Topic: Divinity 2 -- Update: DKS will get patched-up to Director's Cut for FREE

[MysterD]

Sven Vincke of Larian (Lar on RPGWatch) had A LOT of blunt stuff to say about people's reaction to Divin 2 and his take on some things on the game.

Hi everybody,

I just wanted to throw in my 2 cents about this as I saw a lot of flak thrown at us and this is one of the sites I visit every day, I wanted to react:

No save-games in demo - I admit that was a mistake. The original reasoning was that we couldn't provide compatibility between the demo savegames and the full game and therefore it was deactivated. I'd like to rectify that, but I dont' want to bother QA at this point until they've done with the patch testing.

Patches - all I can say is that the bloody things have been there since November, but the process of getting them released is just really slow. The problem is that they need to test it against every single version, which due to the advent of online distribution has risen to over 40. Doesn't help you, doesn't help us, and we're just biting our nails out of sheer frustration while we're waiting.

Save-game location - if I'm not mistaking, the location comes from some specification document we got, which is also why you'll see some other games put it there. I actually agree that it's not an ideal place, but nobody stood still during development and reflected on it.

Windows 7 - the game was developed while Windows 7 wasn't out yet and we checked it on beta versions. The one thing that's really important is that the DX9 drivers are installed on Windows 7 (they are not included).

Game tanking - it's actually doing quite well. It's been charting in most territories, with top 3 positions taken in both Russia and Germany and entered at 6 on Steam in the US.

Securom - Larian's official attitude on copy protection is that it's a waste of time, but unfortunately publishers don't agree with that view. We learnt our lesson with Beyond Divinity which is why we stripped the copy protection for that in the form of a patch, and the remastered Divinity versions don't have any copy protection (at least none that we put on it). Still, for a copy protection system, we aren't seeing a lot of issues with Securom.

DivDiv remaster - the digital distribution versions have been updated to handle the issues that were reported.

On another note, I think it really sucks that some people have issues with the game, considering the insane amount of time and resources spent on QA. PC wise it's just impossible to cover all bases and we only shipped when no reproducible game breaking or blocking bugs were signalled by at least 4 companies involved in the QA process. On PC a lot of the issues we are seeing are OS/HW/Driver related or "some piece of software installed" related. We're fixing everything we manage to reproduce, but of course, it doesn't help that those patches aren't out yet. I know that doesn't help for the people who are encountering issues, but we really are pushing as hard as we can for getting them out there.

[Quemaqua]

Pretty decent little post.  Regardless of the circumstances, I think it's always good when devs try to have open dialogues with their customers.  It's almost never a bad thing.

[MysterD]

Pretty decent little post.  Regardless of the circumstances, I think it's always good when devs try to have open dialogues with their customers.  It's almost never a bad thing.

Agreed 100%, Que.

I really liked how open and honest Sven was about everything. He basically tells it as it is. It's all I can ask really from a dev.

Some game designers and company owners, even w/ the most obvious problems right in front of your face about a game, just won't admit to a game's problems. Or hell - they just won't supply you much info on matters.

I like Larian - they did a good job w/ fixing issues galore w/ both Divine Divinity and Beyond Divinity in patches - so, I hope this trend continues w/ Divinity 2. I'd really like to get my hands on Divin 2, once more matters get resolved...

[MysterD]

G4TV Review - X360 Version.
2 stars (out of 5)

[MysterD]

European version of Divin 2 - Super Patch 1.03 released.
That's for German, Italian, French, and versions of the game.

USA version owners of Divin 2 - you're already up to Version 1.03 (on disc or through your digital distributor).

If you already have a Divinity II patch installed on your PC just click on "Search online for updates" in your start menu and you've got it.

New features:

- Added a crosshair option for better targeting/item interaction
- Physics improvement. Easier to walk forward when running into objects.
- Melee attacks now hit multiple targets in a cone
- Greatly improved both sword and bow targeting
- Turned down homing of enemy projectiles on lower difficulties
- Added waypoint shrines to map
- Shorter animations for certain skills

Notes:

- Patch 1.03 contains Patch 1.01 and Patch 1.02
- To make all changes shall work properly you should start a new game
- This Patch only works with all DVD versions of the game, online retailers will deliver their patch in addition.

