Review anarchistica 2/5 · Apr 30, 2020
Really Bad Sequel
Divine Divinity was an interesting game with many bugs, a bad interface, lackluster combat and poor balance. Beyond Divinity not only doubles down on all of those, it adds a bunch of flaws as well.
In this game you control multiple characters. One of the biggest flaws of DD was the fact that dying meant you had to reload your …
Divine Divinity was an interesting game with many bugs, a bad interface, lackluster combat and poor balance. Beyond Divinity not only doubles down on all of those, it adds a bunch of flaws as well.
In this game you control multiple characters. One of the biggest flaws of DD was the fact that dying meant you had to reload your last manual save (no autosaves here). So logically speaking in this game you would allow your party members to resurrect each other - you know, like in Baldur's Gate. Yeah no. Your characters are linked and if one dies the other does too. So now you have to watch two health bars that were awkwardly placed somewhere in the top right of the screen (why??).
The interface got worse in other ways as well. Clicking on an item equips it and there is no shared stash. To move an item between characters you either have to go through a dropdown menu or clumsily drag it to the switching button. The game still lacks a "show all items" tab. Containers are still super-weird as well. Items aren't neatly arranged in boxes. Instead they exist in a void, sometimes on top of each other.
The skill system is completely generic which allows for many options. But just like your attributes there is almost no guidance as to what to go with. And i read the manual! There isn't even a skill tree, you pick subsequent options. At least you can respec this time but you can't throw people into the deep like that. Have a starting skill for each class, there - problem fixed.
Some other problems include the weird way the camera snaps back sometimes, the bizarre party controls (you select the entire party with ... F4?) and -of course- a lack of balance.
You start in the big bad's dungeon (like in Baldur's Gate 2) which is filled with scared, obedient imps (like in Baldur's Gate 2) and you have to fight your way out (you get the idea). Even on the easiest difficulty i ran into a ghost who was a level above me and damaged 30% of my character's HP per hit. I failed to heal fast enough, so i was thrown back to my last save again. The second time i just quit. I can't even imagine the pain of having to play this for 100-ish hours.
