So… me and Lovisa have been playing quite a lot of Sacred 2 by now, logging in over 100 hours in total spread over multiple characters on both the Xbox 360 and PS3 version, and we have noticed that both platforms have their own set of bugs and quirks. But before digging deeper into that, let’s summarize the console version of Sacred 2: The Fallen Angel:
Sacred 2 is the prequel to Sacred, a “Diablo clone” that never made it past computers when it was released back in 2004 (just recently made the jump to Linux as well). I never played the original game, but playing the console version of the second has definitely spurred my interest. Calling it just a “Diablo clone” is a bit unfair. It’s more like a WoW single player remake clone. There’s a ton of quest, seriously. My Dryad that’s like 15% through the main campaign has done over 150 side-quests already. While most quests are just about as shallow as the ones in WoW, there are also deep lines that goes far, just like in WoW…. but nobody camps your quest mobs 
While there’s basically no choices to make, besides the one at the start where you choose class and alligament (the evil and good campaign takes you through different paths over the world on Ankaria), the quests are easy enough to do quick and you get decent rewards from them. It’s not a deep RPG like Baldur’s Gate after all, but more a linear free-roam action RPG with heavy focus on action. There’s tons of monsters to kill and you’re more or less constantly under attack… think Diablo and you get the idea. You can just roam the world and kill who you want, but if you want to progress through the story, the path is set. We usually follow the main story path and run around the waypoints doing whatever sidequests we may find. It’s really mindless, but damn fun. A shooter fan’s RPG if you may.
Anyhow, there are bugs, and quite a few of them. And besides that there’s some odd differences between the two versions. Here’s a brief list:
Contrast: almost too low on the PS3 and a tad high on the Xbox 360. The 360 also has extra vibrancy to the colors, making it almost too heavy a feast on your eyes.
Framerate drops: The PS3 has less consistent framerates, but the Xbox has to stop to rebuffer the next part of the map more frequently. The PS3 also has problems drawing the high rez textures straight away at times, letting you run in textural mud while it redeems that. Overall the PS3 gives a slightly less uninterrupted experience, but it’s a close one.
Input bugs: Both versions has trouble acknowledging jump spells where you target where you want to jump. It doesn’t happen often, and usually it’s because there’s something in the way to complete the jump… but it can be really annoying when you can’t see the cause. The Xbox also has a really interesting input sensitivity setting, where you start to walk on the weakest possible input of the analogue sticks… which means that if the stick doesn’t reset completely when you let, you’re auto-walking at minimum speed.
Skill bugs: On the 360, if you find a rune for a new spell/skill, and you go to the page where you view these, it looks like the newly learnt spell is fully upgraded (all spells can be tweaked in three steps to your liking, sort of like the talents and skills in WoW and Diablo 2, only you don’t get a spellboost point every level) and trying to upgrade a spell in one school of magic/combat can sometime open the customization window for a different school instead. This only happens on the 360 version.
Lost mounts: At times when playing same screen coop on the PS3, the second player’s mount disappears completely, like the character doesn’t own one. At times the only way to get it back is to switch over to that character’s campaign to “reclaim” the mount and then go back. Since this means having to quit the game and log over to another account on the PS3, it’s very annoying.
Blocked trades: On the PS3 version it has happened a few times that we haven’t been allowed to trade between our characters, because one character’s save gam,e couldn’t be verified online. Since This probably is a hacking prevention system I guess it’s ok to take. But once again the solution is to log over to the other character’s account and back.
Stuck outside the door: another bug that happens every now and then is that when you enter a cave/cellar/whateverrequiresthegametoloadanewsetting one of the two players sharing a system can get stuck outside. Only way to get in is for the person who actually got inside to head out again and then go back in.
Despite all these bugs, this is probably the best action RPG for cooperative play on consoles in ages. Not that there’s much competition… unfortunately. But we can both strongly recommend it for people interested in the genre.
