Pillars of Eternity - News Roundup

Obsidian & Paradox released a new video of the beta version of Pillars of Eternity.

Obsidian presented Pillars of Eternity's backer beta live at the Paradox Fancon at Gamescom in Cologne, Germany.

This is a 25 minute rundown of the beta where Josh Sawyer walks us through one of the quests in the beta.

Everything depicted in this beta is an optional part of the game and does not spoil anything from the main story.

I aslo found a few more screenshots of the game.

Pillars of Eternity: Obsidian Entertainment has released some new environmental screens taken from their upcoming fantasy role-playing video game.

And for last we have a new post-funding update about the beta for backers.

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Greetings, and welcome, at long last, to the Backer Beta! We appreciate all the support our backers have given us on the long road that started with our Kickstarter campaign. Now it's time to take a look at what we've been working on, shake it up, and see how things can be improved.

Before you dive in, I'd like to talk a bit about the nuts and bolts of the Backer Beta, what content is available, what you won't be seeing, things we're most interested in hearing feedback on, and known issues.

More information.

Videos are less interesting, because of design decisions made and combat system chosen. I guess if someone is hungry for a new Baldurs Gate.. but there is Risen 3 now so there is absolutely nothing attractive in PE right now. Compared to mighty Risen 3.

Still there is a mild interest in PE, because of the party mechanics and new classes, but the real-time battles are a huge turn-off..

I'll take buggy POE beta over Risen 3 personally.

methinks you just swallowed some flamebait, or else I fail to see how a party based game with tactical combat is unattractive compared to Risen 3

And I fail to see why would someone have to choose between Eternity and Risen 3.
Buy both!

Originally Posted by Sacred_Path
methinks you just swallowed some flamebait, or else I fail to see how a party based game with tactical combat is unattractive compared to Risen 3

I didn't swallow it. I have no interest in Risen 3 (I did like the first game, mostly).

I'll take a party based isometric with deeper gameplay over a 1st person shooter of an RPG with crappy combat (like Skyrim for ex…or Risen 3) any day. But I usually play both/all that are worthy.

If anyone around here ponied up for the beta, I'd be interested to hear a description of character development, I.e. skills, abililities, progression and so on.

Originally Posted by Capt. Huggy Face
If anyone around here ponied up for the beta, I'd be interested to hear a description of character development, I.e. skills, abililities, progression and so on.

Best just read the wiki for that. I rolled up a Barbarian and levelled him, but without feedback I just put my skillpoints into Athletics and Survival on every levelup without knowing what it does. I mean… I got new abilities, but were they related to skill gain? No idea.

Originally Posted by Capt. Huggy Face
If anyone around here ponied up for the beta, I'd be interested to hear a description of character development, I.e. skills, abililities, progression and so on.

Sacred_Path made a a thread about the beta.

You can also check the wiki.

Character creation is quite awesome. Everything I was looking for. One of the best character creation systems to come out of all the Kickstarter games I've backed.

The environment, menus, GUI, responsiveness, animations - all of that looks great.

Not the biggest fan of RTwP, personally, but it seems to stand up as far as giving orders and options and feedback. That said, combat is my biggest disappointment in the beta - though it is still beta, and I love so much of it that this is a minor quibble (unless it isn't fixed / gets worse by release.)

RTwP has always made things a bit hectic for me (not as bad as RT, sure, but I prefer TB) but I could cope in great games like Icewind Dale and (flame retardant shields engaged) Dragon Age: Origins. But in PoE, the combat is hard for me to follow as it happens and, as I watch, it is a mish-mash of pixels mushing together into unrecognizable action. The pausing doesn't quite work for me, as I try to pause but it acts as if I just unpaused (hiccuping and then continuing) half the time.

Long story short, I am impressed and anxious for the release. I already feel an affinity to the fantasy world they are creating (whereas for Elder Scrolls games, or my forays into DOS, I am just very detached and uninterested in the world and lore) as well as the new races and takes on classes. The combat balance and planning, on paper and in character creation / design, seems very solid - it is just the experience of the combat that leaves something to be desired for me.

Hope that helps a little.

I seriously dig the character creation system.

It does, thanks. But that prompts another question: is there autopause, and is there a setting that resembles the "pause every round" option from Baldur's Gate? I read there would be, at least the first part, but you never know if planned features will actually make it into a game.

It does have many autopause options. I had a lot set. They might have been easily conflicting with my pausing manually, but that is still an issue.

Originally Posted by Capt. Huggy Face
It does, thanks. But that prompts another question: is there autopause, and is there a setting that resembles the "pause every round" option from Baldur's Gate? I read there would be, at least the first part, but you never know if planned features will actually make it into a game.

There is a "auto-pause" every X seconds (where X is configurable) and lots and lots of other situational auto-pause.

Oh my god that looks awesome. Wow!!

The backer beta is very buggy at the moment and in some aspects it's almost unplayable do to constant crashing. I'm not trying to bash it as it is a "beta" build, but I'm curious why they decided to release it in this condition. I backed it for $250(signed collectors edition), so I have 250 reasons to stay positive. I just don't see how it will be ready for release in the next 3-4 months.

Since release is supposed to be before the end of the year, I was expecting a build with a little more polish. It's hard to help them identify bugs when there are so many of them. Where do you start?

Here are some observations. The art, characters, and environments all look great. The only problem is that during a battle they often group on top of each other or blend in with the background and it's difficult to tell what's happening. I hope this is something that can be "fixed" and not a design flaw.

Combat has a lot of potential, it just needs balancing to make it all flow instead of looking rushed as it does now in it's current state. I thought that too many of the spells and abilities do the same thing.

Probably the hardest thing to accept is that PoE is not Baldur's Gate & the infinity engine. It's going to take a bit to get used to how everything works.

Originally Posted by Capt. Huggy Face
It does, thanks. But that prompts another question: is there autopause, and is there a setting that resembles the "pause every round" option from Baldur's Gate? I read there would be, at least the first part, but you never know if planned features will actually make it into a game.

It has roughly 17 auto-pause options, including a slider that goes from 2-14.5 seconds with .5 second intervals.

Originally Posted by Voqar
I'll take a party based isometric with deeper gameplay over a 1st person shooter of an RPG with crappy combat (like Skyrim for ex…or Risen 3) any day.

Yeah… because that's what those games are.

Originally Posted by Merin
Long story short, I am impressed and anxious for the release. I already feel an affinity to the fantasy world they are creating (whereas for Elder Scrolls games, or my forays into DOS, I am just very detached and uninterested in the world and lore).

Really? I think the world and lore in TES are fantastic. Easily the best part about that series imo. The dialogue and quests on the other hand…

I've played 2 hours and I like it a lot. Haven't experienced any crashes or bugs. It's going to take me a while to come to grips with all the game systems, but I'm glad for this opportunity to do so before the full release.

Originally Posted by Merin
RThe pausing doesn't quite work for me, as I try to pause but it acts as if I just unpaused (hiccuping and then continuing) half the time.

I guess you're using the GUI for combat control? Because there are two modes: Pause (space button) and Slow Motion (S button). The first is the same as in the infinity games, the second is like in Game of Thrones. Both modes can be activated at the center bottom of the GUI and it's not that intuitive that there are actually several command buttons in this circle area.