My Thoughts After Two Playthroughs - A Review

[Guest]

*REVIEW*

 

"What do you believe?"

 

This is the driving question of Pillars of Eternity. In the opening minutes of the game, you potentially find yourself negotiating a hostage situation. Provided that you have the skill set, you can try to deescalate by engaging in a theological debate with a religious fanatic, or you can reaffirm your belief that luck favors the bold by rushing the ringleader. There is a spectrum of options between these two extremes, and this provides but a small taste of what's to come.

 

"Compelling story-line, deep companions, tons of exploration, moral complexity, and fun, tactical combat"

 

 

Pillars of Eternity takes place in a small region on the continent of Eir Glanfath. Tensions are high. A recent religiously-motivated conflict, and subsequent genocide, has opened fresh the unhealed wound of other wars and other persecutions. The population is in moral crisis. Since the end of the previous, the gods have been silent, even with their priests, and no healthy children have been born. After more than a decade of desperation, civilization itself appears to be on the cusp of unraveling.

 

You begin the story under strange circumstances; a mysterious illness has come over you while travelling. Coincidentally, your caravan's path is blocked by a tree in the shadow of a forbidden ruin. Could the timing and location be happenstance, or could the hands of higher powers be at work here? Either way, life-altering events transpire and you are thrust into the middle of a conflict between nations, gods, cultures, and ideologies.

 

Throughout the remainder of the game, you encounter many potential companions who bring things you may need to the table. Their help doesn't come for free though. You have skills that they need, as well. Whereas companions in most games come with some elaborate side quest that, frequently, distracts from the main narrative, Obsidian has taken another route. Rather than unlocking some hidden ability or recovering powerful loot, the companions in Pillars of Eternity add value by acting as sounding boards for the main theme. In helping them to resolve their quests, the game asks you, "what do you believe?". If forced to choose, which is more important: your family or your traditions? If no authority figure exists to provide context for knowledge, does it still have value? It is more important to follow orders, or do what you think is right? There are no right or wrong answers; the developers give you a laundry list of nuanced responses to these situations, and the consequences of your actions are almost always guaranteed to surprise you.

 

In most role-playing games, I find myself coming back to the question, "how would my character respond?". In contrast, "how would *I* respond?" quickly became the norm. Perhaps, by this metric, Pillars is a horrible RPG, but it was nice to be challenged in this way.

 

And Obsidian has given us a finely crafted setting for asking (and answering) such questions. Eora is a world in the death grip of a culture war. By using allegory to frame "big question" debates that exist in our own culture war, Obsidian manages to ju-jistu us into a "real-world RPG" that makes Alpha Protocol's use of that label a little funny. This is where we get to see the craftsmen of Obsidian at their best and simultaneously show why crowd-funding is so valuable: it takes brass balls make a game about the debate between science and religion. No publisher would touch that in a million years. Kickstarter made it possible and Obsidian owned it.

 

The last two points I want to touch on before wrapping up the review are exploration and combat. Most of the top tier items in the game can only be found via exploration. This could include completing optional quests, venturing off the beaten path far enough to locate some secluded cove filled with traps, monsters, or high level bandit, or finding hidden content via a skill check. Sometimes the reward for your effort is nothing more than a semi-rare ingredient required for crafting, but hearing that unique chime followed by a party member's "look what I just found" bark always feels a little like finding a forgotten $20 in the back pocket of your jeans.

 

Regarding combat, Easy is for casual players. Normal difficulty is fairly straight-forward and seems to be geared toward people who want don't want to put too much time into it, but don't want to play with training wheels on either. Hard difficulty may the sweet spot for people who want a challenge, but aren't necessarily gluttons for punishment. I'll leave Path of the Damned for other, braver souls to comment on. Regardless of which difficulty you choose, there will be some encounters that are more difficult than others. Some areas are intended for high-level parties only. This doesn't mean that it's impossible to clear them at lower levels, however that fight would have been a lot easier with the right level 7 ability/talent/spell/etc. While the Bestiary isn't necessary on all difficulties, it is certainly useful and indicative of the amount of thought that went into combat.

