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Divinity Original Sin 2 · The Long and Short of It

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We hope you enjoy the show. Hello and welcome to the long
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and short of it. The podcast where we discuss
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each of the games on the Metacritic top 100 list.
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My name is Dan and I'm joined by.
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I'm Lawrence. Welcome to the podcast.
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Valentine's Day that took on which we are recording.
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Yes I am. I've been very busy and dropping
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So I've been very busy. Good.
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Good to hear. Now, onto a sort of themed
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Valentine's Day episode. We've never done one of these
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before. I don't know why we usually take
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any old excuse to do a themed episode.
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Maybe we'll do more this year, but yes, our first Valentine's
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Day special and it is very special and I'm probably being
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it up far too much. Okay.
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So today we're discussing number eight, 88, on our Metacritic
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list number. 88 is Divinity. Original sin to Definitive
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Edition that was the version that appeared highest on the
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list that was released on the Nintendo switch in the year,
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2019 with a score of 93. So as usual, do you have any
2:20
history with this game? I do not have any history with
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this game. I don't think I'd heard of this
2:26
game until we came across it for the list.
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All I know is that this game exists and Divinity.
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Original sin exists. They're both you know,
2:37
well-respected, see RPGs and that is literally all I knew.
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I went into it. Pretty much totally blind.
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What about you? Yeah, I had heard about these
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games. I was aware, they came out on
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the switch. But I didn't really, I knew it
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was an isometric game but I thought it was more in the vein
2:59
of Diablo, then what it actually was.
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So it's much closer to something like Baldur's Gate which we
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played much earlier in the list or not much earlier but I wanna
3:10
ghost. Yeah, so it's much closer to
3:14
something like that than Diablo. But yeah, I didn't really have
3:20
much experience of it. I think it was always one of
3:22
those games that I wanted to try and I have now tried it and
3:26
obviously you'll get my conclusions later on.
3:29
That's right. So when did you play this play
3:32
that on the PlayStation. I was going to play it on a
3:35
switch but after playing BioShock on the switch I was a
3:39
bit switched out and I wanted to play some some PlayStation so
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played it there I did find out afterwards that you could play
3:46
on iOS as well which is I was somewhat tempted by.
3:50
It seems like a good game for that but platform maybe, but I
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mean the last time I said that, I play GTA 3 on the iPad and it
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was a very bad experience, so perhaps not.
4:01
But yeah, for this time, I played it on the PS4.
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PS 5, but it was the PS4 version.
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What about you? I played the switch version.
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Generally speaking it ran pretty well.
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I think the load times in this game are a known issue anyway
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and They were horrific, it's five times on the switch but the
4:21
actual game when it's running was fine.
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Yeah, so that was where I played it, okay.
4:28
So do you want to give a bit of a rundown of the plot if you
4:31
can? Yeah, I can give you a basic
4:33
overview. I didn't play as much of this
4:36
game as you did. I think you started this a lot
4:38
earlier than I did. I think you put a bit more time
4:41
into it but the game I believe it takes place about a thousand
4:46
years. After the events of divinity,
4:51
original sin, 1 and you, are you play as a character in, at the
4:57
start of the game, you can either choose from like a
5:01
collection of pre-made characters with Origins and, you
5:05
know, their own builds which is probably the best way to play
5:09
this game. If you're a newcomer but you can
5:12
start the game you enter into a world called rebellion and the
5:17
oh, All Arc of the story, is you start out on this like prison
5:23
Island call for Joy. After you've been attacked by
5:28
like this crackin thing and the main aim of the game and I found
5:36
it to be quite, what's the word that it wasn't a very focused,
5:41
linear game. In my opinion, there were quite
5:43
a lot of things that you go off and do other than the main
5:46
quest, which is probably a good thing.
5:47
Thing. But the main quest the game is
5:50
to defeat the main antagonist. Brackets Rex to basically
5:58
restore source to all of the sorcerer's, which is what they
6:01
use to, you know, upskill their magic and their physical
6:05
abilities. And I think, at the end of the
6:07
game, you've got like a bad choice, you can make in a good
6:10
choice in. It depends how you do it, but a
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lot of this game is actioned off the way that you do your
6:17
interactions. The choices that you make is
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kind of a very, very basic overview.
6:22
There's probably some stuff that you can add in there because
6:24
like, I say, you've played portent of this game that I
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have. Not really.
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So I have played a fair bit of this game.
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It's a it's a funny one. So yeah you are God woken and
6:37
you gradually realize that and you unlock some of your Source
6:40
ability. Yes.
6:43
But I didn't complete this game. I got a decent way or so I'm on
6:49
what I believe is the main island.
6:50
I got off for Troy. I got out of the marshes, and
6:53
I'm on the main island and I put into the fair amount of time
6:56
there, but I'd say the main story.
7:02
Is quite slow and yes it's not always clear when you're doing
7:08
the main story. So I was I was trying to get to
7:12
an island before I finish to it before I stop playing this game
7:17
and apparently there are main story ways to get there and
7:20
other ways to get there and sometimes you'll be doing
7:23
something and it turns out to be a companion Quest.
