RPGWatch Feature - Risen Review

Pirnanha Bytes has always been a favourite of our team, so it's no surprise most of us played Risen. Corwin writes our main review, with additional input from txa1265 and Gorath, to find if Piranha Bytes has rediscovered their form. Here's a sample:

Your actions produce consequences; either through what you do, or through what you say. Annoy a person and they might not talk to you again, or a quest might fail. Get caught stealing and you will be attacked, frequently by several people. Choose to support one group and you might close off quests for a different faction. There are plenty of choices to be made, but their consequences can permeate the entire game. Yes, some quests are of the tedious variety; find 3 golden bowls, collect 5 pieces of armour, but these are balanced, if not outweighed by others, such as helping Patty, where you’ll end up exploring much of the island while having some fun and perhaps getting rich.

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Read it all here.
More information.

It is a great game, but I wont be replaying it for a while after I finished it last week. The main reason is because outside of chapter 1 there really aren't that many faction specific quests with consequences. The ending didn't really build up on your consequences, but than again there are few (or no?) RPGs that do.

The game at some points reminded me of playing an adventure game, which is not a bad thing. It was fun working around some of the traps in the dungeons and temples. But you'll need spells to get through these traps (Levitate, Nautilus Transformation and Telekenisis), I set myself the goal to not use any magic but that was a goal I couldn't keep.

Sometimes quests were unclear (could be a coding or localisation problem) or PB made the mistake of not controlling the flow, meaning that unknowingly you could have triggered step 4 of a quest while not even having gotten to step 1. This leads to you not having al the information you need.

Another bug was that somewhere in Chapter 2. I was told I had to find a way to meet the Inquisitor. I thought I was being smart by going to his second-at-command (Commander Carlos) and asking him if I might meet the Inquisitor. I visited the commander and suddenly he starts talking angrily, the gist of what he says is: "You went into the volcano with the Inquisitor, he never came back, what did you do to him?" At that point I hadn't even seen the Inquisitor in-game, and I didn't know I was going to end up in the Volcano with him. This was clearly a bug, not game breaking, but it did foreshadow that I was going into the volcano with the Inquisitor.

I didn't get any feezes or CTD's in 50 hours of playing. So I really have to take my hat of for Piranha Bytes.

The only problem I had was that the game was running a bit low on fps when in Harbor Town. That's mainly due to one of my 2 year old SLI cards having broke down a month ago. So I can say a single 8800GTX had problems in Harbor Town. I ordered a new more powerful one to replace the 8800GTX that is working, but the new one turned out ot be broken from the outset, so I'm having it RMA'd. Once I have a (working) new card I'll have a reason to back to Harbor Town and see if it plays smoother.

As for graphics, I actually thought the game had great graphics. I don't see why every review has to mention it has 'okay' graphics or that graphics don't matter.

Love the review Corwin!

"As for graphics, I actually thought the game had great graphics. I don't see why every review has to mention it has 'okay' graphics or that graphics don't matter."
+1
Graphics is superb compared to other RPGs I've played so far!
What game(s) had better graphics that pushes Risen back to 'okay'?

Completely agree about the graphics - and I think it's one of the best looking CRPGs of all time.

The lighting in particular was amazing, and at least on my "decent" rig - it ran absolutely stutter-free.

Come to think of it, I can't think of a single other free-roaming streaming engine game that runs that well, so that in itself is a feat.

Maybe WoW with its cardboard graphics, but that's about it.

Good Review Corwin, and I think the input from the rest of the guys helped nail my
feelings about this game too. I love it but it could be so much more (still hoping for
an addon announcement btw )...

Also agree about the graphics with the posters above , very satisfying especially in
comparison to other recent AAA RPG games (DA i.e), but indeed the very good Art
direction and exceptional world building is the actual highlight in the visual sector
for me too as mentioned before.

Great review. I'm curious, do you think the ending was bad?

Good reviews. i loved the first chapters, but am now quite close to the end and don't have the motivation to continue. I agree that the dungeons are not bad, but there are just too many. The complaints I heard about the ending don't help.

