The Risen 2 Thread

[Metro]

Sounds like the dragon egg hunt quest in the mercenary path in G2! 'cept PB didn't charge $10 for it. I take it the preorder 'Treasure Isle' DLC is similarly as weak?

 

[JarlFrank]

It's actually a little better but not by much. Similar in style. Patty has one of 4 pages of Steelbeard's diary, go find the other 3! It's a bit more engaging since you actually have to look for them and it's a bit more involving than "lol kill gargoyles", and the treasure island was pretty cool actually.

Again, playtime is 2 hours at max, more like between 1 and 2 hours. Overall it feels less arbitrary than the Air Temple DLC, too, it's a lot more inter-connected with the rest of the story.

 

[Metro]

Guess I'll grab that during the 75% off sale!

 

[made]

And the sword fighting was better than in R2 as well. ^^

 

[Carlos' Bitch1]

So...

I take it, as someone who greatly enjoyed G1, G2 and Risen 1, I should avoid this game like the plague? Or perhaps await a Super Awesome Finished Edition! sometime in the future?

 

[Konjad]

So...

I take it, as someone who greatly enjoyed G1, G2 and Risen 1, I should avoid this game like the plague? Or perhaps await a Super Awesome Finished Edition! sometime in the future?

As someone who greatly enjoyed G1, G2 and Risen: Chapter 1, while not enjoying G3 nor Risen: Chapter 2-4, I can tell you that you will enjoy Risen 2 just as much as 1st chapter of Risen and Gothic series (though NotR still remains on the throne).

 

[Raghar]

That depends on how do you like melee combat. If you played Risen for combat, you'd see massive down step. If you played Risen for story and RPG part, you would survive Risen 2.

 

[Captain Shrek]

That depends on how do you like melee combat. If you played Risen for combat, you'd see massive down step. If you played Risen for RPG part, you would survive Risen 2.

Augmented. And that too with great hostility.

 

[Darth Roxor]

I take it, as someone who greatly enjoyed G1, G2 and Risen 1, I should avoid this game like the plague? Or perhaps await a Super Awesome Finished Edition! sometime in the future?

Yeah, I would say so. There is a good idea for a game buried somewhere very deep underneath all the derp, fedex quests and horrible design decisions that constitute Risen 2, but that's unfortunately only an idea and not any substance. I'll try to have a review ready in the middle of june, so you'll be able to read all my gripes in-depth, but the gist is basically this. Simply a massive waste of opportunity.

If you managed to like Gothic 3, I guess you might give it a try, but I would advise not to.

 

[Mortmal]

Its no better than gothic 3, i force myself to finish it , even patched its still clipping like an xbox game with shoddy code .Its not even an action rpg, you can remove the rpg part , your character build doesnt matter at all, just dump all the point into cunning or youll miss some gameplay. Use a musket, shoot , step back, shoot, rince and repeat , no special moves or abilities, thats really poor and underwhelming. Fable 3 was more entertaining than this, i am not kidding.The only ones who could defend this game are germans cause of patriotism , else i dont understand.

 

[Metro]

How could they make the combat worse? I mean... why not just use the same damn mechanics?

 

[toro]

Finished the game after 36h and is time for feedback

Graphics
If you have NVidia video card, please disable your 3D Vision crap cause after Witcher 2, this is the second game that has problems with those.
After the mentioned fix, the game visuals were superb: jungle, beaches, sunshine and rivers. Hand crafted stuff at stable 30+ FPS.

Sound
The ambiental music is very good, but they jump the shark on battles. Also when is raining, there is roaring that is very confusing.
Also the English voices were quite ok. Nothing really abysmal and they tried to conjure some sentiments sometimes.

Skills
Attributes and talents equivalent to stats and skills. Each attributes is influencing a group of three talents. It's nothing special, but at least is not retarded as in Skyrim.
Something that really bugged me, was the fact that I could not produce any potions because I refused to side with the natives. Even if I've invested skills and money in the voodoo stuff. This sucks, if is not a bug.
Mining is simplified. You can mine only gold and in the end, they could have scrapped it completely.
Resource gathering is also simplified. You don't need a teacher for skinning and the other hunter stuff, only the tools.