7:25
And yeah, it's I'd agree with you.
7:30
When you said that, it's not very focused and that was a
7:32
problem. That I had with their, I found
7:35
Baldur's Gate 2 to not be hugely focused but that game was a fair
7:40
bit more focused than this one. And given the time differential
7:45
between the two games, I was hoping it would be a bit more
7:48
focused. The thing the thing that I get
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from this game is like you say there are a lot of companion,
7:54
kind of Sidelines and Quest you can go on which from what I
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understand is a lot of the meat of this game.
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It is very much about building those links with your character.
8:02
Has and, you know, finding out what makes them tick and their
8:04
backstories, rather than a lot of the other elements of the
8:08
game. Because a lot of the story is
8:10
very much focused on the party that you choose to be with you,
8:12
you know? Yeah, I'd agree with that.
8:15
I think each of the, the characters that accompany you,
8:19
if you choose to have characters accompanying you, which you
8:23
don't have to do, they are quite nicely fleshed out.
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They all have their own Back stories, and they all have their
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own wants and desires. And they make that very clear.
8:32
R2 you and part of the game, is the companion.
8:36
Quest. Who'd you have in your party.
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I had the red Prince. I had a Halo that the but I
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can't remember. I know.
8:49
It's like severe also feel the yeah, that's.
8:52
Yeah, that's the one. Yep.
8:54
And I had lat Lodi or Very good with the names on this game
9:01
only. Yeah, I can't, I can't remember
9:05
that. I will admit, I didn't I change
9:08
my party up, so I have beast in my past.
9:10
He until I got to the main island, and I switched him up,
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but I must admit as well. That I didn't do a huge amount
9:19
of the companion stuff. I spent, most of my time in this
9:22
game, lost, trying to figure out what to do to advance the plot.
9:28
Yeah, that pretty much summarizes my experience with
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the game with how I feel about it.
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Yeah. It's it's interesting because
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we've played a few RPGs on this list and I think all of the
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isometric games that we've played, whether they are maybe
9:44
RPGs or RTS games. I think both of us have
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struggled with a little bit maybe with the exception of
9:51
Company of Heroes but you know, you've or Baldur's Gate, you've
9:54
got Diablo, you've got, was it Starcraft Company of Heroes
9:59
obviously in there as well but I think a lot of the isometric
10:03
games that we've played we've struggled to kind of mash with a
10:06
little bit. Would that be fair to say?
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I liked. I liked what I played of Diablo
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but but generally speaking I think I'd agree with you.
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I got into borders gate to eventually which I can't say for
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Divinity. So I did complete Baldur's Gate
10:25
to but it was a real was a really Tough.
10:30
In issue going on that game to actually get into the game.
10:33
Eventually, I got to that point but yeah, it took a very long
10:36
time for me to get the willpower to want to finish it.
10:41
So yeah, generally, I would agree with it.
10:43
I would say they're not my natural leaning in terms of
10:48
games and I think probably the same for you.
10:51
Yeah. I've always said, like, I enjoy
10:55
an RPG, like I enjoy Final Fantasy.
10:58
Like, Final Fantasy is my favorite series on.
11:00
Droid Persona obviously, and there are other RPGs I've played
11:03
that I think or alright like Breath of Fire, but yeah, if I
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think I find it harder to get into newer RPGs particularly
11:13
fantasy ones. And the thing with divinity is
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it is very open. I was watching a video where
11:20
someone compared Divinity to Elden ring in terms of just how
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open it is and how you can go in any direction you want and make
11:27
the build that you want, and it kind of makes sense.
11:30
Because as I mentioned a few episodes ago, I've been playing
11:32
a bit of a golden ring besides it kicking my ass so I can kind
11:37
of see what the comparisons are. But with divinity is very much
11:42
like a you can do whatever you want and go wherever you want
11:45
explore wherever. And it is very much one of those
11:48
games where you've got control to just explore.
11:51
But then, as soon as combat starts, it goes into a
11:53
completely different vibe. And then it's turn-based and I
11:58
enjoy turn-based RPGs. But, yeah, I think there's
12:01
something about fantasy RPGs that are new.
12:05
That I struggle to get into a little bit.
12:08
I'm not sure what that is but I don't know.
12:10
Something just doesn't really match for me.
12:12
They're not my kind of games anymore, you know.
12:15
Yeah, it says so far. I just checked the characters
12:19
names with sybilla Tolosa. There you go.
12:22
I know. Who did you have in your party?
12:24
I don't I don't think we covered that all know.
12:26
So I primarily use red prints. Because I did a little bit of
12:32
research before playing the game and find out which of the
12:34
characters are the best. So I did think about creating my
12:36
own but then kind of read into it as like that if you're a
12:40
newbie, you probably want to go with the You know, the the
12:45
already created one. So he's him if on was also, my
12:50
God is my main character. And then Van van a was in it as
12:55
well. The, the Undead.
12:58
Yeah. And he was quite useful and I
13:02
was tempted by beast, but I never really used them.
13:04
So I kind of kept it with those three and I think I played
13:11
around a little bit with sabir as well.
