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^ Disables annoying blur and other filters that make the game look ungraciously. After this everything should be clear.


As for the review, first of all if you've never played any of Two Worlds games you definitely need to start with the first one. It still remains to be the best in the series and the only one that is a good game. Two Worlds II and add-ons are just average, including this one.

The island in this expansion has an eerie and gloomy atmosphere, quite pleasant if you enjoy grim aura. As a fan of Lovecraft I liked the fact that there is a friendly village of fish-like humanoids worshipping Cthulhu, and who give you a quest to fight another group and eventually Dagon. That's the gist of atmosphere of this expansion. Furthermore, the story in Call of Tenebrae is not overly complex, but still it's way more than I expected. Quests related to the main story are alright, but side ones are just boring fetch quests. Dialogues are fairly boring as well, I often just skipped some parts as they were too dull. The gameplay is mediocre, same as TW2. Unfortunately a large amount of combat encounters ruins it a bit, there should be significantly less of it since it's not good and fighting frustrates in the end. In addition, there are many cutscenes without audio and some dialogues were not recorded.

Overall, it's a very mediocre and short expansion. Decent atmosphere and story is shrouded by subpar dialogues, combat and straight-forward quests. Would I recommend it? If you never played the series, then play the first Two Worlds, don't even consider starting with this expansion. However, if you have, and were not overly bored with TW2 and are alright with more of it, then Call of the Tenebrae is a decent expansion to go through in 4-5 hours, but only for a cheap price.

Mediocre/10. If you need junky RPG fix and already finished all good games in the genre, then go for it - you probably won't get bored before it finishes. Otherwise not worth the bother.

Really fun but super janky, as is the norm for any Two Worlds title. I would venture a word with this one though, it really should have spent a bit more time in the development oven before releasing as it's loaded with weird bugs that do impact gameplay. Call of the Tenebrae is mostly playable as a standalone release but note it has no tutorial so those new to the series will likely spend the first hour blundering about until the controls are discovered. You literally load into the game world with a nearly max-level character heaped with tons of awesome gear you're not likely to swap out for discovered items later on, which is a bit shocking.

Voice acting is mostly good so far, although lip sync outside of the major characters seems to be nonexistent. Dorchad, the village / town you start the game in, is where the majority of side quests originate so I'd suggest spending time running around talking to all the locals before moving on with the main quest - which is very short by the way, in the region of three hours so the meat and potatoes of this title are in the non-essential quests. The side quest variety makes up for the lackluster main quest, the highlight so far being leading a drunk guy back home while his mind conjures fantastical beasts you must fight off...well apart from the friendly pink rhino, that is.

I mentioned the bugs for good reason, as I've had several quests stop working for seemingly no reason. A missing cow I had to lead back to a local farmer didn't register as returned when led into her enclosure. Harvested animal parts needed to craft a fake species for a naturalist fail to register when in my inventory. Wage and safety disputes between a miners union and the mine owner loves to break then start working again on the next load up. Usually a reload fixes these issues, but I've had to restart once now to successfully complete the lost cow quest. Aside from these, you'll notice glitches with some cutscenes where it's obvious this was intended as DLC and they never patched the old dialogue out.

I still suggest grabbing this despite the above (on sale, obviously), but then again I've always had a soft spot for this series. It's not a cult classic like RPGs released by Piranha Bytes, but if you like your games a little clunky and loaded with pop culture references and more than a few laugh out loud moments this game is hard to beat.

OK, why? Seriously, why? WHY?! Why did they make this? Long story short, what we have here is just a stand-alone copy of Call of the Tenebrae DLC. The original Two Worlds II campaign isn't there, multiplayer isn't there either, but in-built store that allows you to use real money to buy pay-to-win crap is. Of course it is. Because crappy publisher is crappy. Doesn't sound that bad, though. I mean, seriously. We had stand-alone DLC before, right? And yet... think about it.

First of all, they ask $14.99 for this. It's a pretty short DLC for a pretty old game. With a bloody pay-to-win store. Without multiplayer. And yet, they ask $14.99 for it. The original version of Call of the Tenebrae DLC, the one that requires the main Two Worlds II game, it's only $9.99. This one is $14.99. What... the f*ck?

The weird stuff doesn't stop there, though. Even though it wasn't the first DLC for Two Worlds II and it wasn't even the last, it was the only one to be released this way. And guess what? It's a pretty terrible DLC. The main campaign (that will cost you $19.99 and comes with both multiplayer and access to the other DLC, including cheaper version of this one) is bigger and better than this. Pirates of the Flying Fortress? Way better than this. This? It's just you running from A to B and killing stuff. In a pretty small and empty world. Without much optional stuff to do. And yet, here we are. A stand-alone release. Why?

