Pillars of Eternity: Hero Edition

I have always been a huge fan of Baldur's Gate and Planescape Torment etc... I was expecting this game like a child waiting for christmas^^ In the first hours I was really impressed by good graphics and sound quality but then I realized this was far from baldur's gate experience... First of all the story and the universe has some potential but remains very classic. In Baldur's gate you were the son of the God of Destruction Baal! In Pillars you can talk to dead people... The stat system is not necessarly bad but it is just not interesting, no weapon has some cool effects it's all about stats mostly. (remember Carsomyr^^) THe NPC's well... you just don't get attached to them they have almost no interactions and they barely speak to each other. Also they don't have any "moral" system like there was in BG so they don't care wathever you do or say. The max level is 12 which is SO frustrating. You will mostly fight animals and ghosts... This is far from the strategy required in BG where you had to fight very tough mages, druids etc... There are many other flaws and I didn't even mention the bugs... I wanted so much to love this game but finally I can't recommend it to any BG lover...sorry ):

This is HARDLY the 10/10 god tier return to form RPG that the user reviews are calling it. Those people are either diehard Obsidian fanboys or desperate RPG fans wanting to put over classic-style RPGs. Pillars of Eternity is more like a high budget Spiderweb Software game, without the unique settings those have and PARTS of the Infinity Engine games in it. Its focus is sidequesting/combat, and in the latter the game is mostly fine. The new Endurance system cuts out aggravation from oldschool design, and the classes all have abilities compared to some from older games just autoattacking. Spells are a bit hard to make out in larger brawls and combat’s fast pace, but it’s fine and there's useful speed options in and out of combat. Everything outside of the combat though is too damn simple and played safe. The overall game design is WAY too convenient and player friendly. The quests rarely last longer than 5/10 minutes (including walking) and often tell you exactly how and when to do things, with occasional decisions that seldom affect anything. The dialogue trees, while wordy, are simply laid out, and lack failure states outside of you (Attack) options. The Personality system is pointless, it just spawns flavor text in interactions. The 8 companions are down from BG2’s 17, and are nowhere near as interesting or involved/disruptive as them. The dungeons feel too small most of the time. The worldbuilding is horrendously paced, and very much lies in the “just read the codex” mentality. Race lineup is a bunch of human lookalikes, and nonplayable races pretty much all reskinned D&D assets. In 2015. Could go on. PoE is a far cry from the crushing worthlessness of Wasteland 2. But those looking to scratch the CRPG itch would find more satisfaction with their earlier Neverwinter Nights 2 which has more of the feel and philosophy of the old games than Eternity does. It MIGHT’VE scratched up to 4 stars here if not for the unforgivable amount of bugs and setting uncreativity.

For someone like me, Pillars of Eternity was a nigh perfect game. Obsidian's work has long been a definite favorite of mine. However, this is largely because I was able to get used to their particular eccentricities. This is very much a game that the developers wanted to make, rather than a game concerned with appealing to the widest possible demographic. Between the gorgeous hand-designed backgrounds and vivid text descriptions, the atmosphere is one of subtle but unrelenting gloom. It has a way of getting under my skin, but anyone looking for a light-hearted romp should look elsewhere. Likewise, there is a tremendous amount of reading in this game, with really only the main companion characters and important NPCs getting any regular voice-acting. And you'll spend just as much time talking with NPCs as you will fighting monsters, which will definitely be a but-off for less patient players. The main story is also a bit of a rambling affair. There is no urgent quest to save the world. There are traces of that around the edges, but the vast majority of the narrative deals with saving yourself from a vague threat of insanity, by chasing someone from a past life who may or may not even have the ability to help you. If you're inured to games that give you a by-the-numbers plot in which you save the world from an all-encompassing evil while being assured by everyone you meet that yes, you are the most important person in the universe, this is just about the complete opposite of that. I personally found it very absorbing, but I am a sucker for narrative tropes being subverted in unexpected ways, and of that this game has plenty. This game also seems particularly made to cater to people who like to roleplay a character, with both a faction system as well as personal reputations (Stoic, Honest, Clever, ect), but these will likely seem shallow to people who care only for mechanics. In short, this game is straightforwardly good, but not something that will cater to everyone.

Pillars delivers all the pieces of the Infinity Engine RPGs but lacks a real hook: mechanics, roleplaying, plot, characters are all just ok. Obsidian deserves credit for creating such a polished and balanced original system but it's too balanced to the point where you don't feel like you can make good decisions. Perfectly linear tradeoffs make gear a lot less exciting. And, there's been a shift away from big, encounter-swinging spells towards more frequent, less powerful active abilities for all classes. This makes unlocking and using abilities less exciting and makes the game far more micro-heavy than any of its inspirations. Writing is a mixed bag. As usual, Obsidian are great at creating an interesting world and situations, bad at plot, worse at pacing, and even worse at themes/overarching ideas. They struggle to deliver their good ideas in a form other than massively lore dumps from encyclopedias on legs. And while the world looks great, it actually feels rather small and linear in layout (≈Dark Souls 3). There are 8 companions (vs. 11 classes and a party size of 6) met in a linear order. This largely kills party-building, which kills replayability. As characters, they're interesting concepts but not interesting people. Most have the encyclopedia problem and their quests are short and end abruptly with little closure. You could say that's refreshing but it happens so many times that it becomes just as formulaic with the added harm that you don't feel invested. The actual story is a letdown. Most of the game is a mystery that you have little reason to care about and even when it does get interesting towards the end, it's let down by Obsidian's approach to ideas. They've never understood that you actually need to explore/show something, not just have characters bang on about how important the issue is and how you've gotta think for yourself, maaan. This has happened in so many games that I feel like they don't know how to explore a topic in any more depth.

mediocre storyline, repetitive gameplay, some cool characters that's all. Not really what I expected. ~60h gameplay for a story which was super bad. Every combat has the same song, it gets so annoying.