[MysterD]

IGN Reviews
PC Review - 7.0 (out of 10)
X360 Review - 4.8 (out of 10).

X360 Version = VERY BUGGY

I can’t recommend the Xbox 360 version of this product to anyone. The occasionally glitchiness of the PC version was much more pronounced on the console, particularly when it came to enemies getting stuck in the environment. The aiming mechanic is cumbersome and confusing when dealing with more than one target, which happens frequently, the menu system and interface are a chore to sift through, and character movement and control is more imprecise. An inconsistent framerate, low level of detail compared to other Xbox 360 releases in this genre, and jerky animations combined with the already unoriginal art style makes this an unpleasant experience for anyone.

Even worse, at one point a door disappeared from the environment so I couldn’t actually exit and had to reload a previous save (which didn’t solve the issue), and in multiple instances save files I overwrote multiple times didn’t load correctly. That’s pretty poor, and part of the experience you should be aware of if the Xbox 360 version is your only option.

[Pugnate]

It's almost never a bad thing.

I see Derek Smart made you say "almost".

[Quemaqua]

Exaaactly.

[MysterD]

Divinity 2: Ego Draconis for the X360 has been patched.

[MysterD]

Since DAO likes kicking my ass and I'm leveling up and junk - yeah, my copy of Divinity 2 arrived. I'mma go try it out, sometime soon.

Expect impressions eventually...

[MysterD]

I just had a chance to try out Divinity II!

First impressions:
-Visually appealing.
-Animations are great. Character animations during dialogue are well done.
-Seems to have quite a few technical glitches.
-Framerate performance could be better.
-Interesting story.
-Interface is not bad but could do with some enhancement.

Overall, I was quite taken with it. It seems to have a lot of influence from Fable actually!

MyD, if you like Risen I think you'll really enjoy Divinity II since it's a bit more polished, though heavier on the system.

I definitely get the Risen and Fable comparisons here. I really like this game and its combat. It just feels good on the KB/mouse.

One thing, though - the sound effects just seem a little all over the place. I got my sound turned-up good, too. So, why does the mace not sound like it's slamming my enemy when I hit them? It doesn't feel like it's thumping the enemy - when in other games like say Dragon Age, the mace sound effects sound brutal. Though, when I toss a fireball at an enemy here in Divin 2 - it sounds like I burnt the enemy to a crispy - yes, the fireball sound does sounds good.

The "Experience Debt" thing here is interesting. If you spent lots of experience on Mind-reading people, you can actually grow a debt - and you'll need MORE experience to level-up to next level.

Voice-acting sounds good and characters animations are great.

Since my rig is older, I had to jump it down to Single-Core Pre-Set Settings to get it to stop from stuttering here and there on my PC when moving around. I have it running on 1024x768 on Single-Core Pre-Set Settings (which basically is almost everything is on Medium; though Textures are on Low).

Must go play more.

[MysterD]

Divinity 2: Flames of Vengeance (Expansion Pack) announcement should be coming soon.

And yep, Sven Vincke of Larian confirms that this game exists.
DTP should be announcing this in days to come - maybe as soon as tomorrow.

Small tidbits of info what we will see in this expansion.

The developers promise:
- 15 hours of gameplay
- many optional quests
- mindreading is more important and is needed to complete at least some quests
- interesting non-combat oriented quests (e.g. in one quest you're supposed to give a theatrical performance)
- better interface
- better AI
- better graphics (DirectX 11 support)
- you will be able to export your character from the original Divinity 2 or start a new one
- skill trees will be expanded

I can't read Russian, but here you go - this is where the news and screens come from.

Screens:

[MysterD]

DTP officially announces Divinity II: Flames of Vengeance (expansion pack).
Planned for Q4 2010 for PC and XBL Marketplace.

