Risen 2 Dark Waters? What have you heard

[twitter3]

Has anyone got info on this game?  I came across it in the Gamersgate email and was like, huh, pirate themed RPG - interesting.  What do you think?

http://www.gamersgate.com/DD-R2DW/risen-2-dark-waters

[Tpek]

It's not a pirate themed RPG.
It's the sequel to Risen (1), the "spiritual" (aka REAL) sequel to the Gothic series of RPGs.

After Gothic 3, Piranha Bytes (the devs) and Jowood (the publishers) split. Leaving Jowood with the rights to the title Gothic. So Piranha Bytes went on to make their own sequels to the game titled Risen, without much references to the original series as to not invoke a lawsuit.
Jowood made a crappy expansion for Gothic 3, Forsaken Gods, and after it gave some other devs the job of making Gothic 4, which got titled Arcania and its expansion, Fall of Setariff.

Hope this clears it up :)

[twitter3]

Yes, that clears it up.  I was hoping for pirates.   >:(

That being said - do you think this game will be worth getting?  I mean the storyline does sound interesting. 

[Tpek]

Yes, that clears it up.  I was hoping for pirates.   >:(

That being said - do you think this game will be worth getting?  I mean the storyline does sound interesting.

Don't know. If you liked the previous games then yes, otherwise, hard to say.

Personally I'm annoyed that Steam stopped selling it to non-Americans, and Gamersgate now forces me to get the UK version which costs considerably more than the normal one.

[Fetrik]

Personally I'm annoyed that Steam stopped selling it to non-Americans, and Gamersgate now forces me to get the UK version which costs considerably more than the normal one.

Looks like it's buyable to me on Steam (Sweden). Maybe it gets unlocked for you closer to release date.

[son_of_montfort]

Well... it isn't 100% accurate to say that the game is NOT a RPG with pirates. It IS an RPG with pirate characters. Btu I don't think you will be directed ships or anything. Basically, I think it is Risen with pirate aesthetic. I did not care for Risen all that much, but maybe they updated the system to be a bit better. My main complaint was the extremely fiddly and crazy-difficult combat system in Risen. Like it's Gothic predecessors, it was the most hardcore RPG I had played in a while (meaning if you stumbled into an area with difficult monster... and you couldn't tell a monster's difficulty at a glance... then you were dead).

[Tpek]

Just finished a short round of Skyrim to find out Steam is now offering Risen 2 for a more sane price of 50$ (including the DLC for the pre-order). :)

[Fighting Farmer]

Personally I'm annoyed that Steam stopped selling it to non-Americans, and Gamersgate now forces me to get the UK version which costs considerably more than the normal one.

Try Amazon?

[Tpek]

Personally I'm annoyed that Steam stopped selling it to non-Americans, and Gamersgate now forces me to get the UK version which costs considerably more than the normal one.

Try Amazon?

1) I'd rather get Digital.

2) Amazon.com don't sell video games to non-Americans, and the various Amazon-region sites only sell to their regions.
Amazon has some weird policies concerning which product may be shipped to which countries. I can get books, music, movies (despite being in a European zone) and such but not video or board games.

3) Steam has started offering the game to non-Americans, so it's fine now anyway.

[eyebiter]

Tried the original Risen.  Fun game but very difficult combat system. Easy to forget to save and lose a half hour or more gameplay. Wish there was an option for turn based combat ala Baldur's Gate 2.

[Nefaro]

Tried the original Risen.  Fun game but very difficult combat system. Easy to forget to save and lose a half hour or more gameplay. Wish there was an option for turn based combat ala Baldur's Gate 2.

Risen was also one of those over-the-shoulder games that gives me a bad headache after a few minutes.  :(

And, yes, the melee combat can be pretty tough & unforgiving.   The action-y timing windows are pretty tight and if you miss a block/parry, you could easily get locked out of control for a couple seconds while an enemy pulls some damaging combo & knockback on you.  Certainly not easy like the BethSoft series.  Kinda frustrating at times, and the combat system isn't really that great or flashy anyways.  I suppose overall campaign gameplay is the big draw to it.  I definitely enjoyed the idea of old ruins popping up and getting to climb down into them to explore.  Too bad I never got that far. :(

[eyebiter]

Tried the Risen 2 demo.  The autosave feature is improved in this version.  The game will save fairly often.  If you fall in combat, you are restored at your previous save point.