I have logged an unbelievable 68 hours on Divinity: Original Sin so far and we're still not done, although it's reasonable to assume we're in the home stretch. Although it's not a perfect game, it is one of the most satisfying and consistently engaging RPGs I've played in some time. My main issue with the game so far (aside from a number of glaringly annoying glitches) is that it's going to be over soon. I have ideas for what I'd do in a potential replay, but I am typically not the kind of person that replays games frequently--at least not anymore.
Just about everything that Divinity sets out to do, it does correctly. The battle system is strategic and frequently challenging. The controls are intuitive and reward very precise movement. This occasionally leads to frustration when an errant click leads to a mistaken movement instead of an attack, but this is less a fault of the game's mechanics than my own clumsiness. Elemental attacks have synergies and ant-synergies and frequently set off chain reactions. Enemies will resist, absorb, and be vulnerable to different kinds of attacks. A high level of Loremaster on at least one characer will assist greatly in determining your opponents' strengths and weaknesses. Your other option, of course, is trial and error!
The plot is not revolutionary or especially innovative, but it is well written and interesting. The two recruitable characters you encounter on your journey will expound in great lengths on the circumstances surrounding their situations--and a string of unique quests resolve these issues in certain ways. I really enjoy the personality and rich backstory of these characters, but I have to wonder how the game would have been different if other characters--all with their own unique quests and stories--had been recruitable as well. Baldur's Gate II was fantastic about this. Every one of the game's many characters had at least one unique quest associated with them.
It is perhaps disingenuous to focus on what Baldur's Gate did better than Divinity, when instead I should focus on what Divinity improves on from that formula. Although I enjoyed the battle system of Baldur's Gate for the most part, it's clear that it is a dated and often unsatisfying system. Divinity's strategic battle system is incredibly engaging and rewarding--and like many other areas of the game, allows for a significant amount of experimentation. Enemies can frequently be defeated in a number of different ways, just as the many quests in the game often have several different methods available for completion.
There is a cavernous tomb fairly late in the game in which four towering guardians reside. These guardians possess staggeringly high HP totals and are capable of destroying any of the player characters in a single blow. One would be forgiven for making the assumption that these guardians are meant to bar the player's way indefinitely--unless a certain quest unlocks an alternate method of defeating them. This is true to a certain extent, but it is definitely not the only way to progress. Each of these guardians is affiliated with a different element and their attacks deal only damage of that element. If the player character chooses to tank these guardians with elemental minions that absorb the elements, the fight becomes a simple exercise in chipping away at their HP totals and resummoning minions.
Alternatively, you can find a tome that teaches you to speak the guardians' language and then reason with them to get through. For me, violence is often the superior solution. With such a satisfying battle system, I feel I can hardly be blamed.
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