13:13
Well, but again, no one really stuck with me.
13:17
I like red prints. I like tea fan, most, but none
13:21
of the characters really called out to me, you know.
13:24
Yeah, yeah. It says, so let's talk a bit
13:28
about what you do in this game. You've kind of covered it with
13:33
isometric, but in terms of the turn-based combat, what do you
13:37
do? And in terms of the
13:38
moment-to-moment gameplay, what do you do in this game?
13:41
Well, the way I see this game is, it's an Lower to RPG, you
13:45
kind of, like you say, it is quite hard to find out the
13:48
linearity to progress the story but you can kind of play it.
13:52
However, you want. If you want to play this game as
13:56
like a super aggressive player, you can do that and you can get
14:02
into as many files as you want, or you can try and focus in more
14:06
on diplomacy in conversation and playing it that way.
14:09
And that's perfectly fine. And the combat.
14:12
You know, you've got your Standards combat options for an
14:17
RPG, you know, you've got your melee attacks, your ranged
14:20
attacks, but then there's quite a lot of magic to choose from as
14:22
well. So really it just depends on how
14:26
you want to play this game. And that's something that I
14:29
think is a good aspect of this game.
14:31
And a reason why I think it's probably on the list is because
14:34
of how open it is in terms of your playstyle, if you know what
14:36
I mean. yeah, I do think it does the thing that a lot of these
14:42
games do which is They give you the options of whether you want
14:46
to fight with, you want to be diplomatic and try to use speech
14:50
craft. But at certain points in the
14:53
game, they lump you in combat. Yeah, and if you haven't built
14:59
up the necessary skills or leveled up enough, you'll hit a
15:03
brick wall. I was reading some people
15:05
talking about this game saying that they had chosen the paths
15:09
for their characters and someone just said to them, you need to
15:13
start Again because you're soft like those articles aren't going
15:17
to. Yeah, that those characters
15:19
weren't going to make progress through the story and I think
15:23
that's a bit of an inherent flaw with these kinds of games with
15:28
the. Yeah, I think she's a bad bad
15:30
game design, really, because, you know, you do expect to get
15:33
locked out or softlocks out of some games from maybe, you know,
15:36
ten years or so ago, or even further back, but not games.
15:40
That originally came out. I think in 2017 I think I've
15:43
been seriously. He said it was the original.
15:45
Yeah, and I mean it's an interesting aspect of this game.
15:50
This game is quite a challenging game.
15:51
Yeah, I'm if played on the default difficulty, which I
15:54
think is called classic and I think there are two easier
15:57
difficulties. I think one of one is sort of
16:01
like Explorer and the other one is basically you ready for the
16:04
story? But yeah, it's quite a
16:07
challenging game and you can hit some brick walls and I was By
16:14
the time I got to the main, what I believe to be the main island.
16:19
I was dodging because I went northwards probably way too
16:22
quickly and I was hitting some brick walls with the combat
16:26
there and I was trying to dodge fights as much as possible
16:29
because they were just too high level.
16:31
And what this game does is if you go too near an enemy combat
16:36
starts, there's no avoiding it I suppose you could run away but
16:41
you kind of get tied into combat and it's usually the enemies go
16:44
first. So you get damaged and some of
16:48
those enemies later or North Woods of the island.
16:52
We're just wiping me out or wiping a few characters out in a
16:54
single hit. So I think obviously made a
16:56
wrong turn there. So it's challenge is an
17:02
interesting one and we've touched on it before and I'm
17:04
sure we'll touch on it again. And I think probably it caters
17:09
to the people that would be interested in this.
17:11
Aim and I think we're not necessarily the demographic for
17:16
that. No.
17:19
Yeah, it's a bit, it's a bit. It's hard to judge.
17:23
Okay, so let's talk about gameplays King.
17:26
So that the gameplay of talked about the combat and the various
17:29
things you can do, is it fun to play?
17:32
I want to say I don't think I can say fuck it says open it's
17:37
very open to play and like we said there you've got a lot of
17:39
options on the way that you do want to play it.
17:42
But in terms of fun I didn't get too much fun from it which you
17:47
might have guessed from how I've been talking about it so far.
17:51
I didn't hate it and our I want you to toad.
17:54
Yeah it's it wasn't again. I disliked.
17:58
I just really struggled to Get it, I think.
18:03
And that's a problem that I have with a lot of isometric games.
18:06
I just can't lose myself in it to the point where I have fun
18:10
and I don't know if that's due to the camera angle or what, but
18:15
those games I just struggle to lose myself in and have fun with
18:19
the game. I think you've got a somewhat
18:20
Lose Yourself, so I don't think I would say fun as such, but
18:26
open, what do you think? It's an interesting thing is say
18:30
that you said about the camera angle and I think I agree with
18:33
you there. If it had a different
18:37
perspective, I may have enjoyed this game quite a bit more.
18:43
There's just something about that.
18:45
Isometric camera that I think it's because it's not the games
18:50
that I played. When I was younger, they weren't
18:52
isometric games. They're either the first or
18:54
third person. And, yeah, I'm just as a person,
19:01
I'm not used to games like that. So it is a bit jarring and I
19:06
feel like I would have enjoyed this game.
19:07
More had it been the traditional first, or third person game.
19:11
And at times this game reminded me a bit of things like,
19:15
Oblivion and Skyrim, in terms of the things you can do, the
19:18
Freedom, that you have, but I think I prefer the first person
19:23
camera of those games. Yeah, for me, I think it makes
19:27
it a strong first impression, so you're on the boat, and it's
19:32
certainly a bit more for me. It exciting and opening than
19:36
Baldur's Gate 2, and because that opening was, yeah, rific to
19:43
me, hello, just fills me with Dread thinking about it.
19:47
So this was far more. So I thought Okay, this is this
19:49
is going to be more my thing than Baldur's Gate 2 but then
19:57
you kind of opens up a bit and it's it lets you off the lead
20:02
and having lost that kind of tie it.
20:07
And I want to say linearity of the opening but it's writing
20:10
more curated. Yeah.
20:12
More scripted bit, it was overwhelming to me and maybe
20:17
just not what I was looking for, right?
20:18
Now, because I always think with these types of games, you need
20:23
to be in the mood to play them, if it's something very sprawling
20:26
and where you can go off in any direction you want, you can do
20:31
things however you want, you need to be in the mood to play
20:33
those kind of games, and sometimes I am.
20:35
But I don't think I was, I think since Christmas, I feel like
20:38
I've been in a sort of linear game mood.
20:41
Yeah, just want to advance the plot and that's what I felt I
20:45
wanted to do with this game, but I couldn't do it.
20:49
Because I was lost most of the time and eventually I got to the
20:52
point yesterday where I thought, okay, I'm just gonna let
20:55
sleeping dogs lie, which I don't usually do.
20:58
I've completed the vast majority of games on this list but yeah,
21:01
this is one that I think I'm gonna call it a day on, but I do
21:06
think. At times, I get it.
21:10
There are times when things are going well, where the combats
21:12
going well where you're moving it a bit of a clip and I get it
21:19
and then something will happen and you'll suddenly lose
21:21
direction again. And you'll be Meandering around,
21:25
getting caught in a fight, that's above your level.
21:28
And it just goes it just loses all momentum for me.
21:32
So I get it, but it can't maintain it for me.
21:36
That's kind of how I feel. Yeah, I agree with you.
21:40
It's it does start strong but like the, I think the fact that
21:45
it's so open. And I think maybe that you and
21:47
me both from playing the games on this list of probably a
21:50
little bit burnt out, on open worlds.
21:53
Here. They say, as they have breath of
21:55
the wild upcoming and Witcher 3 and imagine that I am looking
21:59
forward to both those games. So but yeah, I get where you're
22:03
coming from with that. It's, you can tell it's a good
22:07
game but it's just hard to two. Not hard to enjoy, but just hard
22:11
to get into. It's a lot systems as well.
22:15
So you've got the combat, you've got crafting, you've got lots of
22:19
menus, there's lots of stuff going on and it wants you to
22:23
learn it systems. It's a game that wants you to
22:26
learn how to do things and I feel like if you don't do those
22:31
things that it wants you to do, you're going to be at a
22:33
disadvantage. There are certain games where
22:36
there are elements of them you can just ignore.
22:38
I feel like if you want to get the most out of this game,
22:41
You've got to pick up the elements and I must admit I
22:45
don't think I did a great job of that.
22:47
No Sam. Okay.
22:48
So do you have a favorite move at all?
22:51
Or maneuver that you choir liked not move as such, but the way
22:55
that I played it, I tried to be quite diplomatic whenever I play
22:59
an RPG or like anything along those lines.
23:03
I always try and build up my character speech skills me too,
23:08
because I like to enjoy combat and he Games.
23:12
But I always like to see what I can get extra or avoid doing by
23:18
having a high speech level. Like a good example of that was
23:21
the having a high speech level and Fallout 3.
23:26
If your speech is high enough, when you go and see three dog,
23:29
you can just avoid going to that museums getting that part.
23:32
And he'll just tell you where your dad is and it, you know,
23:35
takes our massive fetch request from the game.
23:37
So I'd say I enjoyed kind of trying to use the speech
23:40
elements of it's, um, Combat was okay as well but the way that I
23:44
played this game was a lot more based on trying to, you know,
23:51
speak my way through things rather than fight, which I'd
23:54
probably say would be a highlight for me, as it is in
23:57
most RPGs. I think, what about you?
24:00
This game is very strategic and one of the things I do like
24:03
about this game is that You're often presented with a problem
24:09
and it's one of those games where it's like have at you.
24:13
How do you want to solve this problem?
24:15
So so I was always testing the game at a certain point.
24:19
There's a certain point where there are these things I think
24:21
they called shriekers and if you step in the vicinity of them
24:25
they just kill you and Beyond them.
24:28
There is a fight with a Magister.
24:31
Magisters are the bad guys? In this game and he's called
24:35
out. Alexander, and he's a bit
24:37
further on from the shriekers. And then there is a camp before
24:40
them and you've got allies there.
