Overall most helpful review

Posted on: May 13, 2010

Anamon

Games: 1984 Reviews: 3

An Action RPG that gets it right

Two Worlds was, upon its initial release, simply a victim of bad management decisions. It certainly does have its rough edges, so let me start with those: the FMV cutscenes are abysmal. Why they didn't go for in-game cutscenes is beyond me, because literally everything - from the environments to the characters to lip-synching - are several levels below the quality of what you see in-game. There were some minor control issues, mainly related to horseback riding. The shadows are glitchy. And the story, although nicely told and gripping, is pretty standard High Fantasy fare. None of these problems detract from the strong points of the game though, yet still it just got mostly mediocre reviews. The technical problems and bugs the game had on initial release seem to have given reviewers the excuse to simply disregard the game's qualities altogether. And it does have lots of qualities. It has a wonderful soundtrack, and one of the visually most beautiful fantasy worlds, feeling even more like a real place thanks to the high range of vision. It has an interesting alchemy system and lots of stuff to equip your character with. It's game world is huge and full to the brim with towns, people, creatures, beautiful hidden spots, side plots, and herbs to pick. While it does nothing revolutionarily new, everything was designed so carefully and comes together so nicely that as a whole, it can definitely compete with the best of the genre. But the main reason why Two Worlds is so much fun lies at the core of its very mechanics. Released at a time when most CRPGs have switched to a "take the player by the hand and lead him to the end" paradigm, limiting choice to the customisation of ones character, Two Worlds went for complete freedom. The main storyline is nothing but a little diversion compared to the full scope of the game. The world you'll be playing in is one to explore on your own and get lost in - as is supposed to happen in any decent, self-respecting role-playing game. It is very comparable to Morrowind in that sense. I personally suffered from the urge to see and complete everything in a game, which renders elements such as non-linearity, player freedom or choice moot from the outset. Two Worlds has, just like Morrowind, helped cure me from that, because a systematic approach is practically impossible. The only way to play the game is to dive in, see things from your character's perspective, and then make your decisions. I have read a lot of reviews that accused Two Worlds to be short-lived because enemies, creatures and plants don't respawn. These were written by people who still suffer from the same narrow-mindedness. You will not run out of stuff to find and things to do, because there's too much of it. You're not supposed to sweep the game world clean in laborious repetitive gameplay you don't enjoy, just to get a 100% game completion achievement. In my humble opinion, games that guide you through their world and rely so heavily on extrinsic motivation do not deserve to be called RPGs at all. Two Worlds reminded the games world of the real qualities of role-playing games and non-linear gameplay in general. Sadly, many people weren't listening. Instead, they either felt threatened by the game's scope and were frustrated that no one told them what to do, or they did not dare to venture on their own, simply followed the main storyline through to its end and were left unsatisfied. Don't make the same mistake. Get this game in its complete and technically fixed version now, and be prepared to let go of the usual "let's beat this game" approach to get the most out of it. Don't try to kill all enemies or find all the loot, and don't just blindly stick to the path of the main plot. Just explore, enjoy, and decide what you want to do next - on your own. Finally, a few words on the technical state of the game. Surprisingly, in contrast to the state the game was initially released in and the apparent reputation of the developer, I found Two Worlds in the fully patched state I played it in to be one of the most cleanly programmed games of the last couple of years. Considering how good it looks and how huge the game world is, its load times are incredibly short. I booted the game up in about 5 seconds, loaded my savegame in about 2 more and was ready to play. From Windows desktop to game in about 10 seconds, and only experiencing one more second of load time when changing between overground and underground world - never before or since have I seen a comparable game load so quickly. I also did not encounter any technical difficulties - no bugs or crashes in mulitple playthroughs, and no memory leaks even after many hours of play.

Is this helpful to you?

