To start off with, my score translates to a 9/10 but 4.5 stars is not an option. Given that I read some of the reviews saying that the combat is the game's weak point I have to say that it wasn't as bad as I was expecting. Some pointers for the game's combat, your first 10 points of mana regenerate (and even quicker during combat itself). Thus, your basic spell will "always" be available to you. There are four stats and the choice for investing points depend more on your strengths and weaknesses as a gamer. Strength: Choose this stat to make your cantrip ability more reliable. Especially useful in the early game. Intelligence: Choose this stat if you have trouble aiming at enemies or rely on status conditions. Magic: Choose this stat if you like to use mana-intensive spells. In my experience this is only worthwhile against bosses as you need to chug a lot of potions or mage water to make use of it. Constitution: Choose this stat if you are slow to react and have a hard time dodging or outrunning enemies. The trinkets, for further boosting those stats, that you find have got a "health bar". I have to say that I count it as a mark against the game for not properly explaining what happens if they reach 0. In some games you simply cannot use such items but here they are destroyed. I am curious to see what a sequel would bring to the table in terms of combat now that D'Arc is a mage. Maybe you regenerate the first 20 points of mana or perhaps someone will teach you how to use melee weapons? As for puzzles, you won't get stuck on most of them but there was one puzzle that I could not solve and that was because you can only know the answer to this puzzle if you fail. To unlock your final power you must go to the hall described as being "most bare" but you will only encounter this hall if you use a wrong combination which led me to assume that I had to go to the Fountain Hall given that there is a description which talks about its "minimalist approach".
Whereas a lot of games are praised for their graphics or storyline, Two Worlds 2 is a game with absolutely stellar game design. This game is rightfully called a rough gem, but it shines in the parts were it takes the chores you all know and dread in RPGs and makes them fun. One of the biggest things being that there is no junk. In my experience I slew countless enemies and soon my bags were filled with loot and naturally there were a lot of duplicates and inferior weapons to my own. The game does have a weight system so naturally this started to bother me, so I took a look at it and made the discovery (that the thing I hadn't bothered to learn about while chopping up baddies) that I could simply recycle weapons and use the components to upgrade others. No sooner had I made the discovery or every lackluster item suddenly turned into a free weapon upgrade. Not only that, the weight system which had annoyed me before suddenly turned into a reminder to break down any excessive materials I had on me. We're not stopping there, however. Any lesser gems you can equip in special slots can be merged with other lesser gems of the same sort which makes any gem you got once useful till the end of the game and it also helps that you can freely take these gems out of equipment without destroying them, merge them and put the superior version back in the slot to increase your equipment's power. It helps the game so much if you do not have to worry about wasting items on equipment you may quickly outlevel and can instead have fun experimenting with them. The magic path too is based on this principle, you do not get specific spells but rather upgrade your ability to customize with spell cards which make up different spells. Ultimately that is what this game is about. Experimenting with no regrets and if you are not the type to experiment a lot then I'd recommend playing as a warrior for some good o'l hack and slash.
