The good:
• The game is stunningly beautiful, especially the Dreamscourge and the Godless ruins
• Exploration is so much fun, there’s something around every corner
• The parkour is great, I’ve wanted good climbing in a game forever
• The normal people of the Living Lands are full of life and fun to meet
• Fun and varied side questing
• Combat is smooth with many options without feeling like you need to optimise your build too hard
• I like the companions and their stories
• I like the main story, even if it is a bit simple
• Loads of lore flavour text to lose yourself in, I think I’m now a fan of the Pillars of Eternity world
• Great variety of beautiful environments (archmage’s domain and the Garden were highlights)

The bad:
• The animancy stuff in Fior felt a bit thin in terms of substance
• The game loop, while satisfying, feels quite formulaic towards the end of the game
• Shops often feel a bit useless, and cities are a bit dead once you know them. Very little NPC reactivity that feels mistranslated from the game’s CRPG origins
• Shatterscarp region can feel a bit underbaked at times – didn’t feel open enough for a desert?
• Very little tangible relationship with Aedyr throughout the game outside of the Steel Garotte. Feels like the emperor would have lots of things to say about my decisions so far (like the council do in Mass Effect)
• Feels like the game world wouldn’t exist if the player character was removed from it. NPCs do not seem to have much agency except for Lödwyn. Like the devs were scared to let you feel like anything less than the chosen one
• A few visual bugs and dialogues triggering at the wrong times were distracting
• The breakable walls companion mechanic feels a bit cheap and repetitive – I resented having to switch to fire grenades every time I left Kai behind, for example

The ugly:
• The big decision at the end of Shatterscarp sucks. I don’t feel like my character would choose either option and I lost a lot of immersion because of it. There’s a lot of complexity and intrigue built up to this point then you get funnelled needlessly into bad choice A or bad choice B
• I don’t think the game would let me choose a path through the story that is meaningfully different from the path I chose in my playthrough. It clearly wants you to be the good guy against Aedyr