Pillars of Eternity: Hero Edition

Sorry but after many hours I'm about to give up because I'm bored to tears by the writing and game design. The Character writing is just so bland, and I really become immersed or connect with any of my party. The pathfinding AI is absolutely terrible and depite tinkering I can't stop melee characters engaging the nearest enemy, no matter which enemy I target at the onset of combat. I don't get the levelling system either because you're mostlly bound by class and effectively locked out dialouge options because you didn't build a very high perception character and dialogue skill checks are 85% perception, but then if you don't have will/fortitude you'll be forver charmed /petrified /stunned in combat by evey bloody creature with the ability. Levelling... Oh great! I'm stuck with my original build and can only pick perks. Are all RPG's now being reduced to perks instead of stat points or do I have to restart and grind through for the stats my character need? I get that there's classes and it's not Skyrim where you can have it all but not being able to tailor my character base stats as I go is really taking away some of the fun in an RPG. As of 2021 there aren;t too many Obsidian bugs (so far) but the game still has a habit of long load times for small maps and abymal low frame rate stuttering that requires you to tab out and in a few times to fix. I's not the smoothest under 'normal' function, even with custom water loop cooled 3800x, 2080Ti and 16Gb 3600MHz cl15 RAM on a Samsung 1tb Evo ssd. All things considered it's not a truly bad game, just a few design choices and a feeling of "That'll do, push it out the door" hold it back from being a solid, if uninspiring game. As it is I'd give it a solid "Meh" out of 10. Tyranny did it all so much better...

Pillars of Eternity is basically a modern translation of the Baldur's Gate series and its Infinity Engine derivatives, clearly emulating their unique brand of real-time action, isometric exploration, deep storytelling and painted graphics... And well, pretty much each of these aspects is nailed. It's an enthralling adventure with unique characters and exciting combat, set in eye-popping environments - seriously, the beauty of prerendered visuals should not be underestimated! But while it is clearly inspired by classic CRPGs (and DnD in general), it's far from a nostalgia bait ripoff. The character building system is complex, offering a staggering number of spells and combat maneuvers to master. And as expected from Obsidian, PoE's writing is consistently highbrow, almost poetic at times; the worldbuilding rises above your average "dwarves and elves" MedFan setting with its detailed lore and magical peculiarities. You will be showered with questlines featuring memorable characters and exploring bold, esoteric themes... Many of which will force you to take complicated moral decisions! But PoE isn't free from issues, some inherited from its inspirations: like for the BG series the lousy AI often makes it feel like you're babysitting a bunch of brain-damaged kids through the chaos of the real-time combat. While most of the fights are unchallenging, this becomes an actual problem whenever you stumble upon one of the campaign's sudden difficulty spikes. Plus as often with Obsidian games, the decisions you make fuel somewhat obtuse approval systems that can lead to disappointing endings for some story arcs. In the end PoE is a fine game, and a big, beautiful, generous adventure that will satisfy your retro CRPG cravings. That being said, as good as it is I don't think it stands out that much either, and I get why part of its target audience found it disappointing; the genre has indeed better or more significant works that I'd recommend prioritizing over this one.

For starters, I enjoyed finishing the game. However, the game has its flaws. First of all the combat system is a mix of real time and turn based. It is basically turn-based, but when you turn on the AI, it's real-time that can be paused. However the battle AI really sucks in this game, sorry to say. AI controlled characters will not use scrolls, figurines or even switch weapons and thus will not make use of an enemy's weaknesses. To finish the game without relying on AI controlled characters feels kind of tedious. Just make it either turnbased like Divinity Original Sin or make it hack and slash like an ARPG. Also the loot system could use with some iprovement, add an extra loot tier perhaps. The story is topnotch and you won't see anyone complaining about that. You can see that the game has high production values: little to no bugs, well-designed maps and great characters across the board. Overall it makes it an enjoyable experience. Buy the game for 10-15 euro's and you'll get your money's worth.

This game is one of the best rpgs that ive ever played and im not even a crpg fan. With how good the whole rest of the game, it was easy to overlook the top-down aspect of it. And eventually it got me so used to the game style that now i love these games. I never knew what i was missing in a whole genre of gaming until i tried this one. 10/10 game that made me question my very existence

Party based cRPG is my favourite genre. Haven't completed this one, bu managed to clock 100h between 2 attempts and I must say this is my most favourite game of all time. Combat is fun and decent. World is innovative but not forced. Party members - man, the party members are just the best. Durance, Eder and the others - great characters, with grat storylines, delivered in a condensated, but rushed form. The game does everything it should and it does it extremely well. Can't wait to play PoE II and other obsidian titles. I loved Baldurs Gate series, loved Dragon Age I, and this game accomplished what I thought would be impossible - it beats them on thier own field, not being strictly an AAA title. Now I think all the engaging and innovative games you see are indie or, like PoE is, indie-ish.