Pillars of Eternity is a successful role-playing game, released in 2012. This project is the ideological successor of such legendary RPGs as Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale and Planescape: Torment. What is most interesting, when creating this game, the developers did not have money. Funds for the development of Pillars of Eternity were collected using Kickstarter (a platform for attracting investment for various projects). Thousands of fans of the genre around the world supported Obsidian Entertainment (the creators of the game) and threw a penny or two. As a result, the budget of Pillars of Eternity exceeded $ 4 million. Could the game justify its value? And what caused so many people to poke on the creation of Pillars of Eternity? An overview of this project will help you find out the answers to all questions. Interested in? Then read this article!
Pillars of Eternity: Overview
Many players believed that RPG as a genre died back in 2002 immediately after the release of Icewind Dale 2. And this statement is fully justified. After all, subsequent role-playing games were dull copies of their predecessors. There was nothing new, revolutionary in them. They simply repeatedly repeated what the players saw in the same Icewind Dale. In addition, a new trend called MMORPG has appeared in the gaming industry. MMORPGs were low-cost and attracted a lot of people. For this reason, many developers decided to develop in this direction. Why try and create something unique and new, when you can just take a ready-made sample of Korean MMO, remake it in your own way and receive money from internal microtransactions?
Fortunately, after 10 years, everything has changed. The popularity of MMO projects began to slowly but surely fade away. Surely this was influenced by the fact that a new, mainstream direction appeared in the gaming industry (we are talking about MOBA). It was then that the best time came for the reincarnation of RPG. And the game that should return the RPG genre to its former popularity was Pillars of Eternity. You can see an overview of this project in this article.
Why did this project attract so much attention and collect such a crazy amount on Kickstarter? Everything is very simple. According to the developers, Pillars of Eternity harmoniously combines the classic, old-school atmosphere and the new, revolutionary gameplay. This is what made fans of the RPG genre pay attention to this project. But were the developers able to keep all their promises? Is one of the best RPGs in recent years - this is Pillars of Eternity? A review and detailed analysis of this game will help answer these questions.
Plot
All the vicissitudes occur in a fictional and fantasy world. The main character was "lucky" to witness a very strange and truly supernatural event, the terrifying consequences of which will haunt him throughout the game. The main goal is to find out the cause of what happened.
Although the description is rather vague and vague, more can not be said about it, since it will already be a spoiler (premature disclosure of important information). In order to understand the full depth of the plot, you need to play Pillars of Eternity yourself. Passage will drag you head over heels, because the game has a lot of intricacies, secrets, puzzles, alternative endings and additional quests. You definitely won’t be bored.
Another advantage of Pillars of Eternity is the characters. There are many NPCs in the game, and you can start a conversation with each of them. As a rule, through the dialogues the world of the game is revealed, important plot twists, etc. It is for this reason that it is not worth skipping conversations with the NPS. You can miss the important part of the great story that the game Pillars of Eternity tells. The passage of the entire storyline will take about 40-45 hours.
Gameplay
As the famous gameplay is the heart of any RPG. Could Pillars of Eternity distinguish itself against such projects? Definitely. The game with its combat system is very similar to the good old Planescape: Torment, Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale. But at the same time, the brainchild of Obsidian Entertainment has a lot of innovations. A unique role-playing system, reputation, detailed character customization, etc. - all this can only be found in Pillars of Eternity. The review, which you can read below, will help you understand all the intricacies of the gameplay.
Role system
As a rule, the hero’s abilities in RPG games are aimed only at destroying enemies. But in Pillars of Eternity, in addition to combat skills, there are abilities that are not related to battles. For example, if a player has difficulty moving around the world and is constantly lost, you can pump up the ability to navigate. Thanks to her, the character will be able to find shortcuts and quickly get to the desired point. Such abilities are very helpful during the passage and when interacting with the game world, communicating with the NPS.
Reputation
The game has many different gangs. The relationship of the protagonist with them determines the reputation. It is determined depending on the actions of the character. For example, if you carry out instructions from groups, trade with them and maintain friendly relations, then in difficult times you can count on their help. If, on the contrary, they attack gangs, then they will repay with the same coin.
Customization
The first thing to do in the game is to create your own character. For this, the developers provided a whole editor. Thanks to him, making a unique and unique hero is very simple. The editor's interface is intuitive. In addition, you can literally change everything - from the hairstyle to the shape of the face. Also, in order to start the game, you must choose a race (of which there are 6 in the game) and a class (of which 11).
