Risen series was released between 2009 and 2014 and consists of three entries, which vary a lot in every aspect. They are quite distinct to the point that if not for the plot and characters they would feel somewhat like different games within the genre, especially considering the first game in the series compared to later ones. The company behind these games is probably best known for the Gothic series, and that is extremely visible in the first Risen which feels a lot like the early Gothics. However, the following games drift towards their own vision, but the very different approach to their creation yields varied results, and while Risen 2 sets its own entertaining style, it is apparent that the third game in the series must have had either budget cuts or it was rushed to meet a deadline… or both.
STORY
The story seems oddly connected to Gothic for what is supposed to be a completely different setting. In fact, you could almost think that the story of the first Risen starts soon after Gothic 3. Now that gods have been ridden of, it turns out that they weren’t just simply keeping humans subjugated but also protected them. Without gods, the old race known as titans has arisen and they are not friendly to the human race, wrecking havoc to world around without anything able to stop them. Meanwhile, the protagonist is a stowaway on a ship that is attacked by a titan. Once it sinks, we wake up on the island that has *that magical thing* which protects everything from titans. With us there is also a lady… that is completely irrelevant beyond the first hour of the game.
Nonetheless, soon we find out that there are two factions on the island unfriendly to each other. One being the Don Esteban’s bandits and another being the Inquisition under the leadership of Mendoza. We have a choice whether first we go to Don’s camp, a town which is under Inquisition’s control or… get dragged to monastery – also Inquisition’s - by force if we break the law. Bare the latter, for quite a while we can do quests for both factions until finally we have to choose who do we support – the rebels or the Inquisition. Eventually we do fight a titan, and in the following Risens we continue the story to kill even more of them. Basically, performing a genocide on an ancient race to avoid the same being done to humans. There is very little depth. The whole storyline is extremely generic and silly in the first Risen, and each iteration it only gets worse. The entire plot is full of cartoon-like vicious villains that appear to have no real reason to perform their actions, and nothing really is elaborated from their point of view. They exist simply to perform evil deeds until getting beaten or shot by the player.
WRITING
The aspect that distinctively separates every Risen is writing. Each Risen had different writers and their work affected overall game experience a lot. The first Risen is somewhat similar to Gothics in presentation – it keeps somewhat sinister atmosphere. Dialogues are to-the-point and keep style that reminds of Piranha Bytes’ first games. Tasks – while not original – have elaborate enough mini-stories and are usually entertaining to follow. Nevertheless, the lack of any uniqueness in quests is a letdown and blurs the memories about the game. Gothics had multiple events and NPCs that were memorable, but Risen doesn’t have any. The main character in the first game appears to be quite a direct and generic person, giving not many impressions other than being pragmatic. Altogether, dialogs are decent enough to keep interest during a playthrough, but not memorable.
Risen 2 is an exception here, because it appears to be quite unique in style. The writing is absorbing and funny – but without taking it too far. I have never smiled in any RPG as much as I had in Risen 2. Writers clearly knew what they were doing and had a good sense of humor. Writing often feels like it came from a decent book and not a game. The main character tends to be humorous and witty, just as some party members that embark on a journey with us. Encountered NPCs act differently based on their background and culture and their actions are reasonable and fit within the context. Dialogs are usually captivating as they are written with humor, but the game gets occasionally somewhat gloomy when it needs to.
Unfortunately, Risen 3 feels neither amusing nor serious. It tries to keep the light atmosphere of Risen 2, but the quality is not there, the third game lacks wittiness and humor of the previous one. The writing in Risen 3 can bore with too many insignificant details and dialogs are too long. What’s worse, they contain jokes that are dull and inept. This is the only game in the series in which I started skipping some conversations not to lose interest too soon.
PATTY
The most interesting NPC in Risens is Patty. In the first Risen her role was limited to a few quests. The player meets her in a tavern, where she asks for help getting out of town. A few quests with her follow later, however, she remains to be secondary-tier NPC and does not have much more depth or character to her than other important to the story people on the island. I am not sure if she was already planned to become so crucial in the following games, the way her presence is handled she might've been planned as a tertiary quest giver... or as a player's side-kick.
As it turns out, with the new writers the latter was more accurate for the next game. Since Risen 2 Patty plays a major role. Not only she starts as the first and a very useful party member as she killed most of the enemies until I leveled up the main character, but she also remains with the player until the end. Her humorous chimes in add a lot of charm to the game. Patty also appears genuinely feminine. Female characters presented in games usually feel unauthentic and stereotypical, and more intimate relationships tend to be ridiculous and pathetic. Instead, Patty in Risen 2 is full of charm, cheer and femininity, breaking cliches and catching not just the physique but also a believable character of a young woman. Other women in Risen 2 also have credible female nature, although besides Patty only Chani is well developed as these two are the only possible female party members and important women in the game.
