Evil Islands has some aspects, that make the game really special: - the stealth aspect: You have to use stealth a lot in this game and there are some enemies you can't defeat/kill. But there is also a big grey area of monsters and quest. Here you can decide for example, if you steal the quest item from the monster or if you fight it. When you fight enemies the backstabb ability of your main character is extremly useful. So there are also enemies you can kill with backstabbing, but fighting a normal fight is nearly impossible due to their high armor. So you have to adapt your skilling on your gameplay. - the crafting systems for equipment and spells, which both work like a construction kit. So your not just looking for new weapons or spells, but rather for new building blocks. With them you can improve and adapt your euipment/spells. Since you can integrate those customized spells in your equipment (like creating an helmet that casts a healing spell every time you got hit on the head), you can really adapt your equipment on your personal gameplay style. - you can aquire party members or play solo. With party members the experience points split in between the group. Since you can't take party members to the next chapter/isle, this experience is lost. But you can change your party all the time and there are missions/fights you can do easier in groups. Also playing in groups gives a nice strategy element to the game, since you have to execute your ambush on some enemy groups with stealth, because a frontal attack wouldn't work. (But, like others already mentioned, the lone wolf/backstabbing pathway is the most efficient). - Exploring and roaming the islands adds a good atmosphere to the gameplay. Areas on one island are connected through different pathways and when the history goes on you go back to already known places. Since some monsters also have clans and camps (like orcs, goblins ...) you have to talk to some of their representatives and deal with their rivalities. You also can make peace with some enemies or decide to kill them all for the XP. This is quite linear and definetly not isometric, but it makes everything more alive and helps you to dive into the world. -The skill system is nice, somewhat different, but also unforgiving. So you need to have a plan, which you just get after some gaming experience. -On the bad side you have to walk around a lot , save and reload a lot (it's a stealth game). Like mentioned in other reviews, the english dubbing is really bad and halfhearted. So if you can't speak german the amosphere will be worse. I sadly can't say anything about the russian version, but I assume it can't be worse than the english. (I normaly like playing games in english but in this game it made a significant difference for me) To sum it up, you should buy this game if you like to try a different and difficult RPG (since your here on GOG I leave out the abligatory love for old games).
