argh! i'm looking at the char screen... what to be..

The preset people have side stories and an extra source power.. but you can have them join your group (and still get access to the side stories)

But there are more storied people than slots! Also, they all seem a meaner bunch and i'd want to be "me"

Am i gimp'n myself by picking all the luck, chatting, trading, leadership stuff?

Oh well.. these are good problems to have!

Side note, for people that bounced off the first one or skipped it. There is no need to have played the first one. Also this one is more welcoming. I personally found the first game to way to long to get going.

Please let me know how it's going. I may grab it today but I just want to see a bit about how the game handles party before I do, because if I dive into making a whole party how I want to (assuming the game is similar to the first one party member wise) it'll take hours just to make the characters lol.

i really want to play as an undead... but.. a nicer undead? while i will steal 'n stuff. I try to kill as few people as i can. or at least not pointlessly rampage death on everything i see. :)

I wonder how long it takes to craft the face ripping tool. (yes, you'll be able to use other people's faces on the undead once you have the craftable/quest tool.)

What are others doing? using one of the preset backstory people? custom? anyone doing undead?

@artisanbreads: You just make your main guy at the start. You pick up people as the game moves on. But the backstory people are on the starting ship with you.. but you don't group up then.

The game runs SUPER well. But it did when it was in alpha. i'm in 4k with everything maxed and it looks great. (SLI doesn't work, but the game doesn't need it.)

There is controller support. I can't see how it would be better than the mouse for a game like this. But it might be "ok" - ie, Sofa + 4k oled + controller + dog might be worth it. :)

Totally get it.. but maybe first finish the xcom xpac. that dlc made the game pretty amazing.

@zurv: You can run a LAN game, launch the game 4 times, and make 4 characters in a co-op game then log off with players 2-4 and you have a full party you play yourself. So I'm basically just judging if the characters justify themselves story wise so I want to engage in that or not. If it's like the first game they won't, which is fine, I'm just trying to see that.

This origin business suggests more of a proper story to this instead of a kinda jokey excuse for some very good combat.

I bought it on this hope but if that is dashed I will at least still have the latter presumably.

@efesell: I too hope they more work on the story this time around (it looks like they did.) Stories are important to me in games (more so in RPGs.) I still really enjoyed the first one, but it would have been better if they story was more flushed out.

got that right lol

Seriously though, I hope the story and writing is a lot better then the first game. The art sure is.

@zurv: Can I ask if the release version has UI scaling in the options?

I've tried the early access version but had to refund it at the time due to severe problems with eye strain.

@tennmuerti: I don't see one, but can't you just zoom in/out? Play at a different rez? Did you find it to big or small?

@zurv:I have a problem with the UI so zooming the game itself doesn't help. It's too small on my monitor at 1440p, I can see it just fine but it quickly strains my eyes to the point of fatigue and then pain. If I turn the rez down the game becomes less crisp and blurry looking on my monitor which is not good for the eyes either. It is also not greatly contrasted against the background which doesn't help I suspect.

A lot of titles that have a heavy reliance on reading text and UI have scaling options these days since people play on varied monitor/TV setups at different resolutions. RPGs and strategy games especially, Endless Space 2, Total War Warhammer, Pillars of Eternity of the recent stuff I've played, even the first Divinity:OS had a UI scaling option. Which is really helpful if like me you have iffy vision in the first place.

I couldn't get past the boring intro of the first game. I restarted it multiple times and played for about three to five hours until I stopped.

Man, I coulda sworn this thing was out for a while.

Never finished the first one sadly. Got to the last area and fell off it. Loved most of my time with it though.

The ability to play different races always seemed awesome in the sequel.

@theht: I believe it's been in early access for over a year now.

So reading impressions, it seems like you really mold the party characters however you want. They are basically directionless and let you do whatever you want with them, as far as their abilities and class.

Now I probably will just roll with the one character. Most people are really praising how they did the characters and party system, allowing you to set up an interesting character that's less of a blank slate than most RPGs (which does become real boring) and role play it through the game world.

I look forward to the 20 minute co-op speedruns.

It looks great. I wonder when the console release is.

Enjoying this a lot more than the first one but man do I need these battles to move at around 3x the speed.

