I love the game, the combat is much smoother, unlike in Da 1, where you always felt like you need one tactic to beat them all, spawning spells and skills for minutes for some fights and as soon as you just made one mistake you went down the drain not to mention the many luck chances that made a sure way to win into a sure way to loose, now combat is still a challenge, but heck is much more forgiving, but still, if you run blindly in Bows blazing and sword hacking you will loose anyway.
Like the fact that the spells now show the radius around them and in fact love the skill system with its upgrades to certain spells and with the character specific skills, instead of this "approve" skill bullshit they pulled in the first game.I like the Rival and friend System as well, it actually made the game better, now you are not constantly thinking "omg will this answer lower the approval of char x and make me loose his skill", no you can finally play and say the way you want to play and if that happens to turn other chars in rivals, well they won't leave and they still get a skill for it.
I "kinda" miss the camping site, but you still can visit and talk to other chars, so it is just split up a bit, characters still talk to each other and even have some cut scenes here and there.
I haven't played that long for now, just around 6 or 7 hours, but I agree the story is slow, however I like it that way, I hate all those Rpg's where you are the HERO and there is noone except YOU, who can save EVERYONE from >insert game endboss here<.
Its a story about survival, getting used to a new place and living and learning there, I think there is a lot more behind this story than many people give it credit for.
For the trap and poison making and such, honestly who ~ever~ used the trap skill to build a trap, who used poisons, warming salves and all that crap?
The now centralized and much easier access to the system still require to explore the maps, but you don't need to run around looking for a freaking elfroot, because you just used it up, but you desperately need one for a quest, to get a few exp. Points.