The setting is basically a pirate story. We have pirates, ships and firearms. Though Piranha Bytes emphasizes that they're trying to avoid cliché pirates (with parrots on their shoulder and stuff like that). They think more of "bandits sailing the seas", not "Pirates of the Caribbean". The game starts on the island of Caldera. Here, the last remnants of the Inquisition have gathered in the crystal fortress and are still trying to fight the Titans. Unfortunately, a bunch of sea monsters causes trouble and the ships which were supposed to bring important supplies get lost on the sea.
We play the hero from Risen 1. However, he is now a broken and disillusioned person who turned to alcohol.:bottle::bottle:

A comparison is made to John McLane in "Die Hard 3". He wears an eye patch that hides the Inquisitor's ocular from Risen 1. The game starts with Carlos (known from Risen 1) who orders the hero to help deal with another wrecked ship on the shores of the island. Among the castaways, there's another old friend: Patty. She is still searching for her father and rumour has it that he found some way to sail the seas unharmed. They team up to find him.
The world will be bigger than Risen 1 and split into several islands. This allows to easily realise different climates and landscapes (no need to smoothly blend from one landscape to the other). These islands are each a new loading zone (doberlec told me that they still use streaming in each zone, so it's kind of "worst of both worlds" ). How many islands there will be, how much they will differ from each other and how big they will be, remains a secret.
You use ships to travel between the islands but it is unknown if this will just be a scripted point-to-point transport or if you can control and navigate your own vessel.:cigar:
Combat and magics system have been completely redone but no further details are given. Except that ranged combat is now done with rifles. The combat with them is governed by a skill just like archery in previous titles. You can also fire cannons at pre-defined points of the story.
The characters are more detailed and will show basic facial expressions during conversations. The armour consists of individual sets of boots, gloves, hats, upper and lower clothing etc. The textures will be sharper and more individual. Animations are going to be more smoothly and detailed.
The game concept will be basically an inversion of the one from Risen 1. In R1, you started with an relatively open world where you were left alone to explore, gain knowledge and get to know the world. After a while, the story gained more speed and you concentrated more and more on the main quest - until the very linear end. R2 starts relatively linear and leads the player. After a while, the world opens up and you can play more freely and gain more influence over events. The end game of R1 disappointed many players and by this method, PB tries to keep the game more interesting even in the later chapters.
There will also be development cost reducers helpers like minimap, quest markers and other visual immersion breakers aids. The PC Games assumes that these can be disabled but apparently does not know for sure. Hence, it is also unclear whether a Risen 2 with removed training wheels will still be playable or whether the quest design will depend on the usage of these elements.
Apropos quest design: It is said that it will be more logical and believable. They try to avoid quests which will send to across the entire world for some stupid delivery task and stuff like that. An example quest is from the third chapter in the city of Antigua. The player needs a cannon (for what purpose is not revealed). For that, he requires the help of an expert named Wilson. Wilson does not want to help the player because there's an embargo and he's afraid to break it and get into trouble. Now you have several options to resolve this. You can just bribe him with enough money to make the trouble seem worthwhile or you can talk to him. With the information revealed during this conversation you can either help him score with a woman (because he has not done so in a while) or you can help him retrieve a family heirloom. Both options then offer different solutions as well. For example, the current owner of the heirloom can be beaten up, bribed, offered a dual or you can steal the item.
Another element is that eavesdropping will be rewarded. An example given is that you can hear two NPCs talking about a third one guarding a treasure. While the referred person seems to be very careful in general, you can also learn when exactly he'll leave his post. That makes it easy for you to get the stuff. Those who do not open eyes and ears when walking across the world will miss some quests and possible solutions.
The final rating of the article's author reads: "Very good". But it's an exclusive preview, so that was to be expected.