Drakensang: The River of Time was the last game I purchased in a shop (tend to go for digital copies these days.) I am glad I did, as it has one of the finest and most informative manuals I have had with a game for a while. The Drakensang ruleset is not dissimilar to Dungeons and Dragons - only there are a few more attributes and heck of a lot of skills/talents... it can feel a little like the football manager of RPG's. All of the skill are useful and usefully, during conversations your companions social skill points can be used instead of your own.
Not since playing Baldur's Gate have I played a game where I felt rewarded for exploration.
In the Drakensang games character creation is more character selection, you can choose from several character types and races seperated by their classes; though in River of Time you get more aesthetic choice on how you want your character to look. They each have different strengths and weaknesses, and these result in limitations to the level you can increase their skills and talents. During the game you gain Experience Points and Adventure Points, one can be spent any time during the game to increase skills, while the other accumulates and triggers your levelling up. As you level up you increase the maximum values for your skills and spells.
It is not all good. The combat system in River of Time (ROT) is a little clunky but better than The Dark Eye (TDE), real time with pause - the combat is not very fluid and you can see the turns occurring. All characters can be highlighted individually to order them to to things - but highlighting all characters automatically reverts to the PC character - can be frustrating at times. I played as a mage and the spell timers can make choosing the right spells tricky, it can be suicidal to try and buff once combat has started.
The good things outweigh the bad in ROT. The crafting system is wonderful, fun and a healthy dose of realistic. Nothing is overtly overpowered.
There is more humor in the ROT than in TDE, interestingly it introduces a lot of the ancilliary characters and even some of the companions of TDE, so if you have not played TDE - perhaps play ROT first for background. The world of ROT seems larger than TDE, mainly because you can revisit places you have been and there is more depth and variety in merchants.
Graphically ROT has beautiful areas but the character models can be a little cartoonish - it is not a bad thing - but it can be hard to take the plot too seriously. ROT is fully voice acted (and reasonably good) rather than the occasional badly delivered lines of TDE. There is a lesser selection of companions to choose from in ROT, which is a good thing. One of my biggest problems with TDE was too many unnecessary companions by the end of the game - and there was no incentive to take many of them with you or even recruiting them.
One of my biggest hates in the River of Time was a good thing. The sound effects were a big improvement... and if there is one sound I hate above all others it is the sound of footsteps in the snow! ROT captured that sound to perfection and I spent an entire section of the game with clenched jaws
.Above all the things that pleased me most about ROT were the puzzles. Not too difficult or obtuse - just enough to keep you busy for 30 mins. I can't remember the last RPG that had such a variety of puzzles that were not plot critical (though a few are.)
In a nutshell. Get this game if you can find it. TDE was a flawed gem that got some attention on release. ROT is a wonderful and fulfilling experience and should have garnered more attention than it recieved. I played ROT using version 1.0.0.0 - all the way through without bugs. What was the last game you played that didn't require a patch?
Graphics: 3.8/5 - They wont blow you away but not bad either.
Gameplay: 4/5 - Combat can be clunky but crafting and exploration is fun. Has some great puzzles and challenging boss battles. The end battle is like Dragon Age II made by Uwe Boll - Pure Gold!
Sound: 4/5 - Music in the game is unobtrusive and nice in places. The overall voice acting and sound effects are above par.
Roleplay: 5/5 - At its heart ROT is Role-Playing at its very best. There are early quests related to your class. There are multiple options for completing quests (that can result in different amounts of AP). The game relies less on a moral compass, as your actions are more realistically along the lines of keen or disinterested.
If this review encourages just one person to get out the blood hounds and track down a copy of ROT - then it has been worth my time waiting for my virus scan to finish. :laugh: