E3 2009 Preview
No longer are humans and
dragons living together peacefully, they instead are now purposefully trying to
dominate the other through battle. This is the war that Divinity II: Ego
Draconis is pitting players within and it’s up to them to settle the
differences and figure out a way to overcome Damian, the evil entity from the
original Divinity who had led the world towards chaos
As a role-playing game,
Divinity II allows players to start the game as an apprentice dragon
slayer who shall learn the ways of being a dragon knight, a faction that can
shapeshift into dragons. Playing as a dragon, players will use the beast as
their second ego to train, equip it with armor and obtain new skills. As a
dragon, players can cross large distances in a flash and use fire-based attacks
against enemies. Transforming to a dragon at anytime (besides inside anti-dragon
fields, dungeons, and buildings), the only downside to being a dragon is that
players won’t be able to communicate with humans.
One mission has the
player going into a tavern to kick out drunkards who are scaring off
townspeople. After battling the drunks for 15 seconds, their lieutenant made a
graceful appearance wondering what in the world was going on, and after a quick
conversation, you have the choice to continue the battle or end it peacefully to
see the benefits later on in the game. Once the drunkards are gone, the inn
keeper lowers his prices as a thanks and the townspeople show up to drink and
provide quests to accept.
As a single-player only
experience, there’s over 40 hours of gameplay for RPG fans who want longevity in
their games. There are tons of side-quests to participate in, and if by chance
you decide to decline a quest, a few NPCs may actually attempt to accomplish the
task by their lonesome and could end up dying. With a classless system, there’s
a ton of leveling up and work to be done to create the ultimate character. One
skill that should attract RPG gamers is the chance to mind read NPCs. This comes
in handy when talking to merchants and traders who you feel are ripping you off.
Graphically, the PC and
Xbox 360 counterparts are identical. The only real difference between the two
versions happens to be the control scheme. Divinity II is also running on
the Gamebryo Engine that you may recognize from Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion,
but the development team has also implemented a lot of extensions to spice up
the graphics. Later on in the game, the game world will change to look more
demonic and possessed as Damian starts building flying fortresses.
Combat in Divinity II
can be played in a variety of ways including stopping the fight to select a
target to attack and skills to attack. If you hate fighting alone, there’ll be
sidekicks that’ll join your quests from time to time. As a human, you can also
summon dragons, supernatural creatures and demons to your aide. If you’d rather
go about fighting mono e mono, then you can buff your weapons, drain the energy
and set fear into an enemy without a second thought.
Divinity II: Ego Draconis
is scheduled to release on the Xbox 360 and PC in September.