24:43
So I was trying to figure out really, I was trying to figure
24:49
out how to progress and I figured out that it was by
24:53
defeating this Alexander and his group of bad guys.
24:58
Hmm and I used Seville and I basically she had better stay
25:05
Both of my characters than anyone else.
25:08
So I activated the stealth mode and I was using stealth mode to
25:15
dodge the field of view of the shriekers.
25:19
I got the attention of the guards at the far side and
25:24
basically activated combat with them.
25:27
I then somehow lured them, back all the way to the camp.
25:32
So that all the other characters within involved.
25:34
So, I had this huge Sort of. Mini Army.
25:40
Now, fighting these this group of enemies, the the army that
25:45
that was fighting on my side, they didn't want to fight for me
25:49
because of the shriekers but because I'd managed to lower the
25:51
enemies to their and they were fighting.
25:54
So I thought that was quite cool in and eventually.
25:56
Yeah, I won that battle and then I had to then figure out how to
26:00
get my main character who was not that stealthy past that
26:03
recurs to advance the plot. So then I bought an invisibility
26:06
potion and Used it on him, and he was able to sneak by them and
26:11
get to the the character on the other side that he needed to.
26:14
So it's just an example of working smarter, how he, how
26:21
thinking outside the box. I mean, I'm sure I'm sure
26:23
there's an easy way to do this, but I'd, and I did spend a good,
26:27
probably couple of hours, making that tactic work, but the fact
26:31
that it did work. Yeah, he's yeah.
26:35
And that's the game at its best in a way.
26:38
Way when you're kind of breaking it.
26:41
Yeah, I know what you mean and feeling like you're outsmarting
26:43
it a bit. Yeah, because that obviously
26:46
wasn't the intended way of doing.
26:47
Yeah, course I wasn't supposed to get past those shriekers, and
26:50
certainly wasn't supposed to be able to fight them with a bunch
26:53
of AI characters who were quite strong.
26:56
Yeah, with that. There was a whole Quest there
26:58
that I think I missed where I was supposed to find the
27:02
strategy to take out the shriekers, which was suggested
27:05
by one of the characters. So yeah, I stuff like that.
27:08
I always find And good but it wasn't everywhere.
27:12
And no again, few and far between.
27:15
Yeah, I do. And the the filler for this game
27:18
was me being lost. Yes.
27:20
So a lot about her. Yeah.
27:24
Okay. So Let's talk a bit about love
27:29
and romance in this game. So this is a game as many RPGs
27:33
do nowadays that has romantic options.
27:36
So you've got your characters and you can cultivate
27:40
relationships with them. I didn't do this, but the way
27:45
that I understand that it works ice.
27:48
You select dialog options at a certain point in the game and
27:50
you can trigger events and you can flow with certain
27:55
characters. And then there's a There's
27:57
apparently quite a graphic description of a sex scene ass,
28:04
right? Yeah interesting.
28:08
Yes I desire. It doesn't stumble across that.
28:11
Yeah, so I don't know if I needed to be further in or if I
28:14
miss some of those opportunities but I was always intrigued
28:18
purely for from this episode knowing that we were doing a
28:21
Valentine's Day episode. I was trying to see what this
28:27
game offered in terms of the relationship options, but it is
28:30
a game that offers them as many games do nowadays.
28:33
It seems to be one of the done thing, you know, RPGs nowadays.
28:36
I think games like The Witcher really popularized it So that is
28:42
love of Roman Catholics came, I just wanted.
28:45
Yeah, I just wanted to touch on it will come back to that idea
28:50
in a moment. But first, let's talk about the
28:53
audio, this game. So what struck you about the
28:56
audio of this game? I think the music's good.
28:58
I often find with RPGs that, no matter what kind of vibe it's
29:03
going for. Whether it's, you know, fantasy,
29:06
whether it's sci-fi, usually find the music in RPGs is quite
29:09
good because Is it has to be, because RPGs are so bloody long.
29:15
I thought the voice acting was pretty decent overall, it's
29:19
okay. What am I problems with RPG?
29:23
Voice? Acting is lack of
29:27
regionalization in your in your characters.
29:30
This game does have a little bit but a lot of the characters all
29:34
sound like they come from the same place and yeah, if you're
29:38
British, you know, that there are so many Different accents in
29:41
Britain and it would just be nice to hear some different
29:45
accents from time to time like mine in yours.
29:50
Yeah. So yeah, you've got the Scottish
29:53
accent four beasts and there's a bit of a very slight Northern
29:59
lilt for the guy that I was I forgot.
30:03
I forget Eva that guy. Yeah, there's a bit of a very
30:08
slight Northern. I think I think the actual voice
30:11
actor is Northern but I think he's putting on her strata.
30:13
Roxy accent. Yeah.
30:15
And but there are still A few Northern intonations here and
30:20
there. But for the most part, there's a
30:22
lot of RP and it's something that obviously, we both went to
30:27
drama. Quit something other that annoys
30:28
me about generally about British media, that everything is RP.
