The Two Worlds games are some of the best RPGs I've played. Though a lot of people hated Two Worlds 1, and most people view Two Worlds 2 as an "Meh" kind of game, I find them most enjoyable. The whole idea (at least from what I gather) is that Two Worlds games are not so much about the destination, but are rather focused on the journey there.
The first Two Worlds game is fun in a way that's hard to describe. I suppose you could say it's addictive, but it's a little deeper than that. At the time of its release, many criticized it for the voice acting, the poorly structured plot line, the terrible mount controls, some useless perks, and some notably overpowered enemies. Oh, and the fact that the most attractive female in the game is...... the Hero's sister. Although hated by many Oblivion fans, I found that most, if not all, of these "issues" really enhanced the game, though not in the traditional way. For starters, the voice acting is pretty horrible. It pretty much circles all the way through every amount of terrible, and comes right back to being good. "So bad it's good", is an apt way to describe it. Though it could be game breaking for some people, I found that after a while, it wasn't really that bad, once I'd gotten used to it and grew to accept it. The poor story line didn't bother me too badly either. Again, for a game that focuses on the journey, and not the destination, it's not as bad as it could be, and is mostly an enjoyable "extra feature"-esque addition to the game. The mount controls weren't that bad either. In Two Worlds, the horse doesn't like scraping its side up against a rock or a tree, and for that matter, real life Horses don't like that either. And again, horses in Two Worlds don't like going up or down steep hills, and real don't either. The controls and behavior of the horses was annoying and downright frustrating at times, but they were realistic and were easy to master once I'd played enough to be able to pick out my paths more carefully. The useless perks were just that, useless. You could spend your perk points on "Un-horsing" enemies, but there were no mounted enemies, at all. Which made the skill useless, unless you were going to use it in Multiplayer. The overpowered enemies weren't so much an issue to me as they were a challenge. If you thought you could just waltz into a new area and kick the butt of every creature you came across, you were downright crazy. The enemies in new areas never "Level up" with your skill, so if you want to start exploring in a new area, you have to explore the current area and do a lot of grinding and loot collecting to keep going to the next. It's not so much of a burden as it is an incentive to keep playing and pushing yourself onwards. It's all part of the "Journey" and I think it's very well done.
There's no real "Crafting" system in Two Worlds, but there's a very good weapon and armor upgrading system in its place. If you find two of the same weapon (eg, two "Destroyer" maces) you can combine them to make an even more powerful weapon of the same type. Weapons are ranked in "Classes" so if you combine two "Class 1" "Orc Slayer" Swords, you'll create a "Class 2" "Orc Slayer" sword. Enchanting these weapons is as easy. In the world, you can find enchanting crystals that do various damages, such as fire, ice, poison, or spirit damage. Combining these crystals with your current weapon adds that new type of damage to your weapon. So you can have a sword with 50 slash damage, and 50 fire damage, leading to some pretty powerful hits. Though nothing new, the system is very well done, and makes looting a very valuable part of the game.
Yet another well-executed aspect of the game is the exploration. The game world is completely open, and it's massive. Instead of a system of fast travel, each town has a Teleport that has to be activated before you can use it. There are also Personal Teleports that can be obtained, so if you find yourself in a pinch needing to head back to a town to pick up some potions, you can just lay down a personal teleport to instantly travel back to a town with a teleport that you've activated in the past. I'm no fan of fast travel, but the system presented in Two Worlds leaves little to be desired. It's more or less a perfect hybrid between fast travel and traditional travel.
The combat in Two Worlds isn't bad either. There's very little variation between combat animations and the combat isn't near realistic, but it's fun nonetheless. Leveling up and searching dead bodies and chests really doesn't get old, and I soon found myself one-hit-killing most of the creatures that beat the snot out of me early on. There was something overwhelmingly satisfying about finding an axe that did some real damage to those Orc bandits, and then a few hours and levels later, finding an even better weapon that one hit killed em. There are also some enemies are are immune to certain types of weapons. The Stone Golem was barely scratched by a sword that could beat the living daylights out of Cyclops, but could have his butt handed to him by a decent hammer or mace. This made the game feel even more realistic, in a way, and even makes sense (hitting a sword against a rock doesn't do much more than dull the sword).
There's so much more to say about it, but the best way to explain it is for you to pick it up yourself. Two Worlds 1 isn't perfect by a far stretch, but it's incredibly addictive and fun in a very deep way. I'd wholeheartedly recommend it to someone looking for a good 40-50 hours (if not more) of fun. And right now, it's only $1.50 on Amazon.com.
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