This is a fantastic RPG. If you like deep, old-school D&D type RPGs you will love this game!
This game gets it right in so many areas, it's absurd really. I can't believe the low scores it's gotten from reviewers, were we playing the same game? I think this game suffered from being released in the shadow of Dragon Age: Origins, when all the hype was on that game, and Divinity 2 saw very little in the way of promotion or advertisement for it. Which is a shame really, because this is one of the better RPGs I've played in quite awhile.
Let's start with the story. You play the role of a Dragon Slayer in training. Dragons are considered evil and need to be eradicated, and you are on the side of the exterminators. There's also an evil guy named Damian on the loose and you aren't quite sure what his intentions are. I won't go further into the story so as not to spoil anything for you. Dragon Slayers are not only able to slay dragons, but they can see dead people (like in the movies), and they can read people's minds. You get full access to these abilities as a Slayer, which is pretty cool.
Mindreading adds a great twist to the game. You can read almost anyone's mind and tell their true intentions. Is this guy lieing to you? Now you can find out. Someone not telling you what you want to know? Get the information straight from their mind. Sometimes you'll get a clue as to where to find some great item that only that person knows about. It also comes in very handy when doing certain quests, as you could expect. It's just a flat out cool feature to have in the game.
Speaking of quests, there's lots of them, and the best part is, they're not boring! Not at all. Whether it's collecting goblin hearts for gold, or taking out wanted bounties like a bounty hunter, you'll always be doing something interesting. Even the less interesting things like saving a farmer's pigs from being slaughtered, are fun to play through. And here's a shocker, the rewards are really great! Most of the time you can choose your own reward as a special bonus, such as extra gold or experience points, or even an extra item like a magical ring or a piece of armor. It makes you want to do every possible quest in the game that you can because you know you'll be getting something decent, and that's a great thing.
While you're out questing or running around you're going to run into bad guys. Thankfully the combat is great. You have your basic attacks (magic if you're a mage, bow and arrow if you're a ranger, melee attack if you're a warrior), but you can mix and match your skills to your own playing style. There are lots of skills that you can learn, such as a skill that will swing your sword in a big circle to hit any enemies surrounding you, or a skill that allows you to carry more loot, or cast fear into the hearts of your enemies. Want to be a dual mace wielding warrior with the ability to throw fireballs? You can. Want to be a mage who summons undead and picks locks? You can do that too. You can mix and match from a wide variety of skills to create a very unique character, and it really adds to the role playing aspect in a good way.
Leveling up is done right too. Every level you go up you get points to put into your basic attributes to make your character stronger, such as strength, intelligence, dexterity, etc. You can distribute your points however you want, giving you more flexibility to build a truly unique character. Want to throw all your points into strength and just overwhelm your enemies with brute force? You can do that, but don't forget that a certain weapon may require a little intelligence to equip it, and if you don't have it you're gonna be out of luck. And you need to level up to be able to take out enemies. Often you will be exploring and come across an area where the enemies are leveled higher than you are, and they will kill you. You have to go another route for now, come back to that area later at a higher level and exact some revenge.
That's an important part of the game. You can freely explore the huge world, but you have to be careful because the enemies will destroy you if you stumble into the wrong area. You have to be careful. You will die in this game, there's no doubt about it. Thankfully it's not that frustrating when you do. As long as you save often. This is very important if you don't want to lose the last hour or 2 of your game when you die. Save early and often, because you never know what is around the next corner, and the game cultivates a real sense of danger as you explore.
When you actually do kill the enemies, you're often well rewarded, with a few treasure chests or barrels to plunder. The loot in this game is awesome. It's similar to Diablo for those who are familiar with that game, you will find the same basic idea here. Tons and tons of weapons, armor, rings, bracelets, necklaces, belts, etc, all doing different things. Some things are enchanted, some very powerful, some have official names. Others have open slots that you can enchant yourself with special runes. It's just really fun picking up loot in this game, and it goes a long way to keep you playing the game just to see what crazy armor or sword or cleaver or magical ring you're going to pick up next.
I haven't even touched on the fact that you can shapeshift into a dragon in this game. Take to the skies and breathe fire down on your foes as a dragon, how cool is that? Not only that, you can have a necromancer put together a "creature" made out of body parts you found during your travels, and that creature can be summoned to come fight with you. Two very cool additions to this stellar game.
One thing that should be mentioned is that this game does not hold your hand at all. You have to use your wits to solve puzzles and find secrets yourself. It's not impossible, but you have to be patient at times. There are some puzzles that will have you scratching your head and could literally have you stuck at them for a period of time. Like any good game though, it rewards you well for getting through these tougher parts of the game. Just don't expect to breeze right through this game by any means. Tip: For the ultimate experience playing this game, I would stay away from walkthroughs or FAQs, and try to figure things out on your own. Just a suggestion.
As for the overall presentation of the game, you can tell a lot of time was spent crafting the world you are in. There is high attention to detail and plenty of books to be read that just add to the experience. There is also a lot of sights to see and quests to do. You never feel like the game world is cliched, it seems like it's its own unique place. The graphics are nice and I found no technical hitches at all on the Xbox 360 version. The music is very good and immerses you into the game, as do the sound effects. It's a tight package that will definitely keep you immersed as you're crawling through dungeons, or scaling mountainsides for that elusive treasure or quest to find.
Larian Studios really delivered a sleeper with this one. Overall there is a lot to love about Divinity 2 and as a fan of RPGs you could very well be in awe of the amount of cool stuff they packed into this game. For the price this game goes for now it's a no-brainer. Buy this game! If you like RPGs such as Diablo, Morrowind, Dragon Age, etc, you will be glad you checked out Divinity 2.