By Jim Rossignol on December 24th, 2010 at 12:27 am.
Belgian fantasy role-playing epic Divinity 2: The Dragon Knight Saga has a demo version! Just in time for you to turn your back on your family over the Winter holidays and club some goblins to death in the privacy of your game room/office/laptop parlour. The 2gb demo is the first valley of the game, which is a fairly hefty chunk of play, I think. And the game has, of course, been heavily overhauled since its original release last year, both adding new content and new visuals. And it was fairly pretty to start with, if a little grindy.
Also, in the full game, you can build an “abomination” to fight for you, which can’t be bad.
24/12/2010 at 00:35 Dominic White says:
Dragon Knight Saga is probably my biggest RPG surprise of the year. It’s just good – really good. No grind, either – apparently one of the biggest changes in the redux version is they replaced the entire level system, instead making it more an indication of progress, rather than what you need numerically to survive fights.
24/12/2010 at 00:37 Jim Rossignol says:
Probably worth taking a look at, then. It was the level structure that killed it for me the first time around.
24/12/2010 at 00:51 HexagonalBolts says:
Can anyone else verify that the new version is fantastical before I buy it?
24/12/2010 at 01:05 Basilicus says:
I’m pretty sure I’m just waiting on a good sale to snap it up. I’d like to second the request that someone confirm its awesomeness, however. I know it’s not quite the same beast as Oblivion/Gothic/Risen, but how does it compare for one who enjoyed those games?
24/12/2010 at 01:06 Dominic White says:
Yeah, I went into a whole bunch of areas in DKS horribly under-levelled, and while tough, you get a huge XP multiplier for killing stuff above your level, so the skill points to deal with the threats come easily.
One of the writers over at SomethingAwful seems to have had a similar experience to me – just kinda checked the game out knowing almost nothing about it, and loved it:
http://www.somethingawful.com/d/video-game-article/dragon-knight-saga.php
24/12/2010 at 01:13 Jimbo says:
I didn’t play the original release so I can’t really comment on the improvements, but I played through Dragon Knight Saga and liked it a lot. Sadly, most of the interesting stuff comes after the area in the demo. I think it’s worth sticking with if you can handle a slowish start.
Two Worlds 2 is just a much better game all round though, so if you have the option I’d go for that instead.
24/12/2010 at 01:24 HexagonalBolts says:
I remember hearing nothing but ‘meh’ about the original
Edit:
And Jimbo, how do you know, it hasn’t even been released yet…?
24/12/2010 at 01:42 UW says:
Nah, it’s been out for well over a month. There’s just a delay on the demo, it seems.
24/12/2010 at 02:58 Jimbo says:
Two Worlds 2 came out in Europe in November. I had it pre-ordered from CoolShop and it showed up a couple weeks ago.
I suspect it’s gonna be one of those games that Europe likes and America doesn’t. It’s a massive step up in quality over Two Worlds 1, but still too many rough edges for it to review well in America I think (enemies constantly trying to walk through and getting stuck on level geometry, kinda clunky controls, that sort of thing).
The things it does well though -of which there are many- just make it a joy to play through. It isn’t doing anything worthwhile or important at all, it’s just totally ridiculous and awesome. I don’t usually like magic in games (because magic is dumb), but here they’ve made it a science and it is absolutely the star of the show. At one point I was running across the Savannah (and the whole game looks stunning btw) and stopped simply to shoot a Rhino with a fireball, which then exploded and made a load of anvils fall on its head. Brilliant.
24/12/2010 at 08:46 Pemptus says:
Two Worlds 2 looks very good at first glance, and continues to do so for a while after that. After I got accustomed to its mechanics and stopped finding blasting the same respawning rhinos with anvils “awesome”, though, I’ve found that the environments are largely empty and featureless, dungeons bland and uninspired, and (at least melee) combat pretty shallow and easy. Also, the heavily advertised crafting system is shallow, imbalanced and kind of a pain to use.
