Divinity: Original Sin Enhanced Edition Review - A Charming And Challenging RPG

Now that you've finished playing The Witcher or have come to a stopping point in Stardew Valley, you're probably looking for another RPG to fill your time. While Divinity: Original Sin has been out for awhile, the team at Larian Studios recently released the Enhanced Edition for PS4 and Xbox One. If you missed out the first time around, now is a great time to jump in.

Divinity: Original Sin Enhanced Edition places you in the boots of a source hunter, who is on their way to the city of Cyseal to investigate a murder. That simple crime leads to an adventure that brings you into contact with the undead, evil sorcery, orcs, and some of the quirkiest characters and items in any RPG I've ever played.

I make sure to say items because running into a wishing well that speaks to you is commonplace in this game. It gets better, though, as the wishing well has a brother (also a wishing well) that has been kidnapped to a far away castle, and you have to find a way to rescue him. Another example would be the discovery of a talking head, who you then need to steal so you can find out what's really going on with his master. Quests like this are prevalent in the game, and even NPC characters who serve no real purpose in the game have long bits of dialogue, just based on the off chance that you might speak to them on your journey.

The world is charming, never letting its epic in scope storyline (that involves the dissolving of time mind you) bog it down. While the majority of the game takes place at or around Cyseal, I never felt like that was a bad thing, and there are enough other places to warp to that it never felt stifling.

Your party consists of four members at a time, allowing you to swap out at certain locations. The cast is varied, with a nice mix of characters that won't annoy you along the way but won't necessarily stand out either, unless you do a bit of digging. Each character has a dialogue tree that you can initiate, and I really recommend talking to them all, as you'll understand a bit more of where they're coming from. The reason I point that out is because typically a game would walk you through all this, but this game doesn't really believe in that.

There are some helpful tutorials for the game on its website, but within the confines of the game it does not hold your hand. Take for instance its complex element and weather system, one of the combat's highlights. You can ignite oil or poison with a fire wand or douse a burning landscape with a torrential downpour via a water spell. There are so many combinations, but once the battlefield fills up, sometimes it makes it hard to navigate just what cause and effect each spell or combination will have. Having this information somewhere to easily reference in game would have been helpful.

The game is also difficult, and don't be surprised or frustrated if you wipe multiple times. Sometimes the smallest change in approach or preparedness can be the difference between a victory or getting smoked. I've had to redo battles several times, only to take a break in a new area and then come back days later to give it another go. There are more times where I just reloaded rather than slightly edge out a victory, due to how I handled the battle. If I used too many revival spells (which aren't the easiest to find) or had a piece of armor I really liked shattered, I would just redo it.

The combat is addicting and is based on an AP type system. It really behooves the player to specialize in a few skills rather than be a jack of all trades. If you skew toward the latter, you will just end up being ineffective in combat. You can adjust the camera, and zoom in or out or even take a birds eye view of the combat. Still, I never found a happy medium and was constantly trying to get a sweet spot. While you can go it solo, the game is even more fun in co-op, allowing for split screen or online co-op with up to four players.

If you're looking for an RPG that doesn't view difficulty as a bad thing, while also offering a vibrant and light-hearted world to explore, Divinity: Original Sin Enhanced Edition might just be for you. If you don't like talking to NPC's or you typically skip the dialogue in RPG's, then I'm not sure if the combat alone is worth your time.