Aleroth, once a war-torn city, now holds the next challenges for computer role playing gamers. Rivellon, the world of Divinity II, is still not safe. In Divinity II: Flames of Vengeance, the game’s add on, players must face the evil once more.

"The player picks up the story of the dragon knight and guides him to his ultimate destiny. Along the way several accounts are settled, and the answers to many questions in the Divinity universe revealed.", Swen Vincke, Creative Director and CEO of the development team Larian Studios, explains.

But not only the story of the dragon will be continued, the engine has experienced a solid overhaul as well, improving performance and graphics along the way.

Divinity II: Flames of Vengeance will be released in Q4 2010 for PC and on Xbox Live™ Marketplace.

[MysterD]

Sven Vincke goes into some details of what to expect in the upcoming Flames of Vengeance expansion.

As there was a bit of lost in translation going in Moscow, let me explain a bit more what I was trying to tell ;\)

-We're working on improving performance, fluidity and solving whatever bugs still remained in the original game.
-We've increased the graphics quality in the expansion
-We're correcting some design issues people've had with the original game (e.g. impact of level on combat)
-The expansion offers more than 30 new and interesting quests (at this moment 36)
-In the Moscow presentation we showed off a couple of quests to make the point
-The story starts in the astral plane where you ended Divinity II and brings you back to the city of Aleroth, which is now "open for business"
-You can start right away in the expansion area with a character you get to build in the character customisation screen, or you can continue playing from an old save-game. When the original story ends, you will then seamlessly continue into the expansion area, and to a player it will feel like a natural progression of the story.
-One design goal was to provide a similar experience as the first part of the game
-Another design goal was to allow you to become a really powerful dragon knight
-It's not a standalone add-on

We basically had three goals with the expansion pack:

1. If you haven't played Divinity II yet, then you are in for a major experience when you play through the original game and continue into the expansion pack.
2. If you played Divinity II already, then you are going to see the closing of many character arcs that were still open, get the opportunity for revenge if you felt bad at the end, and discover answers to questions you might've had.
3. Several people had comments about the game saying things like "if only this and that", so we tried to take care of the "if only this and that".

It's scheduled for an august/september release and that looks pretty solid as at this point the entire expansion pack is already playable. On that note, we're looking for testers which I think Lynn will announce soon.

Edited by Lar_q (Today at 06:53 AM)

[MysterD]

Sven Vincke of Larian has a lot to say about FOV expansion and the gaming industry (publishers vs. dev's).

Publishers Killing Dev's

The typical strategy that has caused more than one independent developer to die in the last two years is pretty cynical. It basically boils down to – publisher/distributor owes a developer money. They don’t pay. The legal hassle starts, the developer finds itself in trouble because it was counting on that money. If the developer doesn’t have sufficient financial stamina to last for quite some time and pay the required legal fees (which are very high), the developer dies, the publisher doesn’t have to pay its royalties and problem solved (from the publisher point of view).

I find this obscene, and I can easily pinpoint the developers that died because of these practices, and it’s only made possible because the revenues from the sales of the game don’t arrive directly at the developer. I get sick when I see some publishers who I know engaged in these practices boast how they steered their company through difficulty times, because they did it by using illegal methods bordering on the criminal.

CDV = Bankrupt (Div 2's USA publisher)

We're still working on the US market - I hope we'll be able to announce something soon. The bankruptcy of CDV didn't really help there and created a complicated situation which we are trying to sort out.

[MysterD]

Sven Vincke Of Larian Studios on differences b/t Divinity II: Ego Draconis - Original
And the newer Divinity II: Ego Draconis - Remastered Edition that ONLY comes w/ Divinity II: Dragon Knight Saga (DKS).

Flames of Vengeance retroactively applies many changes which are introduced in DKS also to Ego Draconis. Most engine changes for instance are immediately present in Ego Draconis. To maintain compatibility with existing savegames however, there are a number of things which aren't changed when you install FOV. These are:

Enemy placement and balancing (massive overhaul)
Loot and set-items (complete overhaul)
Story and scripting changes (e.g. in DKS flying fortress gameplay is very different to ED)
Art changes in Ego Draconis (though you do get the advantage of better lighting & shading)

In general, if you played or finished Ego Draconis and don't want to start over again, get FOV.