Posted on: May 13, 2010

MacReiter

Verified owner

Games: 492 Reviews: 9

Much better than it at first appears

This game's major problem is that it doesn't make a good first impression. The intro sequence is somewhat disjointed, the dialogue is sometimes cringe-inducing, and so on. But keep playing, and you'll find a surprisingly enjoyable game. From the standard "wolfs in the woods" beginning, you'll work your way out to regions with soft-lit bamboo forests, shimmering deserts, creepy fog-laden swamps and graveyards (this game has THE best ground-fog I've ever seen), and frozen mountains (not necessarily in that order). I also enjoy the inventory system, though I've since been told that it was done in other action RPGs that I just never played. In particular, the ability to combine items that are the same to increase the damage or protection of those items (makes the 100 leather vests you inevitably end up with actually somewhat useful). But it's a tradeoff -- if you're loot collecting, it's better to keep 'em separate. Enhancing weapons with elemental crystals for special damage types is also quite useful. If you get your character build wrong and don't feel like starting entirely over, the larger cities have people that will wipe your brain and give you your development points back -- semi-randomly and expensively, but it can be done. So, as another reviewer said, there's probably nothing here that hasn't been done elsewhere. But (other than the dialogue :P ) they seem to have taken the best ("most fun") parts from various games and put them together. Oh, and the expansions do make the game very solid and fill out the desert region. In the original release, it's clear they had to cut and ship, because the entire desert is empty. Some un-populated ruins and other signs that development was in progress, but absolutely nothing there worth looking at. With the expansions, there are actually multiple villages and several quests, and part of the main quest actually goes through it. If you already own Two Worlds AND you've already patched it up with the latest patches, I believe you have the equivalent of this edition. But having it all in one single installer and DRM free is still tempting to me. If you don't already have it, and you liked Oblivion, I'd say it's a pretty safe bet for your $10. It'll keep you busy for a LOOOONG time. For context, because my idea of a great RPG may not be yours, here are my thoughts on some other major RPGs: Morrowind -- my all time favorite for blend of openness, story, varied settings, and user-expansion-based longevity. Oblivion -- pretty, but I've only played it twice compared to the 5+ times I've played through Morrowind. Two Worlds is at least as pretty (to my eye) and is more varied and more fun than vanilla Oblivion. Shivering Isles balances the two out closer together. The only reason I'd place Oblivion over Two Worlds is because of the huge mod scene for Oblivion and the inability to mod Two Worlds. Betrayal at Krondor -- for you old schoolers, I love this game. Hard to compare, because the graphics are 20 years different and the combat is turn-based. I only mention it from the "poking around the wilderness looking for stuff" standpoint, I suppose. Gothic 3 with the latest Community Patch (and not Forsaken Gods) -- just finished this, and with all the hard work of the community, I've gotta say it was quite nice. The difficulty/grind/tedium factor kinda shot up about mid-way through, and I ended up god-moding it because that started boring me. I just don't get that much out of "fight these twenty guys all at once, and don't ever mess up or any one of them could kill you in two hits". But the first half was fine and the variety was fun and it's a huge game. But definitely get the latest and greatest community patch. And stay away from Forsaken Gods unless you just get it for free and want a good laugh... Jade Empire -- I enjoyed it. Very linear, so not directly comparable. Silverfall -- sorta fun for a couple of hours, then grind-tastically annoying. Never finished the first "level" because re-grinding through the swamp over and over just wore me down. Guild Wars and probably any MMORPG ever made -- I believe I mentioned that I dislike pure and obvious grinds, so, um, none of these really work for me. Drakensang -- another surprisingly enjoyable game that many people have probably never heard of. NWN -- hosed me part way through Undrentide, when they stoned my melee follower and told me to go kill a bunch of magic immune golems to get them unstoned -- not helpful for my magic-only character... More fun when I started a new char in the last chapter (so I got the free 15 starting levels) and then blasted my way through everything with my invincible monk... NWN2 -- too highly scripted, I always hate knocking somebody down in two rounds and then the script pops up and magically kicks me down and tells me that my opponent is just so tough that I can't win and then stuffs me in a dungeon somewhere with no equipment. Major suckage. Complete break of any self-determination and role playing... Haven't finished it. BG/BG2 -- similar, but older, experiences to NWN and NWN2. On the whole, AD&D-based games have not been my favorites, mostly because I like to be a magic user in my RPGs, and (computerized) AD&D wants that to be a pain. Planescape:Torment -- Really, really enjoyed it. The last stages are kind of annoying, but the story was incredible. Sacred -- fun for awhile, grind and respawning wore me down. Divine Divinity -- can't seem to force myself through the opening village -- user interface seems to annoy me for some reason. Too much clicking, or too many tiny things to have to slowly pan over, or something. Can't quite put my finger on it, but I know it makes me tense and annoyed very quickly. Sorry for the rambling, but maybe it will help you know if you're like me or not, which might help you guess if you'd like Two Worlds or not.

