Sacred 2 Stopped Making Me Weep

Sacred 2 has this way of luring you back for more--even with its faults!

It pleases me to say that after becoming a little bored with the Shadow Warrior--with it's monotonous melee--I decided to create a different character, a Dryad, and give Sacred 2 another shot. It's not that I dislike Sacred 2, it's that it's got so much potentoil and it's first impression was spoiled! Hey, I gotta keep trying, man. I just love these dungeon crawlers ok?

So I headed in another direction and went with a ranged class to see how differently it would play. The Dryad class can use melee weapons like the Shadow Warrior, but really, it's built for ranged combat. I have to say, after playing for several hours, I am really enjoying my time playing the Dryad. Sure, chalk it up to personal preference perhaps but it really feels like this game was built for bows-and-magic on the consoles (not the PC.) Come’on, this is coming from a guy who hated the “push-the-stick” melee in Too Human but loved the Marksmen class--it just feel right.

With the class change I dutifully played a few more hours of the game (roughly 4). Unfortunately with in that time I noticed a few more obtrusive issues with the game. Thankfully none of these are deal breakers, at least not for me. Before I get to those I want to reiterate—I am now enjoying this game! unfortunately It’s not as refined as I would like it to be.

However, with that being said....

I cannot find a way to blacksmith in the field despite obtaining the skill to do so. I've checked around on several forums, asked a few people and it appears that this is a common issue amongst players. It’s a nice skill to have as Blacksmiths just aren’t prevalent in the game.

When browsing the inventory there are two options available to you—“Details” and “Compare”. "Details" allows you to—are you ready for this—see more details about a particular item! "Compare" allows you to....see more details about an item! Yes the problem is--both buttons do the exact same thing. This is another very useful feature that would make life easier when upgrading and selling items. Anyone know what's going on with this?

In my previous post I complained about the act of Looting. I'm happy to report that the "catch all" collection system now feels really good and makes my little pavlovian brain salivate with it's "Cha-ching" sound effects.
Just to note--and not to complaint--gone is the color system the PC version of the game uses to identify power level and importance of items and weapons (a la Word of Warcraft) and replacing it is a star system. It works well and I see no real difference between using the two. I'm wondering if perhaps the change took place to better suite colorblind gamers?

Overall—this game is beginning to win me over and I'm excited about that.

Anyone up for some coop? :)