It can look pretty (if you get rid of the overwhelming bloom with a console command, at least), and running around feels pretty good. Too bad the quests are most of the time yawnsworthy, the voice-acting sub-par and the story meh. Oh yes, and the argument that “it’s a massive step-up from Two Worlds 1″ is no argument at all, as the first one was a mostly unplayable mess.
Divininty 2 wins in all aspects for me, except for the graphics. But then I don’t really find prettier = better.
24/12/2010 at 10:40 Archonsod says:
Anvils you say? I was put off getting Two Worlds 2 when it sounded like the devs were taking it far too seriously this time.
24/12/2010 at 10:56 SwiftRanger says:
The Dragon Knight Sage is the RPG surprise of the year, period. It’s absurdly decent stuff, and that’s coming from a non-chauvinistic Belgian. It also uses Gamebryo but never freeze crashes on me (unlike Oblivion/Fallout 3) which is good.
24/12/2010 at 12:52 Dominic White says:
To elaborate on the level thing a bit, I read that in the original version, it applied a flat multiplier to all your stats based on the difference of level between you and the enemy. Essentially, you could barely hurt enemies over your level, and enemies below you could do almost no damage in return. MMO style, basically.
They ditched that. You can do stuff underlevelled without hassle now, although it’s not easy, and instead of punishing you, you get a massive XP boost for fighting tougher enemies, easily levelling you equivalently to whatever sidequests you skipped. Everyone seems to love the change.
Also means that you can still be hurt by low-level enemies, especially if they’re numerous.
24/12/2010 at 14:27 Jimbo says:
Yeah the levelling in DKS seemed fine for the most part. The difficulty is kinda all over the place at times, but I only got to one spot I couldn’t game my way past and that was mostly because I didn’t have my ‘creature’ at that point. The game should really do a better job of guiding you towards getting that thing.
I did enjoy the tone of DKS – it’s all very lighthearted, almost pantomime at times.
24/12/2010 at 21:16 rhizo says:
Got the pack when it was on sale in steam. There is a lot of content in these games. It’s just too bad it feels a bit second rate in places. Also, having been dropped into the story seemingly in the middle of things the plot is not exactly immersive. Made it as far as the proper “dragon parts” but got tired of running around doing random crap and fighting battles that I didn’t really care about at all. Seems a bit odd that there was very little in terms of getting new players to know about the lore in the beginning. Running around smashing buttons without any vested interest in the world gets boring very quickly.
24/12/2010 at 22:52 Dominic White says:
Funny, I found being dropped in the middle of a world where tons of stuff is already happening to be far more interesting. It actually made me seek out all the various lore books in-game to read, and they do fill in a lot of the blanks.
Also, READ THE MANUAL. A lot of the backstory is covered in there.
25/12/2010 at 00:20 Tagert says:
You know, I just went to check out Two Worlds 2 on their website (http://www.twoworlds2.com/) and I have to say…
Those dragons are in compromising positions with whatever they’re holding.
26/12/2010 at 22:04 Chaz says:
Well I found it a lot better than the first demo, so it’s definately going on my to buy list.
24/12/2010 at 00:41 Eclipse says:
awesomesauce, i’ll try to give it a spin before those crazy deals end
24/12/2010 at 01:01 dadioflex says:
It’s a third off on Steam right now (with the original version still available and full price – not confusing at all) but I’m hoping there’ll be an even better one day deal on it before the Steam sale ends.
I have the unexpanded game and was scratching the surface with about twenty hours play under my belt when a drive crash took out my saves. Waiting for a good price to get in on the expanded version.
24/12/2010 at 13:28 Eclipse says:
I’m secretly waiting for a day only sale too. How many days of sales we have left?
24/12/2010 at 01:00 ado says:
Looks interesting enough. I’ll give the demo a spin.
24/12/2010 at 01:08 Navagon says:
Any word on the epic patch for Divinity 2?
