Risen

Piranha Bytes has created a new series. Risen is not only a good heir to Gothic, but also establishes solid bases which could mark the way for this studio in the future.

Risen is a successful RPG that looks really good and offers a lot of fun gameplay, which keeps you busy for hours and hours. However it's a pity that the game offers less innovation.

Struggle through the admittedly bad third-person action, and you'll find a role-playing experience well worth your time.

Risen is actually a real shame because of its promises. The world looks great and it’s funny to explore, but developers didn't pay enough attention to essential aspects like the combat and character progression.

There's a great role-playing game here, but it's hiding behind a terrible interface and clunky combat.

As an Xbox 360 RPG, even as an Xbox 360 fantasy RPG, it's so unpolished, so devoid of the oomph demanded by current gen games, so inaccessible and needlessly punishing, that it's offensive.

The worst RPG on 360 by a wide margin. [Christmas 2009, p.99]

Hier und da ein paar Bugs Aber die Atmosphäre ist echt fesselnd Die Charaktere authentisch und die Spielwelt angenehm.

You can clearly tell this game was made by the creators of the legendary "Gothic," and that’s its main strength. The old-school atmosphere and familiar mechanics are great from the start. However, compared to Gothic 3, the game feels smaller and a bit derivative — it lacks that grand scale and depth. It's a solid RPG for Piranha Bytes fans, but unfortunately, it doesn't reach the greatness of Gothic.

Just played through this is around 45 hours. Pros: Game is challenging, but not too hard. I felt it was just right. There isn't too much hand holding. The game encourages exploration. It's very quest driven. You can literally spend like 5 hours in a city doing all the quests, looting all the houses, finding all the secrets. The island is very large and you can spend a good amount of time just mowing down enemies. Cons: Graphics are horrible. A lot of the game is pointless. There is very little reward in exploration. You can get most of your top tier jewelery crafted by the 2nd chapter. There isn't very many sets of armor. The stat system is very bland and simplistic. The worst things about this game are the bugs and there are MANY! This game is much better on the PC. It plays better and the graphics are much better. So if you have the option, then pick this up for your PC instead.

I am a fan of the medieval RPG and since Dragon Age I have been starved. That being said I still must caution anyone thinking about picking up this game. The graphics are dated and the combat is horribly repetitve extremely early. The voice acting is lackluster and the music score numbers around 3 tracks that seem out of place at times. Even so, what kills the experience are the control issues and game-killing bugs. The auto-targeting makes fighting more than 3 enemies a chore at best and the over-sensitive X-axis is terrible, neither of which can be changed. Many times I found myself losing my entire health bar from a glitch occuring when hit by more than one enemy at the same time. Frustrating sums up my experience with this game. Look somewhere else for your RPG thirlls and your sanity will be the better for it.

This PC port is a train wreck. Graphics are dated, controls are clunky, dialog corny and the gameplay is often glitchy or downright broken. It has some good idea's but fails to execute on a massive scale. This game is also a huge grind with constant reptition. Play at your own risk.