I haven't read the review, but if the reviewer is using the fact that Obsidian is using the same engine as a basis for lowering his score, isn't that rather idiotic on his behalf?
IMO, when I rate a game, I compare it to its predecesor (sp?) and base it on what it hoped to accomplish, yet failed to do. Something like using an existing engine shouldn't be a negative, since it was known ahead of time that that would be the case. IMO, that's like taking points away because it doesn't have FPS combat, even though it was known ahead of time it wouldn't be implementing FPS combat.