24/12/2010 at 01:25 HexagonalBolts says:
lol
24/12/2010 at 01:27 Archonsod says:
I like it, but then I liked it prior to the expansion.
24/12/2010 at 01:36 Sarkhan Lol says:
Did they give the game a new ending? Because holy damn it needs one.
24/12/2010 at 02:57 Malawi Frontier Guard says:
Nope.
Ah, the joys of being called a pet and spending eternity imprisoned.
24/12/2010 at 06:30 BrendanJB says:
….um, thanks a lot.
*facepalm*
24/12/2010 at 07:45 Turin Turambar says:
Yes, the expansion is the new ending.
24/12/2010 at 11:43 65 says:
“Nope.
Ah, the joys of being called a pet and spending eternity imprisoned.”
Well, fuck you too.
24/12/2010 at 15:01 Dominic White says:
The expansion picks up immediately from the cliffhanger at the end of the main campaign, and continues to a very satisfactory conclusion.
24/12/2010 at 15:10 Malawi Frontier Guard says:
Well, yeah. I guess that counts as a new ending. I’m not quite there yet.
24/12/2010 at 02:42 Archonsod says:
The expansion continues the story, so yes.
24/12/2010 at 03:58 DigitalSignalX says:
A nice part of the fully patched DKS is that the expansion is seamless, so there is no “end” you just transition into the next area and mission essentially. I had no idea I’d ended the first game (boss fight was ridiculously easy because I’d explored and XP’d every facet of the game prior) till the credits started to roll. I accidentally clicked and boom loaded into the cut-scene for expansion and continued to play. Which is both cool and annoying because I still had a quest open to explore a shipwreck back on the home island that got canceled.
Another plus for this game is that it scales (no pun) well for lower end game rigs, even well below minimum spec.
(SPOILER)The final plus, you get to turn into a dragon and fly around and shoot stuff like a flight sim, which is a first AFAIK for any RPG. So.. win win. A must play IMO.
24/12/2010 at 04:21 thebigJ_A says:
When does this come out in the US? I rented the original version from Gamefly. I like it, but not quite enough to finish it. I’d like to give it a try again, but I’m not going to buy it outright. If it’s better, I’ll pay to keep it.
24/12/2010 at 14:14 scottossington says:
I dont know if the US is on a different schedule then the Canada, but i have been playing it since November. But that is the PC version, not sure about this Xbox thing you are talking about.
24/12/2010 at 06:11 Paul says:
Larian are awesome. Bought this on Impulse, cannot wait to get into it.
24/12/2010 at 06:27 BlackKraken says:
Good to see the new registration for comments has done its job :(
24/12/2010 at 06:29 BlackKraken says:
I loved the original divinity 2, a game thats first area makes it seem like a bad game but picks up dramatically later on and becomes a lot of fun. Not convinced the changes (and expansion) are enough to warrant buying it again though.
Also; Two Worlds 2 is out? WHY WAS I NOT INFORMED? Where would one purchase this?
24/12/2010 at 10:44 Archonsod says:
You can get the expansion separately if you bought it anywhere but Steam from the look of things.
24/12/2010 at 07:52 MattM says:
On thing I read about in the forums for this game is that it is hard coded to be capped at 30 fps. This is a pretty big annoyance for me, but I heard that they release a patch to increase it to 60 (still a little annoying but not a deal breaker). Does anyone know if they did?
24/12/2010 at 08:21 Pemptus says:
From what I’ve read after the patch(es) you can set the cap to whatever you like in a config file and/or in-game menu.
24/12/2010 at 08:31 Paul says:
exactly, you can set the cap yourself. 40 seems decent compromise in fluidity and consistency.
24/12/2010 at 10:50 Dominic White says:
Yeah, I had three minor grumbles about the game: The 30fps cap, a lack of a quick ‘loot all’, hotkey, and one area where enemies would just stand around dumbly and get killed. All three fixed in the first patch.
