MonkeyLungs

Yeah, but what more would one desire from an isometric RPG in terms of graphics? I LOVE the graphics of Pillars! The beautiful hand painted environments, the character designs, and the fantastic weapon and armor design. And as an added bonus it runs pretty great even on old rigs, which is a plus for me. It is definitely in my top five group for game of the year 2015.

Which is what I am going to do for my current game. I am curious to see how that plays out though as I have not tried this approach. This will be a new thing for me.

I feel like they could have cut the combat encounters in half in both white march 1 and 2. Playing through white march 1 and 2 almost deflated my enthusiasm for the main quest. It felt like a distraction. On top of leaving behind a very important and pressing quest in the main game the expansions just felt like an excuse to throw the player into fight after fight and it wore me down by the end. So much so that I skipped it all (White March stuff) in my tandem 2nd playthrough and for my new 3rd playthrough I have completely uninstalled both White March 1 and 2. It isn't even that I completely dislike the expansions, it's just that the main game is so good that the expansions actually feel like they take away from the experience and from a role play perspective kind of don't make sense.

Honestly, having a keep like this does NOTHING for me. Not a thing. I'd rather be a pure adventurer, roaming free through the land, exploring and looking for treasures and doing quests and so on, rather than having to administer some boring old castle. I will say that what I've seen thus far does seem to be what I suspect some will see as an improvement, and that's ok. My gripe is with the major challenge "quest" for ownership of Caed Nua. It seems to come far too soon after you've taken Caed Nua and I'm constantly wondering how long I can put this quest off, because the first 3-4 times I tried to fight the big battle, I got stomped because my party wasn't of a high enough level and/or perhaps I didn't have enough allies, or whatever. I guess I wish that this particular "quest" didn't get triggered until after a fair bit further into the main story line so that you're certain to be in a better position to deal with the situation. I just want to agree with this statement right here. Not to detract from others opinions, who seem to overwhelmingly like the stronghold aspect and also not to say that I don't think the keep is well done because it was pretty fun. However I like things a bit less grand. I don't really want to be a lord of anything or in charge of so much property. What about my explorer Priest that eschews worldly goods and just likes to wander and help those in need? He has no use at all for a keep.

The only thing I would like to see really addressed and improved is unity's use of 'animated environmental effects' like smoke and fire etc. This stuff is the primary cause of frame rate destruction and performance negatives. In fact just a nice choice to turn them off or tone them waaaay down would be great. Of course if you have a beastly machine it probably doesn't matter but for me the added benefit of some smoke whisping around doesn't outweigh the negative system impact this kind of environmental effect animation has on the game. Give us a checkbox in the graphics options to turn this stuff off or tone it down, pretty please.

The main quest was/is the highlight for me. For future playthroughs I will probably do less and less of the side stuff and maybe even fully uninstall the expansions.

Too much fighting in the game already. But what do I know? I like the role playing aspect and the reading dialogues the most anyway. Maybe the next game should just be: Tactical Squad Based Murder Death Kill Level Up Get Loot Game from Obsidian Entertainment. Now with more blood, more explosions, and endless randomized dungeons. No level cap. Ride a dragon into space and punch all the gods in their stupid mouths!

I would be happier if there weren't all these fantastical super weapons at all and you just had the amazing variety of weapon types all relatively grounded in reality with the great upgrade system (minus the elemental enchantments). I prefer the majority of strength and special features of my character to come from my characters and not their gear. I realize my opinion is not widely shared and is probably the least popular style of itemization in gaming. The first two things I would mod in this game if it had an editor would be: 1. Remove around half the fights in the game. 2. Remove almost all magical weapons and armor.

I vastly prefer the visuals of Pillars honestly. The art direction alone sets it far apart. The armor design the weapon design. D:OS was just so saturday morning cartoon, and while I did enjoy it I would have enjoyed it more with a different approach. Don't get me wrong though I really like both games.

So I am nearing the end of White March part 2. My opinion hasn't changed too much honestly, although I did enjoy Zahua personal quest. I kind of get the impression that many players, probably most, would really enjoy the game if it was just tactical squad based diablo with endless boss runs and trying new builds and never-ending leveling and tons and tons of insane loot. While that does sound like it could be exceptionally fun for some it really isn't quite what I am hoping for out of Pillars of Eternity. I feel like the base game is orders of magnitude better than the expansion content and actually suffers from having the content installed. I'm really sorry that I feel that way and I don't mean to hurt anyone's feelings by sharing my opinion. It's just the way I feel.

Sorry to burst your bubble but Final Fantasy 12 was released in 2006 (Japan/US/Canada) and 2007 (Europe) with such a system while it took Dragon Age Origins another 3 years to a release of 2009 with a similiar system. That's even enough time to insinuate that DA:O could have copied the system from FF12 instead of coming up with that on their own. Good to know, thanks for the correction. I was under the incorrect impression that ff didn't introduce that system until ff13. It doesn't really change my opinion that DA:O has the best party ai tactics system ever though, even if they did copy it from final fantasy. FF system is in a FF game, so I'll never play it.