Animations
Except for cut-scenes, I don't think they used motion-capture.
Therefore is quite hilarious that non-existent monsters are moving in a way more "natural" than the main hero. Just try to jump and watch that atrocious animation.

NPCs
Jaffar was hilarious, Venturo was a good marksmen, Patty was too cocky. Overall, not memorable on the same level as Diego from G1. Bones was a huge mess and the cook completely unused.
Also the party "banter" implementation is superficial, meaning that is nice to have sidekicks verbally reacting to the world, but is not really helpful if they never say something valuable.

Quests
Too many fetch quests. They could really improve this part of the game, cause is bland as shit. But again is way better than Skyrim which is "go here, kill everything".
The Treasure Island quest was an exercise in futility. Do you really need a map when the entire island is a corridor?
Also there are too few cross-island quests. A missed opportunity.

Story
It was quite serviceable, however I think they should drop the entire titan thing. Is just stupid. But I loved the lore in some cases, even if it is underdeveloped like in the cases of the Sunken Ones.
Also they did what TW2 did, midway through the game you have an encounter with the main villain and instead of you running of Mara, she will run from you. Patty reaction was quite normal compared to this.
The underworld island was quite unnecessary. Likewise for Treasure Island, Patty getting an engagement ring means that the sequel will have "emotional engaging" stuff !?
But at least they kept their promise and the story doesn't devolve in forced combat like in Risen 1.

Combat
Blades combat is fucked up. I finished the game, but without being able to have a proper sabre battle. Counter attack, parry, powerful hit, kick ... the timing was wrong. Or maybe bugged, cause for example, I could never kick just ONCE.
A strong example of DECLINE compared to Risen1. I don't understand how is possible to make it good once and then completely messing it up in the sequel. At least for blades combat.
Voodoo I could not use at all, so I don't know if it is ok.
But on the other hand, muskets rules. It felt like the entire game was designed for muskets. I don't know why, but it was really satisfying to aim and shoot. And once you have maximize the gunsmith path, it's really rewarding. I want more muskets in my games

Camera
Sometimes it was annoying as fuck cause it seems the game was not designed with the keyboard and mouse in mind. They could have implemented a toggle for third person view.

Boss fights
Lame. But that is always the same when you fight big bosses like in Demon's Souls. But at least you don't chop bosses ankles as in aforementioned Demon's Souls.
Also the final battle felt anti-climactic, even if it is a step forward compared to Risen 1. To be honest, I don't know how could they do a proper boss battle in such a game.

Minigames
I hate them. They are mostly pointless. The lockpicking one is not a big offender, but the rest are retarded.

Conclusion
The game is definitely a Piranha Bytes game. But it seems they watered down the formula for whatever reason.
The exploration is nice, but it becomes tiring after a while cause the variety of mobs is not spectacular. The story, quests and combat are mediocre (except muskets).
But there are good moments in the game and it's worth a play-through. However I don't think it deserves the full price on Steam. And yes, something is missing. Something that made the former PB games to be more fun.

 

[toro]

I only used the monkey 4 times: 3 doors and one window. Not really a must-have skill, however it pays off the buying price.

And yep. They fucked up pretty bad. I don't know what happened during the development of this game, but it seems they had to do a lot of compromising shit. Maybe it was imposed, maybe not.
To be honest, I don't know if this game is better than Gothic 3. But I was not able to finish G3, therefore I don't know. Anyway, I understand your frustration.

What it also strange is the fact that Risen2 had TWO zero-day DLCs and afterwards "Deep Silver has announced there are no more DLC planned for Risen 2: Dark Waters".
There was a lot of expensive outsourcing done for this game and things like this might indicate a rupture between PB and the publisher. Maybe it happened long time ago and they kept it tight until the release.
But I don't want to read too much in this as is just speculating.

Anyway it seems PB is hiring: http://www.pluto13.de/
The good news is that they will make a new game, the bad news is ... Risen2

 

[toro]

Just found out this on PB site: http://www.pluto13.de/index.php?navtarget=3&lang=en
"Currently the team is working on a sequel to Risen: Risen 2 - Dark Waters."

