GB Feature: Risen Review

After spending nearly an entire month on Risen, our own Brother None has offered up a thorough four-page critique of Piranha Bytes’ latest RPG. Here’s a little something to whet your appetite:

The feel of combat depends heavily on what you’re fighting. As a rule, there are few tactics involved in fighting animals or monsters, as their attacks are often unblockable especially if you’re not using a shield and any skill in fighting them is simply in knowing the weaknesses and strengths of their AI and moveset. This unveils a disappointing weakness adopted from the Gothic franchise: the challenge level of monsters is not directly related to their stats but rather to your ability to adapt to them. As a mid-range two-handed axe-using character, I found ghouls with their lateral speed and deceptively quick attacks significantly more challenging than ashbeasts the presumptive ultimate beasts of the game, as I could simply push up to an ashbeast and the slowness of his attacks would mean he could not interrupt my combo string. This flaw becomes particularly marked as the game can not really adapt your XP to the challenge beasts pose, having only their stats to go by, so that you might get significantly less XP for a significantly more difficult fight.

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Risen takes a definite step back from the likes of Gothic 2 when it comes to depth of quest design. Even if you dig around for alternatives, a shockingly large number of quests in Harbour Town come down to (beat him up and take his stuff or intimidate him), which is fairly ludicrous considering how often you are warned that this is a well-ordered town that you can not just mess around in (people are generally too forgiving of being beaten up through the game). A good example of this is a quest in which you need to retrieve 5 pieces of armour. If you have the pickpocket skill, you’re free to resolve the quest using it. Otherwise, you either have to pay the NPCs an exorbitant amount of money you likely won’t have and by paying that money also miss out on free XP and loot given by beating them up or, indeed, beat them up and take it, to no negative consequence. Why am I just allowed to do that and get away scot-free? Why can’t I trade the armour piece for a favour or a personal item of theirs I nicked earlier? Why can’t I get help in retrieving the armour pieces? Why can’t I side with the aggrieved holders of the armour pieces and gang up on their boss with their help?