Story time is cool, but it doesn't fully solve the problem for me, It just makes the fights really easy. It still feels like the gameplay ratio is very heavily in favor of combat. Obviously this is all just like, my opinion man so it really isn't even that important I just thought I would share my thoughts. Coincidentally is there a way to slow the combat down even more but not affect the difficulty? Like, keep the game on normal but make it twice as slow as the current slow mo does? I have a hard time feeling like I am following everything on screen and if I have to pause every 0.25 seconds why not just make the combat turn based? I was playing a long string of turn based game before this actually ... wasteland 2, dos, shadowrun. Maybe my brain needs afull playthrough to readjust.

The tactics system for DA1is lightyears ahead of anything I have ever seen any other developers create in terms of companion AI systems. I guess Final Fantasy came out later with like a gambit system or something and people say it is somewhat similar but I haven't played Final Fantasy since 1997. I have no idea how hard it would be to implement but it probably differs from engine to engine. It seems like the most intelligent way to design your AI combat scripting systems though because you could just sit and test them out on the fly while being in game.

Thank you very much! Hopefully the expansion content does grow on me. Who knows maybe in further playthroughs my preference will shift to enjoying combat more than the story? Stranger things have happened. ----- In response to some of the other stuff in the thread: ----- Well as I said, I really enjoy the game. Fantastic. Also I will definitely play through the expansion part 1 and 2 (I actually just finished part 1) once and fully explore the expansion to give it a fair chance. Second I wouldn't try to uninstall the DLC while on this save game due to obvious incompatibility issues. My question was mainly for future reference. The advice aartz gave is also relevant for other games for me. I'm pretty new to Steam so just learning the ropes. Sometimes with games I like to play them in their original state (pre-dlc) and I understand I can just ignore the content but it is easier to ignore if it just isn't there. Also for RP purposes my benevolent ruler of Caed Nua wouldn't just be ignoring a struggling villages pleas for help =)

Ok thanks. Like I said above my opinion might change. And I wasn't going to delete them, if that is even possible, until I played through once anyway. Glad to hear part 2 is less of a constant rumble.

The game could really benefit from a detailed tactics system that let you specify EXACTLY which abilities to use and when.

So I'm kind of feeling like the DLC's are taking away from the main game. Maybe my opinion will change but right now going to the White March feels like a giant distraction that serves no purpose other than to get in to 1,000,000,000,000,000 fights. Maybe I'm wrong or maybe my opinion just sucks or whatever but I'm wondering if for future playthroughs I can simply delete the White March content and play the base game without having the DLC installed? I really enjoy the base game it is fantastic but the White March just feels like one big giant fight that never stops. I can just go into Od Nua for that.

I think the coolest thing is how we have so many great options for how we want to play the game. It really makes it possible to find that sweet spot for your current playthrough. And you aren't shoehorned to one mode, unless you are going for a specific achievement, you can switch it up to suit your mood. Or maybe you have already played a the hardest difficulty but want to play a really goofy party of completely unoptimal builds and roll with a smaller party? Drop the difficulty down. I have been switching between normal and easy but I voted for easy. I'm sure I will play the game on harder settings in the future but right now I am having fun and that's all I care about. PoE is making me wish I would have upgraded my pc earlier so I could have been in on the kickstarter. I'm so glad Obsidian took a chance and made this game and very thankful to all you great fans for backing this endeavor and proving there really are a bunch of folk out there that love this type of rpg.

Something many of us are probably hoping you guys are going to make. Or just another great RPG in this wonderful universe. Also the music is superb. Sound effects are very satisfying in general. Critical hit sound always is a joy to hear.

Torment's major hurdle right now, for me anyway, is performance. It is abysmal. PoE runs like a dream. Torment is in need of a lot of work before I'd call it even Beta status.

I just came to say welll .... /Grabs crow, eats some. A for really realz story DLC that adds enchanting, new areas, new mobs, and increases the level cap. I did not believe this would happen and I was WRONG. ... /eats more crow ---YUMMY!

I made a sesame street style rhyme for the devs about the camera.

You guys are asking quite a bit from Obsidian don't you think? What's with all the hate? ... just buy buy buy and don't complain.

I think they are going to wait until the game is 1.17 years old, then open up the forums for the game.

Streamlining, especially when it comexs to games, does indeed mean to simpify. Folks like me used to say dumbed down but streamlining has just as negative a connotation now so I don't mind using the marketing term against them. And yes, I believe simplifying games is a negative thing. I don't mind debating complexity of gameplay, however it becomes more subjective when we do that which is why I was just comparing feature lists. It's the first thing I do when I evaluate a new game ... for instance if the game is an ARPG-diablo-like-loot hunting-level up game then I compare that game to titles I hold in high regard and I fitrst compare things like game modes, number of players available for online matches, number of available party members if its party based, types of weapons available, number of skills, number of spells, are there mounts? etc. etc. Then I delve into subjective territory like quality of story, presentation of characters, the way the game plays coupled with an evaluation of the controls, how is the voice acting?, how do I feel about the art direction, etc. I think I am debating you in a perfectly reasonable fashion, abstaining from personal insults and trying to convey my thoughts on the game and game design in general. These are ... like ... just my opinions man.