Risen 3: Titan Lords

[Outlander]

Well I've become an untouchable god now. Not sure that means the game is too easy since you eventually hit that mark in all games of this type.

Too bad you're almost done with it, there's an overhaul mod that aims to fix many things with the base game, including its difficulty.

https://www.nexusmods.com/risen3/mods/6

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Are there two handed weapons or are we stuck with Rapier McSwashbucklerski.

 

[DalekFlay]

https://www.nexusmods.com/risen3/mods/6

LOL "the game is much darker and the coloring is less saturated to make the game appear more mature." Okay then try-hards.

Anyway the rebalance could be good, I dunno. Maybe someday I'll play with it. I'm not really looking for more challenge though necessarily, I kind of like feeling like a god late in RPGs, if you feel like you've earned it. I'm more just looking for more interesting content. It's much more the islands and enemies feeling the same and story going nowhere interesting mechanics wise that are the problem.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

https://www.nexusmods.com/risen3/mods/6

LOL "the game is much darker and the coloring is less saturated to make the game appear more mature." Okay then try-hards.

Anyway the rebalance could be good, I dunno. Maybe someday I'll play with it. I'm not really looking for more challenge though necessarily, I kind of like feeling like a god late in RPGs, if you feel like you've earned it. I'm more just looking for more interesting content. It's much more the islands and enemies feeling the same and story going nowhere interesting mechanics wise that are the problem.

the color improvements are good, pick the 'lite' version
the massive brightness shift between outside/inside & bloom in the base game is awful
I played the entire game with most of the patch enabled, I recommend it

 

[DalekFlay]

Man I really fucked myself going to Kila last. Had no idea what the hearts were for and doubled my damn health bar in 2 minutes. Whoops. I'm already in god mode though, so pointless now. Though that spider bitch was pretty annoying.

 

[DalekFlay]

Finished it. Really became a slog toward the end because I was completely invincible but enemies still blocked and stun-locked me a lot, making combat tedious. I skipped the second DLC island because I was ready for it to be over and then I arrive at the climax and discover it's another massive island with a ton of quest shit to do on it. I resisted the urge to rage quit and mainlined the main quest, finishing in a couple hours.

This all sounds very negative but I wouldn't say the game is shit or anything, it just wore out its welcome. Just a combination of god mode (on hard) and a weaker translation without much wit or good dialog. The islands are massive and exploration is solid, but without a good story or upgrade goal it just all got very boring eventually. For the first 20 hours or so though I quite enjoyed it, and it brought a little of that old PB charm back here and there. Certainly nice to have a big open world again after Risen 2, and the graphics were nice. Everything in Darth Roxor's review on here is accurate, but just a bit exaggerated in how bad he makes it sound. If you were a fan of the first Risen then this one is definitely worth playing. Just start focusing on the main quest once the game gets easy, or else you'll burn out like I did.

 

[unfairlight]

The DLC island is actually pretty good, so you missed out there.
I never found combat tedious, probably because I was overpowered and 2hit everything with the best weapon in the game and max attack speed + attack speed spell.

 

[Metro]

Kila is the worst. You have to cut your way through a couple hundred spiders which gets old... FAST.

 

[DalekFlay]

The DLC island is actually pretty good, so you missed out there.

Which one? I did Fog Island but skipped Thieve's Island. I read it had stealth missions and was mostly a re-do of a Risen 2 island and I was like nope nope nope, ready to move on to another game.

 

[Lord_Potato]

I just finished Risen 2 & 3 run and must say despite the bad press these games get, I had a good time. Sure, both of them are inferior to Gothics in terms of combat and exploration. They however make up for some of it with the fun pirate setting, distinct style and hilarious dialogues (conversations with Patty and the gnomes always deliver).

Dark Waters have more of the sheer hilarity in badass dialogues (in Titan Lords most funny and dickish responses cost you part of your soul), I also liked combat a bit more - in 3 every human enemy or monster has this ridiculous jumping attack that you have to avoid by frantic dodges, which I did not enjoy at all. Besides, there is also no kick in 3. The story in 2 is also better - fighting Mara is a clear continuation of the struggle against the Titan Lords. Necroloth is revealed as a Titan Lord in the last chapters of 3, like it was an afterthought. The Shadows are lame and cliched opponents, I much prefered the sea monsters of 2.

