Divinity: Original Sin II - The Zelda of Roleplaying Games
 

Techquila is stating that Divinity: Original Sin II is to Western RPGs what Zelda is to JRPGs and then describes why the author feels it is one of the best RPGs.

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Seriously?
If that's one of the best if not *the* best japanese game, then all japanese games are plain garbage.
Calling DOS2 western Zelda is a plain insult. I wish I noticed that article first as it'd instantly go in bs of the week.

But only for Zelda part, because DOS2 is one of the best RPGs out there - you don't have to waste time on cooking, trashmobs don't respawn, Ubisoft towers doesn't exist in it and your sword won't break after only 3 hits.

I quite agree with you but the critics say otherwise

It's a confusing piece because he doesn't even specify which game he's talking about.

Is he talking about the original TLoZ, the most recent one, or the entire series?

Seems to me the only way the author is comparing DOSII to Zelda is in terms of popularity, not any mechanics. Zelda's a game (series) with broad base of appeal and so is DOS2. It is often debated whether Zelda games should even be considered an RPG: For instance, there's only one stat: Hearts (and you don't even increase your hearts by "leveling up" but rather by finding pieces). Any other improvement to your character comes from newly acquired equipment and again there's no stats to improve. Does that sound like an RPG to you?

Anyway, I think Zelda is overrated series. Not bad at all when you're a kid, but they all start to feel the same after however many games it's been; the basic formula just hasn't changed much. However, I also found Divinity Original Sin to be very overrated. Granted I have not played the second one and some people here are saying the sequel is an improvement in many ways, but I'm just not willing to drop $45 to find out.

Whatever point the author hoped to make was lost in:
- The lack of specificity about the Zelda franchise
- The lack of a clear narrative
- Appalingly bad writing

Look - like them or not, some of the Zelda games rank up there as some of the great games of all time. Ocarina of Time, for example, is stunningly good and holds up today as ported to the 3DS. But there are plenty of mediocre entries as well.

Regardless, I would much rather play *any* of the Divinity games, because they are totally my jam. :)

In terms of story and characters, DOSII is an improvement over the original DOS. In terms of gameplay…not so much. While i am not a big fan of the Codex, their review pointed quite a few things that are wrong in terms of gameplay.

DOS series are not bad, but they are a wee bit bland, with no outstanding moments in the story, nor memorable characters. What it makes it worse is the fact that you could probably find memorable characters and moments in the older games of the series, but not in those recent games…

I got all the way to the end battle in the first game and completely lost interest. Never finished it. I wanted to like it so badly, but it just didn't do it for me. I can, however, understand why others like it so much. It certainly is well made.

The loot system sums up everything I hated about Original Sin. I just got tired of the need to constantly upgrade my equipment every level or two. Finding and buying more loot essentially IS the game. Boring. I have a character in Pillars of Eternity who kept the same armor for almost the entire game. It was unique and it made sense for the character to wear it. It had meaning to it. Everything you pick up in D:OS is essentially garbage two levels later.

Anyway, just my opinion. I don't care much for Diablo, either.

Thanks for pointing it out. I had to write this in a bit of a hurry. The main objective was to promote it among console gamers who are quite ignorant of Larian's games. The only reason I mentioned Zelda is cos everyone knows about it and the franchise always tends to get insanely high ratings. It's just a comparison of how enjoyable the game really is. Zelda seemed like an ideal match since it's a nintendo exclusive while DOSII was a timed PC exclusive. Anyway thanks for pointing it out. in the future, I'll be sure to be more careful and explain everything in detail

Came here to bash Zelda as the utter crap it is. Saw plenty of folks beat me to it! Leaves happy.

I'm not reading something what that stupid a title :)

Personally I don't get the comparison at all, but that could be just my interpretation. I find these two not to be apples and oranges, but more like red meat versus salad.

For the last time people, The main objective was to promote it among console gamers who are quite ignorant of Larian's games. The only reason I mentioned Zelda is cos everyone knows about it and the franchise always tends to get insanely high ratings. It's just a comparison of how enjoyable the game really is. Zelda seemed like an ideal match since it's a nintendo exclusive while DOSII was a timed PC exclusive. Anyway thanks for pointing it out. in the future, I'll be sure to be more careful and explain everything in detail. Sigh, whatever. I'll be more careful with titles from here on out

The Legend of Zelda: Brrath of the Wild is an absolute modern classic. Wise developers did well to play it and see how the bar is raised.

It's the distilled essence of gameplay, of fun, delivered in an innovative coating, as only Nintendo is capable of doing.

No wonder the rave reviews it got from critics and players, being considered by many as a staple, as one of, if not the best game ever made.

