Pillars of Eternity 2 has the best RPG shops

(Image credit: Obsidian)

About shops in RPGs are a little rubbish, aren't they? You power buy the left over potion operating room a crafting formula, simply the items tend to be overpriced, and you've already found meliorate weapons and armour on the coldcock in a dungeon somewhere.

Not so in Pillars of Timelessness 2. I am determined to progress to the end of this chunky RPG, but my progress is slower than I'd like, because I hold to check the inventory of all vendor in the game. Feast your eyes on the excerption above. Sure, the items are big-ticket, but how can I walk away from The Amazing and Truly Incredible Instant Potion Belt? Information technology's both amazing AND in truth undreamt of.

And look a couple of options down, below a hat called 'Okura's Kettle'. It's an Animancy Khat. Serve you know what that is? No, nor do I, simply part of Pine Tree State desperately wants to drop a massive 10,000 in currency to possess information technology. You can garner animals in Pillars of Eternity 2, because information technology is a very good brave, and equip them to your main character. This gives your party a stat bonus, course, only the real reason you do this is to see your pet running around with your party. At the here and now I have a little dragon wurm hatchling flapping more or less, but I will booty A many dungeons as I need to to have Animancer Cat. In Pillars of Eternity, Animancers are scientists WHO love to experiment with morta energy. I deficiency to know what a cat would do with all that baron.

Almost every shop has a assemblage of inventively named curios that I wish to collect. I could mess enemies up with the Potion of Ryngrim's Repulsive Visage. In a wizarding shop called The Dark Cupboard there's a grimoire called Jernaugh's Careful Calamities—what a great bring up for a spellbook.

Some of these items come through with story text explaining the item's origins and information about the life of the object's previous owners. I'll glucinium honest, most of them appear to die horribly, but I love how Obsidian has squeezed extra worldbuilding into the lowborn RPG store. Check KO'd this miniature narration attached to a helmet called the Horns of the Bleak Mother.

In the same fund, a mortify little shop called Dockside Implements of war and Armor, I find a dua of heavy gauntlets named the Gatecrashers, and a helm titled Heaven's Cacophony. The magical Dark Cupboard has more delights, ilk a Ring of Focused Flame, or Sasha's Singing Scimitar—magic items are worth extra if they alliterate.

It's a small affair, only information technology makes me actually care about how much money I have, which is unusual in many RPGs. You still resupply from shops, but these exciting unnecessary items make shopping little of a chore, and more of an lengthiness of a great seafaring adventure.

Based in Bath with the UK team, Tom loves scheme games, action RPGs, hack 'n slash games, digital card games… basically anything that helium put up fit on a hard drive. His final boss form is Deckard Cain.