Concept, Setting, and Tone of Narration
After the success of Baldur's Gate 3, Larian Studios became a truly widely known studio. For a broad audience, BG3 was their first introduction to the developers' role-playing games. Therefore, the announcement of the next project caused not only interest but also understandable confusion.
Larian's portfolio already includes a whole scattering of games with the name Divinity - from classic RPGs to experiments like Dragon Commander. Against this background, the new announcement looked strange: just Divinity, without subtitles, without numbers, without explanations.
What kind of game it is and what place it occupies in the studio's lineup is a question that Larian had to clarify separately. According to the developers, Divinity is a stand-alone story in the Rivellon universe, taking place in the same chronology as Divinity: Original Sin 2. The events of the new game take place approximately in the same time period or nearby, and in the same space or in close proximity.
At the same time, knowledge of previous games is not required. The plot of the new part is completely independent and designed for a new audience, although for long-time fans there will inevitably be familiar places, elements, and a whole scattering of references of various shapes and sizes.
Thus, the project is not Divinity: Original Sin 3 in either structure or concept - hence the lack of a subtitle in the title. Larian Studios sees the game as a new entry point into the universe and at the same time as an attempt to bring together all the experience accumulated by the studio. According to studio head Sven Vincke, this is "the Divinity we always wanted to make" - without being rigidly tied to any format or sub-series of the franchise.
The studio calls Divinity its largest and most ambitious RPG to date. However, the developers are not yet ready to discuss the exact scale of the world and the amount of content. According to Vincke, the team itself does not yet know "how big it will eventually be," since many systems continue to develop during production.
At the current stage, the scale is determined by how the developers approach the design of the game. The project relies on the developments of DOS2 and BG3, but does not seek to repeat them directly and makes a key emphasis on freedom of action.
According to Vincke, the level of influence of decisions on the world and the course of history is planned to be "significantly higher than in Baldur's Gate 3." This is not only about narrative forks, but also about systemic freedom. The mechanics and structure of the game are initially designed to withstand non-standard and non-obvious solutions, and not to push the player to pre-planned scenarios.
Inside the studio, this approach is described as working with managed chaos. One of the developers puts it very bluntly: when testing game situations, the team deliberately plays out events in random order, breaks all conceivable rules, and checks how far the boundaries of the possible can be pushed.
Larian Studios considers the moments when the player goes so far from the expected path that he begins to think that the developers have "lost" him to be the greatest success. And it is at this moment that he encounters a situation, reaction, or consequence that was foreseen in advance. This approach is the essence of Divinity at the design level - not to suppress chaos, but to accept it, tame it, and integrate it into the very structure of the game.
Moreover, the "imperfect" outcome is not seen as a punishment here. The developers emphasize that failures and mistakes often lead to the same meaningful consequences as successes, and sometimes open up even more interesting forks.
As for tonality, Divinity will be noticeably darker than the studio's previous projects, and this is directly related to the overall design philosophy. It is about creating a dark world in which the player has the opportunity to become "a light in the darkness." This choice is not imposed. Divinity will allow you to either try to change the world for the better, or consciously choose the path of destruction.
In this context, the announcement trailer shown at The Game Awards 2025 can be seen as a starting point - the current state of the world, from which the player will either lead it to the light or drag it into an even more impenetrable darkness.
At the same time, regardless of the chosen path, there is still room for Larian Studios' signature humor in this world. It is promised to be made more meaningful, situational, and contextual, so that it flows from what is happening naturally and does not turn the adventure into a theater of the absurd or an outright farce.
The musical part also deserves special attention when talking about the atmosphere. Here everything is very simple: Borislav Slavov, the composer of DOS2 and BG3, is once again responsible for the Divinity soundtrack. This is enough not to worry about the music.
But the developers associate confidence in the implementation of all the stated ideas, freedom of choice, and variability with an updated technological base. We'll talk about it next.
Technology, Camera, and Controls
About 500 developers are already working on Divinity - this is more than the number of the Larian Studios team at the final stages of production of Baldur's Gate 3. The game is being created on an updated version of its own Divinity Engine - the same engine that was used in Divinity: Original Sin 2 and Baldur's Gate 3. The studio emphasizes that they do not plan to switch to third-party solutions like Unreal Engine. Their own technology allows them to quickly adapt tools to specific design tasks and avoid unnecessary restrictions.
Gameplay Director Artem Titov notes that the engine for Divinity has been significantly redesigned. The changes affect not only the visual component, but also the system level - physics, animation, and camera work. Technical Director Bert van Semmertiier also confirmed that serious changes to the physics engine are expected in the studio's new projects.
As an example, he mentioned the correct physical simulation of objects like ropes. It is important to clarify that we are talking about the capabilities of the technology, and not about confirmed gameplay mechanics. The engine itself is now capable of more, but how exactly these capabilities will be used remains at the discretion of the game designers.
