My collected criticism on Pillars of Eternity (very minor spoilers)

[IHaveHugeNick]

Do you even have to ask? The branch with drowning Ralphie changed my life.

Seriously though, first there's Highpool and that other place, then there's nuclear monks. In Damonta you can leave the whole town to die and they actually do, instead of waiting there to be saved for eternity. All that stuff is still regional but its certainly not small.

Also, when you side with a faction it actually makes an impact on the region. Defiance Bay is a 10h quest chain and all you get out of it, is a 15-minute side quest. And no matter who you side with, they still send you to Duke's trial to board the Railroad Plot Express to Act 3.

 

[Brotherman Bill]

You can enable in options an option to display what reputation you get from each sentence ... So there's a [Stoic], [Honest], [Diplomatic] etc behind each sentence.

The problem is that they make absolutely no sense, particularly for the stoic one. Good idea but bad execution

 

[Morkar Left]

I wouldn't mind some short personal opinion from both of you at the end of the review.

The whole review will be their fucking personal opinion.

The point is that I know they are "professional" enough to review the game in an objective manner - hence their ability to write one review despite having different approaches to the game. A short personal opinion would allow to break these boundaries and they could just "talk out of their ass" in that paragraph about what they personally value or dislike the most about the game.

 

[hiver]

Do you even have to ask? The branch with drowning Ralphie changed my life.

Indubitably.

Seriously though, first there's Highpool and that other place,

Zero consequences. You get the zombie places, the ... bandits? base to clean up and nothing else. Its a fake choice with no consequences.
Not to mention how fucking stupid and convoluted and incoherent eahc of those places are, and the whole setup of fucking newbies who arent even rangers yet running around dealing with that while the whole citadel of high level rangers does absolutely nothing.

then there's nuclear monks.

There are, yes. And then there are not. Regardless of whatever the fuck you do and which of the three switches "choices" in the Silo17 you choose to press.
Amazing isnt it? Such branching! into nothingness!

In Damonta you can leave the whole town to die and they actually do, instead of waiting there to be saved for eternity.

Why the fuck would you leave them to die?
And does it matter they they died or didnt ?

All that stuff is still regional but its certainly not small.

Its not a branching plot, just some areas where you can kill everyone or do something else thats also stupid.

They dont branch into anything, except nothing.

Also, when you side with a faction it actually makes an impact on the region.

whoowhat?

I wouldn't mind some short personal opinion from both of you at the end of the review.

The whole review will be their fucking personal opinion.

The point is that I know they are "professional" enough to review the game in an objective manner -

rofl

- hence their ability to write one review despite having different approaches to the game. A short personal opinion would allow to break this boundaries and they could just "talk out of their ass" in that paragraph about what they personally value or dislike the most about the game.

 

[Shevek]

I am pretty sure (from their posts) that their views are fairly aligned on the game's strengths and weaknesses. The difference is that they each just value different elements in different degrees. Since there is no numerical score, I doubt that separate conclusions are necessary.

 

[Whisper]

Spell selection for mage is horrible.

A lot of crap buffs like "+10 defence for 15 seconds" spells.


At same time, MOST of cypher spells are useful. Very good AoE dmg spells (with RAW dmg which ignores armor of enemies), best CC spells, good buffing spells.

 

[Whisper]

Also BG had few choices. Much much less then in PoE.

Also race and class hardly mattered anywhere in dialogues.

I dont know why cult of BG exits. Pretty mediocre game, with limited CC, average combats.

 

[Xeon]

I saw a lot of Cipher and probably 1 or 2 Monk class check in dialogue, Ciphers also can have an impact on at least one quest if you lack a companion. Haven't seen any race and there is not much reaction to Godlikes.

 

[LizardWizard]

Spell selection for mage is horrible.

A lot of crap buffs like "+10 defence for 15 seconds" spells.


At same time, MOST of cypher spells are useful. Very good AoE dmg spells (with RAW dmg which ignores armor of enemies), best CC spells, good buffing spells.

Actually Wizards have strong spells.. it's just most people have no idea how to build them. They immediately dismiss the class because they can fighter/mage/theif/goku the game.

 

[Roguey]

How is the current mess improvement over a scale of opposites? Look, if you have a reputation of someone who lies just as much as telling the truth, you do not in fact have an honest reputation. Nobody is going say, well this man is honest, I can trust he is telling the truth when he says god told him to hide our sacred text. Why the fuck would they?! This system only ends up hurting the game by allowing you access to almost every dialogue option. I honestly thought that this was a bug or an oversight the first time I noticed it.

Getting 4 ranks in all the dispositions in a way that gives you all the reactions to them seems like it'd require an awful lot of prescience and metagaming to me.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Rock Paper Shotgun has just put out a good piece about how the whole reputation system works under the hood.

And by good, I mean they basically claimed its an extremely complex system , without giving any actual details.

 

[Ninjerk]

Rock Paper Shotgun has just put out a good piece about how the whole reputation system works under the hood.

And by good, I mean they basically claimed its an extremely complex system , without giving any actual details.

According to the hilariously outdated official wiki, you get a/multiple point(s) when you give a response aligned with a disposition (that are hidden from you, I believe, though I've only been running expert lately) and there are increasingly greater thresholds for each disposition to reach the next level.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Zero consequences. You get the zombie places, the ... bandits? base to clean up and nothing else. Its a fake choice with no consequences.

