Impressions: Two Worlds II – Private Press Meeting At PAX East (Audio and Images)

I am still trying to catch up from this past PAX East event, slowly but surely I’ll get through it. One bit of information that I really want to get out to all of our fans is the fact that Two Worlds II is coming, this time it’ll make the leap to the Playstation 3 as well as the Xbox 360 and Windows PC platforms. Unfortunately I couldn’t get any video for you, since we weren’t allowed to record any video. On the plus side, I was allowed to record audio.

First let me go back a bit to the original Two Worlds that was only released on the Windows and Xbox 360 platforms. I have to admit that even with the game literally being broken on the Xbox 360, my friends and I wanted to love the game so much that we completed the single player campaign and played as much of the online portion as possible. Considering that the Xbox version didn’t hold a light to the Windows version, which was a far more superior version of the two. XBL just gave us a convenient way to jump online and grind up some stats. Visually the game was gorgeous in it’s own right, with great “if not cheesy” voices along some kick ass combat control scheme. The original was to little to late to be saved, but very fun none the less,I’m just an RPG fanatic.

Two Worlds II, from what I got to see, is a far more polished game in every way. I’m not sure how much details I can divulge here but I’ll try to explain what I can remember from the actual game play demo that was shown to us behind closed doors. The version that was demoed to us was the Xbox 360 version which was running on a dev system and still looked and played solidly. First off let me get the visuals out of the way, since this is only a small reason as to why I loved the original.

South Peak and Top Ware Interactive have really push the visuals to a whole new level on the Xbox 360 when referring to the 360 previous TW, yes this a very vibrant and living world, the physics on your avatars clothing and the entire environment, all reflect shadows dynamically, down to being shown a part of the game were their was a hanging lamp that you could move around and see your own shadow move in real time on any object surrounding you. Even mirrors reflected the real surroundings and your character.

Basically with out going to deep into it and if your a graphics whore, you’ll be getting your visual fix with this game, on any platform, as long as the Playstation 3 gets the same amount of attention as the other platforms. Remember this point, this will be the second game on the Xbox 360 and PC so a ton of polish will most likely be evident on those platforms. I really hope that all of versions get the same amount of attention and give more attention to what ever platform needs it. I for one hope that the Playstation 3 owners get an equally stable release, anyone remember Oblivion on the PS3 before the patch update?

Not much information was given to us in regards to the multi-player portion of the game other than the fact that there will be more information available soon but also state that this game will offer online co-op, which the last game didn’t have in the context of the campaign. The last game did allow for 8 player online questing but only the host would receive the said quest’s rewards, then was patched to offer reward and exp sharing. I have to recommend giving the Windows PC version a run, you can probably find the game in a retail bargain bin or online for a few bucks.

I really loved the the combat system and customizations of the original and that system is brought to light in Two Worlds II as well, with even more options added to the weapons and armor customizations. you can break down armor into it’s raw materials to allow for rebuilding brand new armor with better stats or to change the look entirely. This will help when your online, so that you can have a totally different look from your online comrades.

Two Worlds II also kept the magic card stacking element from the original but takes it to a whole news level. I remember stacking up to 3 cards with only a limited amount of combination allowed on the Xbox version, more (but not many) card slots were available on the PC version, Oh, and another quick point I forgot to mention was the fact that on the Xbox 360 version you only had a lobby for setting up an online game while the PC version actually had a full online city with the closest resemblance that I can think of is that of Guild Wars main city hubs were you could walk around town do some shopping and grab up a few folks to guest with.

The bottom line would be, if you liked the original like myself this is a no brainer, you’ll be buying this game regardless of the originals haggard state, I mean how much worst could it be, right?. Trust me when I say I know how bad the 360 original game is, but take my word when I tell you that this is not the Two Worlds that you got from the original.

Everything…..when I say everything, I mean it the visuals, animations, view distances and dynamic lighting are all on a much higher level of polish. After saying all of that, I’m still going to reserve my full opinion until I see what the online options will be and get to see how stable the network will act once I get Two Worlds II into my hands.

I know I spoke mostly of the original with comparison to the original game but from what I was able to see from the private closed door meeting, I can’t wait to give it a second chance to win my heart.

Exclusive Audio Commentary:

No solid release date was announced but from what I’ve been told, the game has a Fall 2010 release window, I just hope that the game doesn’t come out until everything is tested and then retested again. This was my first preview on TheBitbag, please leave me your comments and you thoughts on the game, especially if you’ve played the original Two Worlds.

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