For my first real post, I wanted to talk about a game that I only recently completed, Pillars of Eternity. I was struck by the desire to play an “old-school” CRPG in the style of the Baldur’s Gate/Icewind Dale games, and from what I researched, Pillars of Eternity was a little shorter than those. Unfortunately, I decided to play on the Switch (so I could play on the plane to and from Las Vegas). I had countless crashes, and even one instance where my game crashed while saving over a previous save, corrupting both saves. Nevertheless, I got through till the end and beat it. Spoilers ahead.
Overall, the game itself was great. I was never really invested in the characters as much as I was for games like Dragon Age, but I still found all the companions very interesting. Particularly, I really liked Pellegina and Aloth. The former has a fiery passion for justice and doling out “deserved” punishment, but also cares for the good of people. She generally pushed for helping people in trouble and protecting the weak each time I ran into someone. Aloth, on the other hand, was also interesting to me for different reasons. He was also a good person overall, but not what I expected. When you are given an elf wizard in these kinds of games, you usually get arrogant characters that are selfish know-it-alls. Aloth was generally soft-spoken and timid, due to his past. He was very kind-hearted and supportive of me. Like Pellegina, he hated seeing people wronged or taken advantage of. I thought he had an unusual kind of strength that he proved with actions, at least in my story.
For my less favorite characters, Eder immediately comes to mind. Even his portrait says “generic mainer-than-the-others” companion. I get the feeling that he was designed and written to always be in the player’s party, and to be likeable by every type of player. He is good, but cynical. Oh god have these cynical characters become real bores. They are walking 40-year-old facebook mom memes. There was one point where the party fell down a pit and landed at the bottom. Eder said something like, “Is everyone okay, nobody’s knees hurting? Okay good, just me”. Ugh. So many sarcastic remarks at nearly every conversation to show how desensitized he was to bad things happening to good people. Then there were constant lines about him asking to pet various vicious canine-inspired creatures. I get it, it’s funny. Nerds are animal lovers. Every game these days has some sort of dog-petting mechanic. But it is a little immersion-breaking when you venture into a Glenfathan camp that outsiders are generally executed for, and Eder immediately goes up to a wary guard asking to pet his beast companion. Eder isn’t stupid or careless, so why would he do that other than to get a laugh from players? My biggest problem with Eder, though, is his constant support for the land’s religion. If you make it to the end of the game, you learn that the gods are cruel, and people are treated very poorly by them and those that work with/through them. Despite that, Eder constantly supports giving people “hope” by supporting religion at every turn. I get it, he is projecting. His own life was heavily impacted by the Saints War, and a lot of who he is at his core is defined by religion. However, when you learn at the end of the game that the gods are simply created by people and used to rule over others, it’s hard for me to believe that they are a force for any good.
Aside from the companions, two things I loved from the game were the visuals and the music. The backgrounds were so fun to look at… I have a very soft spot in my heart for these pre-rendered backgrounds (Diablo 2… Resident Evil…). The music was also fantastic. I only wish there were more tracks. Sometimes the game was very quiet, and music didn’t play for a while.
The combat was a blast. So far, I seem to prefer the pause and play tactical combat of these games as opposed to the Larian style turn-based games. I’m a little bummed that the turn-based combat will be the style in Baldur’s Gate 3. It is technically closer to actual D&D rules, but there’s something more exciting and freeing to me when you have full control of you characters instead of having them limited by turns/actions/movement. That all being said, I played Pillars on Easy mode. I spent so long banging my head against the wall with these kinds of games. I’ll give Divinity 2 as an example. I have never made it off of Fort Joy. Every encounter on the normal difficulty, for me, is incredibly intense, and I frequently have to retry them. Great for other people that they enjoy that, however I’d rather experience the story, exploration, and all the rest that the game has to offer. Being gated by very difficult encounters so early on is really unfortunate. Would you say Divinity 2, and other difficult RPGs are solely defined by their combat? I don’t think so. If not, why make one aspect of a game so difficult that people are turned away before they get to experience the rest of what makes that game great? That’s the mindset I went into Pillars of Eternity with, and I’m glad. There were some encounters even on easy mode that were very, very challenging. My goal is to replay the game on PC on Normal mode.
I thought the end of the game had a good twist. The gods weren’t real, and were created by an ancient race, because they decided for everyone else that people could not rule themselves without “divine guidance”. The cost of these manufactured gods’ power was countless sacrifices of souls. I decided at the end to destroy the soul of Thaos (which I thought both just and merciful). I decided to return the souls that were taken back to their rightful bodies. I’m not sure that was the best choice, but it is what I promised the god Hylea I would do. Unfortunately, there seemed to be no repercussions from that. I never heard from Hylea, nor Galawain (who wanted me to just return the souls back to the cycle of reincarnation).
Overall, I’m really happy I beat this game. I am now playing Baldur’s Gate 2, and having quite a bit of fun. I’m hoping to play Pillars of Eternity through again, then moving on to Pillars 2. There’s so much out there for CRPG fans… Pillars, Pillars 2, Baldur’s Gate 2, Icewind Dale, Planescape Torment, Tyranny… I am so excited to go through them all.