PILLARS OF ETERNITY II: DEADFIRE formally announced

Surprising no-one, Obsidian Entertainment have formally announced the development of Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire, the sequel to their successful 2015 isometric RPG.

Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire takes place on the Deadfire Archipelago, an island chain located far to the south of the Eastern Reach, the setting for the first game. The action kicks in when a long-missing god shows up, destroying your castle in the process, and then goes AWOL, leaving you to assemble a new party and follow a trail of clues leading to the Deadfire Archipelago.

Pillars of Eternity II has already been in development for a year, self-funded by Obsidian from profits from the first game. A crowdfunding campaign has been launched on Fig, a new service where crowdfunders can invest for a return of the proceeds.

Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire seems to be targeting an early 2018 release window.

Obsidian begins pre-announcing PILLARS OF ETERNITY II

Teasing announcements or pre-announcing things before announcing them or just plain announcing the announcement all seem to be the new thing, slightly tiresomely. The latest company getting in on the act is Obsidian Entertainment, who have begun pre-announcing Pillars of Eternity II, the sequel to their highly successful, Kickstarted 2015 computer roleplaying game.

Obsidian confirmed that Pillars of Eternity II was in development shortly after the game and it's two-part expansion, The White March, were released. However, that didn't officially constitute an announcement. They've now teased the game with a quote from the character Eder and some secret symbols in the game's fictional language. Sigh.

Pillars of Eternity II will, I strongly suspect, be an isometric, old-skool RPG like its predecessor. It's unknown if this game will be crowdfunded or not at this time. Their last game, the excellent Tyranny, was funded by a publisher, Paradox, so it'll be interesting to see which way they go this time.

I got about 20 hours into Pillars of Eternity (about halfway through the game) before I got a bit bored of it. I need to get back and finish it off. Unfortunately, the game suffered from being described as a "spiritual successor" to Baldur's Gate but featured inferior combat and a less-interesting story, both a problem when it's very easy to just go and play the updated version of Baldur's Gate instead. Tyranny showed more originality and flair, so hopefully Pillars II will be closer to that level of quality than the first game.

Obsidian Entertainment are working on three games

Obsidian Entertainment have confirmed that they currently have three titles at varying stages of development.

A screenshot from the forthcoming Tyranny.

First up is Tyranny, a roleplaying game that they are developing for Paradox, due for release later this year. This game is set in a world where the bad guys have already won and the dark lord is in control of the land.

Second is Pillars of Eternity II. The original Pillars of Eternity (which I really need to get back to) was a big success and made Obsidian a solid amount of profit. A sequel is a no-brainer. However, this is in a rather early stage of development and Obsidian are still considering going back to Kickstarter for the sequel.

Most intriguingly, they have also got a third game under development in secret. This third game is, specifically, being worked on by Tim Cain, the creator of Fallout and former head honcho at Troika, Troika being the company that worked on Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines using the then-cutting edge 3D Source Engine. The new game is using the now-cutting edge 3D Unreal 4 Engine, and Obsidian's new partners-in-crime Paradox recently gained the Vampire licence when they, er, bought the entire company lock, stock and barrel. Fans are already running around screaming in hope that Obsidian and Paradox may be collaborating on a new Vampire game with some of the same team who made Bloodlines working on it. Paradox also recently bought the specific Bloodlines trademarks and rights, which would allow them to make a direct sequel or remake the first game. There is also the possibility that this new game might be related to Obsidian's recent partnership with Paizo Publishing to make video games based on the Pathfinder RPG system.