Patty in Risen 3 suffers along with the rest of the writing. Her dialogs become fairly dull and generic, and there is not much character development that could have been seen in Risen 2. She loses her charm and wit, while jokes attempted by new writers are typically more miss than hit. Traveling with her does not really add much to the game like previously. I tended just to take with me a party member that inflicted most damage instead, because none of the possible party members provided interesting addition.
FACTIONS
Don Esteban's group and the Inquisition are the only factions available in the first Risen. Both sides allow the player to learn combat, but Crystal Mages – a part of the Inquisition – allow learning magic in an extensive way. Both the Bandit Camp and the Inquisition allow joining them by completing a series of quests, but the player might also be forced to join Inquisition upon doing an unlawful act – however, then a lot of quests will be locked and the possibility of joining the mages will be taken away.
Nevertheless, neither magic nor melee combat feel satisfying. Magic is underpowered at the beginning and overpowered later. Melee, on the other hand, is cumbersome when combating non-humanoid enemies: Promotes spamming – especially the “strong” attack, and is simply not fun, particularly the stun-locking enemies can get annoying. The melee combat works better with humanoid enemies, where blocking or dodging gets as important as attacks. Nevertheless, whatever you choose, be ready for the game to provide somewhat exasperating experience in this aspect.
Risen 2 continues the story of the Inquisition, but this time they have developed guns and mages are no longer their part. In fact, the generic magic has disappeared from the game. Inquisition’s muskets are powerful and allow to breeze through any encounter. Their use is enjoyable and these are clearly the best weapons in the game. However, the player starts as a melee fighter and this aspect is completely reworked in the second game. Various more useful and interesting combos were implemented that can be unlocked upon leveling up. The melee fights require more timing now, and the combat became more of an attack-block-counterattack play – although at the very beginning of the game only simple attack is possible and it feels terrible. With leveling up it gets much better though. Regrettably, combat with non-humanoid enemies still remains to be rather unpleasant and something to just get through rather than provide entertainment. However, why would you even want to level up melee instead of just getting muskets? There’s another faction in the game that the player is able to join – natives. They don’t have any special weapons, instead they use voodoo magic for various buffs, curses and such. In addition, they have plenty of quests where the player takes control over NPCs. Natives are definitely worth a playthrough more than the Inquisition, because while Inquisition’s quests are fairly generic, natives’ are way more fresh and amusing. Quests for natives are significantly more enjoyable and worth giving up muskets for, even if you don’t want to extensively use voodoo in combat – you can still focus on melee, which with unlocked skills is more pleasant, although never much beyond average. With addition of pistol shooting to support melee, combat doesn’t take too long.
In theory, Risen 3 improves in this aspect as there are three factions to join. Inquisition is no longer an option, instead we have Demon Hunters, pirate-native combo, and Crystal Mages from the first Risen. While I have never played Crystal Mages in this iteration, it seems that choosing a faction in Risen 3 is less of a deal than in previous games. There are few unique quests, and you can gain access to most magic via single-use items. Overall, it does not seem to affect the game much whichever faction you decide to join beyond a few minor quests. Melee combat appears to be very similar to Risen 2, except enemies are now damage sponges and fights take way too much time than they should. Even getting a musket – which now does not require joining a faction - still means you need to shoot a crab fifteen times in the early game, which is just a frustrating waste of time. It does get better in late game, but everything in Risen 3 appears to be very resistant to damage so the player has to waste plenty of time on combat that is not enjoyable. In addition, not only timing is somewhat less important than in Risen 2 where it was still needed in melee, but also guns aiming mechanics changed for way worse. In second Risen aiming was never an issue – while the character missed, the player always had the control over what they’re aiming at. In Risen 3, the “aim” is constantly lost when enemy approaches near – very often aiming right at the enemy from one meter away is not registered as aiming at them at all, and therefore it’s always a miss. Adding to that the technical issue that causes the game to crash every time you accidentally shoot at water… makes guns a type of weapon to avoid in this game. I haven’t even mentioned the worst aspect of Risen 3: Constant dodging. While present in previous game, now it became even more hilarious. Hit the enemy, roll back, hit, roll, hit, roll… it looks silly. You could avoid doing it, but it’s so much better than blocking that using it is a no-brainer. Oddly enough, even though we play as pirates in second and third Risen, there is no actual naval combat in any of these games. Only some boss fights that are underwhelming at best. What is more, the character present in the first two Risens does not swim and is not able to learn it. Only the Risen 3's protagonist can swim.
TECHNICAL ISSUES
Since I have already begun to write about technical issues… Risen 3 is full of them. Shooting at water causes a crash, and it’s a difficult thing to avoid in a game about islands – some of them are quite full of water, whether as rivers, lakes or ponds. Crashes can also be caused by… talking to some NPCs or finishing some particular side quests. Trying to finish Risen 3 can be a bit of a frustrating experience. Fortunately, the other Risens are not plagued by this issue. In both Risen and Risen 2 I have experienced not more than five crashes in total. Their technical issues were related to other aspects.