Is this helpful to you?

Posted on: May 13, 2010

radio_babylon

Games: 119 Reviews: 2

one of my favorite games

its nice to see im not the only person that liked this game, because it sure feels that way sometimes. this seems to be one of those games people love to hate, even though its evident most of them played very little (or none) of the game. first things first though, it has to be said that this game is about as goofy as they come. not the on-purpose "sam and max" kind of goofy, either. if i had to guess id say somewhere in the neighborhood of $20 was spent on the voice acting. maybe less than that. it isnt that its BAD... i mean, it IS bad, but that isnt what makes it goofy... its just... GOOFY. the delivery of every single line of VO (and theres a lot in this game) is just... off. usually, laughably so... however, im of the opinion that this is not a negative. the actors are earnest in their horrid delivery, making the overall effect smile-worthy and oddly charming, as opposed to cringe-inducing like many games with substandard VO. so, if that kind of unrelenting goofiness puts you off, you might as well skip this game, because its going to drive you up a wall. if you can get past that, youll find a fun game with fun mechanics and a few new things to offer. lots of things to do, places to see, items to loot, dungeons and caves to crawl, and monsters to kill. its open-world, so you can go anywhere you like right away, but unlike the elder scrolls games there is no scaling... the game can and will kick your butt if you poke your nose into the more dangerous areas too soon, so explore with caution. monsters dont respawn, so it is possible to clear the whole world, but i doubt youll ever manage it... but it does mean that routes you travel frequently will stay cleared, which is nice. ok, enough rambling. ive finished the game 3 times, and enjoyed it every time. hard to give a much better recommendation than that :)

Is this helpful to you?

Posted on: May 18, 2010

UK_John

Verified owner

Games: 637 Reviews: 18

Blamed for not being Oblivion!