However, character building in 2 is butchered by the fact that all the best stuff (lockpicking, dialogue options, monkeys, parrots, dirty tricks) is hidden under just one stat: cunning. Risen 3 distributed the goodness more equally between dexterity, influence, cunning, toughness and even made spirit a wortwhile choice (alchemy!). The faction system in 3 is better than in 2 but the problem is those factions rarely interact with each other and mostly don't have mutually exclusive agendas. Basically they all want to battle Shadows and only differ in methods.

Dark Watters have a better hero. If you have a nameless protagonist without a fixed backstory, who is basically avatar of the player, why change him between parts of the trilogy? Patty's previously unmentioned brother is an unneeded addition to the world that already has a heroic figure who saved it a couple of times and should have been given a chance to do it once more. Also, the voice actor of the PC in Titan Lords was obviously trying too hard. I prefered the relaxed no bullshit voice of the nameless hero from 2 to the edgy Batman-like voice of the nameless hero from 3.

Finally, the sea battles. Dark Waters completely dropped the ball here. If you want to make a pirate epic, some of it has to happen on the sea. In Risen 2 you only have like 2 lame battles with sea monsters in which you don't even get to steer, just shoot. Sea battles in Risen 3 are not perfect, but at least you get some maneuvering with your ship and several boarding actions. Still not great but better than nothing. It's a pity you cannot customize your ship in any Risen. At least in 3 you get to choose it's general looks (together with a faction).

All in all these are not bad games, just very flawed ones, hampered by obvious budget problems. The decline from earlier offerings of Pyranha Bytes is obvious, but they also tried to bring some fresh elements to the table. However I must say that being a pirate felt like real fun and in the end, that's what matters when it comes to games. Being a pirate felt so good than now I am continuing the experience, this time in Vendetta: Curse of the Raven's Cry. A game with even worse press, terrible score, but more developped pirate elements (customizable ships and crews, navigating the high seas, real naval battles, historical Carribean setting). I am definately intrigued.

 

[Arrowgrab]

All in all these are not bad games, just very flawed ones, hampered by obvious budget problems. The decline from earlier offerings of Pyranha Bytes is obvious, but they also tried to bring some fresh elements to the table. However I must say that being a pirate felt like real fun and in the end, that's what matters when it comes to games. Being a pirate felt so good than now I am continuing the experience, this time in Vendetta: Curse of the Raven's Cry. A game with even worse press, terrible score, but more developped pirate elements (customizable ships and crews, navigating the high seas, real naval battles, historical Carribean setting). I am definately intrigued.

Please post some updates on whether Vendetta's any good some time in the future.

 

[Lord_Potato]

All in all these are not bad games, just very flawed ones, hampered by obvious budget problems. The decline from earlier offerings of Pyranha Bytes is obvious, but they also tried to bring some fresh elements to the table. However I must say that being a pirate felt like real fun and in the end, that's what matters when it comes to games. Being a pirate felt so good than now I am continuing the experience, this time in Vendetta: Curse of the Raven's Cry. A game with even worse press, terrible score, but more developped pirate elements (customizable ships and crews, navigating the high seas, real naval battles, historical Carribean setting). I am definately intrigued.

Please post some updates on whether Vendetta's any good some time in the future.

I'll be doing it in the relevant thread: https://rpgcodex.net/forums/threads...now-less-hilariously-unfinished.90073/page-23

 

[Darth Roxor]

All in all these are not bad games

YES THEY ARE

 

[Lord_Potato]

Nope, they're not

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

They're ok... ish. If I have to choose between R2/3/Elex and some turbo popular open world action rpg no143 then it's the former all the way.

 

[Lord_Potato]

Elex is IMO superior to both Risen 2 and 3: more interesting and bizarre world, better faction play, character building, story. But Risens can be enjoyable if you set your expectations low enough and after reading Darth Roxor reviews mine were.

