Review of Risen for Xbox 360

Risen, developed by Piranha Bytes and published by Deep Silver, is an open world role playing game that focuses on player choice. The premise of Risen is that you've survived a shipwreck and landed on a beach of the strange and mysterious island of Faranga. Temples have "Risen" up all over the Faranga island, and monsters have begun to appear. As you explore the island of Faranga, you will run across two different factions- the Rebels and the Inquisition. Depending on the player's choices and interactions with NPC's, there are actually three different stories that can happen.

No Good or Evil in Risen for Xbox 360
One feature (or lack thereof) that sets Risen for Xbox 360 apart from other role playing games is that your character is neither good or evil. There is no karma or alignment system in Risen; instead, everything is in a shade of gray. An example of this is when two different NPC's give you quest to retrieve the same item for them, and both have valid reasons for wanting it. Who you choose to deliver the goods to affects both the story and your character's abilities, making it important to consider your decisions.

Character Customization in Risen for Xbox 360
Your character's class in Risen for Xbox 360 is determined by your actions. Did you get caught by the Inquisition? That's too bad because now you can only be a warrior for the Order. Did you help smuggle artifacts for the Don? If so your character can be an aggressive fighter. The most difficult (but rewarding) path is taking the road to spiritual enlightenment as a mage of the Holy Flame by avoiding capture by the Inquisition, not joining the rebels, and proving your worth to the Convocation.

While you cannot customize your character's appearance in Risen for Xbox 360, your character's abilities become customized each time you level up. Rather than picking your new stats immediately after leveling up, you must first find a trainer that will teach the desired skill that you want to learn. One can learn combat techniques, professions, skills, and magic. It is wise to invest learning points in thieving and crafting in order to obtain better items earlier. As the game progresses, some of the better weapons can only be obtained by creating them.

It Pays to Save Often in Risen for Xbox 360
About every eight to ten minutes Risen for Xbox 360 auto saves your progress. Whenever this happens, the screen freezes for a second or too, however its benefits are definitely noticed. It is very easy to die in Risen, and if one isn't constantly saving their game manually, they can lose a good amount of progress even with Risen's auto save feature. Many times I had become so engrossed in a quest I had forgotten to save. If it were not for Risen's auto save, I would have lost valuable progress.

One interesting thing in Risen for Xbox 360 is that while creatures will kill you and it will be necessary to load a saved game, NPC's will only knock you out. After a couple of seconds, your character will get up. The NPC will have looted your body in the meantime, and have taken anything from gold to one of your equipped weapons. Knocking the NPC out in turn will yield your items back.

New Features and Improvements
Risen itself was originally released back in 2009 for PC, and later in the year it was released in Europe for Xbox 360. While the PC version received good reviews, the first transition of Risen for Xbox 360 in Europe did not fair too well, and had poor reviews due to many flaws and awkward controls. For the new North American release of Risen for Xbox 360 there were several additional new features and improvements to fix those flaws bring the console game closer to its PC equivalent, namely:

-Revamped controls to make them more intuitive (mapped combat actions to triggers, etc.)
-New texturing and rebuilt lighting and filtering
-Updated environments and vegetation to look more realistic
-Difficulty balancing at the beginning of the game to better ease the player into the game
-Added brightness controls and sharper fonts for better usability

Positives about Risen for Xbox 360
During my analysis of Risen for Xbox 360, one interesting thing I found is that there is no weight limit to your inventory. Nothing was more aggravating while playing Oblivion and Fallout 3 than having to constantly run back and forth to a town to sell loot from my adventures, rather than progressing with the actual story. One can have limitless amounts of items stockpiled in their inventory in Risen for Xbox 360.

Another great thing about Risen for Xbox 360 is that aside from the initial loading screen there are no other loading screens while exploring the island of Faranga. It does not matter where on the island of Faranga or what building one goes into, say goodbye to loading screens! This means that players can spend more time actually playing Risen, than waiting to play as they do on other titles. The only time you'll get a loading screen is when you teleport (fast travel) to another location or when you load a save file after dying.

Risen for Xbox 360 has a massive amount of content over its four highly detailed chapters. It can take over sixty hours to complete the main campaign. With three main different character choices, each with a distinct different story line and achievements to accompany your character's skill progression, Risen has excellent replay value providing almost two hundred hours of gameplay.

There is also the freedom to do whatever you want that players have come to love from the Elder Scrolls franchise. One can take side quests and explore the island of Faranga to their hearts content until they decide to progress with the main storyline. I personally spent over thirty hours on side quests helping people before finishing the first chapter.

Negatives about Risen for Xbox 360
While Risen for Xbox 360 has many great things going for it, there were also a couple of things that detracted from what could have been a better game. First, the graphics in Risen are not as spectacular as as other recent Xbox 360 games. This is most distinct whenever there is dialogue between characters and you can view their faces.

Second, the voice acting in Risen for Xbox 360 was unimpressive. One example of this is at Tilda's Farm when gnomes attack and an NPC says "To arms, to arms" with disinterest as if he was reading out loud from a Russian history textbook. Because he doesn't yell "To Arms! To Arms!" with any real emotion as would be expected, the surprise skirmish feels lackluster when it could have been a real adrenaline rush.

An annoying thing about combat is that every enemy jumps back when you try to attack them. Unless one specializes in ranged combat, or until one becomes a mage, this can quickly become irritating - with the only real strategy being to pin enemies against environmental elements such as rocks and walls to kill them efficiently.

Despite playing on a large high definition television, I found that making out quantities of items in the inventory screen proved to be difficult. While this may not be the biggest deal for the vast majority of time because merchants in Risen will clearly show the number of any item you are selling, it becomes abundantly apparent when pickpocketing. The inability to instantly tell the number of gold on a person while pickpocketing makes it hard to decide what item to take. A word to the wise would be to take the key, if any.

Final Thoughts on Risen for Xbox 360
Risen for Xbox 360 gets a eight out of ten. Despite its somewhat outdated graphics and subpar voice acting, Risen is a delightfully fun and engrossing role playing game for the Xbox 360. What it lacks for in the video and audio department are more than compensated for in its interesting story and length of game play. Risen provides freedom of choice to its players, and requires players to make decisions regarding quests in a unique way.

Risen for Xbox 360 makes a welcome addition to any role playing gamer or action adventure fan's Xbox 360 library. For those who are on the fence and have decided they do not want to purchase it, Risen is most certainly worth a rental so as not to miss out - however you'll wish you bought it when your late fees star accruing. With so many great recent great releases on the Xbox 360, expect Risen to be a sleeper hit for 2010.

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