Why Risen 2 is shit?

[cvv]

half AC: Black Flag, complete with comic relief characters. Sometimes the similarities with Black Flag were almost eery.

yes

i'm sure risen 2 was based a lot on a game that came out a year after it

That's why it was eery.

 

[adddeed]

I'm replaying Risen 2 right now, as part of my PB marathon, and my two cents are thus:

It's not a bad game, roughly in the Witcher 2 territory: competent, mildly entertaining console RPG. The problem is not the game itself but how much of a decline it is compared to Risen 1, let alone Gothic 3.

The idiotic common "wisdom", displayed all over Codex as well, usually claims Risen 2 has horrible melee combat, terrible writing, useless magic, looks and sounds bad and is short. All this is completely wrong.

Risen 2 looks absolutely fucking gorgeous (maybe except for the lighting, the jungle is either too dark or too bright), sounds pretty normal and is definitely not short (Gothic 3 is longer and maybe G2 with NotR). As for the combat and writing, that's...complicated. Melee combat has its problems but in a properly patched game it's definitely not terrible. My main beef is that compared to R1 it's faster, to cater to the console twitch crowd, so some of the enemy animations and behaviour looks cartoonish. Also parry&riposte are idiotically hard to time. And the imbecile rolling instead of an elegant sidestepping is another annoyance (still, not having any dodge in the vanilla was even more imbecillic). And writing...well, it's a PB game so the overall plot is obviously retarded but otherwise the writing is pretty good, had a few LOL moments which for me is pretty rare in a videogame.

And as for the magic - yeah, no. I mean, useless? Really? How far in the voodoo path have you gone, Supermedo? Because for my high-level voodoo char, from roughly half-way through on, the game is basically an easy mode. Sorry bro, it seems you just don't know how to use it. I'd even go as far as to say it's by far the best magic system PB has ever devised. Or, more precisely, the least bad. Compared to previous games you have no DD spells, only the CC ones. So you can fear mobs, turn them against each other, curse them and when all fails, you can summon a ghost which is a complete faceroll machine, if your Death Cult skill is high enough.

***

No ladies and gentlemen, the real problems of R2 are very different. Let's start with the atmosphere. The main attraction of all PB games was always the setting and general atmosphere. This is completely gone in R2. Instead of a moody, "realistic", "European medieval" setting we have an American theme park of a game, half Pirates of the Caribbean, half AC: Black Flag, complete with comic relief characters. Sometimes the similarities with Black Flag were almost eery. The result is Risen 2 feels much more like an adventure or an action-adventure game than an epic, full-scale, dyed-in-the-wool RPG we learned to expect from PB. It's not as pronounced in the first two initial islands, which are still relatively big, combaty and explore-friendly, but from Antigua on I almost felt like playing a next-gen Monkey Island game, what with all the inventory and NPC shenanigans.

A related issue is the lack of an open world. Gothic 3, which I played a few weeks ago, is the most glorious open world setting I've ever seen. From the get-go you could go almost anywhere, talk to almost anyone. Risen 2 is basically an Assassin's Creed type of game, with chapters, progessing stories, cutscenes and so on. Disgusting. THIS is the real reason people got so pissed off with it. It's just not a PB game anymore, it's a Deep Silver console game.

Minor problems - the firearms are idiotically overpowered. I mean ranged combat has always been a god mode in a PB game but here it's bad to the point you're seriouly thinking if it was actually designed by a genuine autist. Next - PB botched the chests mechanics. Again. You'd probably think that a chest requiring 90 lockpick skill (very hard to achieve) will give you much more awesome loot than a chest requiring 20 lockpick. Ah-ha! Not in a PB game it doesn't! So you can find a legendary in the latter and a few coins, bottle of grog and few bullets in the former (which you do more often than not) Yeah...I mean what's with PB and their incompetence with designing loot?

Also, the running speed is too low, the character is probably a heavy smoker because he can't spring further than a few meters, you can't make map markings so when you find a difficult chest somewhere in the jungle and didn't note down it's precise location you'd probably never find it again and crafting is completely pointless because almost everything is easier to find or cheaper to buy.

I'm still playing though, gonna finish it despite everything. And I'm actually looking fwd to see how they've improved, or not, on the formula in Risen 3 (I know, I've read the threads, but I wanna see myself).

I agree with most of what you said. However i really njoyed the pirate atmosphere. And yes i enjoyed Risen 2 more than The Witcher 2.

 

[Nuclear Explosion]

I'm replaying Risen 2 right now, as part of my PB marathon, and my two cents are thus:

It's not a bad game, roughly in the Witcher 2 territory: competent, mildly entertaining console RPG. The problem is not the game itself but how much of a decline it is compared to Risen 1, let alone Gothic 3.

