RAVENSWORD SHADOWLANDS BOOK CRASH UPDATE

Ravensword also takes a half-hearted effort in giving players something different to do from the combat a couple of hours in with a dinosaur-riding sequence, but that part of the game is genuinely painful in execution. I came across one book in all my time in Ravensword, and yes, it was interesting, but one book is hardly enough to build a compelling in-game history. I spent hours and weeks building up a library of books filled with interesting stories and lore in Skyrim, for instance.

The secret strength of the Elder Scrolls games is the non-combat stuff that you can do. The best you’ll ever get from Ravensword is a Non-Player Character (NPC) telling you which location to visit next. There are no characters in this game that have anything interesting to say. The central city is almost empty of people, and that lonely soul that you come across from time to time has nothing interesting to say. It takes about two hours for the game’s weaknesses to become apparent, and it’s about then that the game stops offering that wow factor. Purely based on the visuals this looks like a game that could compete with the B-grade console RPGs, such as Risen 2 or Two Worlds 2.

RAVENSWORD SHADOWLANDS BOOK CRASH UPDATE

There’s plenty of loot around to ensure that characters are decked out in decent gear quickly, and indeed I would suggest that an update should balance that out a bit better because as it stands the game is not that challenging.Īll of it is nice, and I really can’t emphasise enough just how good this game looks in motion on the iPad. As heroes level up there’s a limited range of specialisations available to customise your hero into the standard magic user, sneaky rogue and brutal warrior types. A generous lock on prevents unnecessary deaths, and simple virtual buttons are arrayed nicely around the screen to allow players comfortable control over their hero. It’s a very linear experience and players are gently guided through the story at a snappy pace, but because environments are so expansive there is a nice sense of scale to what you’re doing.Ĭombat works much like an Elder Scrolls game.

At any given time players will be wandering around the standard fantasy environments, slicing and dicing a limited (but attractive) range of enemies and juggling a single “main” quest with one or two side quests. It’s not that Ravensword lacks for entertainment value though, because it’s really quite engaging. It’s not quite as bad as a Gameloft or Circle Entertainment knock-off, but nothing about Ravensword stands up and says “this is proof that iOS gaming can be as compelling as console titles.” Not when it’s so inferior to the games that inspired it. Like Aralon before it, Ravensword feels like nothing more than a cheap clone of Bethesda games. It shares the breathtaking sense of scale in its visual art style as its clear inspiration, and it goes out of its way to cultivate a sense that the game is as non-linear and open as anything from Bethesda.Īnd I contend that that is a very poor decision on behalf of the developer, Cresent Moon Studios. If you squint, Ravensword looks like an Elder Scrolls game.

Ravensword shadowlands book crash