30:36
But, yes, that's that's probably a tangent for another day, okay?
30:42
So what about the visuals of this game?
30:45
It stands out. I think a lot of the visuals on
30:47
this pop. I imagine.
30:52
I mean playing this on the PS5, it looks very good so I imagine
30:57
playing it on the switch. OLED probably looks very good as
31:00
well particular in handheld mode.
31:03
It's got a very specific design. It kind of looks somewhat
31:07
selfish and very to knee, but I think I think it looks good.
31:12
The colors, really pop the character designs goods and
31:16
there are a lot of different environments for you to explore
31:18
which all look pretty decent. I'd say, overall the The visuals
31:21
of the game they stand out. Probably is one of the
31:25
highlights. I think.
31:27
Obviously, this is a slightly older game.
31:30
So, you know, it's not the best looking game of all time.
31:33
But I think for what it is and for the amount of gain there is
31:35
there I think it looks good for the amount of data that would
31:39
have gone into actually, you know, taking to write a lot of
31:43
these environments if you know what I mean.
31:47
Yeah, I think it looks good. It's got a nice art style and
31:52
you really in a way you can ask for more from an isometric game.
31:56
It looks nice. It looks detailed.
31:58
There's a lot of effects Works going on fire.
32:02
That spread some poison Miss and all sorts of status effects that
32:07
play a part in combat. Yeah, yeah.
32:11
So yeah. It's The times on the switch
32:14
that the frame rate goes a bit wonky.
32:17
And then as I said the low times sometimes between probably three
32:23
and four minutes which drove me a bit mad.
32:24
Yeah, but yeah, generally speaking it's a nice looking
32:29
game and I don't really know what more you can do with an
32:34
isometric game. In terms of the visuals it does
32:36
do pleasing in clean and everything is distinctive and
32:40
the water looks nice and so on, so yeah.
32:42
Yeah, it's quite an attractive game.
32:47
I quite like the way the borders Gates who looks as well, it
32:50
obviously, it's much more, hand-drawn, sort of a bit older,
32:53
but, yeah, but this is, this is the modern equivalent of
32:58
something like that. Okay, so, on to our question of
33:01
the week, which is a two-pronged question, okay?
33:04
The first prong is, can a game depict love as well as books or
33:12
films. What do you think?
33:15
Yeah. I think so it just depends how
33:19
much time is invested into the story or the character Arc or
33:22
relationship Arc of that in question.
33:26
And I also also I also think it depends on the players
33:33
connection to that character. You know, I I use it as a, as an
33:41
example all the time to the point where you could probably
33:46
mean Mm it. But I can use an example of
33:50
Final Fantasy 7. And I mean, do you know the
33:56
story of that game? It's all I know a certain
34:01
character dies, they know who that is.
34:03
You know, that there's she's a love interest and so sort of T4
34:07
and yeah. Yeah.
34:09
And you know, when that happened in 97, I think it was a lot of
34:14
people were really upset and really gutted at the Fact, that
34:17
one of the, the main characters died and they couldn't expect
34:20
bold. Really?
34:21
Yeah. Yeah.
34:22
Massively. Bold move.
34:25
And I think, They showed the grief and the relationship
34:31
trauma that came from the back of that.
34:33
I'm not going to mention the characters now just because, you
34:35
know, will spoil it to that one week when we talk about that
34:38
game will never talk to you about that game.
34:42
That game is bad or this podcast, because we've talked
34:44
about so much already and we haven't even done that.
34:46
So I don't know. That's why, but yeah, I think, I
34:50
think it can be Done. Well, I mean, it can also be
34:54
done incredibly ham-fisted Lee. You've only got to look at not
34:58
so much love, but in terms of lust and sex, you just got to
35:02
look at Heavy Rain. That weird relationship with the
35:07
journalist and Ethan aged terribly.
35:10
Yeah, it goes both ways. But I think, yes you can.
35:15
What do you reckon? Yeah, I think so.
35:19
I think Obviously the dimension that games have which books and
35:24
films don't have, is that interactivity?
35:27
Yeah. And I think the interesting
35:32
aspect of games is I think you can do in cutscenes which most
35:36
games do. But how do you translate that
35:40
love into a gameplay feature without it being an interactive
35:46
succeeding in EM? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
35:50
That That. I'm kind of fits in with the
35:54
second part of the question, which I'll ask in a moment, but
35:57
yeah. So I think I do think It's
36:01
possible. I think it needs to be a
36:02
priority of the game developer. Yes.
36:05
And a lot of people have kind of jumped on The Witcher style
36:09
bandwagon, but that was taken from the books.
36:12
That is very much in the books, that that style of things, and
36:15
obviously things like Game of Thrones, also popularized, it
36:19
and those characters. And those relationships in the,
36:23
which I, we haven't played the game yet for the list with, so
36:28
they are deep. Relationships with multifaceted
36:33
characters, whereas I think games just take oh people like
36:39
sexting games. Therefore we're going to put
36:42
some of that in there. Yeah.
36:45
So I think people focus on the wrong thing a bit too much with
36:50
with the Rick with The Witcher, for example.
