Rock, Paper, Shotgun! has a new preview of Larian Studios’ Divinity: Original Sin up as of today, and it contains enough references to Ultima 7 to merit a mention here on Codex Main.

We already knew that Original Sin was being build, in no small part, as Larian Studios’ homage to what many regard as the crown jewel of the Ultima series. In particular, Larian stated their intention to re-capture the level of world and object interactivity that characterized Ultima 7, to wit:

There’s a sign on the wall in Larian’s studio, almost lost among the concept art (some cheesecake bikini armour is in evidence, but more on that later). It reads, and I’m paraphrasing both Larian and George Mallory here, “Why can the player move a flowerpot? Because it’s there.” To a small extent, those words summarise why Original Sin might well be the most interesting upcoming RPG for somebody like me – somebody who likes to push at the boundaries of a game’s systems, bending them until they crack.

And it would seem they nailed it. The game even begins by tasking players with — get this — investigating a murder:

There’s a murder and a mystery to go along with it, and the first major quest involves discovering the perpetrator. There’s a spot of turn-based orc bashing beforehand, as the heroic duo of Source Hunters head into town, but it’s entirely possible to spend the first four or five hours playing detective. Conversations – mostly comical and well-written – contain clues and accusations, and the flow of the investigation subtly pushes the player into the sizable town’s several districts. It’s a clever way to introduce characters and the different ways of interacting with the world.

For example, to find a way into one suspect’s house, me and my partner found that we could pick the lock, teleport inside using arcane magicks, talk somebody into giving us the key, or murder the person carrying the key. Everyone in the game can be killed and Larian have ensured that every quest can be completed using alternate means if an essential NPC dies. Many of these backup solutions are intentionally obscure and/or challenging, but that they exist at all shows Larian’s strength of commitment to this particular brand of sandbox/open world.

How open a world, exactly? This open:

With enough strength, a character can drag items of furniture, or just about anything else. A bowl could be thrown into a room to set off a trap, or a rat could be chased in to much the same effect (a worse effect from the rat’s perspective). Both of these events rely on rules set within the game’s logic – the bowl has weight prescribing how far it can be thrown and the rat has been programmed to run away from people. If a character were trying to lift a wooden chest, they may be told they needed to upgrade their strength. Empty it of its contents and the weight will change accordingly, however, and the problem might be resolved.

Every item and character in the game has rules governing its behaviour and the player characters (solo is possible but the co-op allows drop-in play and adds a huge amount to interactions and combat alike…can tease and twist those rules as much as they like.

And, indeed, this open:

Even the creatures out in the wilds have been hand-placed rather than spawning randomly and it was during a test of the ways in which monsters interact with NPCs that I created a catastrophe. I just wanted to know if orcs would attack guards if a group were lured close enough to the town walls. I ended up with blood on my hands. And on my clothes and coagulating on the soles of my shoes where I’d stepped through the rivers of the stuff that had spilled from all of the dead people. The dead people that the orcs had killed.

I instigated a massacre.

It gets better from there; click on through to read the rest of the story.

I don’t know about all of you, but I’m even more excited to play this game than I was previously. Which is saying quite a lot, as I was already absurdly keen on getting my hands on it. We may not have to wait for Shroud of the Avatar to see a worthy successor to the open world, sandbox gameplay we all know and love from over two decades ago.

(Hat tip: Infinitron Dragon)