Sacred 2: Fallen Angel Review
Written By Gaetano Prestia
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel is the latest in a recent line of action-RPG’s to hit consoles. Unlike other titles in the genre, this game doesn’t follow the traditional and straightforward start-to-finish direction, giving you the ability to play it at your own pace, how you want and when you want. There’s the massive final boss fight and ultimately an end, but there’s so much variety and action throughout Sacred 2, that it’s difficult to bundle it together with other recent games in the genre. It genuinely feels like a breath of fresh air, providing a challenging and overall intriguing experience through its surprisingly strong narrative and great combat gameplay. Although not perfect, Sacred 2 has plenty to offer for diehards of the genre, but what can it offer for non-fans of the genre?
There are multiple classes/ranks in Sacred 2, all of which can be achieved by playing through the some 500 quests on offer. There are two separate main campaigns – light and dark – both of which have you embarking on a wild adventure as an energy called T-Energy brings the land together to create magic and life. It’s your typical run-of-the-mill, so-bad-it’s-good plot that is executed well for the most part through decent cut-scenes and voice acting.
The classes range from spell casters, hybrids and wizards, all of which have a near-infinite amount of customization options that allow you to play the game however you wish. This is definitely one of Sacred 2's best aspects, as the game really allows you to play the game almost exactly as you’d want to. Your character can be evolved and shaped into anything you want within the basic class ranges, so the depth is there when it comes to the character customization.
The development of your character is very wide-open, with the game really encouraging you to take different directions and risks with your characters customization early on in the game. As you progress, the number of choices decreases, so you have plenty on offer just as you start the game off. This is actually a really great direction for the character development, as you can mould your character early on and create a consistent personality from the start. While that way may add a sense of progression for the character, the ability to choose from so many options early on gives you that sense of choice because there’s so much on offer. Because of this, you’re more interested in what you choose and more decisive, therefore becoming more connected to the character.
As you progress through the game, you can also unlock specific transport by using gold obtained from completing a quest. Buying a Spider or Saber-Tooth is a great way to move through the map quickly, as it’s a rather large map that can take a while to move through. The game really makes you work for things like this though, not letting you get the pleasures of life in the land without earning them beforehand. If you think moving through the land initially is tedious, you’d best start completing some quests and working up your gold storages to get things moving a bit quicker.
There are plenty of portals around the map, which can be used to transport your character to other areas of the land. However, only one of these can be turned on at any one time, so choosing which one to open and when is an important decision to make when deciding to open one up. Portals are located quite frequently, but they won’t cut out running and exploring all together, as the map is large enough to have a portal and quest spread far a part from one another that you’ll need transport between them.
The biggest challenge this title faced when coming to consoles was whether or not it would be able to make a successful transition from PC. Thankfully, Sacred 2 is proof that a PC-based RPG can be made on consoles. The controls are solid and accessible, without any awkward button placement. The triggers and four face buttons are used for spells and attacks, and it’s a pretty basic set-up that actually makes combat a treat to be involved in. You’ll be raining terror down onto enemies with ease, causing havoc across the land as you master your spell button placement and learn your character’s strengths and weaknesses.
Sacred 2 has a surprisingly enjoyable multiplayer experience, offering two-player co-op via local play, and four-player co-op online over XBOX Live and PSN. The campaign is open in full to tackle with your friends, but you can also go head-to-head against your mates in the interesting and fun PvP that takes place in the large world. It’s great that a game with already so much depth and length has a pretty enjoyable co-op mode to get involved in.
The title has a distinctive charm throughout, from the audio to the graphics, with great attention to detail in the villages. The backgrounds are hand-drawn, which look surprisingly gorgeous, although the game seems to struggle with the draw distance.
The Final Verdict
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel isn’t a perfect game, but there’s plenty to like about it. While it has its problems, none of them are really worth even discussing, as they wouldn’t influence your decision either way. They’re relatively minor and are buried under the great gameplay configuration and graphical charm the game has on offer. The character customization is a real treat, and with 500 quests, plenty of great boss battles and a cool and nicely executed story, Scared 2: Fallen Angel is a great action-RPG. The hack-and-slash gameplay might get repetitive, but if you're a diehard fan of the genre, you're probably used to that. It's essentially what makes an action-RPG an actual action-RPG.