Thinking more on it, the first game has a very "tabletop RPG" feel to it. You create a character at the beginning and customize it with skills and stats, then you just basically get dropped into the world without much guidance. You're encouraged to explore, and the game has a lot of mechanics that aren't very well communicated because you're supposed to just try different things to see what works and what doesn't. There's a sense of wonder and surprise sometimes when you're in the middle of a battle and think "can I cast this rain spell to put out the enemy's fire weapons?" so you try it and you can. A huge part of this game feels like you're playing a tabletop RPG like Dungeons and Dragons, and the game developers are the dungeon master. There are tons of different ways to proceed on different quests. There is a progression to the game, but it never felt stifling, you could go at your own pace. You could go back to areas you were before and whomp up on enemies that killed you, now that you're higher level. There was a massive amount of freedom - you could finish some of the game's earliest quests right up to the time you fight the final boss. You can straight up murder most of the game's seemingly essential NPCs like shopkeepers and townspeople. The biggest "flaw" with this game is that it has a really steep difficulty curve, especially if you're playing it blind. You're gonna constantly encounter quests you can't handle until you level up, but the game won't specifically tell you that without simply crushing you.
The second game, in contrast, tried to capture the same feel but fell on it's face (for me, at least) because it's like playing a tabletop RPG with pre-made character sheets and a DM who really needs to catch the bus so they can get home at a decent time because they have work in the morning. Once you clear each of the game's "Acts", you can never go back. Makes sense from a narrative perspective - but all those side quests you were tracking, they're just gone now poof. Want to do everything the game has to offer, you're going to need to play through it multiple times with multiple different pre-made characters. Each time you play, the story is basically the same but with a few things changed up in between. Want to build your own character? Fine, but you're gonna miss like 80% of the game's story. Playing through this game felt like a race to the end (and at times, a literal race) which is a pretty stark contrast to the first game's mantra. If you skip over or miss too many of the game's sidequests early on, you're going to arrive at the end of the game being underleveled with no way to remedy that situation.
The second game is good, don't get me wrong. But the first game is fantastic and on a whole different level.
It's like going to work at this point, i can't get back to it recently.