Risen 2 was the only game in the series that avoided causing any discouragement. It had odd graphical artefacts of plants growing a few meters from the player, which looked surreal, but aside from graphical issues that did not affect gameplay, just sometimes put a smile on my face, I have not encountered any other bugs in the game. The only somewhat annoying aspect was uneven audio recordings’ volume – different characters often had different volume and it could be uncomfortable to listen to them.
Risen, similarly to the third one, suffered from major technical issues. Random crashes were not an issue, but climbing was. Climbing caused the character to get stuck in the environment in probably 90% of attempts. Every time I had to climb I quick-saved, tried to jump and reloaded quite a few times until the character did not get stuck in the environment, then quick-saved again before another jump. Some parts of the game require a lot of climbing and this issue was no less frustrating than crashes. A lot of time was wasted on attempts to climb and getting stuck.
GAMEPLAY
The first Risen has the best user interface of all Risens. In fact, it is the only convenient one as the other two have interface clearly designed for consoles, and therefore performing any action wastes more time than necessary. The first Risen is made for computers and everything can be found and accessed quickly. Risen provides readable menus with lots of information, whereas later parts add a lot of sub-menus, each containing little information and requiring to perform redundant browsing even though one or two pages would be enough to display all the data.
Exploration is a mixed bag in the series. It works best in Risen 2. There are multiple islands the player can visit with – beyond the beginning of the game – open world, but on the other hand many islands are corridors with railroaded progress. Nonetheless, there are a few islands that really are an open world. The first Risen has only one area and there are way fewer locations than in Risen 2, but it doesn’t have many corridors. The player is free to go wherever they like, albeit obviously some areas are more dangerous than other and therefore it might not be the best idea to wander off at the beginning of the game. It is also the Risen with most blatant level scalling, although based not as much on the player’s level but more on the chapter you’re in. Other Risens have the same feature, but it is less obvious, perhaps due to separation of the world into islands. Risen 3 also consists of islands, but most of them have playable areas significantly smaller than Risen 2. The rest is supposedly deserted and conquered by shadows, but… you can’t visit them at all. Some areas appear on the map as desert but there is no way to reach them. Areas than can be reached are – with few exceptions – smaller than Risen 2, but the world as a whole is bigger than the first Risen. Unfortunately, the issue present in the second game - that a lot of places are corridors - still remains. Nonetheless, Risen 3 still has plenty to explore.
In each of the games we start from nothing and can barely hurt anything with a sword, and end up being able to take on the strongest beasts starting in the middle of the game. Fighting skills we can learn are only for land combat as there is no real naval one. All skills need to be learned from teachers in every Risen, and they cost money and glory points – which are obtained by completing quests and killing enemies. Every time the character learns a skill, he needs to find an appropriate teacher and ask for a lesson – then the NPC says a few sentences about what we’re learning, such as how to fight better, sneak etc. Risen 3 is a disappointing exception here because teachers do not say anything, just “alright” and the character learns from that. Pickpocketing skill needs a special mention in the first Risen as it is hilariously implemented. We can steal anything from an NPC's inventory. Including weapons they hold in hand. This is better implemented in the following Risens which avoid such bizarreness.
In each game basic statistics are different. The first Risen has only three – strength, dexterity and wisdom. Depending on the choice how you want to play the game, it’s most useful to focus on one of them. If you’re going to be a mage – invest in wisdom. If you’re going to whack your way through – in strength. Risen 2 raises the amount to five, and some of them will depend on the faction you choose. “Firearms” is only really useful if you choose inquisition, while “blades” and “voodoo” will be important if you join natives. “Toughness” allows to withstand more hits, but overall investing in it a lot would be worthless as it is better to deal more damage instead and roll from the enemies, although it unlocks some dialog options via intimidation. Lastly, “cunning” unlocks dialogues through diplomacy, but also allows you to steal and sneak better, and is a very useful skill throughout the entire game. Overall, the implementation leaves something to be desired – why wouldn’t “firearms” and “blades” be merged into one attribute? “Voodoo” also appears to be unnecessarily unique, could as easily be a part of “cunning”.
Risen 3 raises the number of attributes to eight, but at the same time many of them lose usefulness. It’s better to focus on one or two, and ignore the rest. Either “melee”, “ranged” or “magic” should be your choice for maximum damage – especially since enemies in this game take forever to take down. “Influence” is only for additional dialogues options (intimidation and diplomacy), and there are fewer than previously, while also adding nothing of value, so it is a useless skill. “Dexterity” now is useful for opening chests and pickpocketing, while toughness is basically same as before, but now irrelevant due to dodge working so well. “Cunning” increases damage of secondary weapons, and therefore is a waste of skill points, and the same can be said about “spirit” that allows making potions and increases a special skill “astral vision” that you can use through the entire game and should make it easier to spot items or enemies, but I never found it useful. Risen 3 is a perfect example that more is not necessarily better. It just clutters menu with mostly useless attributes that you’d better avoid accidentally investing in. The first Risen had only three and it was the best implementation in the series.
