The sequel to the well recieved PC version of Risen which was a well developed indepth RPG game.
http://www.worldofrisen.de/?section=newsdetail&id=1007
http://www.worldofrisen.de/?section=newsdetail&id=1007
Risen 2 has been announced!
- Thread starter Neb
- Start date
Risen fucking sucks. It's an atavistic throwback to Gothic 2, hell, it's the same damn game. Zero innovation, PB played it absolutely safe and it feels as stale as any half-assed rehash of a decade old game.
The world is far too small and seriously lacks diversity, there are zero memorable characters, the story is a fucking joke and about half way through the game gameplay turns into a horrible hack&slay-dungeon-crawl abomination that is utterly devoid of any redeeming elements. I don't think I can overstate this: second half of the game IS SIMPLY SHIT.
The first half of the game does have it's charm but it all breaks down after Chapter 2. One thing that seriously bothered me was the utter lack of internal consistency. Harbour Town is supposedly crammed with people who are not allowed to leave but all you get to see is some guy with a cow living in a tent. The town feels lifeless. What the player is being told is different from what the player sees in the game world - and it's not even a good abstraction. That's a catastrophy for any game that tries to present a credible virtual world. It's all about building a convincing illusion and Risen fails at that. One thing that was done pretty well in Gothic 3 were the cities and Risen was a huge step back in that regard.
Yeah, I understand that PB got burned by Gothic 3. Boo fucking hoo. So what now? Are they going to release the same damn game (Gothic 2) over and over again now? As much as a Ioved Gothic 2, I've been there, done that, so thanks, no thanks.
The world is far too small and seriously lacks diversity, there are zero memorable characters, the story is a fucking joke and about half way through the game gameplay turns into a horrible hack&slay-dungeon-crawl abomination that is utterly devoid of any redeeming elements. I don't think I can overstate this: second half of the game IS SIMPLY SHIT.
The first half of the game does have it's charm but it all breaks down after Chapter 2. One thing that seriously bothered me was the utter lack of internal consistency. Harbour Town is supposedly crammed with people who are not allowed to leave but all you get to see is some guy with a cow living in a tent. The town feels lifeless. What the player is being told is different from what the player sees in the game world - and it's not even a good abstraction. That's a catastrophy for any game that tries to present a credible virtual world. It's all about building a convincing illusion and Risen fails at that. One thing that was done pretty well in Gothic 3 were the cities and Risen was a huge step back in that regard.
Yeah, I understand that PB got burned by Gothic 3. Boo fucking hoo. So what now? Are they going to release the same damn game (Gothic 2) over and over again now? As much as a Ioved Gothic 2, I've been there, done that, so thanks, no thanks.
Mass Effect (ME2 isn't a RPG, doesn't count), Dragon Age, Venetica. I've had more fun with all of these.
If the 2nd half of Risen hadn't been so weak and PB had put as much effort into creating the game world and the characters as they did in Gothic, Risen might have been the start of an interesting, new RPG series. The whole game felt like Gothic 2 done on the cheap, sharing most of its gameplay elements but lacking much of Gothic's original charm. Risen's game ending is a black screen with a voice over. That pretty much reinforced my impression that PB simply doesn't give a shit anymore.
While I am fully expecting that Risen 2 will be, in fact, Gothic 2 v3.0, I am still hoping that Risen 2 will see some substantial improvements over its predecessor. If not, it will be the first game by PB that I won't buy.
I'd give Risen a try if the damn price would drop on it.
CouldntResist
Regular
Then think about playing Risen as replaying Gothic 2, except this time you get entirely new set of quests, interact with new NPCs, fight new enemies, experience new story and control new hero in new map.
Bonus: enjoy the best melee fighting system in entire Gothic series (exactly opposite of the magic system though).
Seriusly, I understand you had your expectations aimed higher, but Risen still remains the best product in this lineage since NotR.
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I enjoyed it, but it was almost more JRPG than RPG ...