The Underrated Writing of Pillars of Eternity - Nietzsche and the Death of God 

Hey, thank you for your analysis of the series. I wish second game had sold better than it did. An absolute gem of a game with great rpg system.

Can't forget about the soundtrack. Ondra's gift is just *Chefs kiss*.

Love the video! Pillars 1 has been sitting mostly un-played in my library for ages now and this makes me want to dust it off and take it for a spin. I remember not loving the combat, but I also remember not exactly understanding how/why things work, so I suspect with a little reading I'd warm up to it.

Really great commentary on a really great premise. BG3 builds are cool and all but this is the heavy dope. Keep it up.

Very nice video! I'm also a huge fan of this franchise precisely for many of the topics you touch here, what with the transition of a theocentric worldview to an anthropocentric one being at the heart and so on. But also I would mention... While Planescape: Torment is probably the game people will look at the most as the bedrock for the philosophical aspirations of this game, I actually think it's another Obsidian game that's much closer to the themes and approach in display here, and I'd say that's Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer (specifically the expansion). Mask of the Betrayer is fascinating, and builds on what feels like an otherwise pretty cookie cutter, unremarkable standard fantasy epic to create a really interesting contemplation on the monomyth, Nietzsche's Eternal Return, and also introduces the notions of humanism and atheism to a saga that is so often strictly religious and where gods are literal physical beings that can be interacted with, as is the case in DnD/Forgotten Realms. The main NWN2 campaign is all about the protagonist's journey as he goes from village boy to the saviour of the realms and whatnot, all played rather straight - but as Mask of the Betrayer begins, the protagonist finds that they've been kidnapped, subjected to a strange process that has ripped their soul and infected then with a nasty curse that forces them to consume souls in order to survive, and that the only way to rid themselves of it is to follow in the footsteps of Akachi, the hero that was originally afflicted with this curse after attempting to tear down the Wall of the Faithless, a wall surrounding the Gods' citadel made out of the souls of those who in life denounce or refused to believe in the gods. As such, this campaign gradually transforms into a meditation on the hero's journey, where you as a newly formed "hero" are now made to walk the exact same path that many heroes before you have, and are thus told to be merely a "mask" of the original hero Akachi, and where several other characters and companions are themselves shown to be "masks" of others and so on - all this paired with similar overarching themes regarding metaphysics, humanism, spirituality, identity and so on. Give it a go if you haven't, as I think it's probably that missing link in the genealogy between Torment and Pillars!

Excellent video. Bravo! And excellent pronunciation of Nietzsche

Dude, I would love build guides for this game. I'm sure you have a road map of content planned out, just throwing it out there. Great content as always

I find myself coming back to this video periodically, it's such a well-written essay. I have a million different issues with PoE's storytelling and yet I think as far as deep, meaningful narrative experiences go it is one of the greatest video games of all time.

Haven't given Pillars of Eternity a chance yet, but now I'm excited to give it a go!

Coincidentally I just bought Pillars 2 yesterday due to it having a turn based mode and for its pirate theme (I’m a sucker for that) so far I’m enjoying it more than my first crpg experience Pathfinder Kingmaker. I would rather have a few major choices in character creation and leveling up than a bunch of smaller confusing ones.

Finally pillars of eternity content. May the shining god light your way for this.

good choice for a character name :) gotta relisten to all of peter pringles songs after this ^^

came from reddit: i was honestly ready for letdown, seeing as pretentions of "philosophical" reading of videogames usually is more smoke and mirrors, but you did something substantial, if not terribly in-depth, so kudos

Holy SHIT I wholeheartedly agree. The writing and narrative absolutely blew me away.

25:00 Well; are Monty and Xzar, Jan Janssen, Korgan, Edwin, or even Minsc and Keldorn, "bang-able" ? -I surely wished Jubilost from Kingmaker were, though.😎 The major issues with PoE`s lineup are probably rather connected to its tonality and presentation, while the characters to significant parts serve as a vehicle for ideas. -Plot device, and such. :P I really like Edèr, though. And, certainly: People love their good ol` Greek epic, with its heroes, over the novel that PoE of course is, with its actual characters: God is not dead, after all.^^

How did I miss this?!

correction: fallout 1 defined the crpg genre, not bg1. everything bg1 is known for fallout did before it.

Those games are insane.

Yes man!