Each game contains quick travel options. In Risen, teleport stones can be obtained to various locations, Risen 2 simply allows quick travel via map and Risen 3 requires the player to collect teleport stones and then activate teleports. The last one is a bit annoying as sometimes you don’t have a teleport stone to unlock it, or when you have one you might hesitate to use it as it might come in handy later. The Risen 2’s method is the most convenient and saves most time for the player. While in Risen 2 and 3 you need to use ship between islands, you can always quick travel to the ship and click one button to choose area destination.
The first Risen does not have any permanent companions, but they are available in the following games. Risen 2 has six in total, although two depend on the joined faction, therefore at most five party members are available in a single playthrough. Except additional dialogs they offer assistance in combat and additional help such as healing or collecting items for the player. Path-finding is never an issue in this game, even when I was jumping on rocks NPCs quickly found a way to me. Which cannot be said about Risen 3 where path-finding is terrible and I often lost my follower somewhere on the way. Risen 3 has seven available companions and it is possible to join all of them regardless of the chosen faction. However, Risen 3 has a reputation bar which is affected by choices made during the game. The reputation doesn’t affect gameplay except party members: If reputation is too low then two NPCs will leave the crew, while when it is too high another NPC will leave.
AUDIOVISUALS
The first Risen was released in 2009. The graphics look dated nowadays, objects are angular and textures could be of higher resolution. Animations look especially bad. Yet the style still looks good. The available town appears authentic, farms around make a believable world as you can clearly see how the island sustains itself, while the swamp looks dark, moist and foggy. Moreover, flora in the game looks abundant and better than in many games released even today. Except stiff and limited animations, the only criticism I have towards graphics in the first game is that underground temples appear to be way too bright, and although many of them are abandoned, somebody still lights torches everywhere. It would be much better if the environments were dark and the player would have to use a torch. The atmosphere and feeling of threat could add a lot to the game in such locations. This issue affects all of the games in the series.
Risen 2 and 3 improved graphics a lot from the technical side, as well as animations now are much better and fluid than in the first game. Risen 2 also has beautiful art style and environments, including fauna, even better flora, NPC costumes and basically everything that isn’t user interface. That is mostly due to the art direction as it looks rather realistic. Risen 3 continues the trend, but clothes and NPCs look significantly worse and over-the-top. The best example is Patty – who looked cute and attractive in the second Risen, having only some neckline visible to be slightly seductive but not much. In Risen 3 her breasts grew enormously, and she shows most of them, looking somewhat like a street prostitute. However, most of the graphics still look very good.
Music in the first two Risens is pleasant and fits these games. While I wouldn’t listen to it outside the games, I enjoyed it within them a lot. Risen 3’s music is rather poor. It did not bother me at any point, but it lacks the relaxing themes of first two Risens and the tunes are average. The only times I even noticed it was during combat and cut-scenes. Other times it was just something in the background that I’d ignore completely.
When it comes to voice acting, none of the games gets it right. The first Risen’s voices are fine but not good. They often fit the characters and are well delivered, but lack variety – there were probably too few actors, and that is especially apparent with female NPCs. The second Risen fixes that issue and the quality of voice acting is gratifying to the ear as it becomes generally pleasant to listen to many NPCs, especially party members… until there are technical issues with the volume that happen not too rarely. Some characters speak with a different volume than others. Risen 3 once again is the black sheep of the series. While voices in Risen 2 were pleasant and the main character was quite enamoring, Risen 3 is partly the opposite, especially when it comes to the player character. Not only he is coarse and swears all the time, but his voice sounds like he is past a whole week of binge drinking while having an advanced throat cancer. Other voices are much better and more akin to previous game, but while overall the voice overs are not bad, the terrible choice for the main character breaks the immersion all the time in combination with the inferior writing.
SUMMARY
While the gameplay of Risen 2 and 3 does not change much throughout them, I should mention that Risen appears to be divided into two parts. The first part is the RPG part and lasts through chapter one and two. The game focuses on quests and dialogs with occasional combat sequence and exploration. This part is great and I enjoyed it a lot. Chapter three and four though are mostly dungeon crawling with constant combat and in consequence late game becomes immensely substandard. The late Risen is actually the worst part of the whole series. Risen 2 and 3 are more balanced and do not contain many combat-only sequences. Gameplay of Risen 2 only annoys at the beginning during fights, when the character doesn’t have any combat skills yet. Later the game becomes decent and I enjoyed Risen 2 the most in the series as it kept quality until the end, even if considering the terrible storyline. Risen 3 is better than late Risen’s parts but it is the weakest game overall and the overHPization of enemies makes the combat irritating. Combined with deficient writing the game loses a lot of appeal of the earlier games, albeit the exploration is still as enjoyable as previously and for that aspect alone it might be worth giving it a try. On the other hand, if you consider combat or writing crucial aspects to enjoy a game, best if you skip it. Nevertheless, the first two entries in the series certainly deserve attention and time. Although you need to be aware that they are different from each other. Risen is close in gameplay and atmosphere to Gothics, while Risen 2 is a lighthearted adventure with intriguing setting and plenty of areas to explore.