36:52
But my next part of the question is, what do you think?
36:57
The future looks for in the depiction of loving games, and
37:00
the Reason I ask this is because you think back to games 20, 30
37:05
years ago, love in games was Mario and Peach doing whatever
37:11
they do with a with a gorilla, stealing Peach and then hmm.
37:15
And obviously, we've come all the way to now and we do see
37:21
much more effort and much more complexity going into these
37:26
relationships. So where do you see it in the
37:29
future? And I'll ask the third part to
37:33
this question after that, I don't really know I suppose with
37:37
more technology becomes more options.
37:39
Like you've got that the weird stuff that people can do with
37:42
relationships simulators in like VR and stuff, which is a little
37:48
bit crazy. But I suppose just with the with
37:54
implementation now with AI in quite a lot of different
37:58
Technologies you can probably Bleep have Endless Options when
38:03
it comes to love arcs or whatever and video games are in
38:08
interactive media. But I don't really know to be
38:12
honest with you. That's a hard question to
38:15
answer. I'm not sure.
38:17
Yeah, I think I'd like to see it kind of lean into the more
38:20
interactive elements in terms of, I've talked about this game
38:24
before on the podcast. So game called Catherine made.
38:27
Yeah, Atlas, who also make Persona and They, they delve
38:33
into the complexities of relationships and, and how this
38:39
main character has this, this fear of commitment.
38:41
And then the other characters all have their own issues and
38:44
then they come together to create these quite troubled
38:48
relationships. And that game, I think really
38:52
capitalizes on it and you get decisions that you can make.
38:56
But the gameplay serves this plot, which is a very unusual
39:00
plot. And I think that's a game that
39:02
does relationships very, very well.
39:05
So I think it has to be kind of said it already.
39:08
So I think it has to be Central to your to what your you want to
39:11
do. So I suppose, another question
39:14
for you is, are there certain types of games that Are made to
39:21
do relationships better, and give you an example.
39:23
First person shooters versus, maybe Platformers, maybe versus
39:27
visual novels versus puzzle games.
39:31
Yeah. Probably visual novels are a
39:34
good good one to focus on, obviously not FPS games although
39:38
does not to throw that out the window.
39:40
Completely I'd say RPGs if done well yep, a degree Maybe.
39:48
Like adventure games games, like Uncharted.
39:52
Like those kind of AAA big budget games potentially, as
39:54
well. Yeah.
39:56
And then we also got games. Like the last of us we're
40:03
obviously that is about a man and a daughter figure.
40:09
So it's a different kind of thing but you just change the
40:12
characters around a little bit. There's no reason why with good
40:14
writing that couldn't be suitable as well.
40:16
You know, you also have These relationships in that game,
40:20
which tends to be? Obviously more down the Romantic
40:24
side of things and quite interesting, when you think
40:28
about them, we've got lots of us left behind.
40:30
Yep. The relationship is kind of
40:32
explored there and then the one in The Last of Us 2 as well.
40:35
Yeah. So, yeah, that there are some
40:38
interesting things in those games, and, and they tend to be
40:41
at The Cutting Edge in terms of story and character development.
40:46
I mean, we had such a detailed discussion about The Last of Us
40:51
2 and we still kind of didn't get to the bottom of it, and
40:55
that's a game that really You can just talk about for a very
41:00
long time. I'll probably still haven't
41:02
quite processed how I feel about that game and I think a second
41:05
playthrough of that which I've been sort of resisting, would
41:11
strengthen my views on that game.
41:14
But yeah, so I think that's, that's a good one, an
41:16
interesting one. So any other before we before we
41:19
close out on on the the love romance aspect, any other
41:23
notable examples of games that you felt have done.
41:27
Love right. But I can think of the top of my
41:35
head, I don't think. Like there's always a love
41:40
interest in a game or something but nothing that really stands
41:42
out I think Kratos in. The new God of War is endured
41:49
the Remake that we played recently.
41:51
Not the Remake that, you know, the new God of War 2018, even
41:56
though you don't see craters, his relationship with his wife.
41:59
When he's preparing her for to burned.
42:02
At the pie, you can tell through his relationship with his son.
42:06
How much you loved his wife. And yeah, you know, think things
42:09
like that. Come to mind, maybe, but none
42:11
that I can think of. Oh, yeah, romantic love that
42:14
stands out. You've got a theme in Final
42:15
Fantasy 8. That Maybe argue with Squall
42:18
rinoa, but other than people say, I was a kid, a few lists
42:22
before the episode a few people say, Final Fantasy 1000 with
42:26
tedious and use. Yeah, so few people, bring that
42:30
up as a good example and a few that I've played recently.
42:35
I recently played a game called Some the last day of June,
42:43
that's what it's called, right basically?
42:44
It's about about a man who lost his wife in a car accident and
42:51
he's trying to basically he's grieving and he's been grieving
42:57
for some time and he's left in a wheelchair and he's trying to
43:02
turn back time and alter time, to avoid her death and it's
43:06
quite powerful, quite poignant. And obviously very dedicated to
43:12
this story. That is telling and may not be
43:15
ultimately very satisfying, but it was a worthwhile experience.