Nevertheless, some hints of new forms of interaction with the environment were still made. Head of Design Nick Pechenin, answering a question about new mechanics, formulated it as evasively as possible: "In the starting zones of DOS1, DOS2, and BG3, there was always something that annoyed me. It literally jumps out at you if you think about it. In Divinity, I can finally do what I wanted to do in all the previous games."
Fans saw this as a hint of swimming and improved water physics. In these games, the characters began their adventure near bodies of water, but were limited to shallow water.
The camera in Divinity will use a hybrid scheme familiar from BG3: an isometric view for exploration and battles with the ability to zoom in - to examine small details, admire landscapes, and cinematographic presentation of dialogues and cutscenes. Van Semmertiier separately noted that the engine has no technical restrictions on the orientation of the camera - it can be pointed at least at the sky, if the game process designers find a use for it.
At the same time, the approach to control will remain conservative. As in BG3, Divinity will not receive native support for character movement using the WASD keys on the PC. Control will retain the point-and-click basis when playing with a keyboard and mouse, and the possibility of alternative control schemes, as before, remains in the zone of responsibility of modders.
Combat system
One of the key gameplay changes in Divinity will be the abandonment of the physical and magical armor system used in DOS2.
In Original Sin 2, the presence of separate strips of physical and magical protection meant that most control effects - stunning, freezing, and others - only worked after the corresponding armor was completely "removed." According to the developers, this system often forced players to postpone the use of abilities and made battles more protracted. In Divinity, they decided to abandon this approach: the player will no longer be forced to "wait until you can apply an interesting skill."
At the same time, Larian emphasizes that the abandonment of armor does not mean the absence of protection against control. The team is developing an alternative system of resistances and protective mechanisms, which should prevent endless control of opponents, especially in battles with bosses and when using low-level skills. At the same time, it will not work as a hidden second health bar and will not be directly tied to the damage dealt. The main task is to maintain tactical depth and clarity, making battles interesting even for those who are used to action games.
Despite the conversation about action games, the game will remain a turn-based tactical RPG, but will use its own set of rules, and not an adaptation of the tabletop system, as it was in BG3. This is quite logical: we are talking about Larian's own universe, but not everyone knows what Divinity is in principle. Therefore, Sven Vincke had to separately explain that, unlike BG3, when developing a new game, the team can design battles, abilities, and other key elements without regard to the limitations of the tabletop system.
In this context, Nick Pechenin noted that for Divinity, the "balance of actions in battle" and the character development system were reworked based on previous developments and audience feedback. We are not talking about point balancing, but about rebuilding the logic of combat - how many significant decisions the player makes per turn, how quickly the battle develops, and how often he encounters "empty" actions such as meaningless movement or waiting.
Exploration and Rewards
In Divinity, Larian is finally abandoning the random generation of loot in favor of manual placement of items - as in BG3. If in DOS2 the contents of chests and corpses were scaled to the player's level and formed from a random pool, then in the new game each significant item will be in a predetermined place.
Chief Game Designer Nick Pechenin explained that the team wanted to implement this approach back in the days of Original Sin, but then chose random for reasons of saving time. In practice, this decision did not justify itself: random generation required a complex system of rules and exceptions and often confused players.
The problem, however, was not only in the balance, but also in the narrative. Random loot destroyed the integrity of the world, when an item could be found in an ordinary chest that was not related to the place, character, or situation. In Divinity, they decided to abandon this approach completely.
Now each artifact, weapon, or armor is a conscious design decision, built into the context of the location or story. This allows you to more tightly control the pace of progression and enhances the value of exploration: finds cease to be the result of a "virtual dice roll" and become a reward for attention and curiosity.
Races, Companions, and Romances
In Divinity, Larian intends to seriously rebuild the system of companions and relationships within the party. According to Narrative Director Adam Smith, one of the key lessons of BG3 was the understanding that companions too often built connections exclusively through the main character. In Divinity, much more attention is paid to this aspect.
Companions should feel not like a set of separate characters, but like a living group with its own internal dynamics. We are talking not only about dialogues, but also about reactions to events, conflicts, alliances, and situations that can unfold without the direct participation of the player. A separate emphasis is placed on how the personal stories of the companions intersect with each other, side quests, and the main plot, forming a denser and more multi-layered narrative structure.
An important role in this is played by skirmishes - background communication between party members during travels and exploration of the world. Senior screenwriter Kevin Van Ord emphasizes that such remarks are considered not as a decorative element, but as one of the key tools for revealing characters and their relationships. Through communication between companions, the player should understand who is in conflict with whom, who supports whom, and how the party as a whole reacts to what is happening.
Romantic lines will also be reworked. According to Van Ord, relationships with the player are planned to be developed more gradually, so that their development feels natural, and not as a result of quickly performing "correct" actions.
At the same time, Larian confirms that romantic options will remain, including relationships between characters of different, including "exotic," races. Sven Vincke ironically noted that romances with lizards, apparently, will be especially popular. The developers deliberately do not disclose the full list of races presented in the game. From the obvious options, you can expect people, elves, gnomes, lizards, and, possibly, imps - while each race will have more pronounced features and individual traits than in DOS2.
