Two Worlds Review - PC

As the end of summer nears and we brace ourselves for the massive avalanche of holiday games, Two Worlds has quietly landed on the retail shelf. As a “free-roaming’” action/RPG, it might just be the thing to tide you over until the next big release comes along.  But that all depends on how willing you are to accept this game, warts and all.

Everybody Wants to Rule Two Worlds
 
There’s a lot to like in Two Worlds.  Although the game world pulls from the kind of generic fantasy we’ve all been clicking our way through since kindergarten, the game presents much of the material in an affable manner.  It’s a bit like slipping into a comfortable shoe.

The main story deals with your character being forced into servitude by some nefarious ne’er-do-wells who kidnapped your twin sister.  There’s much talk of ancient artifacts, ancient evils, warring factions, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.   Not really award-winning stuff here, but it’s enough to keep you motivated as you play.

And motivated you shall be as long as you ignore the horrible dialogue and voice work.  The fault here falls mainly on the writing which is filled with more “mayhaps” and “forsooths” than your friendly neighborhood ren faire.

A Pinch of This. A Dash of That.

The gameplay is where Two Worlds get’s a bit right and quite a lot wrong.  Basically, what you have here is a mishmash of ideas cribbed from Diablo, Oblivion, and Gothic.  The vast open game world and indeed much of the map and quest interface feels a lot like an Elder Scrolls game crossed with the hardcore sensibilities of the Gothic series.

This means you’ve got a gigantic world to explore.  Don’t feel like mucking about with the main quest?  That’s ok, there are tons of side quests to do and many, many interesting places to visit.  And it’s easy to get around because there are teleporters all over the place.  But it’s also very easy to get in over your head early on when your character is weak.  You’ll inevitably run into packs of wolves, bears, wild boars, and groms (little gobliny-orc things) who will gladly team up to kick your ass.  While things do get more manageable after you level-up a bit, one has to wonder just why they even bother to start you off with a crappy flame spell that does almost no damage to even the weakest of creatures.  You could burn through your entire pool of mana and barely put a dent in their health.

Clumsy Combat

Much of the combat is about slowly whittling down the health of the bad guy.  But once you figure out the “trick,” which is to constantly stick and move with liberal use of the “jump back” key, you’ll find that fighting is really just tedious rather than satisfying.  And that’s too bad because there’s a lot of combat in Two Worlds.  If the combat “felt” good it might be easier to overlook this stuff, but it never quite feels comfortable. Animations are very jerky and collision detection is spotty at best.  Monsters will hit you even though they don’t appear to be close enough to your character. Fortunately, there’s not much of a death penalty.  You just get resurrected at a nearby shrine.

There are some curiosities in the interface as well.  You have a series of shortcut bars where you can add skills and items your frequently use.  It’s strange however that players cannot customize the default shortcut at all even though it looks like you should be able to.  And accessing these skills in the heat of battle isn’t nearly as easy as it should be considering how quickly you can get surrounded by a horde of monsters.

Mad Skillz

Riding and fighting on horseback is fun once you’ve buffed up your skill.  There are other useful abilities to mess around with like sneaking, stealing, and setting traps.  And the alchemy system in Two Worlds is miles better than the one in Oblivion.  There’s also an interesting “Equipment Stacking” mechanic that lets you improve your existing weapons and armor by fusing similar items on top of them.  It’s a quirky, game-ish convention, but in this case it works nicely.

Small World

It’s a little strange to be recommending a game where the primary form of player interaction, the combat, isn’t very fun, but I found myself drawn in to Two Worlds despite the shortcomings.  Perhaps it’s because the game really doesn’t take itself too seriously.  It’s an easy “pick-up-and-play” kinds of game.  And sometimes, that’s all you really need.

Review by: Greg Bemis
Video Produced by: Albert Iskander