Two Worlds – Xbox 360 review

20 September 2007 11:00 GMT / By Chris Pickering

I hate to use the term "rip-off" too cheaply, but have a glance at the screenshots for Two Worlds, and you’d be forgiven for thinking you’d slipped 2 years back in time and you were peeking at the initial screens of the incredible Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.

Like Oblivion, you’ve a character to give birth to, and a huge world to explore. Again, like the aforementioned RPG stunner, you’re not purely set on working your way through the main story. The game is more than happy to allow you to freely wander around the countryside, picking off monsters here and there to keep the coffers topped up.

Chances are you’ll end up dipping in and out of the intrinsically developed plot, though it’ll no doubt simply be to unlock all those tasty Gamerpoints rather than a story that’s grabbed you by the short and curlies.

There’s a war, a imprisoned god, and a few hundred years of passing to contend with when you decide to take on the main tasks, but making your on way in the world is easily the best way to enjoy Two Worlds. The story is standard fantasy fair, and a long, long way behind the aforementioned Oblivion.

There’s no way that you’ll find anything astonishingly enthralling, mind. The game world itself looks roughly average for a next generation console, but rapid dips in quality are always close. While the world is certainly packed with detail, and views towards the distant horizon can draw your eye from time to time, the game's obsession with constant loading these sometimes mucky textures only ever frustrates.

It’s the pauses during combat that do the most to annoy. Though they might only be quick flashes of stillness, it makes every scrap one that you’ll approach with the mindset of how many pauses you’ll see, rather than how to obliterate the meanie in your sights.

The monsters you’ll be up against seem to have been created on the main artist's days off. At times you’ll find yourself spending a couple of hours simply slaughtering what seem to be the same pack of bears and wolves over and over again, with only the odd goblin looking fantasy stereotype to break up the monotony. Never a plus point when an RPG wants to keep you gripped for hundreds of hours.

Killing them is just as bland a task, requiring button mashing aplenty to get rid of them. Turn the difficulty option up a touch however, and you’ll find yourself regularly on the wrong side of a beating from even the most bog standard of enemies. Far too easy on the Easy mode, and getting a touch too difficult on Medium. Not the way to go.

The other inhabitants of the game aren’t anything more interesting either, repeating the same standard boring tedious sayings, in the same monotonous voice. But that’s a genre flaw full stop – remember the scary dead eyes of the Oblivion folk?

Verdict

Two Worlds might not have the kind of backing that Oblivion had by the bucket load, but that doesn’t forgive it for being, well, not that good.

Single player mode simply doesn’t cut the mustard when compared with the now elderly Oblivion, and the obscene number of flaws make for a game that simply couldn’t be recommended to anyone other than real RPG obsessed freaks.

Pick Oblivion up for the budget price it’s available for and enjoy a proper RPG test.

Score

Review Recap

Made by: South
Price as reviewed: £35
The good: Huge scope, great character development
The bad: Dodgy graphics, loads of technical flaws, just not Oblivion
Quick verdict: An Oblivion rip-off that misses the enjoyable gameplay, and the stunning looks
Score