Gothic 3

I have always had a love affair with the Gothic/Risen games but Gothic 3 is so vast in its maps and freedom it will always be my favourite. Buggy on launch but with mods this game still excels. No hand holding, Map markers. You are on your own and in Gothic fashion you go from a weakling to demigod and exploration is rewarded.

HAven´t played it in 18 years and now I am really enjoying it. It still has itz´s bugs and some grind, but a lot of atmosphere. You can feel the love the developers had put into it, making it a game as iconic as it´s two pedecessors. :-)

So I spent only 60 hours with it.

This game is outstanding. Why? Atmosphere is the key. The music is really good and matches the regions (there are three, Myrtana, Varant and the North Lands). Furthermore each city has it's own look and feel, additionally to some landmarks which also have their own theme. By the way, you can basically go anywhere you want. There's also no real order in which city you do quests. Some regions are shut off, but "only" by guards - which you can either fight or do quests for, or simply take another route. By the way, if you like the game, check out on Vimeo "Nur ein Spiel" - it's a great documentary featuring among else Gothic 3 (only in german, but worth watching).

As a great fan of Gothic 1 and 2, I found myself very disappointed with this sequel. Graphics and sound are highly enjoyable, of course, as is the huge map to discouver, but sadly these are the only good things to say about this game. The story seems quite interesting as well at first, but you will learn very soon that it will start repeating itself over and over, until you reach the point where you either give up or grind your teeth and play on to see the ending. I did the latter (I always do...) and I did not enjoy it. There must be at least 100 or more nearly identical versions of one and the same story within this game. Go there, bring me that thing, slay these monsters, free that city, kill that thug, kill this, kill that... booooring! Even the faction system (one of the major parts of the earlier games) is quasi nonexistent, since you don't even have to choose a faction until the very end. The combat system is flawed, and there are lots of sniping positions around the map where you can easily kill any monster.