Risen 2 - Preview Roundup # 4
 

More previews for this game has been written. I'll quote from two of them and list the rest.
Inc Gamers has a preview. A quote on the concersations:
IGN has a preview as well. A quote on how the game needs polishing:
Other places that have previews:


Atomic Gamer



Gaming Nexus



Game Dynamo



G4 has a video preview




More information.

This seems to be getting quite a lot of coverage, which is good.

Bethesda should take notes here.

hooray for quest details you actually have to pay attention to instead of just following an icon on a map!

Checked out the beta, and it looked significantly worse than the first Risen - and performed pretty poorly. Not sure how recent the build is - but one would hope it's an early beta.

The NPCs (especially that girl) looked really bad.

I'm not expecting AAA-level stuff from PB - but I have to say it was quite a bit worse than expected. The combat was complete crap, though I expect it to improve as you progress your character.

But… It's PB. I'll need more than a crappy beta to lose faith in them. I'm expecting the full version to be better - and I'm hoping I can get past the poor stuff, seeing as how exploration and atmosphere seem strong as usual.

I sincerely doubt we will see much improvement in the graphics department (although I think Patty looked a lot better than her #1 incarnation)…

That said I hope that they do something about the LoDing and DoF distance themselves, or at least provide values in the config xml because it was quite bad in the beta. The graphics are generally fine for me, but the LoD transitions are really close and really weird/distracting in a psychedelic trip sort of way…

P.S FPS generally stayed above 45 for me with shadows turned down from Ultra to high btw and I would overall say that the graphics are generally marginally improved in comparison to #1 but the DoF and wonky LoD may bring them down a notch to your eyes ?

It's not like Risen was a masterpiece in terms of modelling and detail, but I think she looked better in the first game. There's something very wrong with her face and how she animates in Risen 2. It's been a while since I played Risen - but I'm hoping my memory isn't that bad.

Well, it was playable for me too - but given the visuals, I found the performance very underwhelming. Yes, the extremely strange "foilage transitions" hurt the visuals a lot. I also found the first island DoF effects overdone and the overall visual aesthetic slightly clunky and awkward.

But, I might not have given it a proper chance. I just wanted to check it out - and I explored the second island for an hour or two. I'd rather just play these games in their full glory - but after all the beta talk, I couldn't help but sneak a peek. Mostly because I wanted to know if it was really as bad as some people made it sound.

You mean that this looks better than this ? ;)


Its also the world geometry if you pay attention and its very close to the PC too…
nasty… :-/

More like this looks better:

http://mxm-studios.com/wp-content/ga…s-patty-04.jpg

Than this:

http://i.imgur.com/RNejr.jpg

—-

But we can post screenshots all day long. It's not necessarily a matter of detail or anything specific. She just looks REALLY bad in Risen 2 - to me, and I don't remember having that reaction to her in the first game. If I had to try and be specific, I'd say it's her facial expression coupled with exaggerated animation. It looks comically bad - in my opinion.

Well if the #1 model was as extremely closed up as the #2 it would probably look about 9.5 % more crap I am positive! None will win any awards I am sure ;)

Seriously though I was referring to an attempt for a more natural looking female model this time around rather than something that looks like a low poly blow up doll… We'll have to disagree I guess :)

I have #1 in my HD so a back to back is rather easy for me btw…

In the end, let's just hope the world is worth exploring - and the atmosphere can make up for the lack of hot babes :)

Heh, one can say that this was never a strong suit of theirs. At least they are trying to add decent female NPCs (personality wise) the last couple of games and we have to grant them that…

I think exploration and atmosphere are up to their old standards (I played a couple of hours more than you and I am generally satisfied by what I saw). NPC character and dialogues seem actually improved this time around which is nice.

My main concern now is Map size. I know we will be able to return to previous locations via Ship but if the rest of the locations are modestly sized then the open world character of the game (and thus exploration) will be seriously compromised I am afraid.

We'll have to see about that. But I guess it's a natural consequence of them having to make it work right on consoles. Risen had one of the best streaming engines on PC - but supposedly it worked like crap on Xbox 360.

Maybe they've compromised to change that.

The visuals seem on par to me. I'm not worried about it though because PB's games have always been more about style than cutting edge graphics.

As far as performance, I had everything except shadows set to maximum, and it ran fine on my (very average) system.

Btw: I went to boot up the Beta a little while ago and I was surprised to see that it has already been removed from my Steam account. >:(

Preordered. I'm such a PB fan-boy :-( If the world and quest design stays there, it'll be enough for me.

I have a feeling Quest design might actually be better this time around. Brother none certainly seemed to think so in their preview…

I guess my insistence on getting the physical thing will probably mean I'll be playing this at least a week after the rest of you guys, again :roll:

I preordered it in a way which allows me to can pick it up from a specific shop myself. I've been disappointed with couriers a few times in the past…

Hmm, yeah I somehow assumed that you meant Steam (its not available there either it seems yet)… I wish there was a deal like that around these parts…

Oh well, seems Amazon will be getting my money again, I am generally well pleased with them anyway…

Those LOD transitions are weird - they looked bugged in fact. The trees literally inflate/deflate as you approach, like balloons… and the versions aren't all that similar - they don't actually look like higher/lower detail versions of the same thing. Maybe Risen's world has pneumatic trees for some reason. There's also a constant flicker in the lighting on leaves which I couldn't tweak away.

Has anyone seen a price for this yet? I wonder if they'll try and hit a $60 price in the US, which is what ME3 and Skyrim went for.

Hang on - did I grab that shot? She's mid-expansive flourish as I recall :)