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Divine Divinity: What's the excitement about?
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RPGDot Forums > Divinity & Beyond Divinity

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raspewtin
Village Dweller
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Joined: 31 Dec 2001
Posts: 19
Location: California, USA
   

I hear of this game not at all on most RPG web sites. It doesn't appear to be in 3D (please correct me if this is wrong) and doesn't seem revolutionary in any way I can see. Is there something I don't get here? Why is anyone anticipating this title with the other great RPGs coming out? I want to get excited about this but I really don't get it. Please fill me in re: what the big deal is. Thanks!
Post Sun Feb 10, 2002 9:50 pm
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Rendelius
Critical Error
Critical Error




Joined: 06 Jul 2001
Posts: 16
Location: Austria
   

Well, first of all: there are some games that you won't hear about on most websites. Two reasons for that: 1) it isn't done by the big companies 2) it is done outside the US or UK. Divine Divinity is from Europe, a relatively small development house, and it gets more coverage in Germany than elswhere.

The reason why we report about the game more than others is that we have been watching it from the early stages. Hell, we have even lost a team member to them, he did dialouges and such for Larian Studios . And last but not least: we care for small, independent projects. We try to give them coverage because we believe there is lots of talent that is overlooked sometimes.

Look at Gothic: it got great attention in Germany, but little so far in the US. I haven't seen a review lower than 75% (most are in the 80's), but still coverage is low apart from RPGDot and GothicDot. A pity, if you ask me.

Now for the reasons why we are excited about Divine Divinity: It seems to be a mixture between Ultima 7 (very interactive world) and Baldur's Gate (quests/story). While it isn't 3D, it has a very complex RPG system behind it, lots of items, weapons, spells, classes, paths - lots of everything.

There are only two things, in my opinion, that could make Divine Divinity inferior: bugs or bad game balance. If Larian studios is able to avoid both, the game will be VERY entertaining and rewarding.
Post Sun Feb 10, 2002 10:39 pm
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Myrthos
Spoiler of All Fun
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Joined: 07 Jul 2001
Posts: 1926
Location: Holland
   

In my humble opinion Divinity has everything that can make the game into a fantastic RPG experience. In a huge game world you can interact with almost anything that exists there. You can trash a chair and take the remains of the chair as a weapon. You can throw anything that is not fixed to the ground at your opponents and you can also get the ability to sneak around and solve things without fighting in that way.
There are a huge amount of side quests and one of the best things is that it is fully based on skills.
You choose to be a wizard, a warrior or a survivor, but you can learn any skill there is so you can turn your character into anything you want.

With such a big world and so many things you can do there it is very hard to balance the game and solve all the bugs, which is indeed the only thing that can keep it from being a great game. But I am confident that they solve that matter and am looking forward to the demo in March

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Post Mon Feb 11, 2002 10:41 pm
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The Hulk
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Joined: 19 Feb 2002
Posts: 728
Location: Southeast U.S.A.
   

I am really looking forward to this game as well. I hope there will be many sequels to it also to take the place of the Ultima series. R.I.P. Ultima.
Post Tue Feb 26, 2002 4:36 am
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Decado
Head Merchant
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Joined: 25 Mar 2002
Posts: 65
   

I used to be a regular at their forums a long time ago. I lost interest because of the delays and the only thing that still concerns me: Combat looks like Diablo 1/2. Sooooooooo boring.

That, and spell selection looks minimal

Still, ambitious looking title and I will read its reviews and hope for the best.

Is there a US release date?
Post Tue Mar 26, 2002 4:03 am
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Myrthos
Spoiler of All Fun
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Joined: 07 Jul 2001
Posts: 1926
Location: Holland
   

As you visited their forums before then you probably know that in the Way of the Wizard there are four paths, with each path having 8 skills and each skill comes in 5 levels. And a new level does not always mean that the same skill just becomes stronger. In the case of Elemental strike, you start out with a fire dart and could en up in level 5 with a combination of elementals doing damage, so not only fire.
This leads to 96 skills. And to that several skills from the Way of the Warrior and Way of the Survivor could be added as they could be considered as being a 'spell' as well.

And you can select the skills from any of the three ways, so you don't have to be a wizard in order to be able to use the wizard skills.

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Reports Myrthos for making me scared and humbled at the mere sight of his name - kayla
Post Tue Mar 26, 2002 11:37 am
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Moriendor
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Joined: 19 Jul 2001
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Location: Germany
   

Yes, Larian promised an entertaining non-redundant variety of spells. Who really needs a fire dart, a fire bolt, a fireball, and a firestorm? Boring.
Therefore, Larian limited the amount of spells to a well balanced mix of spells you will really want to make use of.
And as Myrthos pointed out, you will have a whole lot of fun with the huge choice of skills. I wouldn't worry about any limitations here.

