Divinity II: Ego Draconis Review
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Larian also decided to make your level the most important thing about your character, with your level versus the level of your enemy affecting how much damage you do. That doesn't necessarily sound terrible, but it means enemies under your level sometimes can't damage you at all, making battles against them trivial, and enemies above your level are sometimes brutal to kill, especially since you almost never face them one at a time. Frequently, the only way to get through a battle is to attack, and then run away, and then wait for a couple of minutes while your health and mana regenerate, and then repeat, which gets tedious after a while, especially since opening things like your quest log and your character sheet pause the game, and so you can't do anything while you're waiting.To help you out in your battles, there are a variety of summoning spells, and you can also create a "creature." The creature is formed from various body parts that you find during your travels, which you can assemble once you locate a friendly necromancer to help you out. Creatures are useful because you can control how you want them to behave (for example, you can use a mage head to make it act like a mage), and they're not timed like other summoned creatures, so you can use them even if you don't have a lot of mana.
Campaign
The broad strokes of the campaign aren't exactly inspired. There's you, there's Damian, and that's about it. You don't meet any companions (the dragon knight you encounter at the start of the game stays with you in spirit form, but she just acts as sort of a narrator), and there isn't really a story arc. All of the heavy lifting in the story occurred in the booklet that came with Beyond Divinity, and so all you do in the campaign is build up your character so you're strong enough to defeat Damian at the end.
Fortunately, what Larian is really good at is filling their world with lots of interesting things to see and do, and so their campaign remains enjoyable even if there isn't much in the way of connective tissue. There are plenty of quests to complete, puzzles to solve, fortresses to demolish (while in dragon form), and oddities to find, and the game provides good humor all throughout (such as when you run into the devastating killer bunny). Larian is also good about rewarding players who explore thoroughly. There is always something to find around every corner, whether it be a magic fountain or a valuable skill book or a hidden quest, and I had a lot of fun just searching through dungeons when I knew there had to be a key around somewhere to open a prominently displayed chest.
Sort of sadly though, Larian seems to like their bad guys way more than their good guys. It's as if, after spending a lot of time developing the origin story for Damian, they're reluctant to let him go. That means the conclusion of the campaign isn't what you might expect, but hopefully Larian will use the ending as a stepping stone to a more satisfying conclusion when they release their Flames of Vengeance add-on later this year (it's already out in Germany, but a North American release date hasn't been announced yet).
Conclusion
Divinity II: Ego Draconis has more than a few flaws. It doesn't look great, it doesn't sound great, it lacks a certain amount of polish, and its combat engine is iffy -- but, with all that being said, I generally enjoyed the campaign. I seem to have a similar sense of humor as Larian, and so the campaign kept me amused, and I think the non-combat activities are fun enough to make up for the combat. So if you've enjoyed some of the "also-ran" RPGs like Risen and Two Worlds and Dungeon Lords, then Ego Draconis might be a worthwhile purchase for you, especially if you can find it at a bargainish price.
