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Genre: RPG
Developer: Obsidian Entertainment
Publisher: Paradox Interactive
Release Date: Aug 29, 2017
Edited by KnightAvenger
Pillars of Eternity is a roleplaying game developed by Obsidian Entertainment. It has revitalized the classic CRPG genre of yesteryear of games, such as Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale, Planescape Torment, Neverwinter Nights, and various others. The core of the game is the roleplaying elements, where every decision you make has a positive or negative effect of some kind, along with building your characters from the ground up. Pillars of Eternity feels like a table top RPG turned real time in video game form, and, for that, we love it very much. However, specifically, Pillars of Eternity Complete Edition is the original game and all added content post launch that has come to the PS4 for the first time. How does a game genre equate to a console game…
First, the basics of the game are impressive, no matter what platform you play the game on. Pillars of Eternity harbors an amazing story that has twists, turns, drama, and emotion at every corner. For someone looking to get into a game for a wonderful story, then this is definitely the right game. Every decision you make affects something or someone in some way. The game’s faction system ties into the choices you make, which can affect the characters you meet and the game world itself. You could anger your allies and, well…They might not even be your allies for very long. Sometimes, you might have to walk on eggshells when speaking around some characters or even just not take certain characters on some missions, as it might affect them in harmful ways. This is one of the many things that modern RPGs lost that the older RPGs once had. It is nice to see Obsidian bring this feature back.
Generally speaking, the soundwork is pretty okay. There are some great soundtracks in the game and, moreover, the voice actors are pretty good. I still hate when I am playing a game and half of the game is voiced and half of the game is not. There are a lot of conversations or dialogue in the game that have no voice overs. At least, they have worked with many localizations to get the game voiced and released in many different languages.
The graphics are pretty damn good, too. I know I was worried when I first heard they were going to use the old game engine. This, once again, goes to show that the engine itself doesn’t mean a whole lot, especially if the team working on the engine is as talented as Obsidian is. Playing the game on PS4, it runs pretty great. Not a lot of hiccups and the frame rate seems to stay fairly steady.
The single worst part of Pillars of Eternity Complete Edition is the PS4 control scheme. At times, it feels off-putting and rather confusing. Having played the game on PC and now PS4, I found myself lost at the beginning of the game and didn’t manage to find my special abilities because of how the game’s tutorials are set up. The game feels slower paced because of the lack of a mouse and keyboard to interact with things. The missing action bar (I found to be) was my biggest flaw in the PS4 design. While the game itself holds up as a great game, I just can’t stand the control scheme. To fix this, they need to have a more interactive tutorial, not just a codex of read this, read that. Hell, I would rather still just have the bar at the bottom where I can hold down a combination of buttons during combat to activate abilities.
Pros:
- One of the best CRPGs stories EVER
- Damn good graphics
- Runs great on the PS4 with no hiccups or framerate issues
- Character building and creation is a delight
- Replayability
Cons:
- Not ENTIRELY voiced (often feels unfinished in terms of voice acting)
- Non-interactive tutorials
- Horrible PS4 control scheme
- Lack of co-op
Draul gives Pillars of Eternity a Drastik Measure 7.7 out of 10 (77)
The game is still great for the story, and getting to play a classic feeling yet modern RPG was amazing. Even if the controls are pretty awful on the PS4, the game holds up pretty much everywhere else across the board. The biggest downside to the game is that the control scheme is just uncomfortable, but I could still justify spending $49.99 (USD). The game has a TON of content even without the added expansions. White March just makes that even better.
