Risen 2: Dark Waters

In the review of Risen 2: Dark Waters, we check how Piranha Bytes dealt with the pirate theme and whether it managed to retain the spirit of the Gothic series.

With Risen 2 Piranha Bytes continues to demonstrate skill at crafting big, believable worlds. Dark Waters is at times beautiful, offering a finely detailed set of islands to explore on your quest to become a notorious pirate captain and vanquish an ancient evil. It's Piranha Bytes' most accessible game yet, and though its style and boorish, humorous dialogue fit well with the pirate motif, it's a role-playing experience that uses convention as a crutch and marginalizes or strips away a lot of elements that made the studio's past games stand out. Disappointing character development options, sl...

Risen 2 is a RPG that, despite its technical limitations, offers surprisingly addictive gameplay and provides a fun ride for those who are fans of pirate lore. Upon starting the game, I had some serious concerns, but the combat, exploration, and story kept me entertained throughout. It's not the most polished RPG out there, but Risen 2 is a nice change of pace from standard RPG fare.

Risen 2: Dark Waters strives to deliver something we really haven’t seen before, an open-world pirate RPG that tempts players with the allure of a fully realized swashbuckling fantasy.  Given that the developers of Risen 2 have chosen a pirate theme, it has a unique advantage over other open-world RPG juggernauts like Skyrim, as very few games have dropped anchor on the swashbuckling side of the fantasy world. Unfortunately, pirate games don’t have a great reputation, despite their great potential, and sadly Risen 2 does very little to repair that standing.

There’s a great game in here, and people who buy Risen 2 will probably be quite content with their purchase if they can get past the infuriating first few hours (and that sugar quest in the giant termite cave, shudder). Sadly it’s dug itself a hole with a few terrible design decisions and the good things about the game can’t dig Risen 2 out of it. Not even with a big red ‘X’ on top of that hole. Dodge button and ship combat next time, please?