Posted January 24, 2021
I am giving this game a 4/5.
Id give a 5 if one or two of the mentioned problems below had not existed here.
I love Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura. I love its attention to detail, the way how it represents the world, lore, the very nice story, the choices you make, the reputation you build, great sidequests (many have interesting back stories, tho there are also basic fed-ex quests), how the story gives the player two main quests in the same moment (it happens very often) and the way it lets the player to decide what to do and where to go. The game respects the player and his ability to think. I love it. This is what current games just miss.
I definitely consider the RPG system in Arcanum the best RPG system amongst class-free RPGs. I just love how technology affects magick and magicks affects technology. Tho I cannot 100% say that there is a perfect balance between these paths, since I have to play as a 100% mage yet (I beat the game as a 100% tech at lvl 48). I have my own doubts that a 100% mage can use tech stuff more efficiently than a 100% tech magicks stuff. Well, that's just my impression for now.
I love lvl 50 cap and that you are given just 1 point after leveling (2 points every 5 levels). This forces the player to choose the path immediately from the beginning and hold to it. There are tons of skills and just 1 point when you get a level. When you do not plan, you just may end up being a very poor character. And that's good because, unlike games like Skyrim, you cannot unlock everything so it really matters when you spend your points. You cannot even unlock all tech or spells when you play a 100% tech or a 100% mage during 1 playthrough. I love that this system is strict.
Buut yes, there are problems:
1. difficulty balance - It is just not good when a game forces you to fight lvl 1-10 monsters in "story" areas even close to the end of the game. You just constantly fight much lower enemies during the whole game (except the beginning). So it is really recommended to play it on hard from the beginning as you lvl up definitely slower, but even this solution does not solve this problem completely.
2. the battle system - the game can be played as a turn-based RPG and a real-time RPG and neither of the two is good. The real-time is very fast-paced and it's nearly impossible to control anything at such a speed. However I definitely prefer turn-based so I played the game with this system. It's just basic, bare boned and was not very good, at least for my playthrough as my char only specialized on melee. I can imagine it can be much more enjoyable when you are a mage with various spells or a tech using swords, guns and throwing stuff. But again, the game is too easy and has a bad balance, so it may not matter after all how many weapons you can use. Overall the combat system does not require almost any strategical planning or playing.
3. the ending - NO SPOILERS (just to be sure) While I love the plot, all the plot twists and how the game ends - meaning the main point, I just did not like the final battle, it was just laughable. After it a couple of short videos are shown, the short ending and you appear in the main menu. Not even the ending credits rolls. I spent almost 124 hours with the game and that' all what I got... From my perspective it was a letdown.
4. bugs - Yeah there are bugs when you play the vanilla version. Due to them I do not know what summary at the end I actually got. I killed the main boss three times with all my characters alive and every time I saw a different summary. I mean the words were the same but sometimes some sitiuations were mentioned and some other time they werent and new ones were said. All of this happened despite I had ended the game the same way, which is weird.
Id give a 5 if one or two of the mentioned problems below had not existed here.
I love Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura. I love its attention to detail, the way how it represents the world, lore, the very nice story, the choices you make, the reputation you build, great sidequests (many have interesting back stories, tho there are also basic fed-ex quests), how the story gives the player two main quests in the same moment (it happens very often) and the way it lets the player to decide what to do and where to go. The game respects the player and his ability to think. I love it. This is what current games just miss.
I definitely consider the RPG system in Arcanum the best RPG system amongst class-free RPGs. I just love how technology affects magick and magicks affects technology. Tho I cannot 100% say that there is a perfect balance between these paths, since I have to play as a 100% mage yet (I beat the game as a 100% tech at lvl 48). I have my own doubts that a 100% mage can use tech stuff more efficiently than a 100% tech magicks stuff. Well, that's just my impression for now.
I love lvl 50 cap and that you are given just 1 point after leveling (2 points every 5 levels). This forces the player to choose the path immediately from the beginning and hold to it. There are tons of skills and just 1 point when you get a level. When you do not plan, you just may end up being a very poor character. And that's good because, unlike games like Skyrim, you cannot unlock everything so it really matters when you spend your points. You cannot even unlock all tech or spells when you play a 100% tech or a 100% mage during 1 playthrough. I love that this system is strict.
Buut yes, there are problems:
1. difficulty balance - It is just not good when a game forces you to fight lvl 1-10 monsters in "story" areas even close to the end of the game. You just constantly fight much lower enemies during the whole game (except the beginning). So it is really recommended to play it on hard from the beginning as you lvl up definitely slower, but even this solution does not solve this problem completely.
2. the battle system - the game can be played as a turn-based RPG and a real-time RPG and neither of the two is good. The real-time is very fast-paced and it's nearly impossible to control anything at such a speed. However I definitely prefer turn-based so I played the game with this system. It's just basic, bare boned and was not very good, at least for my playthrough as my char only specialized on melee. I can imagine it can be much more enjoyable when you are a mage with various spells or a tech using swords, guns and throwing stuff. But again, the game is too easy and has a bad balance, so it may not matter after all how many weapons you can use. Overall the combat system does not require almost any strategical planning or playing.
3. the ending - NO SPOILERS (just to be sure) While I love the plot, all the plot twists and how the game ends - meaning the main point, I just did not like the final battle, it was just laughable. After it a couple of short videos are shown, the short ending and you appear in the main menu. Not even the ending credits rolls. I spent almost 124 hours with the game and that' all what I got... From my perspective it was a letdown.
4. bugs - Yeah there are bugs when you play the vanilla version. Due to them I do not know what summary at the end I actually got. I killed the main boss three times with all my characters alive and every time I saw a different summary. I mean the words were the same but sometimes some sitiuations were mentioned and some other time they werent and new ones were said. All of this happened despite I had ended the game the same way, which is weird.
Post edited April 21, 2021 by EchoOfMidgar
