Pillars of Eternity II - Reviews

I struggled to finish the first game. (Might have been the hours wasted talking to stupid gold NPC's, before I learnt they should be ignored.)

Story also failed to catch my interest. I do see myself grabbing it at some future date at a heavy discount.

Originally Posted by you
Yes if the application has an exception the os will catch it but if the os has an exception there is a reasonable chance it will reboot (and yes i've delt with this before - i had 32 GB of memory and the last 10k was bad).

Gotta disagree there, normally the OS's crash handler would do something (maybe only even for a couple seconds), then reboot afterwards. So yes there is a reboot, never said there wasn't - but the "crash handler then reboot", a warm reboot, feels a lot different than a sudden power cycle style cold reboot. Worst case, if the corruption is too bad for the OS to get into its crash handler etc, you may get a hang. Not saying it isn't possible, but I've dealt with many cases of bad memory on the thousands of systems I've been responsible for keeping running, and I've never seen the "power cycle" symptom occur from bad memory, ever.

Originally Posted by Stingray
Bad memory (almost?) never causes a "power cycle" reboot like he describes…"

It was the CPU for me, but happened pretty random in multiple activities.

Semi-off

Originally Posted by codexcat
As time passes.. I find less and less time, must be some algorithm in the matrix..

Yup, agree. So much work to be done, so little time for fun - the paradox of getting older by the day.

Nowadays I'm a proud content tourist: see what a game has to offer, and spend the lowest possible amount of time at it. Then, onto the next one.

If a new game is much too similar to a previous one (D:OS -> D:OS2, PoE1 -> PoE2, Ubi games, etc), I lose interest extremely quickly.

However, being an RPG fanatic, the urge for something epic raises now and then - so I fire up Skyrim (again), start a new character (again) and hit the Great Outdoors (again). It does not help that Skyrim on Switch is a blast to play

/Semi-off

Originally Posted by Stingray
First thing I'd do for a "power cycle" style crash is swap out the power supply and test it with a different one. Second thing, swap GPU and test with a different one.

Also, blaming a problem like this on the Pillars developers is pretty ridiculous. Obviously their game must be doing something to trigger your problem, but their game wouldn't be the root of the problem.

Originally Posted by rune_74
Going to go out on a limb here and say that you may have some issues with your machine….

Well, I blame it on Pillars since it's the only game triggering it. And now with both I and II. I'm _not_ giving any public review on Steam or GOG or such places based on it, though, since I know I'm just extremely unlucky to have some obscure combination of hardware (or error) that hates the game and I think a review with a score should reflect the game, not my bad luck.

If anyone has any good suggestions for how to monitor and test the extreme ends of the hardware, I'm all game. I did three weeks of memory-CPU-GPU testing and stress-testing with Pillars I and nothing I did could crash the machine. (I don't over-clock it, so I didn't go there to get it to burn). Nothing logged over 70 degrees on either Pillars I nor on stress-test. (Norway is a nice place to cool your PC, always easy access to cold air )

So if anyone can suggest me a nice set of software (new-ish as it's been 18 months or so since I last stress-tested this box, and yes, I do dust removal regularly) for monitoring and stress testing and finding that ¤"!/#&¤% bug I'd be very happy.

If you have another video card, any video card, put it in just to test, run the game and see. If it still crashes then try removing half of the RAM (if you have 8GB try 4GB), if it still crashes, use the other half of the RAM, if it still crashes try running the game with the case open and maybe an external fan pointing at it. The idea is to identify first if it's hardware related or what.

The obvious culprit could be a faulty power supply, but I watch a streamer that had this problem playing Divinity Original Sin 2, total computer crash after about 90 minutes of playing, not a blue screen a hard crash/reboot, and only with DOS2 (so far), he replaced the PSU and the problem still happened. He never figured out what the issue is but he got a workaround and now plays the game in one hour intervals. Plays one hour, quits and restarts the game. No more crashes.

Originally Posted by codexcat
Will have to wait as my backlog is just ridiculous. Still havent finished POE1

There is a solution to your problem. Less forums presence.

I wouldn't necessarily rule out anything causing the reboots - a driver problem could potentially do it. Also, if something is very taxing, a heat issue could cause the bios to shutdown or reset.

Originally Posted by Ripper
Also, if something is very taxing, a heat issue could cause the bios to shutdown or reset.

AFAIK, PoE was written in Unity, and a common dev mistake with that game engine is to let it go wild with the frame rate (by default Unity does NOT limit the framerate) - which tends to overheat any portable device extremely quickly. My laptop's fans are literally screamin' while playing that game (or Torment by the way. WL2 : DC seems to fare much much better in this regard).

I'm not sure who will be writing the PoE2 review for the Watch yet (Corwin wrote the one for PoE1), but I suspect the PoE2 one will be more positive, despite not riding the nostalgia wave that PoE1 had going for it (spiritual successor of BG and so on). I'm only level 8 or so at this point, but everything so far is flat out better than what PoE1 had to offer. Atmosphere, character building, music, combat, visuals. It's just a better game, hands down.

Originally Posted by Maylander
but everything so far is flat out better than what PoE1 had to offer.

One question: how's the writing fares? Is it the same dullfest as with PoE's? (With all due respect to Mr Avellone, but seriously: the descriptions were as exciting as reading an aging scholar's thesis masturbation abut the celtic folklore's dullest ever concepts)

Originally Posted by duerer
One question: how's the writing fares? Is it the same dullfest as with PoE's?

