"Fable was one awesome game. Raelly cool. It’s what I’d call a ‘bright’ RPG with really fun gameplay and awesome character building mechanism. And then Fable 2 was announced. I kind of shamelessly went ga ga on it, not because it was anything like the greatest game on earth or something. It wasn’t. It was just fun- oh so fun- which was the beauty of Fable.
Being a PC gamer for the most part, though, has deprived me of the chance to play the second installment of the series, and much saddened was I.
I’ve always heard or seen something about the Gothic series, but tales of bad bugs and glitches warded me off from trying the game out. Gothic’s developer Piranha Bytes announced Risen, and I checked out the trailer and gameplay videos. I was interested. Why not?
And so began my investing countless hours of gameplay to this game.
The game starts with you, as the protagonist and your companion Sara as stowaways in a ship. Caught in an unnatural storm guided by some sort of entity, the Inquisitor aboard the ship teleports to safety leaving the ship to its fatal fate.
Not so fatal for you and your companion, though, as you’ve survived and have washed ashore a mysterious volcanic Island known as Faranga.
Though at first I was skeptical that it’d be much fun to be stuck in a single island for the duration of the game, but I was proven wrong as I found myself enjoying the game quite enough despite the location constraints, with but only one annoyance- trekking through what always seems like miles and miles of grass or swamp or even mountain. Don’t worry, though. Travelling from one point to another becomes easier once you start obtaining teleportation stones.
The gameplay is over the shoulders third person perspective allowing for a certain degree of zooming in and out. One of the major aspects of the game is of course combat. It’s possible to become skilled in swords, bows and crossbows, staffs and magic. Note though, all options may not be open to you depending on what path you take as you progress through the game. Using mechanics of blocking, parrying and dodging, combat can be challenging if you decide to rush your opponents head-on as you’ll realize such tactics rarely work. Patience and timing can win you the battles even if your opponent is significantly stronger.
As you defeat opponents and finish quests, experience points accumulate until you level up. Trainers are scattered around the map, and you spend your ‘learning points’ on these people along with some gold to increase your prowess in battle or other abilities such as smithing or alchemy. All fun and games.
Enemies scattered around the place, be they wild animals or quest villains, none of them will ever be scaled to match your level, but rather if you find yourself unable to defeat the them, the correct course of action is to leave them be for the moment and come back later for some sweet revenge served cold. Cold steel, that is.
There are two primary factions in the game, the Bandits and the Order. Not really as black and white as it may first seem to be, there seems to be some sort of conspiracy going on and it’s hard to say who’s in on it and who’s not. Depending on whose side you take the game play out vastly different, thus giving it a significantly good replay value. More or less.
Exploration is another aspect of the game, one which CAN be annoying thanks to the lack of a ‘fast travel’ system, until you get the teleport stones, which of course you have to find and collect.
Though not really heavily choice-intensive as games like Mass Effect and Neverwinter Nights, Risen aimed for something in between veering very much towards the Action-RPG Hack-and-slash genre. And it was a success. You’ll find yourself toiling around Faranga for hours and hours on end, despite the voice at the back of your mind saying that it’s quite enough for the day and won’t you please leave it off for now?
The graphics are quite visually pleasing except for one quite insistently annoying factor and that is every other character that you run into would remind you of some other bloke you met a while back in another area. Absence of unique character models would have made it a bit lackluster, but you hardly notice it, really. At least, I didn’t. Also, enemies may sometimes be pushed back into walls, and be unable to move. Not really a con as it lets you deal some heavy duty damage on an otherwise really tough son of a gun. It’s not really cheating, right? Taking advantage of the system, that is.
All characters and NPCs have voices, and the voice actors are at the very least above the mediocre range, which is a good thing. There’s been too many a game where the experience was somewhat skewered through the sensors thanks to appalling voice actors.
This might be a spoiler, but what the heck. If you’re interested in using magic, you might prefer to steer away from the Bandits. I suffer for my sins, but I have a Sharp Obsidian Bastard Sword, so I’m content for now.
Risen is a much darker reality and game than Fable, but that’s quite alright. A solid game, one that gamers should give a chance. If you’ve survived the apparent glitchy horror story that is Gothic 3, then this is the apparent redemption of Piranha Bytes. And that’s for you to judge.
Once again, word of advice. The bandit faction, as far as I can see, does not offer you much in the way of magic. As far as I saw. But, hey. I have my Sharp Obsidian Bastard Sword…
Thumbs up. Definitely worth a try!"
- E
