Pillars of Eternity has always been revered as a brilliant CRPG, and today marks its tenth birthday. It’s also recently returned to many gamers’ attention, or blipped onto their radars for the first time, thanks to the high-profile release of Avowed, which is set in the world of Eora that PoE created. With both of these moments in mind, Obsidian has just announced a big surprise for fans of the RPG. Despite it being hard at work supporting Avowed, getting The Outer Worlds 2 ready for launch later this year, and no doubt concocting some new projects for the future, Obsidian has found the time to develop a game-changing feature for good old Pillars of Eternity. Later this year, it’ll be getting turn-based combat.
Pillars of Eternity launched in 2015 as a spiritual successor to the early Baldur’s Gate games, but with the more recent Baldur’s Gate 3 (one of the best RPGs ever created) opting for turn-based combat, it seems that Obsidian wants a similar experience for its own masterpiece. In a post on the developer’s forums, it says it’s “excited to explore this new way to experience encounters in Pillars of Eternity.”
Even for those that have completed PoE once, twice, or a dozen times, this gives fans an excuse to dive back in, and perhaps makes it a more tantalizing prospect for any Baldur’s Gate 3 enjoyers to leap across now that Pillars is back in the public consciousness again thanks to Avowed.
Obsidian says that fans will be able to test the turn-based combat system in the near future, and that it should arrive for everybody “later this year.” It’s definitely surprising to see a ten-year-old game receiving such a significant new feature, especially when Obsidian appears to have quite a lot on its plate already.
Pillars of Eternity also received a fairly sizable patch today to coincide with this announcement, which includes visual enhancements, questline fixes, and lots of bug squashing. If you’re a regular player, or thinking of hopping in soon, you can find the full list of changes here.
Until we hear more about Obsidian’s ambitious turn-based transformation of Pillars of Eternity, take a look at some other amazing single-player games and fantasy games.
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