Going by what I'm reading in impression threads. If you didn't care about POE1 settings, characters and lore, POE2 isn't going to help you with that. If you need a game to tells you what your character should feel and think because you are incapable of roleplaying, POE1 wasn't a game for you and neither is POE2.

But where POE1 was very bleak and dry, POE2 is more bubbly, sorta. The change in settings helped quite a bit there (no Hollowborn crisis going on) as did the VO which gives more personality to the dialogues.

Is there lots of good exploration across many interesting islands?

Originally Posted by duerer
One question: how's the writing fares? Is it the same dullfest as with PoE's? (With all due respect to Mr Avellone, but seriously: the descriptions were as exciting as reading an aging scholar's thesis masturbation abut the celtic folklore's dullest ever concepts)

The issue in POE was partially voiced over lines. It broke the flow and removed the value of interpretation.

In PoE2, characters'lines are voiced over (except for narrator's lines, which streamers usually read aloud)
Acting is good.

This changes deeply the delivery of the text.

Originally Posted by Ripper
Is there lots of good exploration across many interesting islands?

Depends what you mean by "good exploration".

Originally Posted by azarhal
Depends what you mean by "good exploration".

Can you go off the beaten path, find well-hidden secrets, get wrapped up in exploration in farther off in areas you didn't even realize you would be going to, etc.? Are there lots of nooks and crannies, secrets and rewards for poking around in difficult to reach areas? Are there non-level scaled areas and non-leveled loot rewards where you could try and survive and maybe explore a difficult area, in tension of not sure when you will be jumped, grab some rare item and trying to escape before getting murdered badly? Interesting locations to find with lore, intrigue and backstory that fleshes out the world you're in more? Unexpected encounters with interesting things, be it characters, monsters or some landmark? Legendary item hunts where you could track down hard-to-get and powerful artifacts? Is there any sort of puzzles, riddles while exploring, areas you have to come back later to with new information, and free-form, open exploration? That would be the start of good exploration to me. Interested to hear about the exploration if you could talk a bit about it.

Originally Posted by Ripper
Is there lots of good exploration across many interesting islands?

If you ask me the answer is neither yes or no but: meh.

Originally Posted by Fluent
Can you go off the beaten path, find well-hidden secrets, get wrapped up in exploration in farther off in areas you didn't even realize you would be going to, etc.? Are there lots of nooks and crannies, secrets and rewards for poking around in difficult to reach areas? Are there non-level scaled areas and non-leveled loot rewards where you could try and survive and maybe explore a difficult area, in tension of not sure when you will be jumped, grab some rare item and trying to escape before getting murdered badly? Interesting locations to find with lore, intrigue and backstory that fleshes out the world you're in more? Unexpected encounters with interesting things, be it characters, monsters or some landmark? Legendary item hunts where you could track down hard-to-get and powerful artifacts? Is there any sort of puzzles, riddles while exploring, areas you have to come back later to with new information, and free-form, open exploration? That would be the start of good exploration to me. Interested to hear about the exploration if you could talk a bit about it.

Yes, yes, yes. There are but when you get stupid garnet or ruby and not soulbound weapon goodbye sense of accomplishent. Levelscaling is an option, you can (I actually already did it a few times) get in, avoid stronger trashmobs, grab the loot, escape. No. No. No. Yes, yes, yes, partially on both. I disagree. We have separate threads on hints and stuff in Eternity forum section as here would be spoilers/offtopic.

Originally Posted by duerer
One question: how's the writing fares? Is it the same dullfest as with PoE's? (With all due respect to Mr Avellone, but seriously: the descriptions were as exciting as reading an aging scholar's thesis masturbation abut the celtic folklore's dullest ever concepts)

What does Chris Avellone have to do with it? He didn't do any writing for PoE, he only came up with concepts and details for two NPCs and they were then written by other people.

Originally Posted by Fluent
Can you go off the beaten path, find well-hidden secrets, get wrapped up in exploration in farther off in areas you didn't even realize you would be going to, etc.?

Are there lots of nooks and crannies, secrets and rewards for poking around in difficult to reach areas?

Are there non-level scaled areas and non-leveled loot rewards where you could try and survive and maybe explore a difficult area, in tension of not sure when you will be jumped, grab some rare item and trying to escape before getting murdered badly?

Interesting locations to find with lore, intrigue and backstory that fleshes out the world you're in more?

Unexpected encounters with interesting things, be it characters, monsters or some landmark?

Legendary item hunts where you could track down hard-to-get and powerful artifacts?

Is there any sort of puzzles, riddles while exploring, areas you have to come back later to with new information, and free-form, open exploration?

That would be the start of good exploration to me. Interested to hear about the exploration if you could talk a bit about it.

That's a lot of questions. lol

yes, although how hidden something is depends on the highest perception stats among party members.

yes

level scaling is optional, can be kept to only level scale upward and doesn't affect rewards. So depends what you sets your options at.

yes (for me, really depends what you find interesting)

yes (for me, really depends what you find interesting)

hmm, I suspect you are going to stumble on stuff more than anything because things are in the game world regardless if you read a book or heard about it or not and you can go pretty much anywhere once off tutorial island.

Game is pretty much all free form once you are done with tutorial island. Depending on the level scaling choose it might be easier or harder to go around though.

Thanks fellas. Sounds great, will have to pick it up sometime later (too many games I haven't played already piled up, sheesh.)

@joxer, you disagree that that is the start of good exploration? Pretty sure you're a Piranha Bytes guy and IMO they nail exploration in all of their games (and most of my points come directly from their style of RPG design.) What is your definition of good exploration? Beyond that, good exploration in an isometric CRPG?