Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

I am really, really enjoying Two Worlds 2

King Crispy

Too bad I have no queen.
Patron
Staff Member
Joined
Feb 16, 2008
Messages
1,876,560
Location
Future Wasteland
Strap Yourselves In
I know we've already had a rather lengthy thread about this game already, but I've been avoiding that thread for fear of spoilers, wanting to avoid general negativity, and out of pure laziness. Nevertheless, many may have missed it so let me take a few moments of your time to go over the finer points of why I'm enjoying myself so much with Reality Pump's little gem of an ARPG here. Stay a while, and listen!

First of all, initial impresions of this game can and probably should be skeptically low. The tutorial is rather misleading and more than a little disappointing since it tends to drag on a bit, and doesn't represent well the sense of freedom and the game's flow of play while you're still in it. The NPC's that you encounter during the tutorial don't provide a great example of what you'll see later on, so at first you're asking yourself why you even bothered to install the thing. But hang on, it does get better!

When first starting off, it takes a while to get used to the graphics, which are excellent and smooth but are amazingly bright. Some tweaks can take care of that and I've modified a few things such as disabling a function called EdgeBlending which is supposed to give foliage a more attractive look but instead makes it look like a blurry mess. I've also disabled fog and applied another tweak to enable texture filtering which has helped a lot. The HDR and bloom are still quite prevalent, but once you transition to the savannah on the main land it doesn't seem so out of place. I actually kind of like it now, especially when contrasted with the darkness of dungeons.

Combat at first is a little fffuuu-inducing. It's grown on me, however. I'm playing almost a pure mage, so this is only from that perspective, but the controls and conventions of fighting are actually pleasantly well balanced and sensible. For example, much ado was made about the inability to back up in combat. You can back up, but you'll wind up turning your back to the enemy. This adds difficulty and forces you to time strategic retreats carefully, lest you take a nice knock on the head for your carelessness. Attacks are of course rather simple, but there are specialty moves, blocks, and "combo-breakers" which are generally stat-driven (as a percentage of occurrence, for example). You can certainly button-mash, and that's generally expected and accepted in ARPG's, but you can combine moves simply, you can sprint away if careful, and the balancing of the timing needed to be successful at it, especially when using a squishy mage, is satisfying.

The game's spell system is fantastic, in my opinion. The rarity of the better cards you need to construct more powerful spells keeps me going. More power! The unique combinations you can come up with are great (I'm still only just past level 13, so I haven't even scratched the surface yet). I love that you can add modifier cards, such as a time-lengthening one, to derive many possible combinations. Doubling, tripling and more of a Fire or Water effect card, for example, will simply add to that spell's damage. Very fun experimenting.

The skill system is, yes, simplistic, but there are enough there, divided into enough sections, to keep you forging ahead to improve. One example of a Mage skill that you don't need but can really use later on is Talented Tongue; putting points into this skill will decrease the casting time of each spell and when you've got a charging rhino coming at you, it can come in handy. You also have to avoid neglecting some of the other skills outside your main set, such as the Assassin's Lockpick skill and other things like Physical Resistance. Since you typically only get anywhere from 2 - 4 skillpoints during each levelup, you wind up spending a few moments deciding.

The quests are surprisingly deep, on occasion. The portion of the story in which you have to gain entry through a particular gate to get closer to the next major city offers several alternate solutions: you can pay someone to forge a pass for you, you can save the village from starvation (which is a multilevelled task in itself) in order to gain entrance, or you can search for a well-guarded pass to go around it. There are a lot of side quests, of course, all of which are very straightforward, but none of them so far seem completely stupid. They offer rewards and satisfaction of their own.

The voice acting isn't that bad. Your own character is a gravelly-voiced chap, but I think it fits. Some of the NPC's voiceacting is rather bad, but nothing we haven't heard before from other Non-English-native developers. The translation/localization to English is actually quite good. I might even hazard to comment that some of the letters and notes and so forth that you find throughout the game are rather well-written. You are certainly not assaulted with brain-rotting stupidity while playing this game.

There are lots of other little touches which add to its charm such as the way horseback riding is handled (it's not nearly as bad as many have said; only the physically and/or mentally handicapped really should be complaining about it), the intentionally simple yet very addictive nature of crafting, and the overall quality and bug-free solidity of the game.

Pick it up or download it. Get through the tutorial. I think if you spend some time with it you'll like it as well.
 