Graphics
The visual component is another advantage of this project. Since Pillars of Eternity was developed on a new engine, the graphics in the game are excellent. Detailed textures, bright colors, a juicy picture and amazing locations do their job. The world seems very vibrant and atmospheric. We can say that the developers have done a good job on the visual part of the game.
Pillars of Eternity: Cheats
RPG games are famous for their complexity. And the brainchild of Obsidian Entertainment was no exception. Strong monsters, cruel bosses - all this is typical for Pillars of Eternity. We will consider cheats and codes in this part of the article. They will help players overcome the difficult moments of the game.
How to use cheats in Pillars of Eternity? Codes are entered using the command line (opens when you press the "~" key). This console was originally intended for testing the game. But the developers decided to leave it in the final version of the product. The first thing to enter is iroll20s. It opens access to other cheats, which you can watch below.
NoDamage X - a team that allows you to make the main character and his associates invulnerable. "X" in this code can take only two values. If “X” is 1, then the main character’s unit receives invulnerability, if “X” is 0, the normal mode is activated, in which all characters are mortal.
AddExperience X is a cheat with which you can increase the amount of experience by a certain number (X). As you know, in the world of Pillars of Eternity, the level plays a rather important role. Therefore, this team can be useful more than once throughout the game.
GivePlayerMoney X - a code that gives the player a certain amount of gold. Money is one of the most valuable and at the same time difficult to obtain resources. In order to earn at least a little, it takes a long time to complete quests, farm. But this is quite boring and not everyone has time for this. In this case, the above code can be used. Instead of "Player", you must enter the nickname of the player who will receive the money. And “X” is the amount of gold a character will receive.
"AddItem thing number" is a team through which you can receive things. As you know, in order to get weapons, equipment or any other equipment in the world of Pillars of Eternity, you must fight with powerful bosses. But even in this case, it is not a fact that the loot that you need will drop out of the defeated monster. Using the above code, you can get any item. Just instead of “thing” you need to enter the name of the desired item. And the item "quantity" indicates how many copies the player will receive this or that item.
invisible - code that will make the main character and his team invisible. This code can help in order to avoid battles with small mobs and quietly get to the boss.
God is a team that turns on God mode. In addition to the fact that the main character becomes immortal, he also gets a couple of interesting abilities. The code can be used to complete difficult bosses, or just to have fun.
In the end, it’s worth noting that using the codes in Pillars of Eternity will “steal” your opportunity to receive achievements in “Steam”. Therefore, you should think carefully and ask yourself the question: "Do I need cheats?"
Walkthrough Tips
As mentioned above, during the passage you can repeatedly meet with various difficulties. In this part of the article, we have compiled important guidelines for Pillars of Eternity. The tips you can read below will repeatedly help throughout the gameplay.
Perhaps the first thing to advise is to read the dialogs. They often slip advice on fighting monsters, bosses, reveals the features of the gameplay. Skip dialogs, you can skip important information, without which the passage of the game will be many times more difficult.
Also, do not forget that diversity is the key to victory. And this rule works for all aspects of the game. For example, if you recruit only physical damage to your squad, the team of the main character will cope with ordinary mobs without problems. But at the same time, it will be vulnerable to magical creatures, ghosts, etc. Therefore, do not get stuck in one thing. In addition to tanks, the team must also have healers, buffers, and damage dealers. The more diverse classes a team has, the more flexible and versatile it becomes.
The game has a pretty useful thing called "Diary". It stores all the information about the enemies, which is often useful in the course of passing. After all, fighting is much easier if you know all the weaknesses of your opponent.
One of the most useful items in Pillars of Eternity is a scroll of paralysis. Although he doesn’t do much damage, this spell can be very useful. Using a scroll of stunning, you can lodge an enemy unit for a long time. As a result, even at a low level and with poor equipment, you can kill almost anyone.
Criticism
The gaming community has taken the game very warmly. Mostly gamers praised Pillars of Eternity for its huge and delightful world, exciting quests and gameplay. Many noted that the game very organically combines the same "spirit of the old school" and modern mechanics, gameplay.
If we talk about large gaming publishers, they flattered about this project. For example, “Metacritic” gave the game 91 points out of 100, “PiSiGeymer” - 92 out of 100, “Gambling” - 9 out of 10.
Summary
We can say that Pillars of Eternity fully met the expectations of the players. The developers did their best, and as a result, an exciting, unique game turned out. In addition, the brainchild of Obsidian Entertainment did what Blizzard failed with its Diablo 3. Pillars of Eternity was able to breathe new life into the RPG genre, regain its popularity, attract a new generation of gamers. This is the main merit of the game.