And the second observation is that GOTHIC® appears everywhere, but there is no ® for Risen, which makes me believe that they don't actually own the IP rights for Risen.
This is also speculated on the forums.

 

[Metro]

Surely they had the rights to begin with? The entire Risen IP (well, at least from the first game) is heavily borrowed the Gothic series. Wonder if they just sold it off to Deep Silver for some cash knowing they were going to work on another IP in the future?

 

[Jaesun]

Surely they had the rights to begin with? The entire Risen IP (well, at least from the first game) is heavily borrowed the Gothic series. Wonder if they just sold it off to Deep Silver for some cash knowing they were going to work on another IP in the future?

If I am reading the US copyright site correctly RISEN is owned by:

Filing DateJanuary 12, 2009
Owner(APPLICANT) KOCH Media GmbH gesellschaft mit beschränkter haftung (gmbh) AUSTRIA Gewerbegbiet 1, A-660 Hofen AUSTRIA

Didn't they go bankrupt a while ago?

 

[toro]

Surely they had the rights to begin with? The entire Risen IP (well, at least from the first game) is heavily borrowed the Gothic series. Wonder if they just sold it off to Deep Silver for some cash knowing they were going to work on another IP in the future?

If I am reading the US copyright site correctly RISEN is owned by:

Filing DateJanuary 12, 2009
Owner(APPLICANT) KOCH Media GmbH gesellschaft mit beschränkter haftung (gmbh) AUSTRIA Gewerbegbiet 1, A-660 Hofen AUSTRIA

Didn't they go bankrupt a while ago?

Nope. JoWood are the imbeciles which went bankrupt.

But it's a good find. Koch Media is the parent company of Deep Silver (http://www.kochmedia.com/games/deep-silver.html) - the publisher of Risen games.

So, Risen is not PB's IP and they probably don't have enough money to work on the real Gothic 4 or they have a contract for a "trilogy", which means that Risen 3 will actually happen. Damn.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Welcome to ze Isle of ze Dead! Otherwise known as Corridor Island mk2 (Marakkkai Bay was mk1).

To enter ze unterwelt, you will need POTION OF FALSE DEFF. I can make you zhis potion for ze bargain price of 6 grave dust and 5 black lotus. Go fetch! GIT GIT!

AHAHAHAHAHAAHA @_@ !!!!

 

[Darth Roxor]

THIS KRAKEN FIGHT MAKES THE TWITCHER 2 KEIRAN FIGHT SEEM EXCITING

WHAT THE FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

 

[Darth Roxor]

wow that was anticlimatic (as usual)

anyway, this concludes Riderp 2. 24 hours 20 minutes clocked, doing almost everything the game threw at me (missed 2 speshul items, one was probably tied with a fetch quest that I couldn't bother myself with, second I have no idea). Now I'll hafta revert to an aulder save, check how voodoo works and gonna write a review.




















AND IT'S NOT GONNA BE A POSITIVE ONE

 

[Emily]

Lol yeah. But wtf you wont feel that you completed the game? Insane much?

 

[toro]

Completionist much?

 

[Elwro]

OK, finished it. The endgame is not as bad as in Risen 1, though it's still bad. All in all the game is certainly enjoyable, has some moments of true PB spirit (in the good sense) and interesting voodoo-related ideas, but I'd say it's a missed opportunity and a step down from the level of Risen 1.

 

[JarlFrank]

Pretty much what Elwro says. It's still an enjoyable game, but it's a step down from PB's previous efforts.

I think that especially the partition of the gameworld into multiple smaller areas detracts from the strengths of the game. One larger but seamless world, as all their previous games have been, works a lot better for explorefag gameplay.

 

[made]

I think that especially the partition of the gameworld into multiple smaller areas detracts from the strengths of the game.

That wouldn't bother me if the islands themselves were better designed. The latter ones are actually smaller/more linear than the Sword Coast or whatever it was called.

 

[JarlFrank]

Well yeah, that's true. Tacarigua and the Sword Coast were the best areas in the game. The islands/coast that came afterwards were a lot more linear.

But still, I think putting all the content of the game into one single big island would have been better.