I played it for like 6 hours straight yesterday and I think it's pretty great. The writing is a pretty clear improvement and the story stuff with character origins seems promising. I'm also really digging the changes they've made to combat. The first game had a lot of crowd control spells that would often lead to you resorting to the same routine of rain+electro bolt+Ice Shot over and over again because of how effective it was at removing half of your enemies from the battlefield. Now you have to wear them down first, and generally you're not going to keep anyone out of the fight for more than a round or two even if you do stun or freeze them. It also seems like you can handle enemies that are slightly higher level than you with less trouble, which has led to a fewer instances of "stumble into horde of tough enemies, retreat or reload."

If I have any quibbles right now, it's the inventory management, which is better than the last one but still messy. I get that it's the way it is because of co-op (this game seems a lot more suited to it) but moving items into Ifan's inventory because he's the one with the high Barter skill is still more of a hassle than it should be. Also I don't think the music is nearly as memorable thus far, but IIRC that's because the composer for all of the prior Divinity games passed away a year or two ago.

Additionally...

I actually stopped playing today after a battle that literally took a good 30 minutes or so to complete. Because of the way armor works now it seems like battles drag out even longer than they did in OS 1. Maybe I need more straight-up DPS in my party, but I think there's already a mod out there that increases movement speed, if that tells you anything.

@arbitrarywater: What was getting to me was the size of most arenas and usually archers or mages flank the corners so I just had to look at them and think Oh god you are so many turns away and each of the enemy turns takes minutes to resolve...

I have helped this along somewhat by making sure my rogue can fly and that really helps with that part of the problem at least.

I've yet to play the original. Sequels are developed faster than I can get through my backlog :/

The quest log seems heinously bugged and now I'm super paranoid that it's going to fuck up event flags left and right.

@efesell: As far as I can tell so far it's not so much bugged as it is incredibly ambiguous with its objectives. I've had quests where I thought I completed the quest as there's no further objective only run into the completion state of the quest out of luck further on in the game. I'm not sure whether they're bugged or they're just quests that permeate the campaigns multiple acts without any proper indication.

As for the rest of the game I'm really enjoying it a lot. I'm half and half on the new armour system as it has some cool benefits like reducing how flowcharty the crowed control in the fights happens but it also ends up resulting in all my more interesting tactical plays being significantly less effective than "pick a target, and get everyone to nuke that 1 target to trim the heard". It's also been awhile since the first game but I feel like there's just too many enemies that have mobility spells that negate interesting positioning. Far too often I get my Ranger up on high ground, flank with my rogue to get the mage etc, but all that is for nought when 85% of the enemies have ranged attacks and teleport/leap abilities. The writing is significantly more engaging despite my general apathy for the type of plot it has, the voice acting also goes a long way for my long term engagement with dialogues too.

All this could change as I just got off of Fort Joy, but so far very positive.

Oh no, I've been sitting on the last few hours of the first one for a while now. Thought I had more time to finish it before this one came out, but there are so many games! Can't wait to sink my teeth into this

The Voice acting really helps. As some one with a short attention span i tend to skip written dialogue in the first game witch wasn't to smart. Combat seems hard even on the explores level ( or i am just bad at video games ) made it to the mainland. World building is great although some off those cheesy instant deaths are a real bummer. Like someone mentioned on the forum quest feel bugged, there not. There just really really open and have multiple ways off finishing them.

@ivdamke: I think it's definitely a bug because I had quests that I finished and got rewards for sit idle int he log until they were closed by the Act transition. They then offered me contradictory journal entries saying that I had both aided someone and ignored them for instance.

@efesell: Ah that's a shame.

Played a couple hours last night, the writing is definitely more palatable than the first game. Though that's definitely amplified by having party members with actual stories and voice acting (I know they added that stuff to the first game eventually but I was long done with the game by then, so it's still a big jump for me).

It's taking some time to get used to the combat again. Started using a controller because I preferred the movement controls, but then everything else just feels clumsy in comparison so I'm planning on switching back, and hopefully that helps with the flow of combat. Playing as an undead because I'm not one to pass up something that unique, and already enjoying it way more than any of the classes I played in the last game. Also want to commend the character portraits this time around, the NPCs don't look so hot, but the last game to do something similar from memory was Dragon Age: Origin, and this looks way better.

Encumbrance though... just... stop it video games...

I'm really enjoying this game, but I have to echo the sentiment above about the quest log being bad and some quest lines and objectives being overly obscure. You have to be extremely thorough in both your exploration and dialogue to make sure that you don't miss anything.

It would be very easy to leave Fort Joy behind without even touching some significant quests. At the very least, you're likely to be uncertain about whether or not some quest lines were seen through to their conclusion because of how vague or completely unhelpful the quest log can be.

