Risen 1 is a game that dares to be merciless, but unfortunately, it also dares to be broken. At its core, there’s undeniable potential — a harsh yet rewarding world, an atmosphere thick with danger, and gameplay that challenges you to claw your way up from nothing. But all of this is buried beneath layers of bugs, unfinished mechanics, and glaring technical issues that sabotage the experience at every turn. The combat is punishing but fair… until it isn’t. Timing your hits and watching for opening in enemy defences is a great idea, but the controls are clunky and unresponsive. Some features appear bugged (like counter-block) It seems as though your character obeys your commands whenever he feels like. The dialogue feels stiff and disconnected, but you can overlook that if you’re drawn to gritty settings. What you can’t overlook, though, are the moments when the game simply refuses to function. I got cutscenes locking up because an NPC can’t find its way around my character, reloads leaving the camera stuck. In general, it feels like the game never should have left beta. There’s something heartbreaking about a game that shows you what it could have been but then asks you to suffer through its flaws to see it. Ultimately, I gave up, not because I don’t appreciate its ambition, but because no player should have to endure a broken experience for a glimmer of potential. Some might find the patience to push through; I didn’t, and I don’t regret walking away. If you’re curious about Risen 1, go in knowing this: the cracks run deep, and your enjoyment will depend on how much frustration you’re willing to tolerate.
I have a lot of fond memories with the original Sea Dogs and Sea Dogs 2, however badly they aged. I can't say that this game is an improvement. Sure, it has better graphics than the originals, more NPCs, bigger world and a new story, but it doesn't matter. This game would have been absolutelty amazing in the 90s, where this games' engine and graphics truly belong. But today, alas, it's barely playable. The interface is outdated, camera movements and fov are really awkward, land combat is unfairly difficult and clunky even at its easiest difficulty setting and the seabattles are at best slow and unrealistic. AI is both merciless and stupid: every ship uses the wind to its advantage with uncanny precision, yet gets stuck circling in one place trying to shoot you with all sides, to name one example. In other words, the game is just a mess. The most sad thing about the game, though, is that unintuitive and unfair to the player. The developers do not seem to understand the difference between not holding the player's hand and total lack of guidance or conveyance. If you start the game as a default freelance privateer, you have no idea what you're supposed to do or even where to go. The instructions given to the player are served in the worst possible way: as NPCs reading instructions out loud (and since there is no real voice-acting, it means that you are reading a manual instead of playing). Even then, the instruction are unclear at best. Last but not least, the amount of bugs, unfinished content, badly translated dialogue and patchwork design is jaw-dropping and makes the impression that this was supposed to be a side project or a coding exercise never meant for anyone except a small group of friends. The scope of the game turned out to be way too much of a bite for such a small studio to chew. Which is a shame, becasue there is great potential in it.
A star for trying. Everybody keeps saying how great the story is but I can't even get to the story because of how badly designed this game is. The combat is a mess. It's boring, non-engaging and confusing. Camera control is from early 2000s. Most of the time I'm looking at the minimap because I can't look around freely. Stealth is a joke. I can pass the guards right in front of them but I can't pass the character that starts a cutscene that seems optional at best. The game does nothing to tell me how to use the interface or what skills do what. It's a shame, really, because the world seems so good. I wish I could explore more but not with these mechanics.
