The start of Sacred 2 allows you to choose from a group of six character classes, these include your standard fantasy classes such as High Elf, Shadow Warrior and the High Priest Inquisitor but you also have some original classes like the energy based Temple Guardian, the ethereal Seraphim and also wood imp Dryad. Each one has their own weapon sets and powers like simple swords and arrows to start with but through playing the game you are able to customize them beyond the original settings.

 

 

I made a slight schoolboy error on starting this game and went straight onto the online quick start which literally dumps you on an island, no tutorial or anything, just you, on a beach and a few dirt trails to follow. As you walk around you come across a few turtles to kill and a couple of baddies which you dispose of with relative ease. As you progress you are shown a few new hints like weapon management. Each weapon you can put to a face button, plus with the press of the RT and LT you can bring up even more slots to fill with weapons and magic. This idea really works well and makes weapon management quick and simple especially in large battles. You can also place potions and certain magical powers to the d-pad, again making the basic controls very easy to get to without any menu's to navigate.

 

Only through walking around and generally killing all in your way will you start to meet people and open quests, you have the main quest line which is slightly different for each character but there are also loads of side quests to kill time with. When you start a game you are asked to carry out a light or dark quest, occasionally the game will branch allowing you to do good deeds or become a nasty S.O.B.

 

Unlike other console fantasy quest games the addition online mode makes a huge difference, you can either host or just quick join an ongoing game, at all times keeping the same characters and treasures from both your single and multiplayer exploits. If there are other players on the server try to find them as soon as you can then team up and take on the bigger quests as this is where the game really starts to work. You can have four players total online, each battling the never ending hordes and trading all of your treasures.

 

After a bit more menu flicking I actually found the single player mode, which in reality is exactly the same other than you are going solo. There are a few cutscenes driving the rather poor story about the leaking of T-energy and a brief introduction of your selected character. Whilst it is fun it does get monotonous and lacks the team-play that you get with the online modes.

 

 

The slightly angled top down perspective takes some getting used to as when zoomed in it is too close and even when pulled back you have little to look at, so rather than landmarks to guide you around you rely more on the map that you have to continually bring up mid action to get your bearings. There are thankfully warp locations that you can activate as and when you find them, making this huge map a lot easier to traverse.

 

Graphically the game is a bit limp, the characters look basic with some poor animations and the baddies also look a bit generic, the environments though look great and once you move away from the initial fields and beaches the game really starts to shine. I suppose this is a trade off for having such a huge map with no load times. There are a few slowdown moments when the action gets hectic plus a little pop-up on, which I even managed to experience on the title screen, oh well no game is perfect I guess.

 

Sacred 2 is a game that reminds me of Baldur’s Gate on the PS2 or even the Diablo on the PC with its constant fighting to gain experience and upgrade to get even more powerful weapons. If you enjoyed these games this is definitely worth a try, but for newcomers it could be a confusing start to this genre.