STORY
The story seems oddly connected to Gothic for what is supposed to be a completely different setting. In fact, you could almost think that the story of the first Risen starts soon after Gothic 3. Now that gods have been ridden of, it turns out that they weren’t just simply keeping humans subjugated but also protected them. Without gods, the old race known as titans has arisen and they are not friendly to the human race, wrecking havoc to world around without anything able to stop them. Meanwhile, the protagonist is a stowaway on a ship that is attacked by a titan. Once it sinks, we wake up on the island that has *that magical thing* which protects everything from titans. With us there is also a lady… that is completely irrelevant beyond the first hour of the game.
Nonetheless, soon we find out that there are two factions on the island unfriendly to each other. One being the Don Esteban’s bandits and another being the Inquisition under the leadership of Mendoza. We have a choice whether first we go to Don’s camp, a town which is under Inquisition’s control or… get dragged to monastery – also Inquisition’s - by force if we break the law. Bare the latter, for quite a while we can do quests for both factions until finally we have to choose who do we support – the rebels or the Inquisition. Eventually we do fight a titan, and in the following Risens we continue the story to kill even more of them. Basically, performing a genocide on an ancient race to avoid the same being done to humans. There is very little depth. The whole storyline is extremely generic and silly in the first Risen, and each iteration it only gets worse. The entire plot is full of cartoon-like vicious villains that appear to have no real reason to perform their actions, and nothing really is elaborated from their point of view. They exist simply to perform evil deeds until getting beaten or shot by the player.
WRITING
The aspect that distinctively separates every Risen is writing. Each Risen had different writers and their work affected overall game experience a lot. The first Risen is somewhat similar to Gothics in presentation – it keeps somewhat sinister atmosphere. Dialogues are to-the-point and keep style that reminds of Piranha Bytes’ first games. Tasks – while not original – have elaborate enough mini-stories and are usually entertaining to follow. Nevertheless, the lack of any uniqueness in quests is a letdown and blurs the memories about the game. Gothics had multiple events and NPCs that were memorable, but Risen doesn’t have any. The main character in the first game appears to be quite a direct and generic person, giving not many impressions other than being pragmatic. Altogether, dialogs are decent enough to keep interest during a playthrough, but not memorable.
Risen 2 is an exception here, because it appears to be quite unique in style. The writing is absorbing and funny – but without taking it too far. I have never smiled in any RPG as much as I had in Risen 2. Writers clearly knew what they were doing and had a good sense of humor. Writing often feels like it came from a decent book and not a game. The main character tends to be humorous and witty, just as some party members that embark on a journey with us. Encountered NPCs act differently based on their background and culture and their actions are reasonable and fit within the context. Dialogs are usually captivating as they are written with humor, but the game gets occasionally somewhat gloomy when it needs to.
Unfortunately, Risen 3 feels neither amusing nor serious. It tries to keep the light atmosphere of Risen 2, but the quality is not there, the third game lacks wittiness and humor of the previous one. The writing in Risen 3 can bore with too many insignificant details and dialogs are too long. What’s worse, they contain jokes that are dull and inept. This is the only game in the series in which I started skipping some conversations not to lose interest too soon.
PATTY
The most interesting NPC in Risens is Patty. In the first Risen her role was limited to a few quests. The player meets her in a tavern, where she asks for help getting out of town. A few quests with her follow later, however, she remains to be secondary-tier NPC and does not have much more depth or character to her than other important to the story people on the island. I am not sure if she was already planned to become so crucial in the following games, the way her presence is handled she might've been planned as a tertiary quest giver... or as a player's side-kick.
As it turns out, with the new writers the latter was more accurate for the next game. Since Risen 2 Patty plays a major role. Not only she starts as the first and a very useful party member as she killed most of the enemies until I leveled up the main character, but she also remains with the player until the end. Her humorous chimes in add a lot of charm to the game. Patty also appears genuinely feminine. Female characters presented in games usually feel unauthentic and stereotypical, and more intimate relationships tend to be ridiculous and pathetic. Instead, Patty in Risen 2 is full of charm, cheer and femininity, breaking cliches and catching not just the physique but also a believable character of a young woman. Other women in Risen 2 also have credible female nature, although besides Patty only Chani is well developed as these two are the only possible female party members and important women in the game.
Patty in Risen 3 suffers along with the rest of the writing. Her dialogs become fairly dull and generic, and there is not much character development that could have been seen in Risen 2. She loses her charm and wit, while jokes attempted by new writers are typically more miss than hit. Traveling with her does not really add much to the game like previously. I tended just to take with me a party member that inflicted most damage instead, because none of the possible party members provided interesting addition.