If you don't mind starting over again, get DKS, in which the total gameplay experience is in my opinion much more stream-lined.

There's no big differences between the FOV content in DKS and the FOV content applied to ED.

[Xessive]

So, will this be free for people who already bought the game? Kinda like The Witcher Enhanced Edition? If not, that's a shit deal considering how buggy Divinity 2 is, or is that was Flames of Vengeance was for the original Ego Draconis?

I'm just a little confused.. Is this more like what Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena was to Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay?

[MysterD]

So, will this be free for people who already bought the game? Kinda like The Witcher Enhanced Edition?

Nope.

If you want the Divinity II: Ego Draconis - Remastered extra in-game content and modifications (game balancing, new areas, new quests, etc), you'll have to buy Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga Edition.

If not, that's a shit deal considering how buggy Divinity 2 is, or is that was Flames of Vengeance was for the original Ego Draconis?

Wait for a price-drop on DKS Edition, I'd guess - that's what I plan to do, since I already own Ego Draconis.

If you have Ego Draconis - Original and you do just buy FOV Expansion, you will get the engine overhauling and performance-issue fixes. All those technical tweaks were put forth into FOV.

Put simply - Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga Edition is the version to buy.

[MysterD]

Sven Vincke clarifies more on ED Original + FOV vs. DKS.

Ok, let's me try again - it's pretty clear when you play it but somehow I find it very hard to write it down:

The Dragon Knight Saga has been approached as if it were an entire new game from the point of view of the core item-fever & hack and slash parts of the gameplay as well as getting rid of those areas that we considered to be "boring" in Ego Draconis. We've upgraded the engine, upgrade the graphics, upgraded the audio, changed the levels, changed the balancing, modified several features and where possible applied those changes to both Ego Draconis and Flames Of Vengeance.

Additionally, on the 360, we changed almost the entire interface, modified the levels and gameplay to increase performance, changed the camera system/controls, and made sure the 360 has its a different balancing than the PC version as both platforms play differently.

If on PC it plays more "streamlined", on 360 it's almost as if it's a different (and better) game.

Since its a pretty big redesign of several parts of Ego Draconis, it's impossible to convert Ego Draconis in The Dragon Knight Saga with just a patch - for that there are too many changes - but those areas of the game that we can change, without affecting the existing savegames, we've tried to change through the upcoming patch.

For instance, if you install FOV, you get a better-looking Ego Draconis, and also the engine improvements. A patch which would bring ED to DKS would consist of replacing almost every single file, and it's guarnateed that you wouldn't be able to play any of your previous saves.

So D2:ED + FoV (which includes patch) does not equal DKS, but it's as close as we can get it without destroying the save-games.

For people who don't buy FOV, we'll provide a D2:ED patch, but I need to add that it's up to the various publishers to release it.

The intended audience of DKS consists primarily of people who didn't buy D2:ED, but in the same breath I have to say that I think that all the changes done make the entire experience more fun and I wished we could've launched DKS as ED.

EDIT - 9-13-2010:
Sven on some more changes in Divinity 2: Ego Draconis - Remastered Edition.

The fjords specifically have gotten a big treatment in terms of monster placement and we also got rid of most of those annoying shield puzzles.

[MysterD]

Sven is thinking of a Possible FOV -> DKS Patch
Sven Vincke kicking around an idea.

He's thinking about those (ED Original owners - PC version) that do buy FOV Expansion...
There could be a FREE patch later released to turn that game into The DKS Edition [ED Remastered + FOV].

That'd be cool w/ me.

[MysterD]

Focus-Home.com -> New Divinity 2: Dragon Knight Saga screenshots.

FOV Screens




Ego Draconis - Remastered Screens

[MysterD]

Divinity 2: Dragon Knight Saga - Box-Art

[MysterD]

Larian Forums -> Sven Vincke on DKS Status for all NON-USA Versions.

This is the current status:

DKS Xbox360: English, French, German, Spanish and Italian versions are in submission at Microsoft and we are waiting for their approval. If they give the go ahead, then the november 5th date will be respected. As always, it's possible that games arrive in stores sooner.

DKS PC: We are doing final checks on the gold masters for English, French, German, Spanish and Italian versions and expect these to be ready in time. Actually, as it looks now manufacturing of at least the German version will probably start this friday.

FOV PC: English, French, German, Italian versions are being prepared and tested. These will be released digitally, and for the moment we have no reasons to assume the November 5th release dates won't be met.

Other languages are also in the works and we hope that by the end of October all versions will be finished.

So in other words, it might not be October 26th, but I think the week after that, The Dragon Knight Saga and Flames Of Vengeance should be available.

Larian Forums -> Sven Vincke on USA Version of DKS and FOV.

Unfortunately I can't give you much more information on this yet - US release is still being discussed but we're doing our best.

[MysterD]

Digital Versions of DKS and FOV

Larian Vault
Larian Vault -> Divinity 2: DKS Edition and also Divinity 2: Flames of Vengeance are being sold on their LarianVault download service.
According to their FAQ, games sold on LarianVault contain some form of DRM w/ 3 install limit activation-style DRM.
Uninstalling will get you a revoke.

Steam Version
Steampowered -> Divinity 2: Dragon Knight Saga Edition will unlock on Steam in 21 hours.
If you own Divinity 2: Ego Draconis from Steam, upgrading to DKS Edition will get you a 33% discount.
WARNING: Steam version of this contains additional Securom 5-install limit activation-style DRM.

[MysterD]

Divinity 2: DKS - Demo Released
Divinity 2 Website -> Divinity 2: Dragon Knight Saga Edition DEMO Released.

[MysterD]

Larian Boards -> Sven Vincke of Larian explains why some PC games in the UK don't get released as quickly as some of the other regions.

So here's a little industry secret to explain why PC versions of games aren't always available in the UK immediately.

The problem with PC UK is that in order for the stores to be able to slash prices so aggressively they demand enormous discounts from publishers/distributors. If they don't get their discounts, they don't take the game.

When they then eventually get their discounts, grey importers buy large quantities of stock and sell them to other territories in Europe, destroying the market in those territories for the distributors/shops that bought the games at the normal trade price.

Net result - for a publisher it can actually be more interesting not to release a PC version in the UK in order to protect the other PC markets.

And yes, the second hand market is affecting the game industry heavily.

[MysterD]

Larian -> For owners of ED+FOV, here's the ED+FOV -> DKS Upgrade BETA Patch.

[MysterD]

DRM Free EXE released for Divinity 2: DKS Edition.

First off, make sure you are running version 1.4.9.70
If not, patch-up to it!

Download the zip file [with new EXE file w/out DRM] and unzip it.
Go into your Divinity 2 DKS\bin folder.
Rename the old file to "Divinity 2_withDRM.exe" [just to have as a back-up]
Take the unzipped file DRM Free "Divinity2.EXE" and throw it in the Divinity 2 DKS\bin folder.
Get running the game!

I tried this w/ Non-Steam version of the game, BTW. Works fine.

I don't know if this will work for Steam version - or if they'll release this EXE via Steam.
So, if for some reason you are going to try this No DRM EXE w/ Steam version, you might want to do the usual Steam stuff so you don't get backwards-patched or in case you have issues w/ running the game:
Turn-off automatic Steam updates and community for DKS; back-up old DRM-littered EXE somewhere else or rename DRM-littered EXE [i.e. rename it to Divinity2_withDRM.exe]; put DRM-Free EXE in 'DKS\bin' folder.

[MysterD]

Larian says the DRM-FREE EXE will work w/ Steam version, too, if you want to apply it now.
The DRM Free EXE is coming to Steam officially, so it'll come an automatic update sometime next week, if you don't feel like applying the EXE yourself.

EVERYBODY WINS!

[MysterD]

Sven Vincke on financial matters w/ DKS Edition.