Since I installed a bunch of GOG games to an OpenSUSE Tumbleweed Linux laptop (mainly to test them out, how well they run on OpenSUSE Linux) and being positively surprised how easy it was to install them and how well they work, I've started playing Divine Divinity on it. Let this be the start of my journey through the Larian studio games I have, hopefully ending at some point at Baldur's Gate 3.

https://www.gog.com/en/game/divine_divinity

It seems like a basic old-skool action RPG similar to Diablo, but the first impressions for its game mechanism, RPG progression/skills etc. seem positive. I am playing a male warrior on Hard mode.

One example, I like how I can pause the game when I see an enemy so that I can take my time deciding what to do and click with my mouse to the enemy without any hurry, at which point the pause ends and my warrior attacks the enemy in a battle that ends when it ends. This makes the action-RPG much easier for me to stomach, I dislike some action-RPGs because the combat seems too stressful and hectic.

Oh and the game music seems quite good too, I like e.g. the menu music with female vocals etc.

This game will take my mind off Daggerfall (Unity) which I am hating again at the moment, and it also helps Team Fortress 2 (an online multiplayer game I play often) is again invaded by cheater bots making the game unplayable, so this is a good time to concentrate on my single-player game backlog instead.

Playing around a bit with the debug mode of Paladin's Quest. It's actually possible to access this mode without a cheating device.

The Japan-only sequel, Lennus 2, has a secret right at the start of the game that gives you most of the equipment in the game. (For anyone who's played Ultima 7, I'd compare it to the Trinsic chimney secret, except without the plot items or teleports.)

You might want to skip Beyond Divinity. It's... a mess.

I'm currently playing Tomb Raider: Anniversary. I've never played the first one, and since I've been informed that this game is a remake of the first Tomb Raider game, I don't see any reason why I shouldn't give this game a try. And seeing that I've just finished playing the 2013 Tomb Raider reboot, I can already notice much appreciated differences between the two, some of which are the puzzles (although Tomb Raider 2013 has them, they're pale in comparison to the ones in Tomb Raider: Anniversary), and the atmosphere is just crazy eerie in the remake.

Again, I've never played the first Tomb Raider game so I can't tell for sure how that game's environments made the players feel, but the lack of life and any musical sounds playing in the background (if I remember correctly, the game was pretty much silent most of the time other than the more obvious ones like Lara's voice and other sound effects) followed by the sometimes sudden encounter with predatory animals accompanied by the abrupt shift in background music often put me on edge. It's horror in its own way.

As for the platforming, I very much prefer the 2013 reboot, as the one in Anniversary more often than not requires a lot of precision on the player's part where jumping a little too early won't allow Lara to grab on the ledge she's trying to jump to. Ofc, seeing that both games were developed by the same developer, I appreciate that it's been improved in the later game.

I have heard it has its problems and was apparently rushed to the market, but I will give it at least a chance, just like I've repeatedly given to Daggerfall.

Besides, there seem to be quite many favorable reviews on the GOG game page as well, so we will see...

That's fair.

I haven't played "Anniversary" yet, but at least in the very first Tomb Raider game that was not a problem because as long as you prepared yourself, the game would auto-jump you right at the precise time when running towards the edge. So you couldn't "jump too early" as long as you did those precautions.

It has been awhile when I played it, but IIRC you would slowly walk towards the edge with some key pressed down, Lara would stop precisely at the edge, then you'd just back off with a couple of jumps backwards, and run towards the edge. Then the game would take care of jumping right at the edge. It is like you made Lara to assess the situation herself, and then do the jump precisely herself.

I liked that approach, but IIRC there may have been some jumping puzzles where that didn't work because you didn't have time to make that "assessment".

That actually sounds kinda nice, makes me wish I could see Lara do that self-assessment in Anniversary. As for the auto-jump, either I don't know how to make it work in the game, or the devs simply didn't carry forward that feature into the remake from the first game.

And expanding a little further in regards to the jumping too early problem I have with Tomb Raider: Anniversary, is that it would sometimes make me question the path that I was taking. There was especially this one time where I needed to get Lara to get across to a different platform separated by a horizontal pole attached to what was initially a ladder I just broke. Looking at the distance between Lara and the pole, anyone would think that there needed to be something else in between because it didn't look viable for Lara to get to that pole simply by using the normal jump. At the same time, there was nothing that could be put in between.

So I kept jumping to the pole hoping to get a hold of it, and died many times in the process. At some point, I even began to believe that it was not possible and that I needed to do something else first. Turns out, after several more tries, I was able to grab that horizontal pole after making Lara jump super close to the edge. That moment really wasted too much of my time.

The last couple of days I'm playing Drunk in Finland. Well, actually the game is called Dead in Vinland but considering how much beer and mead I have already given the characters to fight off depression I think that my chosen game title is far more fitting...