Seriously, it only makes things more complicated. Because people who didn't even start with Two Worlds II yet (you did a very smart thing, guys, keep doing it) may feel seriously confused here. Do you need this expensive version? Or $9.99 is enough? First of all, you don't need either of them. Two Worlds II is a pretty bad game and this DLC is even worse (feel free to check my review of $9.99 version for more details). But if you're hardcore RPG genre fan who just wants to play every single RPG game out there, then go for $9.99 version.

Seriously, just get yourself the complete Two Worlds II bundle. By doing that, you'll get this DLC way cheaper and you will get access to all other DLC. Because if you'll pay for this? You'll stuck with just that. An expensive version of crappy DLC with no way to access the rest of Two Worlds II content. Including the multiplayer. But honestly, stay away from Two Worlds II completely. It's not the game you're looking for. Dixi.

It pains me to give negative review to a game from TW series, but I have no other option here. I played first TW game and I loved it. It had some minor issues but overall I had great time. TW 2 and Pirates DLC looked like solid games too. To play this standalone DLC I used my old save with character that had completed main game and Pirates DLC. I imported it (if you're planning to import your game too, I have howto written in game guides).

First thing I saw after import is chopped off content. my whole inventory turned into question marks for items from previous game. I can't drop it or get rid of these items in any way. Navigating inventory full of litter isn't fun.
Then achievements, you won't be getting 100% because for some unknown reason game asks for base game activities (and base game isn't included).
I spent hours on turning my char into archer (from mage) then turning him into warrior because I were unable to use bows efficiently. The reason for that - greatly worsened performance of the game compared to previous games. When I had solid FPS before now I had like 30-45 FPS as a base and it went even lower if in fight with many visual effects. Can't use a bow under such low FPS, it feels bad. Going with dual wield (swords) worked much better. And that's a mystery why this "updated" engine turned into resource hog if the game even looks worse than before. I'd say developers did no optimization whatsoever.

Loot. It lies like a dirt, everywhere. You're entering the house and there's more than 10 chests with loot. I can understand how it can be beneficial for new player (who has no money to buy things) or for magic user who has to farm for cards to make their spells, but for existing character it felt OP. There's no feeling of reward because every chest gives top tier loot.

Bugs. I had one quest where I had to communicate with one NPC from village. I needed him for 2 quests. Guess what, when I stepped inside the tavern he fell under floor and I only saw his hair. Can't speak to him, can't reset him. quests failed.

Camera. I have no idea what they did to it, but camera angles felt so bad. There was long dungeon consisted of tiny rooms and masked skeletons will shot you from all sides. It was a pain to manage camera. PS 1/2 games did it better.

No dialogs, no lipsync. Sound bugs thru all game (annoying).

"Innovations". That's what forced me to uninstall and look for ending on YT. Sure developers tried to add some new mechanics but the joke felt flat. While I tried to beat the camera in that tiny dungeon it started to shake screen every 2 seconds. Scripted event, but what's the purpose? To induce migraine or motion sickness? You're selling RPG game and instead of delivering RPG you want to shake it till someone throws up?

Screw you, devs. You had perfect games, you necroed it and the result is appalling.
Not recommended under any circumstances. Especially if you're a fan of the series. Don't upset yourself.

Played on Linux (Debian 10, Nvidia drivers) with steam play (Proton). Technically it worked no worse than on Windows but the game itself is in very bad shape.

This DLC is kinda too short. I guess its okay for an modern DLC, but Pirates of the Flying Fortress had set a bar there: it had more content and then there's a question of quality of that content. Call of the Tenebrae for that matter... mostly sucks? Side quests are annoying (who likes collecting myriad of different plants) and plain stupid (instead of being supposedly humorous). Main story is kind of just powering through a bunch of enemies, so if your character is weak at combat you'd probably spend a lot of time (and save/loads), but going as fire mage I had it finished in under 3 hours.

And then there's awful voice acting and awful animations. Something something remember, Two Worlds I? I'm not kidding, quite a few of animations are on that level. Thumbs down here, you did way better with original game.

What happened?
I loved TW2 and the first expansion. They worked fine, looked nice and offered a good experience.
This standalone expansion however.......
Who made it??

The first thing you realize: voice acting - it's ABYSMAL, worst I ever heard. It's kinda bad in the opening sequence, but when you reach the village.... ohh you're in for a surprise, because it kicks you out of the immersion in the game every time and you shudder and cringe. I can imagine random people from the street doing a better job with zero preparation.

