
They'll also help the base PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions of the game achieve 1080p30 performance even during split-screen play. These improvements will not be bound to console, of course, but available as a free update for existing owners of DOS2 on PC. It's a similar story for many of the game's 'surfaces', and textures have been improved as well. The fire effect, for example - which spreads across a lot of environments a lot of the time - has been changed for one more economical and arguably better looking too. The physics engine has been changed for the Definitive Edition and numerous improvements have been made, making the game up to four times faster in certain areas. The reasons for the differences run deeper than hardware. It was smoother and more responsive too, and will apparently run native 4K30 on Xbox One X, and dynamic checkerboard 4K30 on PS4 Pro.

The Xbox One X version, running in 4K resolution and with high dynamic range enabled, was brighter, crisper and more vibrant. It wasn't a Digital Foundry-style controlled test, with the laptop fans wheezing and picture coming through an older 1080p screen, but it got the point across. On one screen we had DOS2 as it exists now, played on a gaming laptop and on the other screen we had the Definitive Edition of DOS2 played on an Xbox One X dev kit. To do this the developer ran two versions of the game - old and new - side by side to highlight the differences.

Larian visited the Eurogamer office to show me the new and improved Definitive Edition of Divinity: Original Sin 2 last week.
