My first impressions

[otokage]

The biggest problem of PoE is, no doubt, the impossible-to-evade comparison to the legendary BG. Indeed this is a title doomed to live in the gigantic shadow of other game forever. Hopefuly, Obsidian will pay atention to all this issues and make PoE 2 a much better title, with more personality, more length, more immersion, more variety of scenarios, a reactive environment and an epic campaing lead by characters that actually feel like heroes or antiheroes, not like regular low-profile people.

[Fenixp]

As far as I know, the only game which shares most of its aspects with Pillars of Eternity is the original Baldur's Gate. Pillars is even more similar to Baldur's Gate than Baldur's Gate 2 was - BG2 stripped the free exploration and is the first game by Bioware which came up with the much more linear Bioware formula that they are using to this day. Thing is, I love sandbox games, and I prefer Baldur's Gate to the second game. As far as I'm concerned, Pillars of Eternity is the sequel Baldur's Gate deserved - keeping every single aspect of Baldur's Gate which made its gameplay stand out to me and improving upon them as opposed to doing something (even if ever so slightly) different. And since I prefer BG1 to 2, I prefer Pillars to both Baldur's Gate games. This also brings the grand total of games which are like the original Baldur's Gate to two. I'd say Pillars did a fairly good job of differentiating itself, and ensuring that it'll remain relevant.

[Junai]

I think PoE is pretty close to BG and IWD. When you get into it, they're not all that different. There is something about BG and IWD that's a bit more soulful in a way.  

 

It feels like they overreached a bit in PoE, with the long winded descriptions and conversations. We already know the quest mechanics, so you can basically just press enter and skip through an entire conversation, because you know you'll run across that quest artifact you've got to find, at some point. Then it's just a matter of returning it to the questmaster mentioned in the journal. I often feel that the rest is just fillers. I'm sure the PoE novel would've been great, but as a Hollywood script-reader once told me - a movie script can't be written as a novel. It has a different form. In a crpg, the graphics and music should provide description and atmosphere. Page up and page down with poetic descriptions can be tedious, imho. Also, the first IE games had all the contrasts - from soulful Kuldahar with the wonderful music, to the gloomy Vale of Shadows. Everything from salt, to sweet and pungent. PoE is a bit more grey. You DO remember the first level of Dragon's Eye in IWD. Do you remember level 4 of.. Od Nua, or whatever it's called? Or Cliaban Rilag? You DO remember the argument between Korgan and Shagbag on the roof of the Copper Coronet. Do you remember Eder's comment when you first met those.. Knights.. or whatever. It's all grey to me, for some reason.

 

Descs and conversations have to be shorter. Less poetry, more succinct. Let graphics and music be the atmosphere. The quest cutscenes with options are great. A storyteller voice there would be good. Don't waver on the tone when it comes to quests, area atmosphere and character interaction. The characters should be clearer and easier to get an impression of. Good? Bad? Sneaky? It doesn't mean they have to be simple. Korgan is good example. Voiceovers by people who have a voice - not that coder in office 3B down the hall. It's probably a budget thing. Avatars that aren't hunched forward, and a bit less spell-flash so I can actually see what's going on in combat.

 

Kthxbye..

 

Oh, and thank you for a great game.. gonna return to the Cliah Bliah Bulah dungeon now. Sounds very fancy, doesn't it? . How about Cairn of Shadows, or.. the Basilisk Caves? Too rpg mainstream?

 

 

J.

[Fenixp]

The Adra Statue was actually pretty impressive. And I definitely remember the level in Endless Paths with Vampires (Fampyrs, whatever) in the statue's hand, along with the quest which was pretty cool. And then there was the level structured as part of a hive of those ... Hive ... Creature ... Things. And then there was the experimental level with four elements where Kana found the tablet. ... I remember a lot from the game, surprisingly enough, I usually don't manage to do that so long after last playing it. Can't say whether or not it's more or less memorable than Icewind Dale, I played the game ages ago and don't remember much (I do want to replay it after I finish playing Baldur's Gate. I want to roll a Cleric/Ranger for added hilarity.)

 

As for writing, I personally enjoy games which are more wordy - Planescape Torment is by far my favourite Infinity Engine game. However, I can certainly appreciate minimalistic simplicity with which Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale approached a lot of situations, NPCs just telling you information you needed to finish a quest and only giving you options to reply if it was relevant enough. I hated it when I played BG back in 1999, I grew to like the approach quite a bit now.

[Mathuzzz]

As far as I know, the only game which shares most of its aspects with Pillars of Eternity is the original Baldur's Gate. Pillars is even more similar to Baldur's Gate than Baldur's Gate 2 was - BG2 stripped the free exploration and is the first game by Bioware which came up with the much more linear Bioware formula that they are using to this day. Thing is, I love sandbox games, and I prefer Baldur's Gate to the second game. 

I agree with you. I too prefer sandbox RPGs, that´s why I find BG as good as, if not even better than BG2. So the formula PoE used is OK with me. Sandbox would be better, but this is definitely better than BG2 or IWD etc...