Alright, I've played a lot of video games in my time, and I've studied a healthy deal of literature and literary analysis. I will say right off the bat that this review comes from the mind of a person who approaches video games with the perspective of a literary scholar - if you're just looking for a few hours of something to do, Divinity 2 is fine for that. However, if you're looking forAlright, I've played a lot of video games in my time, and I've studied a healthy deal of literature and literary analysis. I will say right off the bat that this review comes from the mind of a person who approaches video games with the perspective of a literary scholar - if you're just looking for a few hours of something to do, Divinity 2 is fine for that. However, if you're looking for something more interesting, you might want to take heed.
First of all, don't let the ads and reviews fool you: The dragon mechanic IS kind of cool, but ultimately it feels very lacking. In the Ego Draconis content there's only one area you really feel like you're flying freely around, and there are 'anti-dragon zones' that prevent you from entering on pain of near-instant death. There aren't even tooltips or anything warning you, just just figure out that entering the wavy bubble shields as a dragon means you die and have to reload, which can be a really bitter lesson. Also, throw away any ideas you have of raining fiery death from above. You can't target most ground units as a dragon, only certain structures. Dragon armor has some use, but only gives bonuses to dragon abilities, not any kind of protection. The dragon function really only feels as good as it's advertised in the very last sequence of Flames of Vengeance (I should also note that said sequence is the only time you can use dragon form in the entire package), and even then, it wasn't all I expected. All in all, don't expect the dragon form to be as awesome as others might seem to make it.
With that out of the way, another huge problem here is how pointless the whole thing feels after a bit of content. The loading screen tips say "consequences are irreversible" for your decisions, but I never felt like my decisions really had any impact. A non-spoiler hypothetical example - not from the game - would be having to decide between saving your best friend or you significant other, but either way the one who "dies" is revealed to have actually survived to come back later. At first you think this was just a little twist, but then you find that every single decision is just the same. Not only that, but there's no real free-roam feeling. All the side-quests are built in to help you level and progress - failing to do them will pit your level 9 character against groups of level 12 enemies, I found - so they feel like a part of the main game, not like they're additional things you can consider doing. So ultimately all your hard-earned gear, skills, spells, and abilities go towards the main story of the game and nothing else. Once the game ends, it ends, and everything you just did is no longer relevant. That's not a feeling I like to have - I like the feeling I have in KOTOR II, where my choices can really impact the game and even my companions need to have good gear or I'm the one who's boned. Even though there's limited free-roam in KOTOR II, it still felt like I didn't have to do almost every quest to level properly (in fact, my first few runthroughs, I didn't do many side-quests).
And then there's the STORY. The entire cast is extremely forgettable - Commander Rhodes, your former Dragon Slayer mentor, is seen three times in the entirety of Ego Draconis, and never for very long. You learn through hearsay that she's apparently the best of the Dragon Slayers - I never would've known. She's made out to be some critical, important player in the story, but you hardly ever see her, and in Flames of Vengeance, whatever kind of character arc she had doesn't even get any kind of proper closure. Names and characters like Lord Lovis, the cursed Dragon Knight whose soul haunts his tower in penance for his crimes, and Talana, last of the Dragon Knights, are introduced, but just those descriptions I get are the extent of their character. You now know about as much of them as I do. Play the game and learn just a teensy bit more and then never hear of them or from them ever again. Everything in the game feels extremely disposable, like I could've gone without doing or hearing or learning of it, yet that's the whole game. Nothing about the story seemed to matter eventually - after the beginning, it felt like characters were introduced only to exit stage left the moment the scene ended and never return. Even in Flames of Vengeance, which apparently was meant to bring "closure", nothing of the sort really comes. Even the ending feels incomplete.
This game is not what it's made out to be. It's not AWFUL - it's worth the buy if it's on sale for a decent price - and I wouldn't call it bad, even. But it's extremely rough-hewn and half-baked, and all the features advertised are blown out of proportion to the point where it almost felt like a different game than advertised. Get it if it's on sale and you need something to do and nothing else is available, but just keep in mind the whole mythos of the badass Dragon Knight is a bunch of dragon ****… Expand
Divinity II: The Dragon Knight SagaYour Score0 out of 10User Score