We live in a gaming world today when a game like Borderlands or Jade Empire can be called RPG's, despite having little in the way of character stats and attributes. On top of this you have the Mass Effect and Alpha Protocol type games that have stats and attributes, but only in the weapons and armour, not in the avatar. North American RPG's are going more action and less stat based, with RPG's going the Bioshock route. This leaves us with European publishers and that leads us onto Two Worlds. It was never the case that Two Worlds was 'worse', but rather that it was 'different'. Did it have bugs on release? Yes. But name an open world non-linear RPG that didn't get released with bugs? Oblivion is known as being pretty bug-free, and yet an unofficial patch fixes over 5,000 bugs! Two Worlds was lambasted for not having the multi-million dollar budget of the larger publishers, and of course it had to deal with a biased media. For example, while Bioshock's 'life chambers' were seen as helping 'move the story forward', the very same life chambers in TW were seen as story breaking! This bias always works against smaller, non-American developers. Two Worlds actually straddles two worlds, it has the great gameplay of a 90's RPG, but had graphics and animations that were a couple years older than when the game was released. For those of us that don't care about graphics as long as the gameplay is there, Two Worlds is exactly the RPG we want. It has a huge open and non-linear world. It doesn't hold your hand and forces you to respect the other NPC's and creatures, who can hand your butt to you very easily, especially early on. The horse riding is actually very realistic, with horse AI that means you cannot ride him off the edge of a cliff (like you can the Oblivion horse!) and thereby makes it 'separate' from you, as it should be, rather than 'part of you', like in Oblivion. While the graphics are not up to a Crysis or Oblivion level technically, they are more realistic in many ways. The depth of field is probably the best in any game I have played, and while the NPC animation and voice work is only of a medium standard, I would rather have multiple average voice artists used than just the half dozen or so voices used over and over in Oblivion (and used again in Fallout 3!). There is a charm to the characters and voices that makes the world seem much more 'middle ages' than a pure fantasy world! With a fantastic draw distance and an interesting group of creatures to battle, I think the graphics are certainly good enough. They are up to the level of Gothic 3/Risen, two of my favourite RPG's! While the sound effects are pretty generic, they do the job adequately. the music on the other hand is a tour-de-force, with an excellent main theme that is up there with the best. Most of what TW does with regard UI and inventory is quite excellent, with the combining of weapons and alchemy/spells done very well indeed, certainly up there with The Witcher, for example. Overall then, this is the equivalent of an independent foreign film rather than a Hollywood blockbuster. It doesn't have huge stars in it, it doesn't have multi-million dollar special effects and it never had a huge advertising budget, but it is a great little game that you will love, that will draw you in, occasionally hand your butt to you and generally make you feel it's 'your game' rather than 'a game' that you play. If you love true 'real' RPG's, like Fallout 1 and 2; if you preferred Morrowind to Oblivion and if you find retro gaming almost more interesting than modern gaming, then this game is for you. It has everything you want in a good 90's RPG - great gameplay, a large world to travel across, and enemies that are challenging! Take a chance with this old fashioned RPG that is a follow on from the Wizardry and Gold Box RPGs rather than the Oblivion/Mass Effect style or RPG - surely a good thing!

Is this helpful to you?