Engine: broken. playing in DX9 doesn't work. DX10 is a fake by MS to force people to buy vista back in the day and the performance is terrifyingly bad. It looks slightly worse than the original TW2 (non HD, lol, what a dumb marketing word) but requires about 5 times the power to run, and even then it doesn't run smoothly. Also, it uses ONLY ONE CPU CORE properly. FML

Totally is a bad game. I am at level 60 and I can't even use my weapons to attack or defend, but if I pay $1.99 I can have a warrior pack to enable me to fight! Uninstall the game and that is what I did. Not worth the purchase. Both thumbs down.

I LIKE TW II HD, A BIG THUMBS UP FROM ME! I have not had any problems with this game at all. Starts good, graphics are excellent, controls are fluid, in other words it's great.There are some difficulties with both characters, Knight and Woodsman when it comes to weapons and their use. You are stuck with basic weapons and alternatives see you swinging like crazy to no effect while your health quickly circles the drain. The Woodsman has virtually no armor whatsoever and has to shoot and run, mainly run. I guess this will sort as the game progresses. Most comments are to the negative for TW II HD but you need to give them a chance, most seem to be concerned about everything else but the game.

Awesome expansion, but very flawed.

+ Storyline is great.
+ Tons of content, dozens and dozens of quests and areas to explore. Took me 50 hours to complete everything.
+ Even more detailed level design than in the first expansion which had more detailed level design than base game's already. Most of the stuff have better textures too.
+ A whole new soundtrack which is very beautiful and epic.
+ Much less glitchy and more stable than DLC version of this expansion.

- Half of the cutscenes do not have any sound.
- Very glitchy. Two side quests were glitched and I had to use cheat codes to complete them. In one quest the item wouldn't spawn, in another the dead body which had a quest item did not spawn. Glad you can bypass these issues with the right cheat codes.
- It's very long, but it's quantity over quality kind of thing. Some of the areas are clearly stretched out. There are some areas and dungeons which are huge and very samey looking the whole way, they are very repetitive and it feels.
- With this expansion Microtransactions were added to the game. Game's very easy so there's no way you'd ever need to buy any. They also removed some cheat codes which were for material item spawns, because of material item microtransactions.


8/10

I don't really know, how to rate this game. Two Worlds 2 was actually, underneath the technical issues, quite a good game. So i assume as actual content this here is as well. From what i've read, it's a decent game. So i give it the benefit of the doubt until i know more. But new players be aware of the no-tutorial issue below. MAybe buy TW2 for a few cent in a sale before.

This was very obviously in the drawer for TW2 as Addon (=todays DLC, just bigger)
Now they made it standalone and released it, years later.

Sadly the game was not adjusted to that change. And despite the HD label, it was NOT adjusted in any way to the higher resolutions of today. Which leads to 2 problems:

1. They have not added a new tutorial. They kinda assume you know how to play it from Two Worlds 2. As you would have, had this been an actual Two Worlds 2 DLC at the time. It's straight at the deep end with a fully fledged character. Combat, inventory, skill system are pretty obvious standard. Magic and soem items use is a bit tricky though.

2. They have not adjusted the interface. It's either way too big or parts of it way too small. There are options for 2 sizes.
First size ("resizable interface" ON) makes everything H U G E! Text, UI elements block huge parts of the screen. And feel extremely clunky.

Second size (off) makes it mostly much more managable. But on resolutions above Full HD (and even there) parts become absolutely T I N Y! The small HP bubble is barely visible. It's also half transparent... Which is a serious issue in combat.

"Best" workaround is the same as in TW2: UI set to "resizable" (i.e. HUGE) but options "small icons" in interface options and "UI use safe zone" in gameplay options. It's still huge but uses wide screens better. There was a interface mod for TW2, haven't found it yet. It was bad back then, they could have spent 10 minutes to fix it!

Also to recommend the options for the ingame console (enter) "cam.bank.move 0" and "cam.bank.rotate 0" without the ". To disable the absolutely horrible camera shaking and bobbing (in a 3rd person game!). Have to do it everytime but can use up-arrow key in the console to get last used commandos, even after restart.

Performance is obviously very good on todays PC's, graphics are still decent, controls (apart from the tutorial issue) are ok. It has flawless (except interface) out-of-the-box 21:9 widescreen support. Haven't had (yet) any major bugs.

PS: As for the microtransactions issue: They are nothing more than a joke for these old games. They are completely irrelevant, Therefore i absolutely don't care. And the console still works.