FACTIONS
Don Esteban's group and the Inquisition are the only factions available in the first Risen. Both sides allow the player to learn combat, but Crystal Mages – a part of the Inquisition – allow learning magic in an extensive way. Both the Bandit Camp and the Inquisition allow joining them by completing a series of quests, but the player might also be forced to join Inquisition upon doing an unlawful act – however, then a lot of quests will be locked and the possibility of joining the mages will be taken away.
Nevertheless, neither magic nor melee combat feel satisfying. Magic is underpowered at the beginning and overpowered later. Melee, on the other hand, is cumbersome when combating non-humanoid enemies: Promotes spamming – especially the “strong” attack, and is simply not fun, particularly the stun-locking enemies can get annoying. The melee combat works better with humanoid enemies, where blocking or dodging gets as important as attacks. Nevertheless, whatever you choose, be ready for the game to provide somewhat exasperating experience in this aspect.
Risen 2 continues the story of the Inquisition, but this time they have developed guns and mages are no longer their part. In fact, the generic magic has disappeared from the game. Inquisition’s muskets are powerful and allow to breeze through any encounter. Their use is enjoyable and these are clearly the best weapons in the game. However, the player starts as a melee fighter and this aspect is completely reworked in the second game. Various more useful and interesting combos were implemented that can be unlocked upon leveling up. The melee fights require more timing now, and the combat became more of an attack-block-counterattack play – although at the very beginning of the game only simple attack is possible and it feels terrible. With leveling up it gets much better though. Regrettably, combat with non-humanoid enemies still remains to be rather unpleasant and something to just get through rather than provide entertainment. However, why would you even want to level up melee instead of just getting muskets? There’s another faction in the game that the player is able to join – natives. They don’t have any special weapons, instead they use voodoo magic for various buffs, curses and such. In addition, they have plenty of quests where the player takes control over NPCs. Natives are definitely worth a playthrough more than the Inquisition, because while Inquisition’s quests are fairly generic, natives’ are way more fresh and amusing. Quests for natives are significantly more enjoyable and worth giving up muskets for, even if you don’t want to extensively use voodoo in combat – you can still focus on melee, which with unlocked skills is more pleasant, although never much beyond average. With addition of pistol shooting to support melee, combat doesn’t take too long.
In theory, Risen 3 improves in this aspect as there are three factions to join. Inquisition is no longer an option, instead we have Demon Hunters, pirate-native combo, and Crystal Mages from the first Risen. While I have never played Crystal Mages in this iteration, it seems that choosing a faction in Risen 3 is less of a deal than in previous games. There are few unique quests, and you can gain access to most magic via single-use items. Overall, it does not seem to affect the game much whichever faction you decide to join beyond a few minor quests. Melee combat appears to be very similar to Risen 2, except enemies are now damage sponges and fights take way too much time than they should. Even getting a musket – which now does not require joining a faction - still means you need to shoot a crab fifteen times in the early game, which is just a frustrating waste of time. It does get better in late game, but everything in Risen 3 appears to be very resistant to damage so the player has to waste plenty of time on combat that is not enjoyable. In addition, not only timing is somewhat less important than in Risen 2 where it was still needed in melee, but also guns aiming mechanics changed for way worse. In second Risen aiming was never an issue – while the character missed, the player always had the control over what they’re aiming at. In Risen 3, the “aim” is constantly lost when enemy approaches near – very often aiming right at the enemy from one meter away is not registered as aiming at them at all, and therefore it’s always a miss. Adding to that the technical issue that causes the game to crash every time you accidentally shoot at water… makes guns a type of weapon to avoid in this game. I haven’t even mentioned the worst aspect of Risen 3: Constant dodging. While present in previous game, now it became even more hilarious. Hit the enemy, roll back, hit, roll, hit, roll… it looks silly. You could avoid doing it, but it’s so much better than blocking that using it is a no-brainer. Oddly enough, even though we play as pirates in second and third Risen, there is no actual naval combat in any of these games. Only some boss fights that are underwhelming at best. What is more, the character present in the first two Risens does not swim and is not able to learn it. Only the Risen 3's protagonist can swim.
TECHNICAL ISSUES
Since I have already begun to write about technical issues… Risen 3 is full of them. Shooting at water causes a crash, and it’s a difficult thing to avoid in a game about islands – some of them are quite full of water, whether as rivers, lakes or ponds. Crashes can also be caused by… talking to some NPCs or finishing some particular side quests. Trying to finish Risen 3 can be a bit of a frustrating experience. Fortunately, the other Risens are not plagued by this issue. In both Risen and Risen 2 I have experienced not more than five crashes in total. Their technical issues were related to other aspects.
Risen 2 was the only game in the series that avoided causing any discouragement. It had odd graphical artefacts of plants growing a few meters from the player, which looked surreal, but aside from graphical issues that did not affect gameplay, just sometimes put a smile on my face, I have not encountered any other bugs in the game. The only somewhat annoying aspect was uneven audio recordings’ volume – different characters often had different volume and it could be uncomfortable to listen to them.
