Beaten: Aug 14 2021
Time: 28 Hours
Platform: Xbox Series X

Pillars of Eternity is a great game, my rating above surely gave that away, but almost more interesting (to me) is it's place in gaming at large. If you don't know, Pillars started as a Kickstarter campaign, put up by a financially strapped Obsidian, called Project Eternity. Project Eternity was pitched as a return to the Isometric CRPGs of old, the kind of games that Obsidian had built a genre out of back when they were called Black Isle, filled with hand-painted backgrounds and thoughtful writing. It was an interesting pitch, an appeal to fans of an all but dead genre, and one that'd never exactly sold gangbusters to begin with, but it worked. In fact, it not only worked, it both saved the company AND started a new wave of Iso CRPGs, bringing them to a level of cultural importance they've pretty much never had (coming to a head with Divinity Original Sin 2). So that's the scene that Pillars came in on. A successful kickstarter to save a company and a similar set of goals to the DOOM reboot, albeit in a much more niche genre. Where do they take this? Well, right back to Baldur's Gate.

The original Baldur's Gate is an interesting game. Not the greatest of the old school iso RPGs, but certainly one of the most important to the genre, let alone Bioware as a company. It's more interested in letting you explore the world at your own pace than telling you a great story, more interested in being a tone-setter and an exploration of the brand-new-at-the-time Infinity Engine, and Pillars is largely going after the same thing. There's a great new setting to explore, one that's very Obsidian, and very Josh Sawyer; It's full of factions, philosophical allegory, and an ever-present somber tone. If you've played New Vegas, imagine a dark fantasy version of that setting, complete with paranoia and riots and religious persecution. It's really an amazing setting. It splits the difference between the Forgotten Realms of the Infinity Engine games, Middle Earth, and a healthy dose of Obsidian's own obsessed with the past flavor. It's all very... prescient.

The unique aesthetic touches of the setting really shine here. The maps make a gorgeous use of Unity in their attempt to recreate the Infinity Engine's particular viewpoint, and the interesting lighting and color effects really pop in ways that the old games just couldn't do. The particular style of the Glanfathan ruins (that's the old creator race) mixed in with more classic medieval architecture and wide, grassy plains hits a spot not many renditions of a similar concept can. On top of that, there's a bit of Welsh flavor in some of the names that are supposed to be ancient (Bîaŵac, Eir Glanfath, etc), and that kinda worldly flavor is always super welcomed by me. Broadly, it's a very grounded fantasy setting, grounded in the struggles of it's people, the wars they'd lived through, and the longer histories they share.

The story itself is interesting more in it's themes than it's plotting. The first half of the game focuses on setting up the world, but the second half of the game really has some hard hitting questions. I don't want to get into them, because they're spoilery, but I'll just let you know that it apparently heavily references Dostoyevsky's Grand Inquisitor, which is exactly the kind of high brow I like in my CRPGs. It really does a good job of working the themes into the characters too! My personal favorite character was Eder, an early companion you get who'd fought in the last war, against his own god. He's written very much like the farm boy he is, but he's got a real depth to him, a believeable ability for self reflection you don't often see in side characters like him. The rest of the companions in my opinion don't quite measure up, but I enjoyed them all, particuarly Aloth and Durance.

Mechanically, the game stumbles a bit. The actual composition of the dnd-like system they've built isn't the issue, in fact it's a great replacement for using actual dnd rules, since these rules are much more tied to usability in a video game. My issue comes with the encounter design. For the most part, I've got no issues, but every once in a while you'll encounter either enemies that are much stronger than the enemies around them, not bosses or anything just particularly tough enemies, or groups of enemies that can mob you and take you out much quicker than your characters can get spells off. Encounters with spirits are the big offenders here, a group of 4 spirits can quickly turn into 8 and surround your spellcasters, even on easy. This isn't a big issue with the game, but it doesn't feel like a considered decision like the harder parts of, say, Baldur's Gate 2 or Icewind Dale felt. These just come out of nowhere, and when you get past them the difficulty drops back down.

Regardless I still liked the system here. Your stats are easy to understand, the skills all make sense, and there's an extensive amount of range that each class has for its role in combat. On top of that, there's ample opportunity to talk through tough encounters, to find a peaceful solution, and it's not even just by attempting persuade checks every time you see them!! You really have to think through these conversations to get them to go where you want. It's ideal for roleplaying, even if you're just roleplaying "nice person who doesn't wanna do too much combat because it's hard" like I always end up doing lmao.

It's a great game, and a great RPG, and I completely understand why it caused such a huge splash when it dropped. It could stand to modernize itself a little more (see Tyranny for that), but as it stands, it's a great update on a classic forumla, rife with interesting creative decisions, often bearing fruit. And what a delicious fruit it is.