Divine Divinity is quite enjoyable to play, quite positive vibes so far.

It does things right what I want in a RPG. I am not even sure what it is but in DD I am eager to explore the wilderness, talk to NPCs and receive subquests, eagerly waiting for the next level up to improve my character and be able to wield that great sword I already obtained but am unable to use because I am still a bit too weak for it, etc..

Hard to tell why in so many other RPGs (including Daggerfall) I just get annoyed by more and more subquests, not interested in exploring anything (especially the dungeons), and even levelling up and combat feels a bit meh.

I like it also how the game offered you "teleport stones" quite early on in the game so that you don't have to wander the same areas back and forth over and over again. It even gave you an exciting way to obtain it: either you could fight your way through to the missing teleport stone by exploring the dungeons, or just teleport yourself right away to it, in the middle of enemy hordes. Just quickly take the stone and teleport back to safety. :)

Those teleport stones can be used even in combat as a tactical advantage. For instance yesterday I decided to try the "kill the troll king in his cave" quest as the trolls were attacking the farmers. At level 10 (warrior), I was still too weak to just go head on against the troll king and 10+ normal trolls in a small cave, but I came up with a tactical plan:

1. Dropped one teleport stone just outside the dungeon entrance where the trolls will not come.
2. Went into the dungeon and rushed to the other end of the dungeon, with angry trolls on my heels.
3. Dropped the other teleport stone there and teleported to the safety, to the dungeon entrance outside.

After that I could keep entering the dungeon from two different ends, shoot at the trolls with a bow from a distance and exit the dungeon either by just running back to the exit, or running to the teleport stone. That way I could keep swapping where I was entering the dungeon, and attack them from behind repeatedly. Damn I am smart!

So far I haven't faced any big annoyances in the game that I quite often do in RPGs, like how levelling up may yield you very little or quite many skill points, which promotes "save scumming" ie. save before levelling up and then retry as many times until you get good points (like in Daggerfall, the original Planescape: Torment (PS:T Enhanced Edition fortunately gave you an option to always get max points on level up) etc.).

Maybe when you identify some weapons save scumming still is there because apparently the magical features of weapons etc. are many times random so if you are looking for a certain feature (like freeze which is apparently a very good feature for a weapon as it may occasionally freeze your opponent during the fight), so retry identification until you get what you want... but that isn't that bad.

About the subquests specifically, while there certainly are lots and lots of them, they still feel quite hand-crafted, each subquest having some different angle or story to it, even if it would be a similar fedex quest you have done before. Bring someone's love letter to a soldier which may be in some combat zone, find the assassin who is threatening a scared knight etc. Quite many quests also give you moral options and even forces you to choose your side, e.g. do you give in the person who stole a necklace, or go with his suggestion and kill the previous owner as he seems to be quite an asshat as a human being, etc. Or in the earlier assassin example, do you reveal the whereabouts of the scared knight (apparently you still have to fight the assassin even if you do) etc.

Divine Divinity does not feel particularly original action-RPG, but they managed to do things right.

Eternal Strands. It's fun but flawed. They need to work on the quests and the pacing. Quests can be repetitive, and the pacing can be slow at times. They already have a solid base with the magic mechanic. I hope there's a sequel that will allow us to do more crazy stuff.

The Drifter, first minutes but it remember me to Beneath a Steel Sky, good taste.

Just finished Drunk in Fi... I mean Dead in Vinland. Whoever was responsible for the writing must have thought it would be sufficient to just take a modern day family and put them in a Viking story. And the story becomes a fucking soup opera when you invite NPCs into your community. Everyone wants to seduce and fuck with one of the family members. It can easily become a porn game with bad writing but without the stimulating pictures if you catch my meaning...
Also after day 200 there are no more tributes to pay because reasons... Apparently the big bad motherfucker and his minions who terrorise your little community from the start lose from one day on the other any interest in making your life miserable and your survival questionable. The game becomes so easy, it's boring.

btw.: I played with the Norse Side Stories and Vallhund DLCs.

Going back to Elminage Gothic.

Didn't take that long to get a Death Arm on the floor that, on my previous playthrough, had twice gotten me teleported into rock. (Good thing I have a habit of saving frequently.)

I'm at the point where I want to switch to builds designed for long-term post-game use. (Although, I want to use a Spirit Pact Dhanpir, and I don't yet have access to an area where that enemy appears.) This means remaking some of my characters.

I've discovered that Elves are immortal, so old age isn't a problem for them. Also, Devilish ideally should be at least 50 years old to avoid major stat loss at level up. (5 is the youngest I'd consider starting to level them up; before then, best to just let them die and resurrect them, or intentionally trigger aging traps.)

Also, being able to duplicate items, including the Medal of Power, opens up new possibilities.

Dungeon Designer.