To develop these relationships, the game will have an analogue of the camp - a separate social space not directly related to the mechanics of resource recovery. According to Smith, the camp is conceived primarily as a place for key conversations, conflicts, and rapprochement between characters. It is there that important moments of the companions' personal stories will unfold and the dynamics within the party will be formed.
Character Customization
Art Director Alena Dubrovina confirms that in Divinity, the character editor is planned to be made more flexible than in BG3. The key formula that the studio uses to describe this approach sounds very simple: more colors, more options, more control.
We are talking primarily about visual customization - appearance, hairstyles, costumes, and overall freedom of image customization. At the same time, Larian Studios is carefully studying community mods for Baldur's Gate 3 related to the appearance of characters. According to Dubrovina, such works help to understand which elements of customization are really important to players. The specific list of new options is not yet disclosed and will be formed as it is developed.
Cooperative and Modifications
Divinity is being created from the very beginning with an eye to cooperative passage. As in DOS and BG3, the cooperative is initially considered not as a secondary option, but as a full-fledged way to play, which directly affects the approach to creating content.
The developers have not yet named the exact size of the party. In past Larian games, the standard was groups of four characters, but in the case of Divinity, the team is considering different options. Sven Vincke emphasizes that the size of the party affects not only the balance, but also the narrative - the pace of scenes, dialogues, and reactions of the world. That is why the studio is in no hurry to fix the final number.
From a technical point of view, there are no strict restrictions on the number of participants. According to van Semmertiier, the Divinity engine does not "break" when the number of characters is increased, and all limits are introduced solely for design reasons. This means that even with the canonical size of the party, modders will be able to expand it - as has already happened in BG3.
Accordingly, it is worth separately mentioning another obvious fact: support for modifications in Divinity is officially confirmed. Artem Titov said that tools for modding will be, but whether they will appear on release or later has not yet been decided. At the same time, Larian understands that modding is an important part of the ecosystem, so support for modifications is laid down already at the stage of system design.
In the future, the studio strives for cross-platform support for mods, including consoles. The developers admit that this is a complex and long-term task, but they consider it realistic - including with an eye to the experience of BG3, where, albeit in a limited form, modifications eventually appeared on consoles.
Use of AI
Larian Studios separately emphasizes that when creating Divinity, it does not use generative AI for artistic or narrative content. According to Sven Vincke, this is the studio's fundamental position: the developers want players to have no questions about the origin of assets and the authorship of the game. Visual materials and concept art are created manually, without the participation of neural networks.
Narrative Director Adam Smith confirms that all dialogues, descriptions, and quest texts are written by people. Generative models are not used even at intermediate stages. The studio admits that experiments with language models were conducted in a research format, but their results turned out to be weaker than even the early drafts of the screenwriters and did not receive further development.
At the same time, Larian does not abandon machine learning as an auxiliary tool. It is used exclusively in technical and production processes - to reduce the routine load, for example, when processing and adapting motion capture. These tools do not participate in the creation of creative content and do not replace the work of artists, screenwriters, or actors. It is also confirmed that neural networks are not used to generate voice acting: contracts with actors directly prohibit the training of AI with their voices.
It remains to be hoped that this Q&A session has finally clarified Larian's position and will allow us to close the topic, which in recent months has increasingly turned into a meaningless "witch hunt." It was important for the studio to state its position as openly as possible, put an end to speculation, and focus on the main thing - because there is still a lot of work ahead on Divinity.
Release Date and Platforms
At the moment, there is not even approximate information about the release date. We can only say with certainty that the game will not be released in any format in 2026. The project is in active development, but the release is still far away.
At the moment, only the PC version has been officially confirmed. Nevertheless, we can say with almost complete certainty about the release on the older consoles of the current generation - PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S, and possibly even the next generation, if it appears by that time.
This confidence stems from the statements of Larian's technical director, who confirmed that the studio is at least considering releasing Divinity on Nintendo Switch 2. In addition, Larian separately notes the success of Baldur's Gate 3 on Steam Deck, so they will strive to ensure optimization and verification of the game for Valve's portable console already at the start.
What Should We Expect?
Larian Studios has earned a huge credit of trust. For thirty years, the studio has come a long way from niche projects to world recognition, so there is really little doubt about the quality of their next game.
However, returning to Divinity is a challenge. The studio will have to re-introduce its universe to an audience that came for Dungeons & Dragons and Baldur's Gate. Now Larian does not have the support of a world-famous license, but it has its own ambitions, budget, and technology.
So far, the project looks like a dark, adult fantasy, where mechanics and player freedom are higher than scripts. The developers promise to raise the bar in everything: from physics and combat system to the development of companions. If Larian manages to implement the "managed chaos" that Vincke talks about, the new Divinity may become not just a successor to the success of Baldur's Gate 3, but also a new standard in the genre.