Larian Studios - News and Information

We are proud to announce that the French broadcaster Jeunesse TV has released GulliLand, a new addition in our creative community-series. In GulliLand children can explore an exciting magical world, filled with games and creative studios. For more information, click here.

Divinity II: Ego Draconis fansites galore! Myrthos has updated his fansite to include Divinity II: Ego Draconis. For everything Divinity and Divinity II, head over to the Locus Inn. And check out these fansites for even more goodies.

Belgian game site 9Lives is up with a preview of our up-coming next-gen RPG Divinity II: Ego Draconis.
Here's their conclusion:

"Divinity II: Ego Draconis is een spel van Belgische bodem dat wederom voor heel wat vernieuwing zal zorgen. Zo zal het ‘mindreading' een extra dimensie geven aan de vele conversaties die je voert, vooral omdat je er kostbare ervaringspunten voor moet afgeven. Anderzijds heb je de interactie tussen mens en draak die de speelwereld van Rivellon nog groter maakt. Tel daar bovenop nog eens een heerlijke spelervaring, een gigantische questtree en een prachtige speelwereld bij en dan weet je gewoon dat je bij Ego Draconis aan het juiste adres bent. Dat worden deze zomer weer lange nachten."

For our German fans - the cover of the latest issue of PC Games is dedicated to Divinity II: Ego Draconis and in the magazine you'll find 6 pages of Divinity II news including several new screenshots. The journalist writes about a 3 hour walkthrough through the game and talks about what his impressions of the game were. He concludes by saying

"Was uns Larian Studios vor Ort gezeigt hat, war interessant, abwechslungsreich und lief verblüffend stabil under ruckelfrei. Zwar gibt es noch kleinere Punkte an denen es hapert, aber wenn sich die Belgier wirklich die kommenden sechs Monate mit Balancing und Optimierung beschäftigen, dürfte nichts schiefgehen."

If you can't find PC Games, the latest issue of PC Action also contains a 3 page story on Divinity II.

For our French fans - Joystick has a 4 page story on Divinity II and also includes a host of new screenshots. The journalist gives a detailed account of what he saw in a lenghty presentation of the game and puts focus on the inspirations and influences he's seen as well as on the overal design philosophy. Quite an interesting read. He concludes by saying:

"Une chose est sûre, il a les épaules pour jouer dans la cour des grands RPG."

We are pleased to announce that Norwegian broadcaster NRK has gone live with Superia. Superia is a new creative community in which children can explore an exciting magical world, filled with games and other activities. For more information, click here.

Divinity II: Ego Draconis captures the Editor's Choice for Game of the Year Award 2008 at RpgWatch, this is a must have in 2009.
Read it all here.

Divine Divinity is a unique game, combining the addictive traits of a hack'slash action/RPG with the open world, interaction and quests of Ultima along with a sense of humour and quirky style – if you've read our recent retrospective, you'll know how much we enjoyed Divine Divinity. Divinity II looks to expand on this base with more choices, more consequences and some risky features – if they can integrate mind-reading and flying around as a dragon into the game beyond mere gimmickery, the potential is fascinating.

Time for those with literary ambitions to sharpen their pencils and dip their quills in ink, because the good folks of World of Divinity have prepared a Divinity II: Ego Draconis Story Contest. To compete you must write a story set in the Divinity II universe, so if you’re up for it, tell an epic tale filled with the exploits of fearsome Dragon Slayers and mighty Dragon Knights. The only constraint is that your story should be written in German. All entries can be sent to team@worldofdivinity.de up until the 15th of December so don’t tarry too long! Prices include exclusive artwork signed by some of that rare species – the Larians – games, T-shirts, tattoos and more. Good luck and happy writing!
For more info about the contest, visit the World of Divinity-fansite.

We're happy to announce that KetnetKick 2 has just been released in Belgium by VRT, the Belgian national broadcaster. KetnetKick 2 is the new creative and interactive TV community that builds further on the concepts introduced in KetnetKick. For more information, click here.