43:21
And another one that I played recently was a game called To
43:23
The Moon. Again these are these are
43:24
smaller games. Yeah, independent, yeah.
43:28
And that game also was about time travel funnily enough,
43:33
which is yeah, so so in this one he was he It's fulfill his dream
43:40
of going to the moon, and in order to do that, he had to
43:44
raise his wife. And actually, as part of part of
43:49
these memories, it turned out that she she was still there and
43:53
it was about him, discovering these memories of her being
43:55
still. It's still being that I've
43:57
completely butchered that plot. So if you are interested, have a
44:01
look elsewhere because I butchered that but that's
44:05
another good one and One of the games that I one of the games
44:10
actually on this list. Well, we'll be on this list.
44:13
One of the extra games that was added to the list.
44:17
After we compiled, it is housing fata Morgana, which is a visual
44:24
novel game and it. I don't know how you'll feel
44:29
about it because obviously it's a visual novel and I think
44:31
they're a bit of an acquired taste, but it quite literally
44:35
blew me away. And I I was playing it
44:39
obsessively for for about a month and a half and I thought
44:42
it was utterly brilliant. And I will, I'm not.
44:45
I wasn't that I wasn't really into visual novels before I
44:47
played that game. And now I'm looking for a game
44:50
that can even come close to that game.
44:51
Yeah, it really blew me away and that had that the the
44:54
relationships in that game, obviously, they're more akin to
44:58
books. Yeah, so it's a bit different
45:01
but yeah, the relationships are so multifaceted, and yeah.
45:08
I think there's going to be a very interesting episode when we
45:10
come to do it. Yeah honestly yeah that's
45:12
another one for me. Okay so I think we've kind of
45:17
run the gamut of love relationships in our Valentine's
45:22
Day special so hopefully you enjoyed that discussion.
45:26
Okay so does if you're strange going back to Divinity to
45:31
happen. So after that conversation does
45:34
divinity original sin to deserve to be on the Metacritic top 100
45:39
list? I don't think so.
45:41
I think it's a fine game. It's not one that I could get
45:44
into search. I think there are a lot of
45:47
elements to it that for someone like me someone who doesn't have
45:50
very much time to get into invested in these kind of games
45:54
as a 31-year old, it's very Why it's not big enough friendly?
46:01
There are good elements to it and I think there are a lot of
46:02
parts this game. Aw.
46:03
Yeah. Okay.
46:04
That's decent or yeah, that works.
46:06
But overall I probably wouldn't say so no.
46:08
Not for me. What do you think?
46:11
Yeah, I'd agree. And for me it's a very simple
46:14
reason. I could probably get along with
46:17
the combat I could get along with the facts that it can be
46:21
of. Well, the fact that you can get
46:23
lost at times, my the biggest thing that I think is going
46:26
lacks is just Bit of focus and that could be something in the
46:31
main menu that says. To advance the main storyline go
46:36
here. Yeah, they didn't do that.
46:39
Quest log. Yeah.
46:41
And the question of that it does provide is quite basic.
46:45
Yeah. And vague and I get is
46:47
deliberately so. But for me certainly right now,
46:50
I needed a bit more focus and it didn't have that.
46:54
So yeah, I did. I tried for probably close to 30
47:00
hours to get into this game and I just couldn't and sometimes
47:06
you've got to walk away and say this game isn't for me right now
47:10
maybe. It will be in future.
47:11
Yeah but for right now I don't think it deserves its place on
47:15
the list. No, that's fair enough.
47:18
Yeah. Okay, so what have we got coming
47:21
up next week in our episode next week, we have got Splinter Cell
47:25
Chaos Theory, the third game in this been sold Trilogy.
47:30
The original trilogy. Anyway, we've played Pandora
47:33
tomorrow, already on the list, and I think so.
47:37
Chaos theory is a personal favorite of both yours and mine.
47:40
Yeah, I love cast. Yeah, I've not played it for
47:43
about 15 years so I'm looking forward to going back to it.
47:45
So that should be a good episode and there is the bonus level as
47:51
well, where you get to sneak one as mr.
47:52
Blobby, you know what? I forgot, my mr.
47:57
Blobby usual inputs, good job on here.
48:00
Let's good job. You're on the ball.
48:01
I'm asleep. Coffee forget, mr.
48:04
Blobby on Valentine's Day like but yes.
48:07
So Spencer Chaos Theory next week.
48:10
As usual, you can find us on social media at the long and
48:13
short of it podcast, you can email us at long and short it
48:17
podcast at hotmail.com. And if you've enjoyed this
48:19
episode or any of our other episodes, please feel free to
48:22
share them with friends, family, pets or wild animals.
48:25
As I'm sure they would enjoy them as well.
48:28
But yes, I believe that is all we have to say about Divinity,
48:32
original sin to anything else to add from yourself.
48:36
Whether you're single or in a relationship or something else,
48:40
we hope you have a lovely Valentine's Day and we'll see
48:43
you next week for some Chaos Theory.
48:46
We shall see you next time, cheerio.