Risen 2: Dark Waters Previews and Interview

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Written by WorstUsernameEver on June 11th, 2011

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To travel between the islands of Risen 2 you'll be able to own and operate a ship, and even populate it with crew. These crew members, one at a time, can then be taken out into the field with you to help out in combat. There won't be any detailed sort of control system for the secondary character aside from basic halt and go commands, but each will have distinct advantages, like one might be a melee fighter while another acts as a healer.

I didn't get a chance to play Risen 2 so I can't say whether the combat system is going to be just as challenging as its predecessor, but Piranha Bytes says it's changing things up by ditching the shield and adding guns. As you power up you'll also unlock plenty of moves for the sword combat, including the ability to parry and counter. From what's been shown so far it seems like the pace of combat is similar to previous Piranha Bytes games where you have to be careful about when to strike instead of mash the attack button, and the improved animations do a lot to make the fighting appear more natural.

The original Risen found a niche, and the people who played it seemed to really, really like it. But in a landscape already filled with fantasy medieval RPGs, it was easy to miss. Its developers are trying to change that, by making its sequel not a fastasy, medieval RPG. This time, it's about pirates.

That means no shields, no bows and arrows, and no fireballs. It does, however, let you become a pirate captain, with your own ship (that, sadly, you can't steer), crew and pistols. And yes, with your own parrot that you can (launch to annoy people,) says Daniel Oberlerchner, one of the game's developers.

This pirate theme stays throughout all of the environments that we saw - they're more crisp and more colorful than the brown-toned world of the original Risen. Also, the screenshots we were shown of the console versions of Risen looked quite good; the original title was fairly stripped down graphically for console release. Deep Silver and Piranha Bites have learned their lesson, and both the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions of the titles are being developed concurrently with the PC version. While the game doesn't look like Skyrim by any stretch of the imagination, the world has its fair share of vistas and landscapes that are impressive. The architecture is more refined too, and doesn't look generic like the first game's rooms did.

Combat has changed significantly: since you're a pirate, you don't have the patience to use a shield. What do you have instead? Guns, bombs, powder kegs, and all sorts of other off-hand weapons. This gives Piranha Bites the ability to develop action-oriented combat sequences, but it doesn't mean defense is out the window. You'll still be able to parry, throw sand, and use other dirty tricks to keep from getting hit. Combat looked smooth, though the demo (which was pre-alpha) hadn't yet been balanced, so Deep Silver's demo character was destroying just about everything in his path.

Watching the protagonist create fighting combinations between drawing from his abilities with ice, sand and even a parrot for distracting his enemies, it was clear that battles are engaging and have the potential for creativity. We saw some unique spins on traditional animal-like enemies. Crabs, alligators and angry monkeys will be just some of the enemies you encounter. Each enemy has a particular weakness that you will have to exploit, as well. This forces the player to choose between abilities and tactics that work for that particular situation, rather than settling into a tried and true method of combat that some might be too lazy to experiment outside of. The basic components to your fighting style will include melee, range and magic. You'll even be fighting on your ship in the midst of storms on the water while battling large sea creatures. Although this wasn't shown in the demo on the show floor, this is what I will most be looking forward to, especially because the water animation was really where the game's visual pleasantries shined. The developers clearly knew that water was their strong point when they focused on a waterfall to end the demonstration and use as a backdrop to our interviews.

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