Game Review | March 30, 2011 4:11 am

By Melissa Evol

Developer:Reality Pump,TopWare Interactive
Publisher: SouthPeak Games
US Release date: January 25, 2011


Sometimes I really feel like an island on the Internet, as my opinions are frequently unpopular, and this has led to some fairly amusing discussions between myself and others. My taste in games seems to be equally controversial- there are times when I’ve been the one detracting voice in a discussion about a game where the general consensus is that it’s a masterpiece, and other times, I’ve championed a game that was being hailed as the worst game ever made. No game, however, has ever been at the center of so many hot debates as Two Worlds- which is one of the few games that even Evol and I will never see eye to eye on (he’s even written a scathing review on another site, ripping into not only the game, but people who like it).

To those who don’t know, Two Worlds is one of my 5 favorite 360 games, and my 10 top games of all time. It was broken and flawed and ugly, and at first glance didn’t even pass my low requirements for playability in an RPG, however on my second attempt, the richness of the game, the immersiveness and just plain fun converted me and made me a die hard fan. Needless to say, I have been waiting for the sequel anxiously, and over the years I followed the press releases about the game’s evolutions and changes eagerly.

Initially, Two Worlds 2 was just supposed to be an expansion of the first. Eventually, they realized they had too much game for that and decided to make a sequel. Meanwhile, gaming had evolved, and the developers ended up completely scrapping what they were working on, using a new graphics engine, and making an entirely new game altogether. Whether that was a good choice or a bad one remained to be seen, until early October 2010, when the game was set to be released. A week before the release date, the publishers announced that the release was being postponed until November 2010 for Europe, and Jan 2011 for the US and UK. The reason given was that they wanted the game to be perfect when it was released. The US release was pushed back one more time, and the UK release was scrapped altogether, to the best of my knowledge.

So after some of the most controversial and complicated release theatrics in recent history, the game has been released, and everything’s great, right? When I purchased the game, I didn’t expect to even have to think when I wrote a review of the game- I was anticipating the praise to freely flow from my head to the keyboard. Well, I will say that this wasn't hard to write... the words did flow of their own accord.

The first problem I had with Two Worlds 2 is that the plot just doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t make sense standing alone, and it absolutely doesn’t make sense piled together with what I remember from the first game. I suppose that could be because it’s building on an ending that is different from the ending I chose in the first, or it could be because Reality Pump proved, once again, that they just don’t care how the game comes off to us. Apparently, you play as the same guy that you played as in the first game, and once again you’re trying to save your large breasted, scantily dressed, heavily made up sister, Kyra. I’m not going to spoil the story for anyone... partially because I don’t want to put spoilers in this review, and partially because I don’t drop acid, and I think that’s state of altered consciousness is the only way these terrible shards of story could possibly appear to form together and make sense. You could go to any Kindergarten in the country and tell the students there some of the background of the game, and they could put together a more coherent, more well-written storyline. Besides the main story, there are many side quests, although there don't seem to be as many as the first had. These are also largely uninteresting, although some are pretty funny, and mostly they’re fairly confusing as to what just happened.

Clearly, my problem with the plot isn’t just what is written, but it’s how it’s written as well. Reality Pump is a Polish company, and it’s clear that they didn’t spend very much time or money in the localization department. First off, yes all the “Mayhap”-ing and “Forsooth”-ing of the first game was obnoxious. That doesn’t necessarily mean that it should have been completely abandoned in the second game, but it was. Instead of making the game better, it makes you feel like you’re playing a character that had just had a lobotomy. As a side joke, you do run into a character who talks like you did in the original game, and your character calls him out for it, and asks “Who talks like that?”


Ahhh- refreshing.[/I]

On top of playing as the victim of trepanning, many of the NPCs talk like they’re the foreign guys in Family Guy.


A little more time and effort by the writers of this game, and the localization team really would have made a huge difference- in a game that was supposed to have been delayed for perfection. A lot of the writing is tongue in cheek, and while I truly enjoy the humor, you only hear the humor if you go back through your quest log and read the entries of completed quests (this is also useful for a number of quests where your character knows something that was never introduced to the player- whether the cutscene was just never made, or a conversation was just cut out of the game, it can be difficult to follow).


That's right... that's how English works...

If you think reading the dialogue is bad, try listening to it! While the voice acting is much improved (especially for the main character), it’s still not good. 'Our' is consistently a multi-syllabic word in this game. The music isn’t Nier-quality, but it’s pleasant, although it tends to be overshadowed by the combat noises, sound effects and stupid grunting from battles.

Graphically, obviously there has been quite a bit of improvement over the first game. It’s clear that a new graphics engine was used, but it still doesn’t stand up to other games that have come out in the last year or so. If the first Two Worlds had come out looking like this, it would have been better received. Unfortunately, this is the 2nd, and it’s 2011, there’s no excuse for not being able to do a quest because you can’t distinguish the beavers you need to kill from the grass they’re crawling around in! Of course the focus of Two Worlds has never been the graphics, but they did brag about the new engine, and promise plenty of polish! I want my polish!!!

