PoE2 is possibly the best rpg ever

[tedmann12]

Just wanted to say that this game is seriously incredible. I've played all the crpgs, thousands of hours probably. And I think PoE2 is right up there with BG2 for me. Just unbelievable. Well done Obsidian!

[daven]

Glowing praise. I think the story and characters are a bit too weak to put it up with the best but it's bloody good.

[xzar_monty]

Yeah, it's great. It does have some peculiar problems, like Gorecci Street and/or the digsite being a lot more difficult than anything you ever meet afterwards (like, huh, how's that possible?!), and the main story is a bit weak(*), but all in all it's bloody good.

 

(*) I suppose the depiction of the main story also relies on the dialogue options you choose, because some of it left me a bit baffled. I also had some of this in PoE.

Edited January 3, 2020 by xzar_monty

[Boeroer]

I don't think that Gorecci Street and the Enwithan digsite being spikes in difficulty is a problem. For me they are a nice change of pace and a funny slap in the face of "So I already mastered the game after 1 hour, hahaha"-attitude.

Both fights are not mandatory.

Usually don't care much about the main story since it's only an excuse to go adventuring anyways so I can't really judge.

[xzar_monty]

21 minutes ago, Boeroer said:

I don't think that Gorecci Street and the Enwithan digsite being spikes in difficulty is a problem. For me they are a nice change of pace and a funny slap in the face of "So I already mastered the game after 1 hour, hahaha"-attitude.

It's not that that is the problem. It's the fact that in retrospect, after you've basically won the game, you realize that boy, the hardest fights and greatest difficulties I ever had were right there on the first island, and nothing has come close since.

[Boeroer]

That heavily depends where you go and when you go there. If you don't pay attention to the skulls or turned off those indicators you might run into a lot of encounters that are way too hard for your party and a lot harder than Gorecci or Digsite (in my book the digsite isn't even than difficult, Gorecci is brutal though). Engwithan Titan on Poko Kohara can be impossible, Oathbinder's Sanctum, Splintered Reef. I once went into the Forgotten Catacomb for the first time, highly curious and had no problems with the initial vessels and fampyrs... until I met the Deathguard who's protecting the Reckless Brigandine.

Also if you rush the main plot you can run into some hefty encounters with some Flame Nagas and Rathun and stuff.

Since it's an open world  game and all.

[xzar_monty]

For me it was the other way around: Gorecci Street was easier, the digsite was really hard.

But here's the strange thing: they were not red skull encounters, not even close (maybe one white skull). Engwithian Titan was a "three red skulls" encounter but proved to be not difficult at all, etc.

[tedmann12]

I think the story is good, not as good as the baldurs gate saga, but its good enough. For me I just love being in the world of deadfire and the story is just an excuse for that.

I like the characters a lot to be honest. All of it on par with bg2 for me. Probably prefer bg2 characters just a little, but idk something about deadfire is just so great. So much to do, so much content, so man things I wanna buy.

I play on potd and gorecci street was certainly tough but I’ve ran into a lot of other really tough fights I’ve had to return to.

Anyway this game is amazing!

[AwesomeOcelot]

Yeah, I'd say Deadfire is definitely up there. If you take into account improvements in design and technology it's the best. I really like the companions of Deadfire, but 3 of them are from PoE, so obviously a lot of what makes Deadfire great comes from the first game. It's a great sequal, that improves and builds upon everything, doesn't make some of the mistakes.

Edited January 4, 2020 by AwesomeOcelot

[daven]

On 1/4/2020 at 3:07 AM, tedmann12 said:

I think the story is good, not as good as the baldurs gate saga, but its good enough. For me I just love being in the world of deadfire and the story is just an excuse for that.

I like the characters a lot to be honest. All of it on par with bg2 for me. Probably prefer bg2 characters just a little, but idk something about deadfire is just so great. So much to do, so much content, so man things I wanna buy.

I play on potd and gorecci street was certainly tough but I’ve ran into a lot of other really tough fights I’ve had to return to.

Anyway this game is amazing!

It's kind of unfair comparing anything to the BG games as that setting had already been established for years with so much history and characters and whatever to draw from. I think BG2 companions were great for the time, but Deadfires are disappointing. I'd have hoped for companions with more content like Dragon Age or KOTOR. They really don't have much to say back on your ship in Deadfire.

[thelee]

20 hours ago, daven said:

They really don't have much to say back on your ship in Deadfire.

I just finished Disco Elysium and it is frankly amazing what you can do with dialogue when you don't have to pay for full VO. Yes, I am going to harp on this a lot, I think a lot of compromises we see in Deadfire is a result of full VO breaking the bank and tightening the development schedule.

[xzar_monty]

Couldn't agree more. Also, the benefits of full VO are kind of hard to see; after all, you can give the gist of any given character with a relatively small number of voiced lines (see BG2 for example: I don't think any of the characters call for more voiced lines, everyone is perfectly satisfactory as is). Not only may full VO break the bank, but it also ties the developer's hands in a very significant sense: there is essentially no room for rewrites or even any kind of edits, even if you do get good ideas later on in the production. I would say that full VO is simply a bad idea, unless you have positively huge amounts of money to burn.

I have not finished Disco Elysium yet, in fact I'm in day two at the moment. But boy it's good.

Edited January 6, 2020 by xzar_monty

[Wormerine]

My hot take is, that Deadfire has some of the best individual elements of any RPG I have played, but as a whole it doesn't come together as well as some other games. There is a lot of baggage that Deadfire is carrying (IE legacy), which doesnt serve its setting or goals, and some design decisions, which while I can appreciate, dont work in the game's favour. Its a game I can praise and complain about to no end.

[Bleak]

On 1/6/2020 at 7:11 PM, thelee said:

I just finished Disco Elysium and it is frankly amazing what you can do with dialogue when you don't have to pay for full VO. Yes, I am going to harp on this a lot, I think a lot of compromises we see in Deadfire is a result of full VO breaking the bank and tightening the development schedule.

Full/extended VOs definitely earn a place in the "10 best ways to murder an RPG" list. 

Edited January 7, 2020 by Bleak

[Boeroer]

I also don't appreciate Full VO. For me it adds nothing to a game.  I couldn't care less if it's all voiced or not. Honestly it's more likely that I get annoyed because the VO is messing with me reading the text. I like reading text. And books. Full VO in RPGs with lots of text is like reading a book while listening to the audiobook at the same time.