Given, I think the game has been designed in such a way that there's no expectation for you to need to do everything. There's 4-5 ways to escape the starting area, at least two ways to get your collar removed, and the experience from doing quests significantly below your current level typically doesn't amount to much. However, it's still going to nag at completionists regardless of whether or not it's by design.

They have since acknowledge on the steam forums that the quest log is busted for some quests and should be addressed soon. It also doesn't seem to break event flags for future quests and that was my major concern.

@efesell: It really does seem bugged, so many quests seem finished but they don't move over.

Apart from that I'm really enjoying it so far but there's something a bit annoying about having to grind through each enemies magic armour or physical armour before any of your special moves do anything but damage.

So I found out there is a kind of a workaround or rather a non fully implemented UI scaling option in the config file.

It's not perfect, hence why it's not in the game proper I assume, some of the bottom of character stats menus can get cut off and the equipment paper doll stretches out and become weirdly fat. Still it's a big help for me and I repurchased the game and was able to get a few hours in yesterday.

Excited to see more of the game now.

I had to put off getting this for a bit but sounds like there are some things to be cleaned up. Hopefully by the time I get there it's more polished. Sounds good otherwise though.

@artisanbreads: The weirdest part is that some of these issues, like the buggy quest log, are apparently mostly just present in the first act. Considering that's the portion of the game that was available during Early Access, you'd think that would have the fewest bugs.

I wonder if the site will check this game out. Ahem @rorie

@chaser324: huh that is odd. The game seems deep so I'm pretty forgiving with issues when developers make RPGs with lots of ways to solve quests and things. Everything I've heard is encouraging.

New thing I'm worrying about, should I just pick 3 party members and forget about all the rest? I want to do all their quests so far, but not if they don't level up offscreen, or if it's a hassle to go and re-recruit them.

@teddie: At a certain point, you're going to have to choose three and stick with them, so I don't think it's possible to see all of their origin storylines through to completion in a single playthrough. I'll leave it at that for the sake of not getting too spoilery.

EDIT: Just to be a bit clearer about things, I also don't think you need to worry about leveling all of them up equally while you're on Fort Joy. At the end of Act I, I think their level will automatically be bumped up to match your main character's level. I'm not 100% sure about this, but it seemed to be the case that at least the two party members I had never used gained a pile of XP all at once.

The end of Act I in general serves as a reset for your entire party, but some of the choices you make at that point are then locked in for the rest of the game.

We'll take a look at it in some form, but I don't really know when.

How long do the battles get drawn out in this one?

I loved the first game, but I reached a point where I couldn't stomach one more fight that lasted 40 minutes.

What about that quest log issues, are they game-breaking, have there been any updates to it?

@betterley: The quest log issues are not game braking but just slightly annoying as far as I know. I am not that far in the game (30 hours in and just past the first region) but I haven't encountered any bugged quest yet. On a technical level this game feels very solid for how open the world is and how complex the mechanics are.

So far the battles have been not that long. I have been wiped a couple of times and this is the kind of game were you want to save often because it is sparse with auto-saving. If you didn't like the turned based combat of the first one you might want to wait for a discount before trying because aside from some tweaks here and there it is largely the same.

It's when games like this are released that I really wish Giantbomb would diversify its tastes with each new member of staff. It got some minor attention on the Beastcast with Vinny sounding like he'd played the first couple hours and saying he hopes to find the time to continue playing, which basically equates to no. Unless Rorie gets some screen time to play/discuss then I think that's all were getting of what is largely considered one of the best RPGs of the past few years. I understand the need for them to keep up with releas3s and keep relevant but not every single staff member need a to. I don't even own DOS 2, it's just a shame for me to hear the all the staff, at times both east and west, talk about some triple a games, and yet other games or genres get 5 minutes of lightly washing over them, discussing very little of the actual mechanics, largely in part because it's just one guy who's played so nobody else to even bounce off of. I know the site is built on the foundation of a bunch of laid back dudes that just play video games, I just sometimes wish there were more varied interests in the attempt to include and relate to different people.

@frodobaggins: I totally get your point it's a reason why the Witcher 3 got kinda ignored on this site, but a big RPG where you probably have to put in a minimum of 50 hours always seem real menissing when there are so many games coming out plus they probably got other stuff to do when there at work. I would have seen Austin Walker go in depth into this game but i don't see Ben or Abby tackle this behemoth, witch is kind of a bummer.