Divinity: Original Sin 2 Review: Co-Op RPG Perfection

Divinity: Original Sin 2 gives every player in its four-player co-op an independent character with their own dialogue choices, quest decisions, and the ability to disagree with or betray other players. It is the only CRPG where your friend can secretly sell you out to the enemy faction while you negotiate in good faith.

How We Reviewed: Our assessment is based on testing multiple builds and difficulty settings and comparison against genre standards and predecessor titles. Ratings reflect extensive playtime, community consensus, and mechanical depth analysis. This content is editorially independent; no brand provided compensation for coverage.

The Elemental Combo System

Every surface in DOS2 interacts with every other surface. Rain creates water. Fire on water creates steam that blocks line of sight. Lightning on water electrifies it, stunning everything standing in the pool. Poison on fire creates an explosion. Ice on water creates a slippery surface where characters must pass balance checks or fall prone.

These interactions are not scripted events but emergent physics. An enemy standing in blood (a surface left by damaged characters) can be electrified through that blood, or the blood can be frozen to create difficult terrain, or it can be set on fire to create a burning surface. Understanding surface interactions transforms combat from a stats check into a terrain control puzzle.

The Aerotheurge spell Teleportation picks up any character or object and deposits them anywhere within range. Teleporting a heavy crate onto an enemy deals physical damage based on weight. Teleporting an enemy into a lava pool is an instant kill regardless of health. Teleporting an ally out of danger is a free disengage without provoking attacks of opportunity.

Origin Characters

Six origin characters each have fully voiced backstories, unique quest lines, and special abilities. Fane is an undead whose Shapeshifter Mask lets him wear faces to bypass racial barriers. The Red Prince is a lizard noble whose storyline involves a prophesied conquest. Sebille is an elf assassin tracking her former master with a needle that extracts memories from corpses.

Playing as an origin character gives you their full story. Having them as a companion gives you a condensed version. Four-player co-op with four origin characters means every player experiences different narrative content simultaneously, creating conversations where players share completely different perspectives on the same events.

The Armor System

DOS2 replaces traditional AC with Physical and Magic Armor values. Crowd control effects (knockdown, stunned, frozen, charmed) only apply when the corresponding armor type reaches zero. A character with 100 Physical Armor cannot be knocked down until that armor is depleted. This creates a two-phase combat dynamic: first strip armor, then apply crowd control.

The system encourages party specialization. A full physical damage party focuses on depleting Physical Armor to enable knockdowns and bleeds. A full magical party strips Magic Armor for stuns and freezes. Mixed parties risk splitting damage types and failing to deplete either armor efficiently.

Replayability

Four origin characters with unique storylines, multiple approaches to every major quest, and the ability to kill virtually any NPC create enormous replay value. A playthrough as the Red Prince exploring his imperial heritage feels entirely different from Lohse’s arc of struggling against demonic possession. The game master mode also lets one player create custom campaigns for others, extending the experience indefinitely with community-created content. These factors make DOS2 a game where three complete playthroughs still reveal new dialogue, quest solutions, and hidden encounters.

Verdict

DOS2 remains the gold standard for tactical CRPG combat and cooperative role-playing. The elemental system creates genuine tactical creativity, the co-op design enables genuine interpersonal drama, and the origin character system provides narrative depth that rewards multiple playthroughs.

The crafting system lets you combine mundane objects into useful tools, and experimenting with combinations rewards creative thinking beyond what recipes explicitly teach.

For co-op RPG comparisons, see Best Co-Op RPGs. For build theory, check RPG Class Archetypes Explained.