ArcaniA

First of all if you played the "real" Gothics (1-3), then do not be fooled by the name of the game. It is NOT Gothic. And it is NOT a Roleplaying game. The game is very linear, you are forced into very narrow areas where you can move around but you can not find any loot/secrets/chests/extra quests. Once you cleared one area you can go to the next and even though you can go back to older areas, there is no reason to. The gameplay is repetetive. There are no NPC with an interesting story, your main hero is a dumb shepherd who speaks dull one liners all the time and wants to kill the king. At the start of the game you have a girlfriend which luckily dies together with her father before you can marry her, or i would have liked to killed them myself. Gameplay: 3/10 simple Hack & Slay Story: 1/10 Normal random dude safes the world ( and this dude rly sucks man) Graphics: 7/10 they spend basically everything into it so it looks at least fine Gothic Flair: -1/10 The game was called Gothic4/Arcania because of marketing reasons Quests: 1/10 grinding mobs/ collecting loot all you have to do RPG-elemts: 2/10 simple slider improvement of either Defense/Attack or Magic This game was the worst computer game i ever played!

played it when it came out. Done without imagination, with claustrophobic and tunelled locations. It was a semi ok game at the beginning but lack of imagination and non-existant plot made me abandon it at some point. Pity.

I know the game is not a good Gothic BUT okayish for a rpg, the visual glitches are annoying in the 2.0.0.2 version, would be awesome if GOG provide the older version 1.1.0.1433 with some fixes The only way to play Arcania today is on Steam with enabled beta "Legacy" and the ArcaniaSteamFix script from hexaae under Guides "Arcania framerate fixes and improvements" GOG should give this game some love and work <3

The game takes place in the Gothic world, the same monsters, NPCs, etc. The plot is simple. Very predictable. Unfortunately not worth any pounds. Gothic 1 and 2 have a more open world and a more interesting plot. It is well below Gothic 3 which has some open world elements. This game is linear and has nothing about the open world. I think GOG set this by mistake. You move from one location to another, step by step. It is not possible to go, for example, to houses that are not intended for this purpose. All roads are blocked until you complete the tasks that allow you to open the next door. There is nowhere to go but forward. Very linear. I would say it's a shooter set in a gothic world.

A lot of people complain about the fact this game is not like other Gothic games. That is not a very fair assesement of a game. I havent played the Gothic series, but played Risen, which is very similar to Gothic since it was made by the same developers. And I am glad it went a different route from Risen in terms of combat. However, it has plenty of issues on its own. Disclaimer, I only played through the starting area, but judging by some other descriptions I think I know what to expect. In regards to Graphics and audio I can say its pretty decent. It goes for a more realistic look, which I enjoy. Some things may look bland, but overall the view was nice. The general idea for the main quest was pretty simple - a revenge arc. And its fine. However the presentation of the quests/stories can be very dull, have inconsistent tone and is too linear. The voice acting can range from alright to weird. The quests themselves are very basic. Gameplay is much more streamlined from Risen. You have the same melee weapon, ranged weapon and magic, but the enemies are easier to handle. They can still block and have strong attacks, which you need to evade with rolls, yet its no longer a duel to the death with each low level enemy you encounter. Attribute wise enemies are suited to the players level. Probably due to the linear character of the game. Using the bow here is much more enjoyable than in Risen. However, the balance here is now way off toward the easy spectrum. Nothing really presented a challenge and when the game tries to make enemies use unique features it is very clunky. Like a bug that hides in its shell to regenerate if you damage it too much. You can get it out with the use of lightning, but it then makes a knowckback and quickly hides again. Turns into a grind situation. There are some small technical glitches as well. The game isnt bad, its just not that good in anything. You can play it, but Im pretty sure there are better things to try first.