Hey Aestus, I appreciate the time you took to share your thoughts on this and other CRPG. You have a great channel, keep up the excellent content. I cannot agree with comparing Planescape with Pillars however, it's just a night and day difference. Pillars was a welcome respite from a draught of good Infinity engine style games but simply cannot be mentioned in the same sentence with Planescape or even BG2. While I have only played Pillars the and expansion twice while playing BG1, BG2, Planescape, Fallout, Fallout 2 an many times, the experience is simply not comparable.

I counter the philosophy of accepting eternal recurrence with the desire to break the cycle. To see that which has been nature since time immaterial, and to see it wrent asunder by the unbreakable will and wrath of man unchained and unbound by that nature. To see the wheel that God made before his death, and to break free of it.

This is the third time I’ve watched this video and I cannot understand how in the name of Christ they could shelf the Durance story. I highly doubt they’ll revisit it if a third game is ever made, even though the writing and premise of Durances predicament is sequel worthy in itself. Imagine Durance finding the Watcher after the events of Deadfire and having a plan to destroy the pantheon of man made Gods. Woedica and Magran throwing everything in their power to stop you. Redemption for Eothas. It’s the perfect set up to the conclusion of the Watchers story.

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Agree on the topic but... I still believe the storytelling and writing are simply bad in PoE 2 (still not perfect, but way better in PoE 1). I don't mean the topic itself - the philosophical themes you reviewed in the video, but I think about the use of language, way of exposing the story to the player, dialogues etc. Well, I don't expect every story writer in the gaming industry to be a Tolkien or other very talented author, but... The quality of writing in PoE 2 feels really on the low end.

cant say I care much about poe (I prefer 1 over 2) or obsidian games in general, although I did like durance. Ive heard people equate animancy with science before but I dont see it. animancy uses souls cruelly and stops their rebirth, denies them their dignity in death. and what is there to learn from it? its not like the souls are going to tell you how to make electricity or whatever. watchers are the more humane approach in any case. needless to say, I was against animancy in my playthrough. nothing is stopping the people of poe to develop their actual sciences like we have. I think one of the reasons I didnt like those two games is that to me the themes you mentioned in the video are a bit tired, not in games but in general culture, espcially colonialism and pirates. appreciate the video.

Okay, the question i want to ask is:The fantasy setting with magic and mythical beast really a place to explore a conflict of faith vs reason in the same manner it happened in our world? In real world naturalism separated itself from faith, based on a need for observable evidence in the nature. In Pillars world the faith in supernatural is not a faith, its a empirically observable thing that happens in a game. You can't reason out of magic because magic is part of the same reason. Same with clerics and paladins who in the game literally get more powerful as their belief grows. There's nothing to contradict naturalistic viewpoint because magic is a natural part of this world. This is another reason why the world shouldn't be so bleak. Gameplay shows magic to be birght, colorful and sparkly. Humans tend to love decorations and bright colors. The world looks gray, dull, colorless and hopeless. But i just don't believe it when magic exists - someone would have hired a mage to decorate all the places where people live. Medieval and Reinassance architecture and clothing styles were bold and colorful. Not dull and boring. Add literal magic to it- and people would have decorated their inhabitats with unbeliveable miracles. That's what they would have done in real life.

Okay, so, what is exactly the truth about the gods in context of the setting? It might work for us, the players, as a real life message, but inside the game well, it might be a mistake on my part - but i don't remember the game saying or implying at any points that gods are worshipped in the same manner as Abrahamic gods. This is a game where you can level your character and achieve godlike powers, the line between "mere mortals" and "gods" is very blurred already because of the feats regular humans can achieve. This worldview already puts the game closer to the unorganized religions conceptions of supernatural and gods, so in that sense, your character who can already slaughter entire armies of level 1 humans - what's he's supposed to take from the fact that the gods of this world were mortals just like him? Again it might be shocking for the player in the context of real world philosophy, but the way the world is constructed just doesn't make sense for these reveals to be there in the first place. There's nothing inherently metaphysical about these gods, because the'yre just powerful entities worshipped as such for the purpose of "order" (which is debatable in the first place but okay), so in the end there's nothing much different between the god in this universe, and lets say - the state apparatus in ours. These gods are more representative of catholic church at its worst rather than godhood imo, and im not sure if the game realizes that.

Man, like a third of Obsidian games have "Nietzschean" themes in their writing. Kotor 2, Then MoTB, Then New Vegas, PoE. Its not even a new concept for them, and the way its executed in PoE has been done by them better elsewhere