Risen, similarly to the third one, suffered from major technical issues. Random crashes were not an issue, but climbing was. Climbing caused the character to get stuck in the environment in probably 90% of attempts. Every time I had to climb I quick-saved, tried to jump and reloaded quite a few times until the character did not get stuck in the environment, then quick-saved again before another jump. Some parts of the game require a lot of climbing and this issue was no less frustrating than crashes. A lot of time was wasted on attempts to climb and getting stuck.
GAMEPLAY
The first Risen has the best user interface of all Risens. In fact, it is the only convenient one as the other two have interface clearly designed for consoles, and therefore performing any action wastes more time than necessary. The first Risen is made for computers and everything can be found and accessed quickly. Risen provides readable menus with lots of information, whereas later parts add a lot of sub-menus, each containing little information and requiring to perform redundant browsing even though one or two pages would be enough to display all the data.
Exploration is a mixed bag in the series. It works best in Risen 2. There are multiple islands the player can visit with – beyond the beginning of the game – open world, but on the other hand many islands are corridors with railroaded progress. Nonetheless, there are a few islands that really are an open world. The first Risen has only one area and there are way fewer locations than in Risen 2, but it doesn’t have many corridors. The player is free to go wherever they like, albeit obviously some areas are more dangerous than other and therefore it might not be the best idea to wander off at the beginning of the game. It is also the Risen with most blatant level scalling, although based not as much on the player’s level but more on the chapter you’re in. Other Risens have the same feature, but it is less obvious, perhaps due to separation of the world into islands. Risen 3 also consists of islands, but most of them have playable areas significantly smaller than Risen 2. The rest is supposedly deserted and conquered by shadows, but… you can’t visit them at all. Some areas appear on the map as desert but there is no way to reach them. Areas than can be reached are – with few exceptions – smaller than Risen 2, but the world as a whole is bigger than the first Risen. Unfortunately, the issue present in the second game - that a lot of places are corridors - still remains. Nonetheless, Risen 3 still has plenty to explore.
In each of the games we start from nothing and can barely hurt anything with a sword, and end up being able to take on the strongest beasts starting in the middle of the game. Fighting skills we can learn are only for land combat as there is no real naval one. All skills need to be learned from teachers in every Risen, and they cost money and glory points – which are obtained by completing quests and killing enemies. Every time the character learns a skill, he needs to find an appropriate teacher and ask for a lesson – then the NPC says a few sentences about what we’re learning, such as how to fight better, sneak etc. Risen 3 is a disappointing exception here because teachers do not say anything, just “alright” and the character learns from that. Pickpocketing skill needs a special mention in the first Risen as it is hilariously implemented. We can steal anything from an NPC's inventory. Including weapons they hold in hand. This is better implemented in the following Risens which avoid such bizarreness.
In each game basic statistics are different. The first Risen has only three – strength, dexterity and wisdom. Depending on the choice how you want to play the game, it’s most useful to focus on one of them. If you’re going to be a mage – invest in wisdom. If you’re going to whack your way through – in strength. Risen 2 raises the amount to five, and some of them will depend on the faction you choose. “Firearms” is only really useful if you choose inquisition, while “blades” and “voodoo” will be important if you join natives. “Toughness” allows to withstand more hits, but overall investing in it a lot would be worthless as it is better to deal more damage instead and roll from the enemies, although it unlocks some dialog options via intimidation. Lastly, “cunning” unlocks dialogues through diplomacy, but also allows you to steal and sneak better, and is a very useful skill throughout the entire game. Overall, the implementation leaves something to be desired – why wouldn’t “firearms” and “blades” be merged into one attribute? “Voodoo” also appears to be unnecessarily unique, could as easily be a part of “cunning”.
Risen 3 raises the number of attributes to eight, but at the same time many of them lose usefulness. It’s better to focus on one or two, and ignore the rest. Either “melee”, “ranged” or “magic” should be your choice for maximum damage – especially since enemies in this game take forever to take down. “Influence” is only for additional dialogues options (intimidation and diplomacy), and there are fewer than previously, while also adding nothing of value, so it is a useless skill. “Dexterity” now is useful for opening chests and pickpocketing, while toughness is basically same as before, but now irrelevant due to dodge working so well. “Cunning” increases damage of secondary weapons, and therefore is a waste of skill points, and the same can be said about “spirit” that allows making potions and increases a special skill “astral vision” that you can use through the entire game and should make it easier to spot items or enemies, but I never found it useful. Risen 3 is a perfect example that more is not necessarily better. It just clutters menu with mostly useless attributes that you’d better avoid accidentally investing in. The first Risen had only three and it was the best implementation in the series.