Frau Bishop

Erudite
Joined
Aug 16, 2005
Messages
2,147
Location
Mitten im Vaterland
Good post. I'm almost ready to kill some raging ostrich and stuff its well fireblazed carcass with fresh cheetah hearts. And bury the whole mess deep down where I will never find it again.
 

The Exar

Liturgist
Joined
Aug 30, 2004
Messages
259
Location
Smoldering Corpse Bar
Two Worlds 1 was really enjoyable as well. It lacked so much but in the end it was more than the sum of its parts.

I already have my copy of TW2 but sadly can't find enough time to play it...
 

Konjad

Patron
Joined
Nov 3, 2007
Messages
3,930
Location
Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut Codex+ Now Streaming! Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
I couldn't get into 2worlds2... good for you that you like it but I just couldn't due to retarded dialogues and combat (it's even worse than in oblivion... come on, shooting 3 arrows at the same time killing 3 enemies?!).
 

RK47

collides like two planets pulled by gravity
Patron
Joined
Feb 23, 2006
Messages
28,396
Location
Not Here
Dead State Divinity: Original Sin
ummm. I went up to 15 arrows in one shot before calling it quits. It was silly.
 

BLOBERT

FUCKING SLAYINGN IT BROS
Patron
Joined
Jun 12, 2007
Messages
4,235
Location
BRO
Codex 2012
BRO THE FIVE DOLLARS I PAYED FOR THE FAGBOX VERSION OF TWO WORLD NUMBER ONE HAD ME ALOT MORE ENTHRALLED THAN BORDERLANDS

BROS I WILL EVENTUALLY GET THIS ONE FOR SURE
 

Forest Dweller

Smoking Dicks
Joined
Oct 29, 2008
Messages
12,196
You hinted at C&C but tell me more. How prevalent is it through most of the quests? Compare it to say...Risen or Divinity 2.

And did the first game have any? My impression was it was just a Diablo clone.
 

Turisas

Arch Devil
Patron
Joined
May 25, 2009
Messages
9,925
Dicksmoker said:
You hinted at C&C but tell me more. How prevalent is it through most of the quests? Compare it to say...Risen or Divinity 2.

And did the first game have any? My impression was it was just a Diablo clone.

C&C is nothing major, but it's there... occasionally. Some decent evil options too which is always a plus. First game was a free-roaming ARPG, but not a complete lootwhore clickfest that Diablo is. I'd give it a try, especially if you're into exploring; the game world is huge and nicely varied.


This is pretty mandatory btw. http://www.insidetwoworlds.com/showthread.php?t=32213

a small mod that extend inventory and do items smaller.
Original grid size for the inventory is 5x4(only 20 items), i have changet it to 7x6(42 items). And for the store is 3x4 - changed to 5x7.
 

Hobo Elf

Arcane
Joined
Feb 17, 2009
Messages
13,997
Location
Platypus Planet
I heard that you can build your own village in 2w2. Anyone tried that yet?
Anyway, I'm off to buy some tape soon, so I might go and finally pick up 2w2 as well now that I have an excuse to get off my lazy ass and go.
 

Roguey

Codex Staff
Staff Member
Sawyerite
Joined
May 29, 2010
Messages
35,653
I'm not even going to consider touching this unless a) they fix death strike so I can kill any human even if he/she's sitting or guarding or whatever b) Fix the excessive HDR and bloom and c) (optional) Fix the arms and get rid of the modelers who have no concept of human anatomy.

Konjad said:
come on, shooting 3 arrows at the same time killing 3 enemies?!
Better stay away from Age of Decadence. :smug:
 

commie

The Last Marxist
Patron
Joined
May 12, 2010
Messages
1,865,249
Location
Where one can weep in peace
Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Divinity: Original Sin 2
Ancient said:
Do you like it because you payed good money for it ?

Yeah, Crispy's one of those 'sick' individuals who buys games in order to enjoy playing them and not just to whine abut how much they fucking suck.....Amazing, eh?
 

Raghar

Arcane
Vatnik
Joined
Jul 16, 2009
Messages
22,499
Are you saying someone is paying for a game to whine about it?
 

zeitgeist

Magister
Joined
Aug 12, 2010
Messages
1,444
Crispy said:
The voice acting isn't that bad. Your own character is a gravelly-voiced chap, but I think it fits.
I found his deadpan delivery reminiscent of JC Denton's. It's especially amusing in contrast with some ridiculous NPC affectations you can encounter in the first few hours of the game.
 