Gamespot posted a first look at Divinity II: Ego Draconis in which they offer a look at some of the depth and complexity of our newest RPG.

We've touched only the surface of Divinity 2, but already you can see how layered Larian's latest project is. Keeping tabs on the quest log is the only way to keep up with the sheer number of possible outcomes in each quest. We'll have more on this exciting new RPG as we approach its 2009 release.

IGN published a progress report on Divinity II: Ego Draconis in which they give out details about the Battle Tower, a feature which has just been announced.

Perhaps the coolest part of the tower is the group of inhabitants that can't directly improve your ability to survive. In the game you'll be able to find runners who you can send out on errands. Need an enchantment and don't want to seek it out yourself? Send out an errand boy.

Two more German fansites, dedicated to Divinity II: Ego Draconis, have been released!

Both are wonderfully presented websites that have provided fans of Larian with tons of media and information since the company’s first steps into the RPG genre with Divine Divinity. These German fansites are sure to spread the Dragon fever even further, especially in their native country.

Thank you TheReaper and Nemisis Dragon!
View this page for an overview of all the Divinity II: Ego Draconis fansites.

We've released a number of new screenshots showing the dragon into which the player can shapeshift while playing
Divinity II: Ego Draconis. For the full story, head here.

We are happy to announce that the first three fansites dedicated to our upcoming RPG Divinity II: Ego Draconis have been released!
Thank you for your continuing support.

Do you own a Divinity II: Ego Draconis Fansite too? Please let us know; we will add you to the fansites-page.

IGN did a special feature on the Games Convention in Leipzig in which they asked developers what their goals were at Leipzig. Lar was quizzed about Divinity II: Ego Draconis and you can read his view here. There are also a couple of new screenshots to be seen, some including close ups of the dragon.

"My modus operandi was to show how many choices people can make, and how their decisions pan out as consequences in the gameworld. I also spent considerable time talking about the mindreading option."

GB: What changes have you made to the dialogue system as opposed to what we saw in DD and BD? Will any of our skills or statistics influence which dialogue choices we're presented with?

Swen: Dialogs are presented in a cinematic way with all the graphical fluff you’d expect. The coolest thing I think is that we’ve added the option of mindreading in each dialog. This adds a unique twist to a lot of quests but you have to be willing to invest in it, and there are also negatives.

RpgWatch had a Q&A session with Lar in Leipzig and it's now online. Go check it out at RPGWatch.
Here's a snip:

RPGWatch: How many quests are there?
Swen Vincke: We haven't counted them. It is a lot. The interesting part is the amount of solutions to a quest. There are quests with something like 30 solutions. Even though there are sometimes only small differences between the choices, in many cases the difference is quite big. If you count all of those it is a huge number."

The kit is packed with game information, website tools and graphics including screenshots, wallpapers, character art, the logo of the game and some extra art assets such as backgrounds, buttons and rulers.

We've just released a teaser trailer for Divinity II: Ego Draconis. The trailer has been created using in-game footage and shows you a number of previously unseen locations as well as a number of new creatures. You'll also get to see what it looks like when a human transforms into a dragon. You can download the trailer at GamersHell. We will add more links as they become available.

RPGWatch posted a very detailed preview of Divinity II: Ego Draconis. The article contains some minor spoilers but offers a very detailed look at how the game plays. Here's their conclusion:

"So the expectations I have for Divinity 2 are high. Sure the graphics are a big improvement over the graphics of Divinity and are on par - or maybe even better - from what is to be expected of modern day RPGs. You can check out our gallery to verify this for yourself. The music is from Kirill Prokovsky and I have faith that he will be able to match or even improve over his Divine music. But even though graphics and music are important, more important to me is whether or not the developers will be able to match or even improve upon the RPG experience Divinity had to offer. The quests that were shown to me clearly point in that direction and the combat looks like an improvement as well. I hope they also succeed in improving and balancing the skill system over the one used in Divine Divinity and that they keep the humor of the game. I know that you can never be sure by watching a half hour presentation, but Swen Vincke was able to impress me and give me faith that Divinity 2 will be the game I want to play."