Enhanced Sinning

Divinity:  Original Sin has sat proudly atop my pile of unfinished games for well over one year.  Recently I made the decision that it was time to suck it up and finish a game that somehow ended up being played and then not completed.  I am happy to report that I am still merrily commanding my party of heroes and still haven't given up.  Hurrah!  It's probably worth mentioning that my second adventure is taking place in the much better "enhanced edition."

What's so "enhanced" about it?  Well, if you're someone who has an aversion to reading lots of text and dialogue in games you will enjoy the numerous voiceovers.  Everything has a voice!  Cats!  Sheep!  Cows!  There are even voiceovers for the epitaphs on tombstones in graveyards.  It might seem a little excessive, but it's entertaining to hear the dialogue of a sheep acted out.

Probably one of my biggest irritations with my first adventure into D:OS was the lack of tutorials.  I had no idea how anything worked due to the very limited instructions.  I knew there was a crafting system but didn't know how it worked.  I had to spend quite a bit of time Googling, reading, and then trying things in game to get a handle on how to do even simple things.  Now, whenever you read a crafting book you automatically learn the recipes and they are recorded in a crafting book that allows you to find what you're looking for.  The tutorials help a great deal, but I'm still not 100% sold on the crafting system.  Making decent gear seems to require a massive amount of materials--it's just easier to stick with loot.

Speaking of loot--I have noticed that the loot in the enhanced edition is noticeably better than anything I ever had in the original version.  My party is rocking some legendary items and vendors have plenty of uncommon, rare, and epic gear to sell.  Bosses seem to drop rare "unique" items more frequently as well.

This is the loot window for a dead sheep.  It made me laugh.

Even with all these improvements I still find myself making plenty of rookie mistakes.  Probably the biggest of those mistakes is not saving.  Games with frequent autosave have trained me into thinking that I don't need to save my game very often.  There is autosave in D:OS, but it tends to be fairly spaced out and I have found myself replaying things that really didn't need to be replayed.  This is particularly stupid because D:OS has one of the most forgiving save systems--you can quicksave at any time, even in the middle of combat!  Just keep mashing that quicksave button...even if you're not completely sure you need another save.

Another of my rookie mistakes is friendly fire.  CRPG's like D:OS have tried to be less hand-holdy than other RPG's and want players to be mindful of the many aspects of strategy.  I have gotten really horrible about paying attention to the small details--way too frequently I find Jahan unleashing an electrocharged bolt of death at an enemy who is standing in the same puddle as ALL my melee (I have a lot of melee....probably a mistake).  I can only facepalm myself so many times.  There has also been several times where I've accidentally targeted a friendly character while trying to mouse over an enemy.  That is the quintessential dumb mistake.

Fighting a group of fiery Immaculates.
  My cat jumped on the screenshot button.

So far my lack of skill hasn't become a major hurdle.  My party has managed to solve the mystery of councillor Jake's death while simultaneously ending the undead AND orc threat to Cyseal.  Now I am leading them through the wilds of Luculla forest to find out what happened to the White Witch Icara.

The enhanced edition of Divinity:  Original Sin is proving to be a solid improvement over the base game.