Abraxas

Scholar
Patron
Joined
Feb 28, 2006
Messages
132
Codex 2012 Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Wasteland 2
I remember reading in their forums that the greater part of the bigger island is out of limits in singleplayer and only accesible in multi. So people who are looking for a big world to explore might want to look into this before purchasing.
 

dr. one

Augur
Joined
Dec 5, 2009
Messages
656
Location
posts
Crispy said:
I'm still only just past level 13,

that´s just about the level i´ve become pretty sure the whole game won´t live up to the very positive impression its beginning stages left on me.

start of the game is indeed misleading.
tutorial island´s design, quests revolving around getting the pass, open ended world..
you won´t get anything like that once you proceed a bit further.

2W2´s main good points are its variety of game systems, spellcasting especially, great engine and very good visuals (with tweaks) + ambient life.
with the exception of bothersome UI (main GUI is very good though), it just "plays" well, at least it did on my end.
some story elements are pretty good and there´s challenge here and there.

however, there are two important areas where the game falls short - quest design and exploration aspect.
if at least one of these was good, i´d call it a good game, but it imo isn´t the case and that´s why i think it´s an overall very mediocre affair.

sometimes quests contain interesting story elements, but bar few rare exceptions, their design is extremely lazy. most are simple, repetitive, self-contained (aka not intertwined with other quests / being mutually exclusive), you´re rarely given any choice how to complete them, etc.
this wouldn´t pose such a problem if the game was a good hitch hiking simulator, but it isn´t.

exploration in 2W2´s simply sucks.
besides the tutorial island and eastern part of savannah one, the world is designed in a very confined, restrictive manner, dungeons are linear and devoid of anything interesting, all non-quest related loot is extremely level-scaled and there isn´t much variety of it. exploration is further discouraged with all those locked, quest-related areas. it´s good that sometimes you can run into monsters which can kill you in one hit, but that´s just about it, and doesn´t apply to later chapters anyway.
chances are, that once you´ll try to explore more on your own, you´ll discover how hopelessly unrewarding it is.

with the exploration ou of the picture, 2W2 becomes pretty much a quest-driven hack´n´slash, which is primarily why the sketchy quest design is an issue.
mileage may vary, of course, but personally i really had problems finishing the game due to its repetitiveness caused by lackluster quests and absence of interesting world to explore.
i did finish it though, mostly because developing my character was quite fun (i´ve played a sorta warrior/spellcaster hybrid which added some challenge, i think, and made combat reasonably varied) and as i´ve implicated above, i liked how smooth playing it felt.

the game needs better content, ´tis all.

so basically, ditto on this:
Crispy said:
Get through the tutorial. I think if you spend some time with it you'll like it as well.
with the addition of:
dr. one said:
Spend some more time with it and chances are you´ll like it less.
 
Self-Ejected

BeholderX

Self-Ejected
Joined
Aug 29, 2005
Messages
112
TW2 is basically a better, occasionally more complex version of ArcaniA with about 30 hours worth of slightly repetitive content. It's not a bad game, but Alpha Protocol had better PC controls, more RPG elements and more polish.

Yeah, that about sums it up.
 

AlaCarcuss

Arbiter
Joined
Jan 6, 2008
Messages
1,335
Location
BrizVegas, Australis Penal Colony
This is just crazy. I'm actually trying to play TW2 and Div2:DKS at the same time atm, and I'm only about half way through NV as well.

Have to say, despite my worst fears for each - I'm ejoying all three quite a bit. What a great second half of 2010 this has been for RPG's (or ARPG's).

So far however, without mentioning the pros/cons of each, I'm finding Div2/DKS by far the most addicting - not necessarily the best, just the more 'just one more hour' kind of adictive.

But yeah, was having a good time with 2WT as well - I'll get back to it soon... now where's that fucking wyvren egg....

:incline:
 
Self-Ejected

Jack

█▓▒░
Patron
Joined
May 5, 2010
Messages
4,900
Location
Yondo
Insert Title Here
Two world 2 is actually really good, looks nice, runs well and is pretty fun to play.
Surprisingly enough I'm thinking of buying it, what DRM does it use?
noshit.jpg
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom