Played 6-7 hours to get through the first island, though I know there's stuff I've missed. Elwro is right, pretty much - it's a good game, a good RPG and a PB game through and through, but not up to Risen 1 in certain aspects (a bit less exploration, seemingly dodge-less combat that makes monster fights a bit more tedious). But just listening to the talk gives the wrong impression, because there's no major dumbing down going on - just a series of little things. (E.g. the minigames we freaked out about pre-release are there, but they each take ~10 seconds, are pretty much all optional, and don't provide any easy shortcuts past real C&C or costs. i.e. nowhere as in your face as Alpha Protocol. The shooting one is pretty fun, actually.) In fact, the piratey stuff, which is foregrounded, doesn't actually change the core PB formula that much, and the Inquisition v. Bandits now just becomes Inquisition / Pirates / Savages.
If you liked Risen 1 this is worth buying, there's not enough differences to make you hate this one. I am disappointed about the degraded monster combat, though, and the major question is how the second half of the game will work without joining factions. (And, will we finally have a PB game that isn't total shit for the last 1/3.) Maybe I'm just inclined to like the game, having looked forward to it so much, so we'll see how/if my opinion changes.