I think you're too positive. What have they improved since G1? 8 years to think about it and zero improvement. Not a redemption in my eyes. It's nice that it runs properly, but that's a minimum requirement not an achievement. I can't think of an RPG that wasn't at least as enjoyable.

The catch though is that you have to have a very high skill level with two handed weapons to be able to use a shield as well.

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Can someone please elaborate on this sentence? Is it saying I can use a shield with a 2hdr if I have a very high 2hdr skill?

That would be a unique mechanic.

LuckyCarbon said:

Can someone please elaborate on this sentence? Is it saying I can use a shield with a 2hdr if I have a very high 2hdr skill?

That would be a unique mechanic.

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You can use 2-handed weapons just like 1-handed weapons, gaining one free hand for a shield, after you have reached a certain level in 2-handed (not sure how high you need to level in 2h... I think level 7, was it?)

Can't say I can think of any specific improvements in any RPG in recent years that is not specifically in either the graphics or audio department. Gothic 1 was probably the last title that made me go "oooh" in terms of innovations and fresh thinking.

Not always a bad thing - refining a recipe can create amazing results as well, but I'm merely pointing out that the lack of innovation in Risen is something we're seeing everywhere in the RPG genre nowadays.

As I have pointed out in another thread, however, PB does have to refresh their style a bit in the future (possibly after an add-on or sequel to Risen).

Moriendor said:

You can use 2-handed weapons just like 1-handed weapons, gaining one free hand for a shield, after you have reached a certain level in 2-handed (not sure how high you need to level in 2h… I think level 7, was it?)

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9 for Swords, 7 for Axes, if I recall correctly. Can't recall when you get Bastard Swords in 1H, possibly 6-7 (I don't really pay attention, since 2H swords are so much better).

Interesting, I never knew that about the 2-handed weapons….. I played a Mage though.

Excellent review and comments. This is on my list to play some day, but I can now put it a bit farther down as it seems to have a lot of the things I found offputting about the later Gothics. The first one was a great experience, and I didn't mind being a ruffian in a prison colony, I actually enjoyed it for the unique point of view. Unfortunately my taste in games keeps me from enjoying having no alternative to lying, cheating and thievery and I really don't understand why playing as a magic user has to be something you can only achieve for part of a game. So looks like this one will wait for awhile.

I think the gameplay has seen some improvement, especially in terms of combat. For the next game, I think that the quest structure needs to be changed. I am a bit tired of chosing one of a few routes for the first chapters and seeing them united later in terms of plot. Also, the factions felt too familiar.

Alistair said:

I think you're too positive. What have they improved since G1? 8 years to think about it and zero improvement. Not a redemption in my eyes. It's nice that it runs properly, but that's a minimum requirement not an achievement. I can't think of an RPG that wasn't at least as enjoyable.

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Accessibility, balancing, game performance (relative to the graphics), writing (international), voice acting (international), QA. The combat has not improved for True RPGers (tm).

Lack of innovation is not something we should punish in the rating, because (a) it would have to be done for all games for fair play reasons and (b) it's a non-issue in other genres (sports games, The Sims, adventures, FPS).

People complain about lack of innovation. And then criticize the dungeons and the final battle unable to relate the two things. We have the new genre mixture. Tomb raider + gothic.

I like the dungeons - they are not too big, interesting with nice puzzles. Daggerfall dungeons are big.

* Very similar in style to Gothic 1&2

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I'd consider this also as a con. Come on, even ALL the skills are copy-pasted from G2. The game was just too Gothic 2 Remake to me. And actually, I prefer to G2 over Risen.

But if you are not familiar with Gothic 2, then this game is definately a superb RPG for you.


And for the graphics, it actually has decent graphics, especially if you tune the INI settings and install these two mods:

* Better Vegetation
* High Res. Walls/Stones

Excellant review and comments. I did want to remark on what magerette said about the stealing and lies you have to do in the game. You are only forced to do that as a means to help the good guy person you are trying to be. Of course you can take the low road as well if you like, but the bad behaviors are not rampent in the game. If you want to save the day you just have to steal a little or tell the occasional white lie to a bad guy. :lol: