Divinity Anthology – Rao Dao Zao

It’s always a nice feeling when you’re too drawn-in by a game to write blogs about it. But I’m sure you have the appropriate intestinal fortitude to stomach slightly longer gaps between entries than usual, dear reader…

It’s also a nice feeling when you can heap praise on something. There’s always that worry when you get a new game that you just might not like it, and that’s kind of awkward. Luckily, there have been no such issues with Divinity II, so let’s look at a few more things that I completely forgot to mention last time…

Continue reading “Blog 538: Divinity Discourses: More Divinity II” →

Gaming

Blog 537: Divinity Discourses: Divinity II

Feb 28, 2013May 16, 2015 Rao Dao Zao

So here we are at the main event. Divine Divinity and Beyond Divinity both had their ups, downs and horrendous lows, but they’re basically irrelevant now because Divinity II is a totally different game. Sure, there are a few attitudinal hangovers, and the continuation of the same story arc…

But Divinity II is not a slightly confused tactical/action RPG. Divinity II is a fully armed and operational 3rd person action RPG, and it is glorious.

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Gaming

Blog 536: Divinity Discources: Beyond Divinity

Feb 20, 2013May 16, 2015 Rao Dao Zao

I remarked that Divine Divinity (the daft title was forced on the team by the publishers — makes sense) suffered heavily from not knowing whether it was a tactical RPG or a hack ‘n’ slash, awkwardly straddling both spheres not particularly well.

Beyond Divinity cast the dice in favour of Baldur’s Gate and realised that, yes, it probably should have been a party RPG all along and added more characters. Even so, it didn’t quite manage to go all the way…

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Gaming

Blog 525: Divinity Discourses: More Divine Divinity

Dec 9, 2012May 16, 2015 Rao Dao Zao

I think most of my comments about Divine Divinity‘s difficulty stemmed from how badly I arsed up the introduction — right down to being unable to access a giant tomb full of nice level 1 and 2 skeletons that would have been ripe for my fledgling Survivor. But no, I had to completely miss the manuscript on the floor with the instructions on how to get in and give up. I got in at level 24 and… Well, didn’t get much useful experience out of it.

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Blog 524: Divinity Discourses: Divine Divinity

Dec 1, 2012May 16, 2015 Rao Dao Zao

As with all serials, one must start at the beginning, lest spoilers and rewinding technology spell disaster. Divine Divinity may have one of the most redundant names this side of an actual comedy, but the back of the box suggests that PC Gamer put it in their “top 100 games of all time” list.

I’ve probably not played many more than a hundred games in my life, so I suspect it will be markedly easier to get that dubious honour from me.

Continue reading “Blog 524: Divinity Discourses: Divine Divinity” →

Gaming

Blog 523: Divinity Discourses: Anthology (Introduction)

Nov 27, 2012May 16, 2015 Rao Dao Zao

The opportunity arose recently to get Divine Divinity, Beyond Divinity and Divinity 2 (its new Developer’s Cut edition) in one lovely little DRM-free box. I was only tangentially aware of two thirds of these games before, but with the phrase “Three RPGs of Epic Proportions” bandying around next to “DRM-free” they didn’t have to ask twice.

Continue reading “Blog 523: Divinity Discourses: Anthology (Introduction)” →