25/12/2010 at 08:21 MattM says:
Cool, thanks!
24/12/2010 at 09:27 dhruin says:
For mine, DKS is much better than Two Worlds II and well worth a look. Exploration is really rewarded, the areas are much more interesting and the quests often have choices and different approaches. I found 2W2 like an MMO – big areas with random spawns to farm and empty location that suddenly spawn content when you get the quest.
A US publisher is just about to get signed – should get announced in early January. Ego Draconis -> DKS mega patch is in the queue but they are still getting through the other updates they have to get out.
24/12/2010 at 09:29 edwardoka says:
Am I the only one who noticed that the screenshot for this article appears to be… suggestive?
24/12/2010 at 09:52 Rinox says:
Larian are one of the few companies that make games with interesting/funny dialogues anymore. So I’m picking this up.
24/12/2010 at 10:21 Dominic White says:
Yeah, while the gameplay is fun, the absolute best thing is probably the dialogue. it’s positively python-esque in places, and even if you’re playing a good-guy, you can be an enormously sassy, smartarse hero, which is great.
Larian are also pretty humble. Read an interview about DKS a while back, and they openly admitted that some design decisions were really dumb, the cliffhanger ending was because they ran out of money, and generally seemed to be pretty apologetic about the state of the original release. So they (against any standard industry logic) went and put it back into active development for a year. Apparently a gamble – if DKS hadn’t sold decently, they’d have had to shut down.
24/12/2010 at 14:37 Eschatos says:
Excellent game, definitely worth buying.
24/12/2010 at 14:41 suibhne says:
Whoa, I’m glad to see all the fondness for DKS after the multifarious recriminations lobbed at the base game. Here’s hoping Steam puts it up there in a Daily Deal. There can’t be that many RPGs to put on sale, and they do seem to like having a balance of genres on most days, so maybe….
24/12/2010 at 20:01 FreezerBag says:
I downloaded the file at the link and it was borked.
This link from the developer seems better: http://www.larian.com/dks_demo.php
However I should warn you they have their own downloader client. Seems reasonably quick though.
25/12/2010 at 01:23 Torgen says:
Downloaded the demo, and am going to play this tomorrow after a lazy Christmas breakfast of ham and cheese omelettes and bacon. (Advantages of not having kids! )
25/12/2010 at 06:43 Demiath says:
I’m impressed by the massive performance gains; I don’t have a gaming rig as such and would still have to play the Microbox version, but the fact that the game (unlike the original Ego Draconis) is at all playable even on my Bootcamped iMac says something about the improvement made by Larian Studios in this, eh, Director’s Hack version…
25/12/2010 at 15:32 Johnny TooBad says:
I thought Ego Draconis was the most beautiful game I had played in a long time, and the most fun since Bioshock 2. Ego Draconis ran smoothly on my rig (3 ghz dual core and GeForce 9800 or something) while Two Worlds 2 looked and ran like shiat, with textures flashing. Good thing about Two Worlds 2 was the custom spell/magic card system. Good thing about Ego Draconis, aside from the gorgeous artwork and kewl looking magic weapons, was the mobility of the character: run, jump, forward/back/side flip. Lots of dodging for my weak-constitutioned mage. One fun thing to do was to front flip off a clip and then morph into dragon and fly away.
27/12/2010 at 20:07 Ezhar says:
Demo good, crave for more, but should finish Two Worlds 2 first… argh, the guilt.
27/12/2010 at 23:03 Nick says:
Enjoying it so far, its quite amusing too. It scored points for a Blackadder reference as well.
29/12/2010 at 00:47 mipearson says:
Bought this on the Steams for $26. It’s definitely scratching my Witcher-2-isn’t-here-yet-and-I’m-bored-of-Cataclysm-already itch.
It’s got rough edges, sure, but as somebody who grew up on CRPGs in the 90′s I find them endearing.