War has been waged across the kingdom of Myrtana. Orcish hordes
invaded human territory and the king of the land needed a lot of ore to forge enough weapons, should his army stand against this threat. Whoever breaks the law in these darkest of times is sentenced to serve in the giant penal colony of Khorinis, mining the so much needed ore.
The whole area, dubbed "the Colony", is surrounded by a magical
barrier, a sphere two kilometres diameter, sealing off the penal
colony from the outside world. The barrier can be passed from the
outside in – but once inside, nobody can escape. The barrier was a
double-edged sword - soon the prisoners took the opportunity and
started a revolt. The Colony became divided into three rivalling
factions and the king was forced to negotiate for his ore, not just
demand it.
You are thrown through the barrier into this prison. With your back
against the wall, you have to survive and form volatile alliances
until you can finally escape.
This game has been patched to the latest official version: 1.08k
Age requirements: ESRB Rating: TEEN with Blood, Suggestive Themes, Violence.
Minimum system requirements: Windows XP or Windows Vista, 1 GHz Processor (1.4 GHz recommended), 512MB RAM (1 GB recommended), 3D graphics card compatible with DirectX 7 (compatible with DirectX 9 recommended), Mouse, Keyboard.
Radeon X1*** series graphics cards cause a glitch in the game, where inventory icons would not be displayed, however the game remains playable.
A sometimes quirky but worthy addition to CRPGs
(by
MilkmanDan)
It's very surprising to me that I loved this game. I'm something of an old school RPG fan, I cut my teeths on Bard's Tale, Wasteland, Might & Magic, and the like. I never really liked any of the Elder Scroll games (not even Morrowind). Despite the similar presentation, this game does have an old school feel to it. The difficulty level is high enough, particularly in the... full review beginning, though I don't believe it was ever unfair. The biggest hurdle I've faced was the combat system, which to be honest I probably never got very good at, but I managed to be good enough at it to succeed. Regardless, you are definitely not an invincible hero that destroys everything in his path, you must learn how to survive. But it is refreshing that, whereas in other games you would simply be grinding random encounters to "level up," in Gothic you hunt animals for their meat, teeths, claws, and other tradeable or useful items. You hardly ever just "find" weapon, armor, or gear, you must have it crafted, loot it from other less fortunate explorers, or join one of the factions. And since the place takes place in a colony filled with convinced criminals, questions of ethics and morality will occasionally rise and are handled in what I thought was a sensible manner.
Gothic takes some getting used to, I'll admit. The controls are a bit clunky and seem to frustrate first-time players. But once you get past the learning curve, it's a great game (as is the sequel). The setting is grim, suiting the tough-guy character you play, and full of surprises. And it's a diffcult game to master in the early stages. Nothing's easy. There are no hordes of... full review low-level monsters to get you started. Right off the bat, you're moving through a landscape full of things that can kill you with one swat of a claw or swipe of a beak. And the human enclaves can be just as dangerous. While the odd person treats you fairly, you're going to have to earn most peoples' respect -- and often that's by fighting them. You really have to work at levelling up, but there's a feeling of accomplishment when you do. And if you're patient enough to take the magic route, you'll be well-rewarded; there aren't many spells compared to RPG's like Baldur's Gate, but the ones you get are enormously powerful.
This is no pretty fantasy world. It's and rough and ready, everyone scraping for a living and struggling to survive. I go back to it time and again.
a worthy addition to GOG's rpg section!
(by
ArtyArt)
This game was hailed as "the game that Ultima 9 should have been" when it was released. Which is partly true, I guess.
Gothic does a lot of things right: you get a small world with different factions to join, lots of npcs to interact with and quite a few quests to do. Plus, you can interact with basically every item you find... want to cook? Then cook! Want to craft... full review your own weapons? No problem at all. There are some drawbacks, like the high difficulty, the rather generic story or the clunky controls, but overall this game is definitely worth your time and money. If you're up for the challenge and have about 40 hours to spare, give this game a chance!
MilkmanDan)
Loralou)
ArtyArt)