Two Worlds II

Grote hands on :


http://twoworldsvault.ign.com/fullstory.php?id=58715




Hot on the heels of the first review of Two Worlds II comes the first hands-on post-beta Q&A from Polish gaming portal GameCorner.pl by Slawek Serafin. He had the chance to play the release PC version of the game already so decided to take a closer look at some of the features. And we took the liberty of translating a few of the interesting tidbits and there's a veritable goldmine of those in the comments section beneath the original Q&A article. Check our highlights below!

* Character movements look smooth. It's not Assassin's Creed level of animation, but it's still head and shoulders above e.g. Alpha Protocol. Trot looks kinda odd but still natural. Sprint doesn't look artificial. Sneaking and walking without running have correct animations. The combat also looks nice: the swings have the "momentum" feel to them, it's definitely not just swinging any weapon as if it was light as a feather. Blows do have an impact on the enemies. The only odd part is jumping - it looks a bit stiff. In addition, regular movement is not very precise, and sometimes to get to the box or when moving in a cluttered interior, you need to slow down to a walk or sneak. Horses have the worst animation - the mounted movement looks quite stiff in trot and jumping. Slawek notes that he didn't get the chance to fight mounted and there might be no possibility to do that at all.

* Combat is real-time and very input-intensive. Aside from performing special attacks, constant movement and aiming your character's swings is key. Enemies' AI seems higher for humanoid enemies: they can use active blocking and block breaker moves, while only very rarely do ripostes themselves. Non-humanoid enemies are much more "dumb" in that they only move back and forward, run away or charge the hero from the distance. Speed and range of weapons is of crucial importance: Slawek notes that sometimes he was able to get in close to the polearm-wielding enemies and just bash their heads in with a close-range axe so fast they were unable to mount defences or perform their attacks. The bow&arrow fighting was even more fun: with automated aim and manual sniper modes, several types of arrows (stunning, freezing, etc..), possibility to enhance bow by shortening draw time and increasing the draw strength archery was fun. The "dead-eye"-like mode where several enemies could be multi-hit at once was a life-saver, but Slawek noted that pure archers will have trouble fighting, since one arrow, maybe two is all you could pull off before the enemy closed in on you. He wasn't able to find all of the magic cards he wanted so he didn't really get the chance to test magics that much, but there's a definite need to use magics against some of the enemies- since they are usually resistant to some types of damage more than to others. This also confirms that there's several types of damage and resistance to it. Slawek advises to always carry a sword (slashing damage) and a blunt (crushing damage) in order to be prepared for most enemies, and have a spell or two on the ready for some immune mobs. [7 types of damage are available in TWII: physical - piercing (reserved for arrows only), slashing and bludgeoning, elemental - cold, fire and lightning, and (not mentioned, but shown before) spirit and poison.- Two Worlds Vault]

* As far as enemy density goes, Slawek confirms that Savannah is very densely packed with rhinos, cheetahs, baboons etc.. However, if you have cleared some region once, unless plot dictates it [e.g. in case of the Swallows where permanent blight on the land causes dead to rise all the time - Two Worlds Vault] the region will stay cleared. The enemy variety is quite moderate: if the region is occupied by Varns, you'll only meet Varns and perhaps a hyena or two. Most of the mob placement has been apparently done by hand, so there's no "randomization" of encounters.

* Slawek describes (for the first time) the pickpocketing minigame mechanic. To pickpocket an enemy, you have to position yourself properly and pay attention to special "snake" meter. It shows two (or several?) snakes that are trying to bite one another's tails with narrow space(s) between them. You have to rotate the hand above the snakes until the gaps between them are aligned, and then there's a very brief window of oppportunity to empty your target's pouch. An interesting note to lockpicking has also been mentioned: the lock rotations and amount of "rings" to nail with the pick are random any time you attempt to lockpick, so if some pattern is particularly vicious and fast, it's enough to move away from the lock and back into the lockpicking to get the new, perhaps easier one. Quicksaving/quickloading will not let you off the hook that easily!

