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Platform: PC Genre: RPG Publisher: CDV Developer: Larian Studios ETA: Q2 2002
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Divine Divinity
If anything, Divine Divinity (DD) sets itself apart from other sprawling RPGs by having a title that sounds like a badly translated beer label from Micronesia. However, titles and labels aren’t everything – especially when it comes to beer or, for that matter, RPGs. And if titles were any indication of quality, Pools of Radiance would have been called something else entirely. I suppose what I’m getting at, don’t judge a book by its cover – unless its produced by Playboy.
DD enters an already crowded RPG market and it automatically shouts “Me too!” with a story line gamers have seen many times before. Apparently the Lord of Chaos has the land of Rovellon under his well-manicured thumb and you take up arms against his evil hordes only to discover – hold onto your pants – that you’re the Divine Savior! Okay, I sound overly cynical about the story, but it’s a staple of classic RPGs. (The plot, not the cynicism.)
You begin by selecting one of three class types: Survivor, Warrior, or Wizard. Wizard and Warrior are self-explanatory; Survivor is basically your typical thief character. Sticking with tradition there are many skills and skill levels – 96 skills with 5 levels each. Also, sticking with tradition are the usual plethora of mana levels, offensive / defensive spells (Possess the dead? Shape-shift? Cool!), point and click interface, mixing and matching inventory items, branching NPC interactions, auto-map, teleporters, questlog, and tons of “ingenious” monsters to slay (about 100 different species). It sounds like so much vanilla with one or two exceptions. |
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In a nod to Gauntlet and arcade games in general, DD offers one-use power-up items and each character will have a special move specific to the character and class – kind of like a Mortal Kombat finishing move. With these references to arcade games you might expect to have a lot of twitch action, possibly burning out a mouse or two with lots of left-clicking. Nope.
Instead of multiple clicks during combat you just have to click once on an enemy – sure to please those that are prone to index cramping (or cramping of the index finger). Of course, it remains to be seen how this will |
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actually play out. Will it enter an auto-resolve mode common to turn-based games like Disciples II? Or will you have the chance to affect the outcome if you do feel the need to rapidly click your mouse buttons. If you’re getting your savior butt soundly trodden on, running away and healing is an option. But you don’t always go it alone. NPCs can join you and will probably be mandatory on the side quests – they can only come in handy across the 20,000 screens that make up the game world.
If you’ve got a good enough rig, DD should look and move like a dream. The minimum requirements are probably conservative (PII 233MHz, 64MB RAM) and to take full advantage of what DD has to offer you’re going to want a muscle rig. Spell effects seem to be plentiful (if the screens are anything to go by) and there’s mention of water effects. Not only that, each character has many frames of animation and their appearance can be modified by what they’re wearing. (Putting on a suit of armor will actually show your character wearing it on-screen.)
Divine Divinity doesn’t seem to be looking to blow the competition out of the water because it seems to promise all sorts of stuff we’ve seen before but with a less click-intensive interface. However, it’s too early to judge it – wait till we crack the cover when it’s released Q2 2002.
- Omni (May 8, 2002) |
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