Posted on: June 3, 2010

fijau

Verified owner

Games: 101 Reviews: 1

Great potential not fully utilized

These are my impressions after completing about half of the game. I divided them in three groups: = neutral features, you decide if it's good or bad + pros - cons = Two Worlds is a blend of hack'n'slash and story-based, open world RPG. It reminds me of the Divinity series. Story is quite interesting (with few exceptions), and so are the side quests. But the action part of the game is more highlighted. You can tell it from the amount of dialogues. Usually you have only 2-3 options while talking with someone and all the non-important NPCs in a place have the same options and usually answer identically. = The idea of an adult man, a mercenary, searching for his kidnapped sister above all, doesn't seem as a good base for the story, does it? One may begin to suspect sick relationship between the siblings :) And Kira's, the protagonists sister, dress doesn't help in dispelling this anxiety ;) Still, later in the game this becomes clear why they are siblings, not partners. = Two Worlds gives you lots of casual gameplay. There are no complicated quests. The story is not so important. The devs have put most effort in making the gameplay fun and easy. = The interface is well thought out. Several "hotkey bars" for assigning 1-0 keys to your favourite skills, items and spells. Collecting loot from multiple enemies is very convenient; it tells you which body you did or did not search yet. In the inventory when you check stats of a weapon you see a comparison to the one you hold in your hand. You can leave lots of stuff in your horse's saddlebags. Well done map with all the information about quests. = Interesting skill system. You have 38 active and passive skills that you may freely develop throughout the course of the game. You don't have to stick to one class; in fact there are no classes in this game. Important thing is that there are so called soulpatchers - mages that can retrieve your already spent skill points, so that you could rearrange them. You can't choose which skill should be weakened - it happens randomly, so you may have to repeat the process over and over again till you succeed. = When it comes to a close combat it's all about fast clicking. There are several combat skills you may use (if you have them), but it's still just rapid clicking. = AI of enemies is soooo simple. Whenever they see you, they just run at you, unless they have a bow... Well, typical for hack'n'slash games. = When an enemy reaches you he attacks you, and then he stands in one spot for a second. It's possible to move away from him just when he starts an attack. This way you don't get hurt and you have a moment for setting a trap, or shooting at him. = There are combat skills such as sticking a torch into enemy's face (for blinding him and extra damage), breaking enemy's sword, pulling down enemy's shield or piercing shot, that can hurt multiple enemies if they line up in a cue :) You don't often find such skills in other games, do you? :) = Shooting is characteristic. When you draw the cord of the bow, the view gradually becomes larger. This may take a while to get used to it. Also, when you shoot at an enemy, you always hit them. But when you aim at any dead object, the arrow will most probably miss. I don't quite understand why shooting works this way. It's just another point that makes the gameplay more convenient. = I can't say much about magic, because I don't use it much. I know that the whole system is based on cards. You may get new spells as cards, that you put in your spell book. You can also find booster cards, that can improve certain spells - increase their effects or lower the mana cost. = Monsters, animals and all the humanoids you kill for exp don't respawn. It means that you'll have to move to new hunting grounds once you sweep the forests out of all enemy creatures. Some say it sucks. I say it's real :) = Most adversaries come in groups. There's always 3 or 4 wolves in a pack, 3 or more bandits in a band. Bandits are always found by camps. It may be boring for some people. = You have three teleport stones that let you to travel instantly between them and the net of stationary teleporters. = There are plenty of mana and health regenerating shrines across the country. These places make combat easy. If a fight is difficult for you you may draw your enemies to such a place and finish them off there; the shrine will replenish all your health, but not your enemies'! This tactics doesn't work with enemies that kill you with one hit or can poison you seriously. = Unless you choose high level of difficulty, you'll respawn in a nearest shrine every time you die. You don't loose any of your skills or inventory. AFAIK there are no drawbacks of respawning. = Beside a regular horse there's also a mutari and an undead horse. They mainly differ in appearances and the weight they can carry. It's hard to say if there are any other differences between them. = Your horse can't teleport with you. = There's an alchemy system. Simply put at least two ingredients to brew a potion or make a crystal for upgrading weapons. Each ingredient shows clearly what effects it will cause, but sometimes after brewing a potion they cause different effects. It may depend on the level of your alchemy skill. = There are lots of merchants in this game. When you go to a town, around half of the population are merchants! It's cool; makes you feel like in a real market. = There are several guilds that you may work for and earn reputation. Usually higher reputation gives you lower prices in shops, more wares to choose from and permits you enter several locations. + Beautiful, diverse world. + Outstanding graphics (I mean it!). + Two Worlds IS NO MORE BUGGED. I play on a PC with Win7 and the game crashed once - too many mine detonations in a single moment caused it. I haven't noticed any other problems. + Game loads rapidly. It takes less than 10 secs from starting the game to loading a save game file. Besides this you have to wait a few secs on entering dungeons and caves. + There are some good ideas for combat developed in the game. Probably the best one are traps