not sure though, if that's a problem with getting too few ability points, or a problem of too few skills available at Rank 2/3 (and NONE at Rank 1). That's one reason I've stopped, because I'm a bit tired of the same skillset.

But the next patch is supposed to have a few dozen new skills, so I'll wait and see if the single Ability Point feels better once I have more skills to choose from.

I.e, frustration: This is the issue Larian was faced with when they were deciding on an early (i.e, long) alpha/beta period. The fact is that most games simply announced a delay in release date (which is frustrating) but you don't see the actual state of the game until it is closer to release or progression due to update. This situation is not unique with Larian but it is very new to the gaming industry (i.e, early access seems to have caught fire this year; not only with tiny indie developers that have done it for years with SMALL followers but larger 'indie' developers).
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There are two dangers here: people get bored with the game before it is even released. They get frustrated with waiting. The benefits (esp for small developers) is they get early cash needed near the end of the developement cycle and they get much needed feedback before the 'release' so they can adjust game play and fix hard to find bugs.
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I'm mixed. To be honest I think major games should not be released quite this early for the general population (i.e, on sale in steam) in the cycle (I would say 3 months top but that is just a guess as to what people can tolerate) but I think it would be interesting in the years to come to do some studies on the matter trade off of benefit/harm.
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Am i frustrated. Hum. I guess - not really sure - but to be honest with or without early access the game would still have been delayed. We can only hope (at this juncture in time) that early access allowed for a faster release of a better game and the game is not spoiled by the time gap between first play and final product (I've personally have only played for 5 or 6 hours as the current state is somewhat unsatisfactory for my play style tolerance level).

The more I think about it, I don't think that a month between updates is beneficial to anyone. That's far too long. Users don't see any progress, and run out of things to do well before that. Once a major update does drop, there's suddenly a gigantic amount of bugs found flooding QA. It may be true that some features do take a month, but there's no way that every feature being added takes the entire month.

I don't think that delaying all of the one-or-two-weeks-to-get-working features to package them in with the one-month-to-get-working features is a good plan. Instead they could release a smaller update every two weeks, and things which take longer could be delayed for the next one.

I think I like that idea: What if you get 1 Primary Attribute Point every single level? That's a simple change which would make builds much more flexible.

Currently, odd-numbered points in a primary attribute grant the next stage in a bonus (AP cost reduction/Increased AP generation, etc), and even-numbered points only grant incremental improvement.

Because all the attributes do something useful, this means that you have to spread them really thinly. In the current build, Jahan requires you to spend many points into Speed just so he can get enough AP to do something – the high cost of his water spells means he has to spend half his turns saving AP – the INT cost reduction isn’t enough.

If he got a point every level instead of every two, I could make him more useful quicker instead of it taking like six levels. Yes, you’re doubling the points, but it also means that your character can grow faster, and is harder to screw up. More points also makes hybrid builds a bit more feasible.

Woah - dozens of new skills seems like major overkill, unless they're replacing the entire old skill system (i.e., removing all of the old skills to make room for these new ones). And still earning only one ability point per level (EDIT: for certain levels, at least) when there are even more skills to work with seems like a step in the wrong direction. I was hoping for either a more focused/useful skillset, additional ability points to allow for more noticeable/satisfying character development, or both.



I completely agree - from the devs' standpoint, posting larger and more infrequent updates may actually create player feedback "bottlenecks," and definitely makes the feedback process less interactive/responsive. With smaller and more frequent updates, players can more easily provide manageable and incremental feedback, which may also help prevent development "missteps" that would already be bundled into a larger update.

You're confused. Skills are NOT Abilities. Skills are the active things on the hotbar that you have to pay gold to acquire.