Should I bother with Beyond Divinity?

[Double Ogre]

First I'd like to mention that I discovered Divine Divinity a few weeks ago and was pleasantly surprised by it. It definitely had this oldskool feeling to it. The large, consistent world with lots of interactivity was really engaging, and the quests were mostly original (many of them also had multiple solutions). In addition, the game turned out to have one of the best 2D engines, the graphics were really beautiful, the sprites were detailed and nicely animated. The music was also very nice--quite original and charming. The game wasn't perfect though, the plot and setting were very cliched, and the combat got really tedious at times, e.g. I've spent literally a whole day just clicking on monsters in the final area.

Naturally, since I enjoyed the game, I got interested in the series. And although I heard bad things about Beyond Divinity, I decided to give it a try. I played it a bit today, but it really looks mediocre. Beautiful prerendered sprites got replaced by ugly low poly 3D models, the skill system doesn't make much sense, and from what I've heard the game is very linear and focused on combat. And the combat seems really boring so far.

So, I'm wondering what were your impressions with Beyond Divinity and should I continue playing it or there's no real reason to bother?

 

[Andhaira]

Don't Especially not if you played DD. I suggest if you have no other games to play you replay DD with another type of character. For example if you played as a mage the first time, replay as a Ranger without any spells whatssoever. The experiance will be different and fun. Or if you played as a thief, then replay as a greatsword weailding warrior mage.

Other games to try if you liked DD:

-Baldurs gate series
-Icewindale 2
-Jagged Alliance 2
-Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel (its a good game)

 

[Lesifoere]

No, don't bother. BD is a piece of shit, a disaster of technical incompetence taken to the ninth, and on top of that the voice-acting is some of the worst I've ever heard in a game.

You'd have a better time replaying DD or seeking out something else.

 

[ArcturusXIV]

Hrm, now I'm tempted to check out Divine Divinity, I've heard good things about it.

 

[Andhaira]

Its probably the best game you will play this year.

 

[Volourn]

Both these games suck like shit.

 

[Andhaira]

 

[Saxon1974]

Divine Divinity is a great game, one of my favorite. The combat sucks and there is too much of it, but if you can get past that it has great atmopshere, great 2D drawn art and I think the best soundtrack ever created for a game.

Beyond Divinity was a big dissapointment, definitely avoid it. How did this pile of crap get made by the same team?

 

[doctor_kaz]

Beyond Divinity wasn't very good. Awful voice acting, much more linear, uninteresting quests, and the game is padded horribly with the "battlefields", which are basically a series of randomly generated crappy dungeons. Even the soundtrack isn't as good although there are a few good tracks. The role-playing system was interesting but they squandered it with a really shitty interface that made managing the two characters a real chore. IMHO the story got interesting in the last chapter but there's not much else good about it.

 

[Thrasher]

BD was horribly buggy and seemingly unfinished and somewhat tedious. POR2 was much better.

Loved DD though.

 

[Double Ogre]

Thanks for the responses. I guess, I'll skip it then.

 

[Thrasher]

Go ahead and play it. It was fun even though not so good. I did for completeness (falling off a love afair with DD). If you have other choices, they may be better, though.

 

[Andhaira]

Also try eschalon. The demo is a free download.

 

[quasimodo]

I liked DD a lot and have replayed it several times, but I never got past the 2 hour mark with BD.

 

[Double Ogre]

Replaying DD with a survivor/archer build, it's really fun. Even though I've explored most of the game on my first run, I'm still finding a lot of new things, the game is certainly very large and detailed.

Also, I just had to post this.

 

[Andhaira]

I want t o replay DD with a warrior-mage this time. Anyone know th ebst way to do it? I want the mage background special ablity though.

 

[Luzur]

Beyond Divinity is Larian Studios own Oblivion.

 

[Liberal]

Better ask, should Beyond Divinity bother with you.

 

[Lesifoere]

Beyond Divinity is Larian Studios own Oblivion.

Oblivion's actually better-executed than BD.

 

[Thrasher]

That's debatable.

 

[denizsi]

In DD, I liked that most of the game took place outdoors and certain battles got crazy crowded, like in a real war, ever more so than in either Diablo games. A second play was impossible for me though. Just running around must've taken about half the time I devoted to the game, that's including using all the portal ruins and stones and whatnot.

I haven't tried BD. I doubt I ever will.

 

[Double Ogre]

In DD, I liked that most of the game took place outdoors and certain battles got crazy crowded, like in a real war, ever more so than in either Diablo games.

Yeah, there's that too. I especially like the orcish camp (in the lower right corner of the main map), it has that war feel for sure. With the current character I entered it at level 16. I was poisoning my bow to take down the elite orcs and was raising the giant orcs as my minions (resurrect + aura of command). Also, splitting arrows rock as well. I got to level 21 when I was finished with the camp.

BTW, I've found a small exploit. Do you remember John the dragon rider that attacks you at the beginning of the game but then gets killed by Zandalor? Well, his corpse stays there throughout the game, so you can resurrect him later. He moves extremely fast, does around 200 damage (fire, lightning, poison, etc combined) and often freezes the opponents. He also doesn't die when you sleep like the other resurrected creatures do. You can probably finish the game without fighting yourself if you take him, but it's no fun of course. The scorpion traps are also a bit overpowered, so I try to not use them much, if at all. However if you find some areas/bosses too tedious, I suppose you can use such tactics.

 

[Frau Bishop]

I actually was considering to order BD on ebay in the next days. Thanks for this thread, Codex, I will spent the saved money on cigarettes.

 

[denizsi]

Anything's gotta be than cigarettes.

BTW, I've found a small exploit. Do you remember John the dragon rider that attacks you at the beginning of the game but then gets killed by Zandalor? Well, his corpse stays there throughout the game, so you can resurrect him later. He moves extremely fast, does around 200 damage (fire, lightning, poison, etc combined) and often freezes the opponents. He also doesn't die when you sleep like the other resurrected creatures do. You can probably finish the game without fighting yourself if you take him, but it's no fun of course. The scorpion traps are also a bit overpowered, so I try to not use them much, if at all. However if you find some areas/bosses too tedious, I suppose you can use such tactics.

That's a crazy exploit, or is it an exploit at all, I'm not sure.

I never got around to use the traps or other similar funky stuff. I could endure the game only once with that female fighter character, I forgot what she was called, and I played as a straight fighter. Because the game gave me a nausea for how long it took to simply move around, I did lots of save-load experimenting to see if anything would be different with some of the multiple solutions in quests or some dialogue options. I simply dread at the idea of going through all of it again.

 

[Thrasher]

I dread going through almost ANY game/story a second time because there is simply too much repetition. Only completism makes me do it (i.e. like unlocking new levels at higher difficulties, or mutually exclusive and extenstive story/quest arcs, or vastly different gameplay tactics requiring different character builds). Completism for an RPG with a zillion possible character builds just for the sake pf moderately different gameplay tactics is a non-sequitar...