Made a amazing first impression on me, the characters, story, cutscenes, combat...
Pros:
Story is awesome, good character chemistry and voice work. Some mad cutscene / comic art work between level transitions to ease you in between the chapters.
Graphics are brilliant! good lighting effects, some insane model detail and animations.
Difficulty is very well balanced, combat is simpler and quite easier to use than its predecesor but offers greater room for improvement resulting in a broad degree of difficulty surrounding each encounter.
Doesn't bombard you with all these skills and abilities, slowly eases you in to a structured skill tree without it feeling as if you have a limited choice in your skills.
Best part which I thought added better feel to the battles was battle preparation with potions and quickslot selection. Makes the battles seem more structured and adds a level of strategy to the fights.
Cons:(had to think hard)
My computer struggles on max settings, but with SOAA turned off I got a good FPS rate.
Some voice work sounded a bit unconvincing and slightly dull at times (minor amounts).
Combat can be a bit laggy when blocking, adding massive frustration to the fights lol (could be just me?)
Severe lack of sound options (Logitech G35 headphones) seemed to not funciton with the manufactures drivers, but worked when using standard win7 stock drivers. Something todo with 6 and 8 channel compatibility?
Overall:
Great so far, I rarely make first impression reviews but this was different. Definitely a worthy successor!