 

[PanDupa]

It's actually a case study on PB because it dawned on me during my Risen 2/3 playthrough how great a time I was having despite how obviously inferior it was to PB's best. "That's how good it still is when they're fucking up" is one hell of an indirect compliment, I have yet to play Elex but if R2/3 was PB's worst then it must be worth it.

If you enjoyed R2 and 3 then for sure you will have lots of fun in Elex. Imo is the best PB game since G2

 

[Tigranes]

We can think of it this way:

Elex is, in a way, the best game in the G3/R2/R3/Elex branch: PB games that are too silly, too sprawling, too messy, to be actually well-designed games, but Elex somehow manages to cobble together its broken assed janky shit into a fun playground of stuff to do. And there is some hope that an Elex 2 could do that even better.

And then there's another track of pure distilled PB where the design principles are actually coherent and elegant - G1/G2/R1. Which we will likely never get again.

 

[Grunker]

We can think of it this way:

Elex is, in a way, the best game in the G3/R2/R3/Elex branch: PB games that are too silly, too sprawling, too messy, to be actually well-designed games, but Elex somehow manages to cobble together its broken assed janky shit into a fun playground of stuff to do. And there is some hope that an Elex 2 could do that even better.

And then there's another track of pure distilled PB where the design principles are actually coherent and elegant - G1/G2/R1. Which we will likely never get again.

I'd say "...cobble together its broken assed janky shit into an alright playground of stuff to do", but the structure of your point is spot on. If Elex 2 is an improvement over Elex it will almost certainly be a fun game, but given Piranha Bytes' track record with sequels now hope seems sparse

Some say Elex is janky shit, some say it's a glorious sandbox, the horrifying truth is, it's just kindda ok

 

[rusty_shackleford]

We can think of it this way:

Elex is, in a way, the best game in the G3/R2/R3/Elex branch: PB games that are too silly, too sprawling, too messy, to be actually well-designed games, but Elex somehow manages to cobble together its broken assed janky shit into a fun playground of stuff to do. And there is some hope that an Elex 2 could do that even better.

And then there's another track of pure distilled PB where the design principles are actually coherent and elegant - G1/G2/R1. Which we will likely never get again.

I'd say "...coble together its broken assed janky shit into an alright playground of stuff to do", but the structure of your point is spot on. If Elex 2 is an improvement over Elex it will almost certainly be a fun game, but given Piranha Bytes' track record with sequels now hope seems sparse

Some say Elex is janky shit, some say it's glorious sandbox, the horrifying truth is, it's just kindda ok

elex is overrated on the codex and underrated everywhere else

 

[Grunker]

We can think of it this way:

Elex is, in a way, the best game in the G3/R2/R3/Elex branch: PB games that are too silly, too sprawling, too messy, to be actually well-designed games, but Elex somehow manages to cobble together its broken assed janky shit into a fun playground of stuff to do. And there is some hope that an Elex 2 could do that even better.

And then there's another track of pure distilled PB where the design principles are actually coherent and elegant - G1/G2/R1. Which we will likely never get again.

I'd say "...coble together its broken assed janky shit into an alright playground of stuff to do", but the structure of your point is spot on. If Elex 2 is an improvement over Elex it will almost certainly be a fun game, but given Piranha Bytes' track record with sequels now hope seems sparse

Some say Elex is janky shit, some say it's glorious sandbox, the horrifying truth is, it's just kindda ok

elex is overrated on the codex and underrated everywhere else

exactly

 

[thesheeep]

Excuse me, did anyone say....


ELEX ?!

 

[Darth Roxor]

i was informed that there are people in this thread disrespecting ELEX

you will cease this faggotry at once

 

[Elwro]

Just a sidenote, anyone played Elex on a PS4? I don't have a gaming PC anymore and would like to try it, but if it's a clunky port of a game I fully expect to be clunky in the PB style that I love I will wait

 

[Broseph]

Just a sidenote, anyone played Elex on a PS4? I don't have a gaming PC anymore and would like to try it, but if it's a clunky port of a game I fully expect to be clunky in the PB style that I love I will wait

I played it on XBone and it was fine. No obvious bugs from what I can remember.