Not everything is bad here, though! The game itself is large, with many areas to explore, and it really opens up in the second chapter, and that's where it starts to feel familiar to Two Worlds fans. The game itself, if you do all the side quests and storylines, should take you around 40 hours, depending on your difficulty setting. Besides the single player mode, there are a few multiplayer modes, that will run you at least 5 more hours to complete... more if you really enjoy making your own village and get into it!

The most frustrating thing for me about this game is the game play. They added a lot to the game- letting you equip different equipment sets, the customization of spells and equipment, and the game is much more quickly paced than the first. However they took out a lot of the best parts of the first game, and a lot of the new additions just don’t work. You can no longer grind experience by pulling hard enemies to a shrine and getting continuously healed as you fight- shrines have to be activated, and there’s a limit on how soon they can be used again after activation. Stacking weapons to make stronger weapons is gone- now you can disassemble weapons, and use those parts to forge stronger weapons. Unfortunately, no matter how many materials you put into a weapon to build it up, when you disassemble it you always get the basic amount of material back. Essentially you lose all the work you put into upgrading your equipment when you find better equipment. Don’t worry, though, that won’t happen often- most of the treasure you find won’t be better than what you have! Horse riding is still clunky, although slightly less so, and you can easily lose your horse... never to be seen again.

The new way of lockpicking is both enjoyable and challenging in later levels, but my biggest frustration is pickpocketing. THIS SUCKS IN THIS GAME. No. Seriously. In Two Worlds 2, there are a limited number of people you can steal from (mostly guards who are stationed in one place) and all of them keep their valuables in a pouch in their pocket, surrounded by 3 snakes of different sizes (so far, this seems normal to me- as I'm sure it does to you). The snakes spin in alternating directions, and the goal is to have the space between their heads and tails line up at the same time, so you can reach in and grab the pouch. This will cause great frustration, as often the place you need to reach from isn’t in the space, but up or down a bit, so you’re reaching through a head or tail... and a few people have reported having to be on the opposite side from the opening and reach through the snakes’ bodies. It’s just terrible, especially since failing usually alerts the guards who attack you without giving you a chance to pay your fine or anything you normally can do with a wanted level in these games. Did I mention the guards are invincible? Most are, actually. Another fun fact is that this game doesn’t allow you to pick locks if anyone is anywhere near an area in which they might possibly be able to see you- even occasionally through walls. If you try, you get a cut scene of a random stranger staring at you, often with their mouths moving but no words coming out, and the occasional raised wanted level.

The gameplay for the multiplayer is just terrible. It shouldn’t have been made, the only possible reasoning behind it existing is that someone said “How can we make a pretty bad game worse?” and they came up with this half assed multiplayer suck fest. The adventure is boring and devoid of story, enjoyment, or even the awesome loot you’d expect from a dungeon crawler. You can literally avoid fights and just run from teleporter to teleporter for the first 5 chapters. The last 2 are considerably more difficult, even if you do fight every battle in previous chapters. Evol and I were both level 21 going into the final chapter, and couldn’t have done it if we hadn’t had 2 other people join our game at the last minute! The other multiplayer modes are a terrible duel mode, a stupid death match mode (the only mode that forces you to have more than 2 people) and a really boring crystal collecting mode (REALLY boring). There’s also a village mode, in which you can build a village, but as far as I could tell no one could visit your town, even though you use your multiplayer character in it. Village mode sounds like it would be fun, but there’s such a shortage of money and things to do that it doesn’t entertain for longer than 5 minutes. Throw in immense, gamebreaking lag, and crappy frame rate, and you have a huge, steaming pile of multiplayer fail.


Evol wanted to fight with me, but he didn't have the guts!

As fun as Two Worlds 2 is, it will eventually come to an end, at which point you may possibly want to run through it again. You may also enjoy smashing a brick into your forehead again and again and again, who am I to judge? There is also the possibility that you’ll have missed achievements you’ll need to go back for- but like I’ve always said, achievements that make you go back don’t add replay value! I can’t imagine having the desire to pick this game up again once it’s finished... if you do, check out another game of the same genre- Arcania, Risen, Divinity 2- any of those would be better than playing through this again! But the bottom line is that there aren’t any real “path diverging” moral choices to make in the game, it has a very linear story, and you won’t want to go back to see what would happen if you did things differently.

BOTTOM LINE: We had a conversation going a few weeks ago, discussing games that should never have had sequels, and I took issue with that, saying every game has gamers who love it and have a right to play a sequel to it if they would like. This game makes me rethink that stance. At the very least, Two Worlds deserved a better sequel than this, where it was gutted and rebuilt without any of the charm that made the original a cult hit. This is just a cookie cutter European RPG, and while it’s not bad on its own, it won’t be joining it’s predecessor in my top 5 list.

FINAL SCORE: 5.5/10

Achievements- Mostly story and quest related, none that are really challenging.

Reviewed: Two Worlds II

Keywords: None