That said, it's pointless to compare it with Divine Divinity. Apples and oranges.

During more than 30 years of gaming, I'm seldon surprised by a new game. Fortunately, CD Projekt and Nintendo magane to save the day and innovate in a pretty stale market.

I agree in that *some* Zelda games were great (to me). Out of the entire series though (including gameboy spinoffs), the Zelda games I enjoyed and completed are few coming in at just 3 (finished original Zelda, Zelda 3 (link to the past), and Windwaker (which I personally enjoyed though that game seems hated among series fans). Finished about 50% of Ocarina and Twilight Princess before getting bored for whatever reason. The rest I bought and started but quickly decided they weren't fun. I haven't bought Breath of the Wild as I do not have a Nintendo Switch (waiting to see if they are in fact repeating the same not-enough-games failure they had with the Wii U or not… game releases for Switch continue to be in "stall mode" so we'll see).

The article is really not very good because it is somewhat confusing and does not state which Zelda games it's talking about. Just came here to say that the Zelda franchise is pretty good. A Link to the Past, from the SNES, is one of the best games of its genre and Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask are still great even if you guys disliked the latest entry in the series, which was somewhat divisive even with long-time fans, although it had a wide mass appeal.

I had a similar experience. I got all the way to the City of Arx and just lost interest. I really didn't feel like exploring a large city as the stage for the end of the game - a fairly subjective reason I admit.

I love Larian as a company and really enjoyed Divine Divinity and to a lesser extent, Divinity 2 (the super finished version I forget what they called it).

I like the game engine they've come up with. But where they lose me with the Original Sin series is where they emphasized and de-emphasized. They spent a huge amount of time developing and refining tactical combat. Creating bajillions of objects most of which are uninteresting and useless. A crafting system that really doesn't need to be there but if it's going to be there, should provide a lot more useful things.

I was hoping the Original Sin series would surpass the world simulation aspects of Ultima 7. A continuous world without "maps" or "zones" would help a a lot… I know this has to do with limitations of console memory but still. Obviously, day/night cycles where time of day impacts NPC behaviors, danger levels, and perhaps other creative things. A real weather system that impacts the game the way day/night cycles might.

I enjoyed the custom characters of D:OS2 but this idea should be extended to the game world itself. The land of Britannia in the ultima series was as much a character as any NPC. Named dungeons, each steeped in lore, with NPCs providing information about their "danger levels" as just one example.

I have enjoyed the original sin games and I'm very happy that Larian is out there making games. It's just that the focus of the original sin games went in a bit of a different direction from Divine Divinity, which i consider their best game so far.

I agree with your criticism of DOS and DOS2.

To me, their games never really felt "authentic" - like, say, Ultima or Gothic. The engines are great and flexible - but they don't seem to put enough effort into the setting or the ambience.

I also agree they tend to go overboard with certain systems - and it's definitely true that the crafting system in DOS is completely superfluous. Much of the loot system is also boring and flawed - and the character system is less interesting than it seems like, at first.

I really dislike the over-emphasis on the elemental/magical effects during combat in DOS1 - where you almost never get to just be really tactical and smart, because that would get you killed through some stupid explosion that you unfortunately missed. It's almost like they encourage you to game the system, rather than be tactical. In DOS2 - it was less pronounced - but still an issue more often than not.

Which is sad, because the heart of the combat system is truly excellent - and I would have enjoyed it much more with a more straightforward approach.

But, what I do admire - and greatly so - are the interaction and simulation aspects of the world.

That said, the primary reason I'm a huge fan of DOS is the coop multiplayer and just how far they went making that work so well - and with such flexibility.

As for the Zelda games, I don't feel like I've played them enough to have a really informed opinion.

I think I understand why people like them - but they don't seem like immersive games to me. They seem more like a collection of toys and mini-games - where they cram as much "fun and cute" stuff into the world as they can, and you're supposed to just have a lot of silly fun.

Which is probably great for a lot of people - but absolutely not the way I enjoy games for the most part.

The article shows another effect of the crowdfunded scene: people try to push products up.

The Zelda franchise has many classics, games that innovate and set milestones.

The last Zelda is one of them, it innovates by linking heavy gameplay to the exploration of an open world.

DOS2 is gameplay light, best thing to happen in here is wax hours over going for a 67 pc chance against a 68 pc chance.

JRPGS stories are light hearted. After all, DOS2 is the zelda of roleplaying games.

