Pillars of Eternity II - Review @ New Game Network

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HiddenX

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New Game Network has reviewed Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire:

Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire Review

A worthwhile sequel that runs into some rough waters



The honeymoon period of the cRPG revival is over. Much like the pixel platformer or the point-and-click adventure game, the genre spent a few years celebrating its own resurrection with a handful of solid titles that were warmly received, in part, because it was so great to have the genre back. I’m not saying that games like Divinity: Original Sin, Torment: Tides of Numenera, or even the first Pillars of Eternity weren’t good or even great games, just that part of what made them great was how refreshing it felt to see the old concepts of the cRPG not only reintroduced but being iterated on. Pillars of Eternity might have been the culmination of this honeymoon phase. The game was the most faithful recreation of the Infinity Engine games like Baldur’s Gate or Icewind Dale - the interface, audio cues, and overworld structure lifted directly from the RPGs of old. There was no hiding the game’s roots and that’s what appealed to so many players.

[...]

Overall
Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire is a fine game that makes it easy to get swept away in the pirate life and the thrills of ship combat. It’s a solid evolution on the first outing, though the technical flaws are significant and ultimately detract from the overall impression.

Score: 76%
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The romance system sucks? Meh. I could give a rat's arse. Most of the technical issues will get addressed in due course.
 
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I've got over 50 hours in and not a single crash, so not sure why he's (reviewer) had problems. There was a memory leak prior to the first patch this week that seems to have addressed it. Also think load times are slightly on the long end considering my system's capabilities combined with the seemingly lower demands a game like this should have. That said, the lighting is amazing and graphics overall are fantastic.
 
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Poor FPS performance. Inexplicable audio glitches—no sound from time to time. I could see this if I were on a custom PC... but I got this for my top-line McBook Pro (I use it for work) and it's just inexcusable. Even worse AFTER the patch.
 
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Ovenall said:
Poor FPS performance. Inexplicable audio glitches—no sound from time to time. I could see this if I were on a custom PC… but I got this for my top-line McBook Pro (I use it for work) and it's just inexcusable. Even worse AFTER the patch.
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Assuming you are running iOS or Linux on that MacBook I will assume your problems are more with Unity on Mac sucks more than on Windows. I played the beta and I was impressed how much better the final game was compared to beta performance but wont deny the could do more but that is almost always the case.
 
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Ovenall said:
my top-line McBook Pro (I use it for work)
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Mac and games? LOL
Man… It's worse than trying to run The Witcher 3 on Chromebook.
 
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joxer said:
Mac and games? LOL
Man… It's worse than trying to run The Witcher 3 on Chromebook.
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Agreed that Macs are not the best for gaming, not arguing that. But the Mac version of the game is made specifically for certain specific pieces of hardware… why should it be so poorly optimized? Also, I have other games on my Mac that run very smoothly, so it's not a hardware limitation issue.

Hell, Elder Scrolls Online is an MMO, 3-D and runs nearly perfectly at high end graphics options for me on the same laptop.

Story-based RPGs work great on laptops, IMO, so if they're available on a Mac, that's usually what I buy.
 
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rjshae said:
The romance system sucks? Meh. I could give a rat's arse. Most of the technical issues will get addressed in due course.
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My sentiments exactly. Romance is for the real world, unless you're a 10 year old. RPGs are for adventuring, fighting, character building, and looting.

The game itself is actually pretty good, it's what I'm playing right now.
 
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ChaosTheory said:
I've got over 50 hours in and not a single crash
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You're lucky. I'm 39 hours in and have had a lot of crashes. And there's the times that the game will just bug out, like today where you can't click on anything and have to restart.
 
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Hyperion said:
My sentiments exactly. Romance is for the real world, unless you're a 10 year old. RPGs are for adventuring, fighting, character building, and looting.
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I'm sure that when you've finally grown up, you'll enjoy a good romance in a video game as well.
 
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Hyperion said:
You're lucky. I'm 39 hours in and have had a lot of crashes. And there's the times that the game will just bug out, like today where you can't click on anything and have to restart.
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Disable the (Steam/gog) overlay, that's what is causing clicks to not work anymore (and I suspect many of the crashed too because I went to 1 crash every hours, to 1 in 30 hours after doing that).
 
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Morrandir said:
I'm sure that when you've finally grown up, you'll enjoy a good romance in a video game as well.
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Consider that every video game romance is a menu-driven state engine with no actual emotional commitment. If that's maturity for you, well good luck out there. :p
 
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rjshae said:
Consider that every video game romance is a menu-driven state engine with no actual emotional commitment. If that's maturity for you, well good luck out there.
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Wait isn't every relationship like that.:lol: I'll just be Moving on now.:invisible:
azarhal said:
It's not called booty for nothing.
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rjshae said:
Consider that every video game romance is a menu-driven state engine with no actual emotional commitment. If that's maturity for you, well good luck out there. :p
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Don't want to brag but…
  1. … having a PhD in computer science I think I know a thing ot two about state machines and software systems.
  2. … being a happy father of two I think I know a thing ot two about maturity.
And imho a sign of maturity (whatever this exactly is) may be that you can enjoy a well done romance despite knowing it's just a state machine and despite having a well done "romance" in real life.
I'm not enjoying it because it may somehow compensate for something I don't have in real life. I'm enjoying it just for the thing it is.
Emotion and art is a complex field. So I think nobody should judge others by claiming to understand why someone enjoys or dislikes something or not.
 
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I think, when it's done reasonably well, the romances can be fun. The first one I remember was in BG2, when the vampires abducted my girlfriend, and I went on the warpath.
 
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Yes, I really enjoy romance done well in games as well. Loved how Anomen's character developed through romance plot. Didn't think I will actually care for Anomen when I first met him but it really got me involved emotionally.
 
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