and mines. Traps come in two kinds: damaging and holding ones. The latter stop a creature in a place for 10 or more seconds. This is extremely useful (especially against one enemy). Enemies usually run straight to you when they see you, so if you set a holding trap on that route, you'll be able to finish them off before they get to you. In fact fighting without traps is quite difficult. And fighting with mines may be pure pleasure if you use them properly. I like to make mini mine fields (5 or more mines) and draw my enemies to it. Or I run into an orc camp/village, I make sure that all of them go after me in one group, then I set a mine just in front of me and I run straight ahead. Watching a group of enemies fly in all directions - priceless :) In the middle of the game I encountered demons, that were not that easy to kill with mines, though I don't understand why. + Great number of weapons and armors available. There are hundreds of armor sets (each one has a number from 1 to around 550). You can upgrade them by combining two same items or by adding special damage crystals to your weapon. This way you can significantly increase their damage/protection rates (there is no limit for how many times you can do it). Armors look very nice. There are many different shapes and colours, so you may want to find one that matches your style :) - The intro movie is terrible. The very idea of the protagonist's sister disappearing in such circumstances seems simply stupid. I hope it's like it just because they lacked time to make a better one. - As far as I noticed only NPCs in the main quest line move their lips while talking. Other NPCs lack the lips synch. - Though the protagonist and armors (thus people wearing them) look great, other NPCs doesn't. They are decent at most. There are only several kinds of body shapes and clothing that come in different colours. - There is one annoying thing about the graphics. All the trees that are further than 100-200 m from you are lower quality than closer ones. Now, while you move, the game loads new images for the trees that come in this range. This loading is rather imperfect and makes the trees seem flickering. Some of them disappear. It's not a bug; it's just the way for smooth loading of surroundings. It's especially annoying while riding a horse; you move fast and the trees around you disappear or appear rapidly. IMHO it's a major drawback of the engine that takes some of the joy from exploring the game world. - Riding a horse. Though I like the idea of realistic horse AI, the delay between my command and my horse's response to it often drives me mad. Riding should be easier. - People complain about English localisation of the game. As for me, a Polish guy, it's hard to find any mistakes in translation. As for the voice acting, it's characteristic for high fantasy. I like it, though there are many people who don't. - Not too many types of enemies in the game. There are several kinds of wolves and bears, bandits, boars, orcs, orc-like groms, skeletons, zombies, ghouls, demons, giant spiders, reapers and dark knights. And that's what I found after completing about 50% of the game. I doubt there's much more ahead. Also I must mention that there are LOTS of wolves, bears and bandits. The rest of the list is less than 50% of my kills :( - This game's is not assassin-friendly :( Though the game mechanics lets you to kill enemies instantly while in sneak mode, it's almost useless because enemies almost always come in groups. You may be able to kill one, but the rest of them will notice you and you may say goodbye to your dreams of silent killing through the game. Two Worlds is meant to be more hack'n'slash than the Divinity series. All would be great if only they made two things better. Firstly, there should be much more different kinds of enemies. And they should differ not only by name, colour and stats (in TW there are wolves, gray wolves, silver wolves, white wolves... I wonder what kind of wolves I'll find in the south :)). Secondly, the game world shouldn't be evenly populated with enemies like it is now. Every 200 meters there's a group of wolves/boars/bandits and sometimes other creatures. There should be places crawling with them and places deserted. They should come in groups of different size. Apply these changes to the game, and it's one of the top 10 games I've played (and I've played quite a lot). Reality Pump Studios claims they had not enough time to finish this game, they wanted to make too many things in the time they had. I take it as a reason for the drawbacks I mentioned. While working on Two Worlds 2 they employed 3 times more people and have been working 3 times longer than on the first game. I can't wait to see the outcome :)

Is this helpful to you?

...

User reviews

Something went wrong. Try refresh page.

This game is waiting for a review. Take the first shot!

{{ item.percentage }}%

Awaiting more reviews

An error occurred. Please try again later.

Other ratings

Add a review

Edit a review

Your rating:

Stars and all fields are required

Not sure what to say? Start with this:

What kept you playing?
What kind of gamer would enjoy this?
Was the game fair, tough, or just right?
What’s one feature that really stood out?
Did the game run well on your setup?

Inappropriate content. Your reviews contain bad language. Inappropriate content. Links are not allowed. Inappropriate content. Content contains gibberish. Review title is too short. Review title is too long. Review description is too short. Review description is too long.

Not sure what to write?

You cannot save your review due to the following reasons:

You need to select star rating
You need to enter review title
You need to enter the content of your review

Filters:

No reviews matching your criteria

English Deutsch polski français русский 中文(简体) Others

Verified owners Others

Last 30 days Last 90 days Last 6 months Whenever

After release During Early Access

Discover CD PROJEKT RED games

Highlights

Featured

Close, but not an exact hit

Two Worlds Epic Edition

Other ratings

Add a review

Edit a review

Delete this review?

Report this review

Additional Details (required):

Report this review