I remember playing this game as an elementary age kid with my best friend on his fathers PC which actually had a graphics card (gasp!). It was one of the most engaging and stunning games during the time. I recently decided to try out the game again on my own, years and years later, and I must say it's one of the better gaming experiences I've had in a long, long time. I cranked the difficulty up to hard from the get go, and yes I have died quite a few times. However, there is something about this game that makes me want to continue even when I die over and over. Don't question it, buy it. Seriously. It's awesome, especially if you're looking to revisit the game. 5/5 Stars from me. Better than I expected or remembered.
Risen itself isn't bad and if you're looking for a decent RPG experience then this might not be a bad choice for you. However those who have played Gothic a great deal might get a feeling of "been there, done that" while playing this game. I won't go into much detail about the graphics with this review. I found them to be nice, and detailed enough to satisfy my taste. The models for some of the characters were odd and a bit freakish looking to be blunt. The combat has been called challenging, but it's not very deep at all. If you're a melee character, the majority of the time you're just blocking with your shield and attempting to strike the enemy in hopes that they won't block or dodge your attack. From there you essentially rinse and repeat till either one of you are dead. Once you have a hold of the combat, even some tougher enemies become a push over. The quest and main story are interesting enough. If you've played Gothic then you'll sense a little bit of deja vu because the structure of the story is very familiar. A lot of the side quest are very boring. Some of them can be avoided altogether by just killing one of the people involved with the quest. Don't worry, you'll be rewarded all the same. If you're a fan of the Gothic series, you might like this, or it might bore you. If you've never played the Gothic series, skip this game and go play those because they're much better so long as you don't mind dated visuals.
