Divinity: Original Sin has been delayed a few months, but gamers awaiting its arrival will likely agree it’s for the best.
A funny thing happened when Larian Studios took Divinity: Original Sin to Kickstarter earlier this year. Gamers ate it up. It more than doubled its goal of $400,000, knocking over one stretch goal after another: a bigger, denser game world, an in-game homestead, companions with unique histories, personalities and goals, and a full day/night cycle with NPC schedules and weather systems.
But all those changes meant a lot more work – more than anyone anticipated. As studio head Swen Vincke explained, the addition of a day/night cycle sounds relatively simple but actually imposes sweeping changes. NPCs on a schedule need someplace to go when the sun goes down, which means more and bigger buildings are required. More and bigger buildings means villages become cities with more space to fill, and more space to fill means more stuff to do. And so it goes.
The success of the Kickstarter has put Larian in a position where it can delay the release of the game to properly implement the new elements rather than rushing it out the door, and so that’s what the studio decided to do. “I’m very sorry, but I think it’s for the good of the game,” Vincke says in the video, “and I think you’re going to have a much more fun and a much more memorable RPG experience.”
Divinity: Original Sin is now slated to come out on February 28, 2014. Vincke wrote up a more detailed look at the decision to delay the game on his blog.
Source: Kickstarter
