Beyond Divinity

It 'could' have been a contender, Sam explains...

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This week I've felt a little bit like Marty McFly. That is if he only travelled back to the year 2000 after going forward to 2004. If you see what I mean. Anyway, after reviewing the somewhat archaic Egypt 3 I've got another review here for you which wouldn't have looked out of place if posted on Ferrago four years ago. Well, if the site was around back then, and without all the bitching in the review about how I felt playing Beyond Divinity was so akin to a game from that millennium year. Because of course back then it would have been a more positive review as the flaws which are so apparent when looking at it today would have barely registered in those salad days. And the better RPGs which have pushed the boundaries of the genre forward would still be in development.

Time travel aside, the thing with Beyond Divinity that really bugged me was is that it could have been a contender. As it is it lets itself down with some poor presentation, some crazy design decisions and an inability develop its gameplay.

Beyond Divinity is developer Larian Studio's latest RPG in their Divinity universe. Having not played the original Divine Divinity I can't really comment on what has changed and how well any persistent story may have been carried on. Beyond Divinity is a hack'n'slash dungeon romp in the manner of all other hack'n'slash dungeon romps. The game begins deep in the bowls of some fiend's putrid dungeon. Into the hero's grimy world appears the Death Knight, a former fiend whose being, through some magical force, has been matched to your fate. In effect this means that you will always be in charge of two characters through the ensuing adventure, with the death of one causing the other to instantly expire. So keep a wary eye on your forbidding companion and head forth to escape to the surface.

Displayed in the typical 3/4 isometric view, the left and right mouse buttons perform the primary and secondary actions. These can be selected from drop-downs beside the character portraits. Gaining a level gains you a new skill, and some of these, like spells, become options for your different actions. This should give you some freedom in your approach to combat, but the speed of the game and the rushing mentality of your foes mean melee combat is almost the only manageable means of fighting. I set a character up as a wizard, but had a lot of difficulty keeping him out of harms way. Taking the survivalist option, the game's thief class was never really an option for me, and seeing how the game plays I very much doubt the stealthy player will feel satisfied with what Beyond Divinity offers up in that style of play.

So it's a good thing that the only item restrictions are based on stats rather than class. You get five stat points to distribute each level. I found myself going for two fighters, although one with some magical ability. Even then I still died an awful lot. If you get attacked by more than three baddies at once in all likeliness you will die. Health bars shoot down at a perilous rate, and unless you have a bountiful supply of potions to administer when you slap the space bar to pause the game, well you and the Death Knight and are going to get used to lying flat out on your bloody backs. I found ease of death to be rather irritating, but not nearly as irritating as the complete lack of an autosave. I didn't even think of using the quick save until I realised that this game was never going to save itself for me. Now most of you probably know the anger that can occur when 30 minutes of gaming gets wiped out by a surprise death, so the lack of any autosave during map transitions or of any sort earns a big black mark for Beyond Divinity in my reviewer's notebook. Especially when the menace of the games instant death 'feature' potentially lurks around each corner. It was just like playing Jet Set Willi again, a contact with a time-ribbon of gaming past that was truly shocking.

The character creation aspect of the game is very good, even if the adventuring itself is almost solely about brute-force. On top of the usual strength and intelligence stats there are a five secondary attributes with which to define your chosen abilities. Factors such as luck, evasion and accuracy all go up depending on the distribution of the primary stats. The various weapons and items that are well sprinkled throughout the game will affect these stats, with heavy armour reducing your accuracy while possibly boosting your regenerative skills. How much of a difference you notice these attributes make is all down to your level of perception, but they do fill the important role of giving the player something extra to build on and improve.