Gothic 3 is awful even with the fan patches.

 

[Metro]

As you wish:
Gothic 1 and 2 have good melee combat.
Dark Souls and Mount&Blade might be better in that regard but at least the latter has other deficiencies that make it a far worse CRPG (I'm not sure that it even tries to be one).

The Gothics have decent combat far superior to most ARPGs out there with:
a gameworld that isn't levelscaled, higher level enemies that can onehit you even far into the game
a rewarding skill progession where learning new abilities unlocks new content and opens up the world
a loot and equipment progression that is tied to the rest of the RPG systems (unlike every single pure open world CRPG out there)
distinct enemy behaviors and enemy groups actually ganging up on you so you could't just jump into the middle of them and shout "boooyah!"
and so on, these games are ARPGs done right.

What it didn't have (and what is the bare minimum for combat to not be complete shit) was responsive controls. I would press the buttons and nothing awesome happened. Playing and understanding what makes the combat good in jedi knight/jedi academy should be mandatory for any developer who wants to make a third person arpg.

Probably brain damage. I found the controls in G1 and G2 quite responsive.

 

[Mastermind]

As you wish:
Gothic 1 and 2 have good melee combat.
Dark Souls and Mount&Blade might be better in that regard but at least the latter has other deficiencies that make it a far worse CRPG (I'm not sure that it even tries to be one).

The Gothics have decent combat far superior to most ARPGs out there with:
a gameworld that isn't levelscaled, higher level enemies that can onehit you even far into the game
a rewarding skill progession where learning new abilities unlocks new content and opens up the world
a loot and equipment progression that is tied to the rest of the RPG systems (unlike every single pure open world CRPG out there)
distinct enemy behaviors and enemy groups actually ganging up on you so you could't just jump into the middle of them and shout "boooyah!"
and so on, these games are ARPGs done right.

What it didn't have (and what is the bare minimum for combat to not be complete shit) was responsive controls. I would press the buttons and nothing awesome happened. Playing and understanding what makes the combat good in jedi knight/jedi academy should be mandatory for any developer who wants to make a third person arpg.

Probably brain damage. I found the controls in G1 and G2 quite responsive.

Well I don't have brain damage so I can't imagine that my character moves when I press a button if it doesn't actually move. To each his own I guess.

 

[Lord Andre]

Well you see, the fact that you can't change your mind mid-swing and press a button for something else to immediately happen is a simulation of physics like momentum, inertia etc. It's not a design flaw, it's a feature. You have to plan before mashing buttons...

 

[bloodlover]

Risen wasn't really that "piratey" tbh. I was expecting to be able to navigate between the islands by myself, recruit a crew, have a captain's cabin, maybe hunt some sea creatures etc. All of this being optional of course but it would have been a welcomed touch to the pirate thing. Not to mention that the combat was very poorly balanced. Muskets were op as hell while magic was useless.

 

[1451]

Risen 2 had shit writing, there was no Gothic 2 humour there. Only retardation in the form of swearing. Fighting was actually good, weapons offered a nice alternative to bows. Sword fighting had some nice moments and the categorizations of swords to piercing and slashing gave the player the chance to choose a fighting style.

The main quest was firm, no dead or boring moments thanks to some nice but easily foreseeable twists.

It's greatest weakness was the lack of an open world and the absolute horrid side quests. Partly in fault is the absence of factions, but I believe they could override this design choice by expanding the possibilities of silver tongue and intimidation over the narrow aspects of getting more gold.

Overall it's the start of pb's decline, the rolling stands as a lighthouse showing the road to a place of dread, called Arcania. What ultimately broke it for Gothic fans is the Mass Effect obsession. The companions, the crew of misfits, the travelling on a world map akin of jrpgs showed their intention of attending to the needs of another crowd. This utter betrayal is far worse any pirate could do.

 

[cvv]

Muskets were op as hell while magic was useless.

The magic definitely isn't useless if you don't try to max all stats at once. If you ignore firearms and put enough points in voodoo then the game is basically a cakewalk. Playing with 8+ voodoo is even a bigger faceroll than with muskets. Slapping a boss with a strong curse and making him your total bitch is very hilarious.

Risen 2 had shit writing, there was no Gothic 2 humour there. Only retardation in the form of swearing. Fighting was actually good, weapons offered a nice alternative to bows. Sword fighting had some nice moments and the categorizations of swords to piercing and slashing gave the player the chance to choose a fighting style.

I found the writing ok, had a couple good laughs. Definitely miles better than most German games. The overall plot was of course idiotic and juvenile, as is an honored tradition in the genre.

