Risen

Overview

Risen is a third-person action RPG created by Piranha Bytes. Risen is considered a spiritual successor to the Gothic series, and features many resemblances to the franchise. The story takes place on Faranga, a fictitious volcanic, Mediterranean island with different sub climates and vegetation zones. The island is inhabited by humans, as well as many fantasy creatures. The player character is an unnamed character who gets shipwrecked on the island. The story plays out over four chapters.

Plot

The player gets stranded on the island called Faranga. He meets another survivor, Sara, and after defeating a few vultures with the help of makeshift weapons, both of them venture deeper into the island.

After helping Sara into a temporary house, the player moves deeper and meets a resident from the Island, Jan who tells him about the situation on the island. He speaks that recently ruins and temples have risen from the underground, bringing along with them strange monsters and animals. The temples are also said to have treasures stored inside. Due to this situation, humans from other lands have come in and placed an inquisition, and have placed a martial law, forbidding citizrens from moving out of the main town, the Harbour town. Anyone caught outside is turned over to the monastery and is recruited in the order.

Jan tells him that there are two places he can go to, the swamps, which are controlled by a group of bandits who are are lead by Don Esteban, (who controlled the island until the inquisition had moved them out of the town), or the Harbour Town, which is under the control of the Inquisition. He also tells the player about a monastery, which requires a recommendation to get into.

Over the first two chapters, the player is required to gain the the loyalty of whichever side he chooses, by doing a series of quests and tasks for them. The player can also choose to do quests for some of the residents and other people of the island, which fall in with the story line. Along these quests, the player opens up more side quests and makes friends and enemies.

After gaining the loyalty of either side, in chapter three, the player becomes involved with the plans of the High Inquisitor Mendoza, who has discovered a temple leading into the heart of the volcano. He plans to gain access to it, but requires the assistance of the main character in finding the five Crystal Disks, which function as keys for the Keep.

Somewhere along the third chapter, lizard-men type enemies also start appearing at various spots in the island, and their population begins to grow. These lizard warriors fall into connection with the Volcano Keep, and their appearance becomes a a bit of a mystery and a nuisance.

After a series of quests to get the Crystal Disks, the player along with the inquisition enters the volcano keep. Here the player along with the inquisition defeats many lizard warriors, and traverses the depths of the volcano to find Lord Ursegor. (Lord Ursegor was a human who had sought to control the power of the titans, but had been cursed by the gods to remain bound to his throne even after his death.) Also, a Fire Titan has been imprisoned in the keep.

It is then revealed that Faranga had been protected by the storms because of the Titan's presence, while the mainlands have been ravaged by the other Titans, which were set free when the Gods were exiled by humanity. Inquisitor Mendoza seeks to gain control of the Fire Titan inside the volcano, in order to defeat the other Titans. In removing the Titan from its prison, Faranga would become vulnerable to the mystical storms and would effectively be sacrificed for the sake of humanity.

After releasing Ursegor from the curse which tethered his spirit to his corpse in the Volcano Keep, the player sets out to find the Titan Lord's armor pieces, so that he can gain access to the Fire Titan and defeat Mendoza. The armor pieces were sealed in the ruins with some Undead Priests; the player explores the risen ruins, retrieves the armor and enters the Volcano Keep behind Mendoza. Mendoza turns mad and is defeated by the player. After that, the player banishes the Fire Titan after defeating him in battle.

Platform Differences

Risen has up till now received conflicting reception due to massive technical differences between the PC and Xbox 360 versions. Reviewers mostly praised the PC version,while the Xbox 360 version is panned as technically inferior. It is worth of noting the differences between the PC and Xbox 360 version when referring to the scores. Risen has a Metacritic rating of 58% for the Xbox 360 version and 77% for the PC version.

Soundtrack

The music for Risen was composed by Kai Rosenkranz.

PC System Requirements

• Recommended System Requirements