Transforming an entire playfield is a zero consequence? So how would you describe 3 people leaving enemy party in the Twin Elms, -3000 consequence?

There are, yes. And then there are not. Regardless of whatever the fuck you do and which of the three switches "choices" in the Silo17 you choose to press.
Amazing isnt it? Such branching! into nothingness!

Yup. Its a 10 hour quest chain that interconnects 3 large areas and has a possibility of nuking an area bigger then the size of entire Defiance Bay.

I'd say that's quite a step up from Pillars occasionally offering you two extra lines of dialogue, based on mean things you've said to a hobo 5 hours earlier and already forgotten about the whole thing.

Why the fuck would you leave them to die?

Some of them were cow farmers, how could I not? Cows are mean people.

 

[hiver]

What fucking "transforming the playing field" ?
What the fuck are you talkiing about? You always get the exact same fucking consequences regardless of who you choose to save.

Yup. Its a 10 hour quest chain that interconnects 3 large areas and has a possibility of nuking an area bigger then the size of entire Defiance Bay.

You dont nuke shit. The game nukes it for you .- regardles of what you do!

The area disappears, its not in the game anymore, thats not fucking branching, its removal of content.

Some of them were cow farmers, how could I not? Cows are mean people.

You are an idiot. Or, let me rephrase that, you call a pointless completely illogical and stupid option that does nothing but erases one location - with no further consequences or effect on anything else - branching content that is i guess good and preferred.

 

[Bio Force Ape]

Reddit hates you guys.

 

[Sothpaw]

Reddit hates you guys.

Raepman aka David Gaider.

 

[KK1001]

The game suffers from a lack of good dungeons too.

If I recall correctly there's:
Cilant Lis (ruins; way too short)
Temple of Eothas (ruined temple; mostly filled with boring shades and the quest tie-in isn't interesting)
Raedric's Hold (castle; pretty good overall)
Od Nua (ruins; solid, but final boss pretty disappointing)
Lle A Rhemen (ruined tomb; okay but again, too short)
Dyrford Ruins (temple; solid)
Cliaban Rilag (ruins; too short and a weak payoff)
Breith Eaman (ruins with big bad and ancient machine; too short for a final area)

The number is fine, but there's a huge lack of variety and content. A lot of the quests in the game have nothing to do with you going into these places. I can't recall any memorable bosses either. They're mostly empty places filled with enemies waiting just out of sight.

 

[Sensuki]

Dyrford Ruins (temple; solid)

 

[AN4RCHID]

The game suffers from a lack of good dungeons too.

If I recall correctly there's:
Cilant Lis (ruins; way too short)
Temple of Eothas (ruined temple; mostly filled with boring shades and the quest tie-in isn't interesting)
Raedric's Hold (castle; pretty good overall)
Od Nua (ruins; solid, but final boss pretty disappointing)
Lle A Rhemen (ruined tomb; okay but again, too short)
Dyrford Ruins (temple; solid)
Cliaban Rilag (ruins; too short and a weak payoff)
Breith Eaman (ruins with big bad and ancient machine; too short for a final area)

The number is fine, but there's a huge lack of variety and content. A lot of the quests in the game have nothing to do with you going into these places. I can't recall any memorable bosses either. They're mostly empty places filled with enemies waiting just out of sight.

There's also the Catacombs and Teir Nowneth, and some mini-dungeons: Sea Cave, Temple of Magran, Light House, Gallawain's Maw, and Noonfrost.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Reddit hates you guys.

Ha.

Believe it or not , most people there actually fully agreed with OP's review, including yours truly. I liked it so much I ended up making this account.

 

[KK1001]

Catacombs doesn't qualify. It's like 4 rooms and some monsters. I'll grant you Teir Nowneth and Heritage Hill together.

I think the point still stands. They'd be wise to just embrace BG2 and cut out the wilderness areas and center quests and combat in and around cities and dungeons.

Poor itemization, boring encounters, and the lack of interesting locations or dungeons really hurt the game.

 

[Ellef]

The game suffers from a lack of good dungeons too.

Raedric's Hold (castle; pretty good overall)

This one disappointed me the most. I was geared up for the biggest dungeon yet, and the guy is 2 rooms away from the front door.

 

[AN4RCHID]

Catacombs doesn't qualify. It's like 4 rooms and some monsters. I'll grant you Teir Nowneth and Heritage Hill together.

wut. It's two large floors and and there's a couple optional quests down there. Bigger than Cilant Lis and Lle A Rhemen by a good bit.

 

[Ninjerk]

The game suffers from a lack of good dungeons too.

Raedric's Hold (castle; pretty good overall)

This one disappointed me the most. I was geared up for the biggest dungeon yet, and the guy is 2 rooms away from the front door.

He's a feudal lord with more soldiers and priests than peasants. How big is it supposed to be?

 

[Shadenuat]

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/76595-issues-as-according-to-me-minor-spoilers/#entry1647101

CON: ±1 Endurance, ±3% Endurance, ±2% Armour Recovery Penalty

Fantastic idea how did Obsidian not think of that

Overall good post even if I don't agree with everything 99%