Regarding combat, it remains to be seen whether the supposedly high degree of AI will lead to tactical fights later in the game. When Myrthos and I visited Larian last summer we were only able to play a dungeon in the beginning of the game. There wasn't too much AI involved there. Pretty much pure Diablo-like Hack'n'Slash. But we've heard often enough that there will be very advanced creatures later in the game that will take a little more than H'n'S to be beaten.

A U.S. release date hasn't been announced yet, other than Q3/2002. Actually all versions of the game were scheduled for a Q2 release until a couple of weeks ago but in the latest CDV newsletters Divinity was set to Q2 in Germany, and Q3 in USA/U.K./France.
Larian has not commented on this issue yet. But it seems to be more of a CDV issue anyway. Larian is planning to finish the game before summer as they said. After it's been finished it's up to CDV when they want to push it out the door.
Post Tue Mar 26, 2002 12:05 pm
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corwin
On the Razorblade of Life
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Joined: 10 Jun 2002
Posts: 8376
Location: Australia
   

As a totally unbiased person who plays a lot of RPG's, I am really looking forward to this game. The demo was a blast. To be honest, I find the games from small companies superior to many from the large profit is everything publishers. I loved Gothic, I'm eager for Arx and Divinity. My complaint is always their availability in Australia. Gothic never arrived and Amazon's et al don't ship games to Australia either. Now, if only they'd lengthen the day to 36 hours, I might have more time to play.
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Post Mon Jun 24, 2002 12:47 am
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Iphigenie
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Joined: 27 Jul 2002
Posts: 5
Location: UK
   

Corwin:

Uk stores like softwarefirst.com gameswire.com and gamer.uk.com
deliver world wide - i don't know at what cost but since they deliver free within the uk it cannot be outrageous even outside. Gamer claims it's £4 for international, the first two don't say how much (the first two stores are actually run by the same company but they have sometimes different prices)

But they have Divine Divinity and Arx Fatalis available to preorder. Divine Divinity is between 26.2 and 27.99 on those stores so if the shipping is not bad...
Post Sun Jul 28, 2002 1:37 pm
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Remus
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Joined: 03 Jul 2002
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Location: Fish bowl
   

Hmm.. based on several early previews that now available, generally all give a positive votes for Divinity. That start make me interested, since its look likes many exploration available and role-play thing & still maintain frequent fighting if we prefer. Games with many options & freedom gameplay always suite my taste. Hope this also accompany with good stories & interesting plot development.
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Post Sat Aug 03, 2002 8:02 pm
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Rendelius
Critical Error
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Joined: 06 Jul 2001
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Location: Austria
   

I started playing it today. I applied the fix, but still have serious performance issues. Apart from that, it is excellent so far.
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Post Sat Aug 03, 2002 9:09 pm
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Remus
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quote:
Originally posted by Rendelius
I started playing it today. I applied the fix, but still have serious performance issues. Apart from that, it is excellent so far.


What!?, that is serious issue indeed. I have checked out on other forum & they said the slow down in performances will get worse if we keep on playing the game. Some said it's memory leak. In non public demo there's no such problem, as i heard. The other bug is after installing the fix (& use D3D) there are no pictures in the trophy library of your character (in Direct Draw they were there).

If there are memory leaks issue, could the developer fix the problem with patch?. In the case of Morrowind, its also got memory leak problem (cause CTD problem) & until now still no fix available. All this make me worry & whether to buy Divinity or not!.
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Post Sun Aug 04, 2002 6:41 am
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Myrthos
Spoiler of All Fun
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Joined: 07 Jul 2001
Posts: 1926
Location: Holland
   

I have absolutely no problems with playing Divinity. If you are having troubles then just try to use one of the other modes instead (via the configtool program).
_________________
Kewl quotes:
I often have an odd sense of humor - Roach
Why quote somebody else, think of something yourself. - XeroX
...you won't have to unbookmark this site, we'll unbookmark you. - Val
Reports Myrthos for making me scared and humbled at the mere sight of his name - kayla
Post Sun Aug 04, 2002 11:01 am
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Lynn
Divine Imp
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Joined: 23 Jul 2001
Posts: 16
Location: Belgium
! Solution for performance problem !
   

@Rendelius:

If you download this file, your performance problem will be solved.

Short explanation of how to apply this file (215 kb)

Startet die EXE-Datei und wählt das "Run"-Verzeichnis Eurer Divinity Installation aus, z.B. "D:\Games\Divine Divinity\Run". Divinity darf während dieses Vorgangs nicht gestartet sein!

Bestätigt, dass die Datei überschrieben werden soll (share1.dll).

Good luck!
Post Sun Aug 04, 2002 4:54 pm
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Lynn
Divine Imp
Divine Imp




Joined: 23 Jul 2001
Posts: 16
Location: Belgium
Re: ! Solution for performance problem !
   

quote:
Originally posted by Lynn

Bestätigt, dass die Datei überschrieben werden soll (share1.dll).



Typo error - file name is slash1.dll instead of share1.dll.

Post Sun Aug 04, 2002 5:26 pm
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