First of all I want to say that I really liked DOS2, played it recently for the first time on Definitive Edition, journey all the way up to ARX was amazing and I really thought this is one of the best RPG's ever made and then I landed on ARX ....
ARX is disgrace that ruins this game completely.
I think its important to mention that I have never played this game before DE and I read that game had even bigger issues with this part before but I am referring to DE version of it.
Don't get me wrong I am not saying that ARX map is bad or boring or lacks content or anything like that I just think that its extremely misplaced and ruins all the game. It had potential to be best city in recent RPG's since its made by Larian and you guys are years ahead of other developers when crafting game worlds. But sadly no-one will remember it that way because at the point you reach it In this game (90 hours of game time for me) its impossible to get immersed into this part.
If you look at this city from story and most importantly players journey perspective it does not make any sense to put this on player towards end of the game!
Arx could have been amazing if it happened after Reapers Coast and it would make a lot of sense from gameplay perspective but now it does not.
You start in Fort Joy map that is pretty linear and is designed for player to get the hang of the game
Then you enter Reapers Coast which is one of the greatest RPG maps I ever played you spend more than half of your play trough in reapers coast gearing up and getting stronger to claim divinity. Once you are done with Reapers Coast you leave to Nameless Isle to finally claim divinity.
Nameless Isle already feels like epic end game content, you get to kill all kinds of bad and worse guys visit hidden temples tied to gods, choose sides forge alliances etc etc.
Your attempt to claim divinity ends in a bummer that does not even make a lot of sense (Dallis just teleports in destroys ... destroys what? some monument or whatever and divinity is gone :D... whatever... ) and even at this point I am still loving the game : now it is the time to chase her into last ACT which is gonna be EPIC !!!
Ship crashes on ARX after decent transition sequence, first thing you see is huge Kraken destroying the harbour.. this is gonna be good ! I reach some bridge where paladins are fighting Voidwokens fight is completely stacked against me because all my characters get put into the end of acting queue undermining all my effort in stacking wits and initiative on my main damage dealers .... but whatever ! I like tougher encounters so I reload and take more tactical approach and win which feels EPIC!
You can feel the end game and journey resolution within the hands reach you enter ARX and........
Find huge city going on about their life like nothing is happening. City which is stacked with Traders, NPC's to talk to, quest givers that need their shit solved, houses that has plenty of stuff to steal, hidden secrets hidden treasures, you quickly realise that you went back to the point you were at when you entered Reapers Coast right after Fort joy.
Your gear is outdated your level is too low for most of the encounters and your quest log is empty but quickly filling up with exploration quests so you basically need to start from scratch, all I did in almost hundred hours of game play does not matter anymore.
At this point I stop and delete my saves, I aint doing all of this over again with these same characters, I already did all that in Reapers coast and had my end game in Nameless Isle.
My point is that game should never drop such big city full of talking and exploring quests on a player at the end of the game, end game should be scewed towards combat encounters where you get to use your character builds and gear you gathered during whole game. Sadly ARX does the opposite it basically restarts your progress.
Last edited by SH42; 04/12/19 06:32 PM.