* In the comments section, Slawek describes the overall combat difficulty. There were many times where he had to retry a fight simply because he was overpowered. The game is definitely VERY hard. Some fights had to be attempted only after gaining a few levels. Some of them were so hard in fact, that only by "bugging" the AI was he able to win them. In the beginning, Slawek had to quicksave (there's such a feature in PC mode) before every encounter, but later on he stopped dying all the time. Apparently, TWII boasts a very steep difficulty curve.

* NPC/Quest Dialogues are more on the simple side. You don't get many choices and it's not Dragon Age or Baldur's Gate "multi-thread" decision chain. Think more elaborate Diablo - talk and decide if you want to do some quest, then get out.

 

Laat dat allemaal ook waar zijn voor de 360 versie !!

 

Ik vind dat deze hands on teveel combat en controls gericht is. Ok dus de game is moeilijk, dat vind ik alleen maar cool. Maar dan beginnen ze over een vreemde jump animatie en niet geweldige animaties van het paard, pffff....echt dat boeit totaal niet. Liever had ik wat over de sfeer gehoord, de NPC's, wat informatie over wat quests enzo.

Maar alles wat er staat over hoe goed de combat werk, dat de bow & arrow echt fun is..nice hoor, dat soort dingen vind ik zeker wel van belang. Maar ik zou niet weten waarom de 360 versie niet precies zo zou zijn...zit wel goed denk ik

 

Klinkt veelbelovend!

 

Ik weet nog wel dat deel 1 uitkwam dat veel mensen voor de release veel positiever waren dan erna. Ik hoop dat dat nu niet zo is.

 

Ok dat valt wel mee denk ik. Je hebt veel portals in de game, health stones zoals in deel I en bovendien denk ik dat je gewoon weer tot leven komt in de game zoals in deel I. Je zou het ook nog apart kunnen instellen lijkt mij. Naast dat was deel I helemaal niet moeilijk, eerder een beetje zoals Prey. Het leek alsof je dood ging, maar je kwam weer tot leven en kon verder met het afmaken van de vijanden waar je mee bezig was, zonder dat die health van hun weer helemaal gevuld was.

 

Van mij mag de game ook lekker moeilijk zijn, liefst zelfs ! En het niet kunnen dood gaan? Raar en niets van gelezen tot hiertoe ! Ook al zat deze funktie in deel 1, dat wil nog niet zeggen dat deel 2 dit zowieso ook heeft ! Voor mij hoeft dat niet zo en als het er toch inzit dan hoop ik dat ik die optie kan uitschakelen ... want in dat geval zou elke RPG simpel zijn pfff ... vechten tot je er "schijnbaar" dood bij neervalt en daarna TOCH weer herrijzen? (als het werkt als een soort van "reïncarnatie" lijkt me dat wel cool, maar we zien wel ... )

Dat de animaties van het paardrijden wat minder zijn zit ik zeker niet mee... in Oblivion vind ik het paardrijden ook maar niets ... ik stap liever met beiden voeten de wereld in ... ik zie graag paarden, maar erop rijden is niet mijn ding, ook niet in het echte leven

Er wordt in de hands-on ook niets verteld over het PAPAK-syteem (Alchemy) en over het CRAFT-systeem ... raar ... ook niets over het zeilen ...

Ik ga deze game gewoon halen en spelen. Het enige wat mogelijk een tegenvaller kan zijn is dat er veel bugs inzitten, maar goed, in dat geval smeek ik net zolang voor een patch bij de dev's tot die er komt hahaha ...

 

Achievements:

Spoiler

Joepie, Mulitplayer achievements...

edit: Over de release:

edit2: Betekent voor ons dus 12 november!

 

Hmmm.....jammer zeg, ik had er echt zin in volgende week. Waardeloos...maar het is opzich wel te begrijpen, de game is klaar, daar gaat het om. En we krijgen em gewoon dit jaar nog.

 

Geen probleem voor mij, ga gewoon eerst DKS spelen.