And agreed about the combat, lots of people shit all over it but with the patch is actually not half bad. Only the slashing/piercing thing doesn't make much sense because it's only cosmetic. Enemies are not more vulnerable/resistant to one type of damage or the other.

It's greatest weakness was the lack of an open world and the absolute horrid side quests.

Definitely. It was a huge shift from the hardcore, uber-open world RPG of Gothic 3 to the mass effecty/assassin's creedy simplified semi-third person action adventure that is Risen 2.

 

[bloodlover]

When it comes to combat, most people go for the more powerful stuff (unless we are talking about very strict personal preferences) and that's why muskets were the obvious choice. And they were available earlier than voodoo if I am not mistaken. If you really wanted to play like that, you'd still have to go with muskets or swords until reaching that point in the story but by then most people, seeing how good the musket were, made up their minds.

Then again, Gothic 2 had the same problem, at least as far as I got into the game. Spamming arrows was more accessible and came earlier in the game than magic. But like in Risen, unless you are planning to play a specific character, giving up on easy killing is not something many people are willing to do.

 

[1451]

Fireball scrolls in G2 offered a significant advantage in difficult early battles. Risen 2 removed altogether the usefulness of magic leaving only one option, a reskinned bow.
This is another problem of the new pb, in the process of streamlining their games they removed the good parts of old pb games leaving the new stuff to row the boat. New stuff that in reality was old stuff of commercially successful console games. They stopped caring about creating a game they wanted like From Software does currently and started making games that would please an elusive demographic.

 

[Gnidrologist]

Playing this right now for the first time. Yugely immersed. I read all the criticism of it and agree to some extent, but i can't help but enjoy this game. I haven't played any Piranha bytes game for ages and this being a fresh for me, is very entertaining.

The bad shit people here tell is combat and linear levels. There is some truth. Combat outside of humanoid fencing is basically spam-spam. Although at the level i am (still on the first island with no skills) it's quite interesting combining with using Patty as a decoy and then shooting or piercing shit to death. Just now defeated The Guardian in one of the temples having no skill in anything from the 5th or 6th try, by decoying Patty then shooting the shotgun as much times as i could and shot him with the last srtraw shot before he would hit me dead after Patty already succumbed. Was very satisfying. Reminded me of one of the old Gothic heavy battles. I guess it will all go downwards, when i up my skills and become monster myself.
Yes, i don't like rolling around ground like a bellend, but it is what it is. Some of the Gothic mechanics were just as silly and clunky so i can't have juch hate in it.

The second most heard critique was linear world. I wouldn't say it's linear, but it's certainly not "flat land" open ended as it was in first Gothics or Elder Scrolls games. It reminds me of the addon world in Gothic II, where you also met with pirates, went to swamp or valleys and so on. It's not completely without alternate routes, but it's more like hub based. It is more linear, but tbh i don't consider "open world" as a merit in itself. If game can provide interesting exploration in more narrowed down environment, it's still good.

So this leads to the last part. What i really like about this game is a hark back to Gothic goodness of exploring very interesting world and enjoying rthe atmosphere. The atmosphere is very "homely" just like on Gothics. You just want to go and sniff any nook and cranny even if there is only a bottle of grog there. It's just the same style of level design and addictive exploring that i liked about the early Piranha games. Besides the average loot chests you still get to find some great items, IF you go to every fucking cave, hill and weird crack in the cliffs and looking around every corner and into every pit. Exploring the shit out of the game is still very rewarding. I know it's simplistic, but very good for instant gratification dopamine.

In the end i really like the protagonist, who is kinda low key, but he has a lot of people to interact with. There are very many characters, most of them seem usual down to earth people just doing their jobs, like in Gothic games. Dialogues are mostly just okay/b;and, but well and realistically executed, while some npcs to various degree give a nice color the game. It's good balance between 'epic' shit and mundane reality.
The sounds, graphics and music are great. Don't thin anyone could have problems in that.

tl;dr
I'm old and starting to like shit casual games.

edit. excuse me for all the bad spelling, i wont be fixing that lol

 

[cvv]

still on the first island

That's your problem right there.

The first island is actually not bad. But it goes downhill from there real fast. You'll see.

For more info read my take on the pros and cons and the real problems of this game.

 

[Gnidrologist]

I will rather not and experience them first hand. Then report.
(i read all the criticism in the years, when game came out anyway-now just trying to enjoy something as i haven't touched any nu-game seriously for years)
edit: actually read your post, which is why i post in this thread; okay, will see ;/

 

[cvv]

i read all the criticism in the years, when game came out anyway

My point was

The idiotic common "wisdom", displayed all over Codex as well, usually claims Risen 2 has horrible melee combat, terrible writing, useless magic, looks and sounds bad and is short. All this is completely wrong.