I could be mistaken but in my view none of the Larian games attempt to 'authentic' like a Gothic. When I first played Gothic (I didn't get very far and never picked it up again); it felt authentic to the point of being annoying. I never played Ultimate - it was pretty much before my time - or at least before I started playing rpg and by the time I thought about trying it I felt it was garbage (I know it is very popular with a lot of people but when I tried to play it in a modern world it felt very cumbersome and poorly designed ui - even compare to m&m games which I played around 2003).

Yeah, I've played all the Zelda games excluding the handheld titles, and they're very hit or miss imo.

Unlike the majority, I actually think Ocarina of Time is overrated. I liked Windwaker and Twilight Princess, but I think the latter is better. Major's Mask is probably my least favorite of all of them. I've only played about 5-6 hours of BoTW so far, but I really like what I've seen, and I'm looking forward to getting back to it.

I have fond memories of the NES-SNES Zeldas, but I don't think they're something I could ever replay at this point.

Always thought it was a highly overrated game.

Windwaker seemed disliked by many because of the cell shading art direction. I was just fine with it though. Windwaker was a fun world to explore and discover things… and not just pretty scenery but useful and/or interesting things. Played it again remastered for the Wii U with my two boys 9 and 12 and we had a blast (I mostly watched but helped them past parts they found difficult).

For me, my least favorite would have to b Zelda 2. I really hated how some of the gameplay was top down and some of it was side scrolling. That was such a bizzare design decision to me. In fact, to this day I think it's bizarre. Dear lord God, no, just no.

Interesting, I'm in the same place. I probably played a bit less than 5-6 hours but I liked what I saw. The universe has decided that I may not get into that game just yet, rather, the universe has decided that I must wrestle with all kinds of life demands right now. As soon as the universe decides it's time I can play, I will.

Same here. I've tried a few times over the decades to replay some of the early games, particularly the first NES zelda game and the third (Link to the Past for SNES), but just couldn't muster enough interest for them anymore.

Divinity: Original Sin is the game that turned me off 'turn based combat' games for life!

I absolutely loved the original Divine Divinity games. But no matter how hard I tried, I hated the combat in Divinity: Original Sin so much that I found the game unplayable.

It has the worst combat system of any game I've ever played. I honestly don't know how people manage to play this game.

I will NEVER EVER again play any game that uses turn based combat. I've learned my lesson!

Oh wow, in contrast, I found the combat system in Divinity Original Sin to be awesome!

I love turn-based combat, and this was a great example of doing it right. So much fun and different 'tricks' and so on that is allowed for, the rogue is one of my favorite characters, just based on their abilities in the game. And really powerful magic spells for the wizard types, as it should be, spells that have a drastic and heavily weighted impact and overall effect in how the combat goes. I have won tough battles after losing all my characters with only my wizard left, and then his most powerful spells finally get refreshed, and he can win the battle solo, at that point. With a little luck.

It is part of why I am reluctant to play Divinity Original Sin 2. They changed so many things, drastically and unnecessarily, about the already fantastic combat system.

I quite enjoyed the first Original Sin, and had the complete opposite reaction to the second volume. And I'm a huge fan of turn based combat, so it wasn't that, it was more how it seemed like I was forced to play in a certain manner. I've never really been good at the whole, "obeying" thing.

D:OS2 combat was definitely a downgrade, but was still fun IMO. D:OS1 had some of the most fun combat in the history of RPG'ish gaming, so I'm not sure why they felt the need to make such large changes.

Vaguely I think the argument for the change was one of balance. They felt it was too easy to 'abuse' D:OS combat. Of course (imho) as we see in poe series sometime too much balance is not a 'good' thing. For myself a little bit of imbalance in a single player game allows you to try new ideas in more radical extremes and that is what sort of creates a 'fun' factor. When the game is 'perfectly' balanced you fall into a pattern of being forced to do things the same way which becomes less interesting.

D:OS2 combat was even easier to abuse…the source skills were ridiculous.

That is like motion. People when they are young are able to do moves. They no longer practised. Instead, they prefered to rely on less demanding moves, requiring less range of motion and less flexibility.

Then, years later, they somehow remember they could do moves when younger. They try to do them, feel discomfort and declare they can just not muster enough interest for them anymore.

Am I being scolded here? Scolded because I don’t have the same interest level for early Zelda games I once had? Really?!?

Yeah, it's really weird how something you enjoyed SO much as a 7-year old is no longer fun to you as an adult. Must be your severely lowered skill, right?

Gaming forums are like a box of chocolates…

https://y.yarn.co/fb1259aa-edae-4d6a…46_text_hi.gif

Joking aside I still watch that move occasionally. One of Tom Hanks best movies.:love:

Fixed.

No.

As really weird as a 40 yo declaring no interest in moves he could do as a 7 yo.

So indeed, really truly weird for superior minded people. For simple minded people, not so much.