Each game contains quick travel options. In Risen, teleport stones can be obtained to various locations, Risen 2 simply allows quick travel via map and Risen 3 requires the player to collect teleport stones and then activate teleports. The last one is a bit annoying as sometimes you don’t have a teleport stone to unlock it, or when you have one you might hesitate to use it as it might come in handy later. The Risen 2’s method is the most convenient and saves most time for the player. While in Risen 2 and 3 you need to use ship between islands, you can always quick travel to the ship and click one button to choose area destination.
The first Risen does not have any permanent companions, but they are available in the following games. Risen 2 has six in total, although two depend on the joined faction, therefore at most five party members are available in a single playthrough. Except additional dialogs they offer assistance in combat and additional help such as healing or collecting items for the player. Path-finding is never an issue in this game, even when I was jumping on rocks NPCs quickly found a way to me. Which cannot be said about Risen 3 where path-finding is terrible and I often lost my follower somewhere on the way. Risen 3 has seven available companions and it is possible to join all of them regardless of the chosen faction. However, Risen 3 has a reputation bar which is affected by choices made during the game. The reputation doesn’t affect gameplay except party members: If reputation is too low then two NPCs will leave the crew, while when it is too high another NPC will leave.
AUDIOVISUALS
The first Risen was released in 2009. The graphics look dated nowadays, objects are angular and textures could be of higher resolution. Animations look especially bad. Yet the style still looks good. The available town appears authentic, farms around make a believable world as you can clearly see how the island sustains itself, while the swamp looks dark, moist and foggy. Moreover, flora in the game looks abundant and better than in many games released even today. Except stiff and limited animations, the only criticism I have towards graphics in the first game is that underground temples appear to be way too bright, and although many of them are abandoned, somebody still lights torches everywhere. It would be much better if the environments were dark and the player would have to use a torch. The atmosphere and feeling of threat could add a lot to the game in such locations. This issue affects all of the games in the series.
Risen 2 and 3 improved graphics a lot from the technical side, as well as animations now are much better and fluid than in the first game. Risen 2 also has beautiful art style and environments, including fauna, even better flora, NPC costumes and basically everything that isn’t user interface. That is mostly due to the art direction as it looks rather realistic. Risen 3 continues the trend, but clothes and NPCs look significantly worse and over-the-top. The best example is Patty – who looked cute and attractive in the second Risen, having only some neckline visible to be slightly seductive but not much. In Risen 3 her breasts grew enormously, and she shows most of them, looking somewhat like a street prostitute. However, most of the graphics still look very good.
Music in the first two Risens is pleasant and fits these games. While I wouldn’t listen to it outside the games, I enjoyed it within them a lot. Risen 3’s music is rather poor. It did not bother me at any point, but it lacks the relaxing themes of first two Risens and the tunes are average. The only times I even noticed it was during combat and cut-scenes. Other times it was just something in the background that I’d ignore completely.
When it comes to voice acting, none of the games gets it right. The first Risen’s voices are fine but not good. They often fit the characters and are well delivered, but lack variety – there were probably too few actors, and that is especially apparent with female NPCs. The second Risen fixes that issue and the quality of voice acting is gratifying to the ear as it becomes generally pleasant to listen to many NPCs, especially party members… until there are technical issues with the volume that happen not too rarely. Some characters speak with a different volume than others. Risen 3 once again is the black sheep of the series. While voices in Risen 2 were pleasant and the main character was quite enamoring, Risen 3 is partly the opposite, especially when it comes to the player character. Not only he is coarse and swears all the time, but his voice sounds like he is past a whole week of binge drinking while having an advanced throat cancer. Other voices are much better and more akin to previous game, but while overall the voice overs are not bad, the terrible choice for the main character breaks the immersion all the time in combination with the inferior writing.
SUMMARY
While the gameplay of Risen 2 and 3 does not change much throughout them, I should mention that Risen appears to be divided into two parts. The first part is the RPG part and lasts through chapter one and two. The game focuses on quests and dialogs with occasional combat sequence and exploration. This part is great and I enjoyed it a lot. Chapter three and four though are mostly dungeon crawling with constant combat and in consequence late game becomes immensely substandard. The late Risen is actually the worst part of the whole series. Risen 2 and 3 are more balanced and do not contain many combat-only sequences. Gameplay of Risen 2 only annoys at the beginning during fights, when the character doesn’t have any combat skills yet. Later the game becomes decent and I enjoyed Risen 2 the most in the series as it kept quality until the end, even if considering the terrible storyline. Risen 3 is better than late Risen’s parts but it is the weakest game overall and the overHPization of enemies makes the combat irritating. Combined with deficient writing the game loses a lot of appeal of the earlier games, albeit the exploration is still as enjoyable as previously and for that aspect alone it might be worth giving it a try. On the other hand, if you consider combat or writing crucial aspects to enjoy a game, best if you skip it. Nevertheless, the first two entries in the series certainly deserve attention and time. Although you need to be aware that they are different from each other. Risen is close in gameplay and atmosphere to Gothics, while Risen 2 is a lighthearted adventure with intriguing setting and plenty of areas to explore.