And then I go on explaining why none of this is the case and afterwards listing the real problems of the game.

But again, enjoy while you can, the next island is p. good too but the rest is just horribly linear, terrible and sad.

 

[retinoid]

Risen 1 was good, but it fell off the deep end in the second half and went to near shit. I know Risen 2 and 3 aren't held in as high esteem as the first game, but which of the two sequels is considered better? I have vague memories of one of them being considered dogshit and the other as competent, but can't remember which.

 

[cvv]

Risen 1 was good, but it fell off the deep end in the second half and went to near shit. I know Risen 2 and 3 aren't held in as high esteem as the first game, but which of the two sequels is considered better? I have vague memories of one of them being considered dogshit and the other as competent, but can't remember which.

Risen 1 falls "off the deep end" not in the second half but in the endgame. Which is p. much the case for every single PB game including G1 and G2.

Risen 2 is a decline but the game still has some heart and soul, at least in the first half. The 2nd half is a joke, more like a linear action adventure than a traditional PB open-world RPG.

Risen 3 is completely soulless, disinterested cash grab. It doesn't turn into a completely different game in the second half like R2 does, the level design is more consistent, but the game just sucks your will to live dry so the endgame is still shit.

 

[Falksi]

Thoroughly enjoyed both Witcher 2 & Risen 2

This to me is an example of why Risen 2 is so good......



.....sexism, racism, and toilet humour.

 

[adddeed]

Risen 2 is way too much fun.
Idiots just like to complain.
As ive said before, Risen Trilogy > Gothic Trilogy, no contest.

 

[Murk]

Since it was necro'd...

Having first played it about a year ago and replayed it a few months ago, the game has its charms. It's just very different from the usual PB fare. If Risen 2 was developed as a separate game or by a different studio, it'd be a pretty good game. It definitely is missing some depth, but it has its moments.

The combat system starts really whack, but by the time you learn some of the melee skills you can get some solid swashbuckling action with kicks, parries, counter attacks, and I was a fan of the dirty tricks in concept (most of them end up being not great, but there was some definite untapped potential.) I also liked how fluid combat between humanoids can be.

Guns were busted, but it was one of *few* games that had a fucking bayonet.

Magic was disappointing, and from what I can tell pretty underdeveloped -- something they fixed pretty well in Risen 3, IMO.

The dialog/writing was good though, and there were some pretty good jokes!

It's not Gothic, it's not Risen 1 or even Risen 3, but if you're willing to play it on its own merits it's not a bad game -- it's just a bad sequel to R1 and Gothic 1/2.

Also, dunno wtf they were thinking with Patty's character. I guess in a way she's a meta-joke -- shrill obnoxious "independent, strong" woman who only berates you and can't do shit on her own.

 

[Sykar]

Risen 2 is way too much fun.
Idiots just like to complain.
As ive said before, Risen Trilogy > Gothic Trilogy, no contest.

 

[adddeed]

It goes like this:

Risen 1 > Risen 2 = Gothic 1 > Risen 3 > Gothic 2 >>>>>>>>>>>> Gothic 3.

Facts.

 

[Gnidrologist]

I guess in a way she's a meta-joke -- shrill obnoxious "independent, strong" woman who only berates you and can't do shit on her own.

She's obviously some feminist thrope as she can kill a lot of foes and i could even kill the ultra-spider in the temple area with her help. While she was fencing the spider i just shot at him. The fight was still hard and i won, but it was still obvious developers wanted to make her super strong.
The good parts here is 1) some great dialogue 2) she gets to distract mobs, while i shoot them
Anyhow, it's still better than most of the stuff from recent times.

And on top of it all, there's still some charm in this game. Can't explain. No other dev makes these kid of games, that's it.

 

[ADULF HITLOR FAN KLUB]

Risen 2 is probably the best shit game I've ever played. A huge disappointment in comparison to Risen, but it is surprisingly enjoyable for being a trash RPG.

Things I didn't like: The lame setting (pirates in the tropics lol). Encounters were also drastically nerfed, combat was dumbed down, the UI was consolized, etc.... I'm not sure what happened, but I'd put my money on publisher meddling.

 

[adddeed]

Risen 2 is probably the best shit game I've ever played. A huge disappointment in comparison to Risen, but it is surprisingly enjoyable for being a trash RPG.

Things I didn't like: The lame setting (pirates in the tropics lol). Encounters were also drastically nerfed, combat was dumbed down, the UI was consolized, etc.... I'm not sure what happened, but I'd put my money on publisher meddling.

Its not a shit game.
Its a better RPG than Witcher 3 or whatever other shit you like.