GB Feature: Divinity: Original Sin Preview

In the event that you’re in search of some more details on Larian Studios’ ambitious and crowd-funded Divinity: Original Sin, then you need not look any further than our brand new hands-on preview. A little something on character progression:

Divinity: Original Sin employs a classless character progression system, which means that its characters are primarily defined by their attributes, skills and talents. Attributes determine the character’s derived stats and affect a few of the skills. There are six of them in total: Strength (affects the kind of items you can lift, how much you can carry, and your melee skills), Dexterity (ranged weapons, Sneaking and Lockpicking), Intelligence (skill points, Willpower and Telekinesis), Constitution (resistances, health), Speed (action points and Pickpocketing) and Perception (sight and hearing, Treasure Hunting and sneaking). All these attributes go from 1 to 10, and can be raised as you level up throughout the game.

Skills follow three archetypes that roughly correspond to the classic Fighter, Mage and Ranger classes, though they can be mixed and matched. The odd ones out are Social skills, which are used both to convince NPCs and when arguging with your co-op partner. Utility skills like Treasure Hunting, Lockpicking and Field Medic are divided between the three class archetypes, though I have to admit I didn’t make much use of them in the alpha, and I’m sincerely hoping the final title will convince me to change my tune on them.