Old-school RPG fans have reasons to be happy about today, as Obsidian has just released a teaser video for its kickstarter project – Project Eternity. And, first things first, the game won’t be called that, as they have announced the game as Pillars of Eternity. As you can see in the featured image, the name-change comes with a shiny new logo too.
Now, on to the game itself. Obsidian started the project aiming to release a high-quality story driven RPG for the fans of the older isometric-type games, such as Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale, Planescape Torment or Pool of Radiance. And the fans loved the idea. Like, a lot. Just to get how much support the project has been receiving, let’s look at the numbers a bit. Obsidian aimed at a 1.1 million funding target to be able to make the game, but the current amount raised on kickstarter is an astounding 3.9 million, from clost to 74.000 backers. This goes to show that the RPG community is really hungry for a role-playing game build in the pure, classical way of the past decades.
[embedvideo id=”HKoDTzea79Y” website=”youtube”]
After seeing the video, I have mixed feelings. I must admit that seeing that isometric perspective brought back some great memories, and the setting looks phenomenal. It sort of creates that sense of nostalgia that leaves a stupid grin on your face for hours, for no apparent reason. On the other hand, I must point out that the game still uses the very old Infinity Engine, which by now has reached all its limits. I wasn’t knocked over by the spell animations and combat/movement animations either, they look a bit unnatural and strike me as odd. Considering the game has collected a budget 4 times bigger than initial estimates, I was expecting better, especially from Obsidian, as they have the necessary experience under their belt.
Still, graphics are not the main attraction of the project, and I’m sure that they still have lots to work on, so we’re likely to see major improvements. The artwork really does look great, and I’m very optimistic about the new fantasy world they are creating for the game. There is no official release date yet, so we’ll probably have to wait quite some time before getting our hands on the game. Until then, should you feel generous, you can throw Obsidian a bone via their kickstarter page, located here.