Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire - Beast of Winter (PC) Review

Deadfire's main "thing" was the ability to man a ship, and have some naval fun when feeling kind of tired from all the dungeon crawling. Beast of Winter keeps things simple by not really caring about all that. Taking place on a weird-looking iceberg south of the archipelago, the Watcher will only have to travel once, as the rest can be done by putting one foot in front of the other. Also, bear in mind that this doesn't continue after the base game's conclusion, and is, basically, another side-quest that can be started after reaching level 10 or so.

Dealing with Rymrgand, the god of death who is less polite than the other god of death, Berath, this four-or-so-hour deviation from the hunt of Eothas follows the protagonist in a realm where everything is frozen and on the verge of dying, with the added faction being a bunch of lunat... err, religious folk who embrace death from the hand of their god as the best thing ever, making them the weirdest folk in the Deadfire archipelago.

Now, Beast of Winter is a very linear kind of trek and, to be honest, with not much RPG-ing in it, in the sense that there's not much character interaction to be found here. This is mostly a dungeon with enemies, traps, some interesting puzzles, and a pretty tough boss fight in the end, but not much besides that. In fact, even the new character, the Endings Godlike priest called Vatnir, won't really have much to say, with the rest of the party being even more silent, especially when it comes to the 'sidekick' Ydwin who mostly communicates with nods...

This remains fun and all, but it's also depressingly short, and with not much replayability within it. As for the gear that can be found while braving the realm of the White Void, there are indeed some interesting pieces, especially when it comes to the trinkets that can be equipped in the Grimoire slot where wizards place their nice little magic books, but few will make you leave your favourite tools of the trade aside. It should be mentioned once more, though: Beast of Winter is not bad - it's just that its current price would taste a bit better if it included another handful of hours in it.

While this feels a bit lacking in terms of pure gameplay, however, it's actually great when it comes to the whole world-building and handling of lore. Those who are in love with the history of Eora, and how the gods fit in it, are in for a brief, yet very enjoyable treat that expands on the Pillars of Eternity mythos. In order to avoid spoiling things, just know that the plot bits are very good, making it easy to forgive this title's few flaws.

Generally, there's no dip in quality when it comes to the "feel" of the game. Beast of Winter retains Obsidian's excellent writing quality; its frozen and otherworldly vistas look beautiful despite their lack in variety; and, finally, the developer has made sure to add personality to this small corner of the world, whether that's through the Nordic, yet, at the same time, unique flare of the new faction, or simply the design of its, sadly, small amount of locales.