Two Worlds - Don't Believe the Hype

Two Worlds

Developer – Reality Pump

Xbox 360, PC

So after countless arguments against virtually every gamer I know that has played this game, I am forcing myself to sit down and write up a quick review to hopefully educate some of you about this game. This game can contend with Oblivion. Yes it can. It has areas where Oblivion is better, but it also does certain things better than Oblivion, and for what it is worth, the game is WELL worth picking up at full price if you are a fan of the genre.

Now that I’ve hopefully gotten you this far, let me warn you. The voice acting and script in this game is absolutely atrocious. It’s terrible. I am failing to come up with a clever analogy involving broken glass and acid on your flesh, but the analogy is there. It will make you laugh, it will make you cry, but it will never pass for decent voice acting. I have a feeling that a lot of people never got past this aspect of the game, and the game got a bum rap because of that. Forewarned is fore armed, or something, so now you know and can hopefully trudge past this aspect of the game to see the hidden gem beneath.

The game is a wide open free roaming RPG, much like Oblivion. The graphics are absolutely breathtaking, and the draw distance is so impressive. I specifically have a game saved where my character is standing atop a small rise that leads down into a HUGE valley with a river in the bottom of it. Far far in the distance, I can see the city walls and castle spires of a city I can actually travel to in the game – I am actually looking at the IN GAME city being rendered, not some clever background picture trick. It would take me twenty minutes to run to that place, that’s how far away it actually is.

The combat is done in a tight third person view, or first person if you prefer. It again, is very similar to Oblivion in that there are only a few different attacks, but in Two Worlds, your attacks string together into combos. The combos are nothing fancy, it’s not a God of War style game, but it plays well even with the simplicity. Another unique thing about Two Worlds is that the different weapon types handle COMPLETELY differently, and even their respective combos are quite different. For instance, pick up a quick one handed sword, and watch the quick successions of attacks snaking out to strike your enemies. But pick up a large two handed sword, and watch the fluid, sweeping swaths your blade cuts through your foes. It’s not a big deal, but it is nice.

Where Two Worlds really REALLY sets itself apart from the rest is it’s unique looting system. In a dungeon crawling sort of epic RPG, there is going to be loot, and there is going to be lots of it. Well, traditionally, you get a piece of loot that you like for either its stats or abilities, and stick with it for a large majority of the game. Towards the end of a game, once you get the best piece of gear (say a sword), you never have any need or desire to find another sword again. You’ve effectively hit a cap, and I hate that. I never want to know that my dungeon crawling isn’t going to yield anything better than what I’ve already got. Two Worlds solves this problem.

Two Worlds has a combination system where if you have multiple copies of the same item (Golden Sword and Golden Sword), you can combine them into Golden Sword Level 2, and it becomes stronger. All of your gear can be combined in this fashion, and it ensures that no matter how long you play, your gear will always be gaining in strength. I never once tired of my questing, because I was constantly improving my character in various ways.

There are also gems that add in a damage bonus via percentages, and they drop like candy. By the end of the game, you can have a weapon getting +1000% damage from a healthy use of gemstones. It’s fun, and you always feel rewarded for your efforts because the game doesn’t put arbitrary caps on things. If you can get enough gems to get +1000% damage, then by all means, do.

Now, I didn’t delve very deep into the magic system, nor the alchemy, so I can’t really elaborate too much on those. I can tell you though, that there are just literally hundreds of different plants and flowers and various alchemy ingredients all over the place, and some potions you can make even give you permanent effects, which is something I loved. Why make a potion that gives me +strength for a minute, I have to keep making a bunch of them, and then I’m drinking potions constantly before and during every fight. I would much rather make a potion that permanently increases my strength. But luckily, you can do either in this game, and the people that prefer the temporary gains will gain a very hefty increase for the duration of their custom potion.

If you liked Oblivion, you truly owe it to yourself to pick up Two Worlds and at least give it a shot. If the hype has you scared, rent it. Just make sure you give it a fair shot before you completely write it off. It’s good in so many ways, and for my money, can stand toe to toe with the Oblivions of the industry. Now it just needs a few expansions…

Score: 84%

Subjective Score: 94%