 

Ja, voor mij hetzelfde
Van de DKS ben ik heel zeker dat die me zal bevallen, zeker nu na de "massive rebalancing" kan de pret waarschijnlijk niet op hahaha ... kan ik eindelijk eens vergelijking maken tussen mijn "oude" Ego Draconis versie en de nieuwe DKS (dit alles op m'n Xbox).
Ik ben héél benieuwd naar de veranderingen, maar heb alle vertrouwen in Larian Studios, dat komt vast vet in orde

_0/

 

Hmmm, hopelijk houdt arcania me lang genoeg bezig (ben bang van niet). Anders ga ik eerst aan FNV beginnen!

 

Stelletje zwakzinnigen daar zeg. Make up your !@#$%^& mind.

 

Klinkt allemaal zeer amateuristisch, dit hadden ze op voorhand kunnen weten. Meerdere keren uitstellen om zulke redenen vind ik een kwalijke zaak.


Naja als de game maar goed is dan. :{

 

Zeker weer een opslagplaats met waterschade.

 

Daar gaat mijn Collector's Edition. Weer!

Nog niet besteld, doe gewoon de gewone versie met meteen even een guide erbij kopen.

 

Vergelijking tussen Arcania en TWII.

 

Geen zin om die lap duits te lezen

 

Het komt er op neer dat de graphics zo goed als hetzelfde zijn en de character customization bij TW II veel uitgebreider is.

 

Wanneer komt DKS ook alweer? En ik kan het niet echt eens met hun zijn over de graphics, die vind ik toch verreweg mooier in TWII dan Arcania, gebaseerd op de gameplay videos een 33 nieuwe screenies.


PCGH, a German Gaming Website devoted to specifically PC Games have got their hands on Two Worlds II ahead of its November 9th Release and have been allowed to take screenshots, 33 have been released and could even be used as Wallpapers for your Desktop.
Screenshots are in 1280x800[Suitable for Smaller Displays]at PCGH's Gallery but you can see the screenshots in Full Rez'(1920 x 1200)[Suitable for Larger Displays] without downloading anything in Our Gallery.

Two Worlds 2: The renderer of the GRACE.
In an interview with Mariusz Szaflik, the Lead Engine Programmer by Reality Pump, we learned various details: Admittedly, Two Worlds 2 as a cross-platform titles, the PC version may, however, with higher-resolution textures, detailed shadows, and improved SSAO (ambient occlusion ) decorate - and it shows. On a purely technical level drives the GRACE nowadays usual full program to this: A FP16 pipeline, including tone-mapping and deferred rendering, scattering effects, ambient occlusion, depth of field, blur, and Bloom, very chic (real time) reflections, soft shadows and a generally successful lighting with multiple light sources (such as skeletons with glowing innards, stagger through the dark passages). A special treat is the so-called quadtree displacement mapping , including self-shadowing, which was explained in the GDC 2009, and textures with realistic depth gives.

Two Worlds 2: Eight cores ahoy.
And the current multi-core trend closes it at Reality Pump it: two nuclei are necessary for maximum detail (with a core running the game but also) to run this rendering and gameplay. Towards the top, the GRACE scaled with many nuclei (supports up to 36, 24 Reality Pump has been tested successfully at least), are created in the corresponding number of threads. Thus, the streaming or the sound will be distributed to other cores, the same is true for physics. Here Nvidia PhysX is used, CPU or GPU accelerated. The look is the same, CPU users also need not expect any performance problems. PhysX provides a relatively lively interaction with the game world, be it magic or items - including clothing moves physically with bob hair reindeer and commute on standing from left. Reality Pump GPU PhysX considered a double-edged sword, the acceleration via the graphics card would eventually offer only a very strong model of added value. Incidentally, the sound delivers Open AL.

Two Worlds 2: MLAA and DX9 to DX11.
We present the version of Two Worlds 2 runs under DirectX 9, anti-aliasing can not activate the menu at least. However Worlds Two 2 seems a very good MLAA implementation (Morphological anti-aliasing, Intel reference implementation) to provide for smooth, shimmering edges, we could make only very rarely. Support for DirectX 10 and even DirectX 11 is probably replenished by Patch, talking is a better anti-aliasing, and improved post-processing, so exactly the cases in which can trump DX10/11.

In the gallery are 30 impressions from the first hours of play. All screenshots are indeed made without HUD and changed camera angles, however, offer in-game appearance. Two Worlds 2 ergo looks like in these pictures.