 

Overall, I'm very pleased with the first chapter of this story and I look forward to seeing what Obsidian has in store for the franchise.

 

 

*FEEDBACK AND CRITICISM*

 

-Things I <3-

 

Scripted Interactions - These should be a staple of the Pillars of Eternity franchise. Don't get rid of them and don't sully them by putting them in other IPs.

 

Reactivity - First time through, I really had no clue what I was doing in Defiance Bay and ended up bumbling about for most of it. Second time through, I locked down my status with Crucible Knights almost immediately. Very different experience. Everyone knew who I was. I love that nameless NPCs banter about active quests when I walk by.

 

Party Banter - Well done. All of it. Except Kana's broken line in Salty Mast.

 

 

-Things that are good, but could probably use a little love-

 

VO - Either more of this or less of this, but the amount that exists right now is frustrating. For what it's worth, I think my vote is for less. One example that probably exemplifies my point: the dialog between Pallegina and the ambassador in the Valian Embassy. Her half of the conversation was voiced, his was not. Read a part. Read while listening to a part. Read another part. Repeat. Maybe I'm overly sensitive, but this was jarring and this is only one example. Give me her opening so I can hear her voice in my head and then switch to all text. Use the money saved to voice all the "my lord" vs "my lady", sir/ma'am, lad/lass options that got skipped elsewhere. I can't imagine that it was easy to know where to draw the line considering time and budget constraints, but please don't make the same mistake in Pillars 2. Side note: major characters (Maerwald, Iovara, Thaos, Caldara, etc) were spot on.

 

Caed Nua - Clearly a lot of work went into this. 11 maps and 6 of them change (a couple of them 2 or more times). The stores provide a convenient place to dump loot for copper, but it would have been nice to have at least a couple choice things to buy as well. It isn't clear what triggers the availability (I thought it was the merchant's stall, but now I think I was mistaken). Despite all the talk of The Master Below mobilizing mobs to maraud, the mayhem was missing. Bandits attacked, but nothing from Od Nua ever came up to say hi. All the +1 resting bonuses bumping to +2 upon completion of the restoration would have been nice. It makes sense that the appeal is *supposed to be* selection rather than quantity (so that inn resting doesn't become worthless). Unfortunately, I think the net effect is that Brighthollow resting becomes worthless.

 

Endless Paths of Od Nua - I especially enjoyed learning about the chain of events leading up to my arrival on the top 6 levels. Level 7 was a kick in the feels. Unfortunately, I think it's kinda telling that I can't put my finger on any memorable thing for levels 9-13.

 

Crafting/Enchanting - I'll start by saying that I really liked most of the options. If a genie granted me 3 wishes for the this aspect of the game, I would ask for 1) a re-balance of the quality choices so that I had a reason to take something other than one of the Fine/Exceptional/Superb options (i.e. why take Damaging 1 if I can buy Fine instead?), 2) remove the vfx for all of the Slaying properties and move the Secondary Damage vfx to places that make sense (i.e. arrow tips on bows, rather than the grip) and 3) make it so that it's not possible to get every other Attribute armor enchantment before Perception 1!!

 

 

-Things that kinda suck, but not enough to really get upset about-

 

Loot - Why are gloves so hard to find? 220+ hours into PoE. Haven't seen Gloves of Manipulation once. Most of the "critical" belts, boots, and rings are either static loot or sold by merchants. Why are gloves treated differently?

 

 

-Things that almost make me rage-quit once a day-

 

AI/Pathing - Easily my biggest frustration with the game. Squishy party members who rush onto the middle of a mob because they thing they just killed is dead. Heavy hitters who arrived just in time to save a buddy in peril, only to run off around the back of my party rather than hit the thing in front of them because pathing. Spells bouncing off invisible edges of doorways and wiping out half the party. I've had a couple of moments where the keyboard was picked up and only avoided getting slammed down because I remembered that I love it more than I hate the buggy AI in this game. This was more of minor frustration on Normal. It makes me insane on Hard.