The Dying World Takes a Chance with Change

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GreedFall 2: The Dying World Preview Trouble in Paradise Taking a Pause Set the Timer and Let It Bake

GreedFall 2: The Dying World Preview

While it might not have the same name recognition as some games, Spiders’ 2019 RPG GreedFall can safely be called a cult fan favorite. With a unique setting and narrative, GreedFall also explored its characters and 18th-century setting pretty thoroughly. Five years later, we have a sequel, which is actually a prequel. GreedFall 2: The Dying World takes place three years before the events of the first game.

Trouble in Paradise

The game begins on Teer Fradee, an island paradise that featured prominently in GreedFall. Instead of playing a colonial-era explorer, players take the role of a Teer Fradeean native named Vriden Gerr. Ultimately, the narrative takes the Vriden from Teer Fradee to the mainland, a nicely symmetric flip from the first game. Much of the early game’s dialogue is in an invented native tongue with subtitles, although there are natives who have learned English. Those with an allergy to reading, take note. Skipping through the dialogue will leave you (even more) confused. Aside from the invented language, which sounds absolutely authentic, GreedFall 2’s art design for the Teer Fradee native culture is impressive. A lot of time was obviously invested in establishing a believable world. Overall, while the developers obviously have a strong vision for the narrative, the dialogue is fairly expository and rarely reads (or sounds) artful or natural.

Only about a third of the final game has been released in Early Access. The narrative is therefore naturally incomplete. As a young native of Teer Fradee who is coming of age, this conveniently allows for the player to learn combat mechanics as part of a native rite. The story, in very broad strokes, initially involves Vriden Gerr trying to get to the source of a mysterious illness that is killing native wildlife and spreading to people. Eventually, he and his companions find themselves on the mainland and the narrative kicks into gear.

Taking a Pause

Aside from switching the point of view from colonials to natives, Spiders has really mixed up combat and some of the RPG mechanics from the first game. The approach is now real-time combat with a tactical pause. The player can hit the shoulder button, pause the game, and assign up to three actions to the party members using a modified overhead view before starting the clock again. It is also possible to ignore the tactical pause and more or less treat combat like a traditional ARPG. I enjoyed Spiders’ Steel Rising, one of the better Soulslikes from a couple of years ago. Unfortunately, I found combat — at least so far — in GreedFall 2 far less satisfying, with some pretty rough animations and not much impact.

However, that might be because combat, though not Vriden’s last resort, is certainly not the focus of the game, either. Exploration, diplomacy, and stealth are more important for moving the story forward and completing objectives. It’s often possible to avoid combat through smart dialogue choices, smooth-talking, and sneaking.

There are no pre-rolled classes in GreedFall 2. Instead, the player character (and all party members) draws from several skill trees when upgrading. These are pretty common kinds of RPG skills around tanking, healing, buffing, dexterity, and magic. It seems like a relatively deep and flexible system. It allows for some impressive combat scenarios and synergized actions.

While characters can be thoroughly customized in terms of their skills, weapons, and abilities, the same isn’t true about their physical appearance. The game has a shockingly rudimentary character editor, with some stock faces and hairstyles. Let’s hope this aspect of the game gets a lot of attention during Early Access.

Set the Timer and Let It Bake

GreedFall 2: The Dying World enters Early Access with a decent amount of game to explore and the beginnings of an intriguing narrative. Developers have suggested that what’s currently available is around 25% of the game, meaning the final release will be a substantial RPG, as was the first game. The game’s world-building is excellent. Unfortunately, the game also enters Early Access in a technically very rough state. I experienced many crashes, graphical bugs, pop-ins, and a large number of broken or bugged quests. Skipping dialogue or cutscenes seemed to trigger a lot of issues and bugs.

The original GreedFall launched with a lack of polish as well, but many fans waited patiently as the issues were (mostly) addressed, and in the end the experience was memorable. In its current form GreedFall 2: The Dying World is a bit disappointing. Hopefully, player feedback and developer attention will help craft the final game into the accomplished and engaging sequel that so many have been asking for.

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