Sacred 2: Fallen Angel Review

Sacred 2: Fallen Angel is the sequel to one of the most fun Diablo clones to date. The excitement I had to be able to take this game for a spin was enormous and I had very high hopes to be pleasantly overwhelmed with enjoyment. From the second I clicked the icon to start the game I got very worried. There I was clicking on the icon for Sacred 2 being extremely happy that no CD was required in the drive to play. I knew there had to be a catch…then it popped up before my eyes. All CD-Keys are authenticated online and cannot be reused without an override key from the company. Overall this was discouraging and I probably would have rather had to use the CD.

Sacred 2 takes many of the features of the original and holds onto it tightly. The mounts are still in the game as well as the mounted combat and the ability to make your own ability combos. The leveling and skill system are exactly the same. This includes putting 1 attribute point into one of 6 attributes which increase various stats as well as 1 skill point per level which can be distributed among which ever skills you have added to your list up to this point in the game. Spells and abilities get stronger via circular runes named after the ability they level up. With the game having co-op campaign, PVP arena, PVE arena, and free mode as options for multiplayer there are plenty of ways to play this game. The PVE arena simply pits the players against wave after wave of increasingly harder enemies to see how long they can survive. While PVP arena is simply player VS player combat, free mode allows the players to explore the entirety of the game world without being locked out from certain areas.

There are 6 character classes each able to choose which god it honors and by doing this gains certain abilities. All but 2 of the classes can be good or evil. The Seraphim can only be good while the Inquisitor can only be evil. The other classes are the High Elf, Dryad, Shadow Warrior, and the Temple Guardian. Each has their own unique play style and side quests determined by both the god you honor and if you are good or evil.

The graphics in Sacred 2 were a large improvement from the previous Sacred but had a very annoying glitch to it that made white sparkles flash across the green areas of the game. I am not sure if it is a bloom effect to show the sun shining off each blade of grass but I found it to be rather distracting and at times it would hurt my eyes. The spell graphics as well as the character models were well done and very flashy. Many of the monsters/creatures/NPCs seemed like recycled models and had no variation. As far as sound goes many of the spells and abilities had sounds that went well with what was happening on screen and really helped draw the player in.

Sacred 2‘s gameplay mechanics followed the same as the previous Sacred as well as Diablo. Left click is attack and move and right click is your special ability. However, Sacred 2 does not have any mana and instead uses T-Energy which can be thought of as a cool-down for all spells and abilities. Once your T-Energy has regenerated you can use another ability. This system limits spamming spells/abilities when in combat and forces you to more strategically use your abilities. It is apparent, however, that this game is riddled with bugs from talking to NPCs and no text being shown but receiving a random quest to strange pop up messages about an ID number when killing enemies. The worst one being that the game will crash each time you alt tab out of the game without remorse with no auto save to restore from.

Final Verdict

Sacred 2 is everything as much as the first game was but with updated graphics. The only reason I can’t give this game a higher score are the horribly annoying graphical anomalies and missing NPC text as well as the random crashes without any auto saves. Hopefully, Ascaron will bring out a patch to solve the these problems. If they do then this game should be just as good as the original if not better, but for now I am sticking with the score you see below.

Score

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