‘I can finally do the thing I wanted to do in every previous game’: Divinity’s head of design teases a new mechanic without saying what it is

While the gory trailer certainly turned heads, we still don’t know much about Larian’s upcoming Divinity game. Even the teases seem shrouded in mystery—design head Nick Pechenin responded to a Reddit AMA question yesterday with a comment that sounds like a reveal, but confirms nothing.

He wrote in the thread: “There was something that bothered me when I explored the starting areas of DOS1, DOS2 and BG3. It stares you right in the face if you think about it. In Divinity I can finally do the thing I wanted to do in every previous game.” Given the comment he’s responding to, this mystery feature is apparently the new mechanic Pechenin is “most proud of.”

Commenters quickly piled on with speculation discussing what he’s on about. The prevailing theory in that thread is swimming, which makes sense; both Original Sin games and Baldur’s Gate 3 all funnel players onto a beach through their intros, and shores flanked by inaccessible water has sort of become the studio’s signature the same way Bethesda seems fixated on starting each Elder Scrolls game in a prison.

For my money though, implementing swimming sounds like a lot of work for not much payoff. Sure, I yearn to travel the oceans, but throwing a new axis of movement into what I assume will be a top-down CRPG sounds like a nightmare. Maybe swimming here would just include treading the surface of the water, but then what makes it such a cool feature?

I think water as the common thread is interesting, though; maybe the new mechanic is fishing? I may be surrounded on all sides by the PC Gamer team’s fishing minigame haters, but I love a game where I can cast spells and cast lines in equal measure. Sailing also comes to mind, but I’m trying not to get overexcited here.

This is where I beseech you, dear reader, to let me know what you think this mystery feature could be. What’s missing from those opening acts?