Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura

Be warned: this game is LONG and SLOW. This is because the major complaints people had with Fallout 1 and 2 (this game was made with the same engine and the same devs) was the low repeatability. So they artifically inflated the game life in the worse possible way: long winded and tedious quests. Everytime you think you've made a breakthrough in the story, they send you to another filler island. The world feels progressively emptier (you can see the end areas are quite barren and unfinished, the starter areas are well done however), until eventually you grind to the end of the game. If you can stomach that and have the patience and time, this is a very unique game with some great mechanics. One of the first game to introduce crafting, and the system still holds decently to this day. Magic is also awesome and arguably superior to crafting. The possibilities are huge and the game has a lot of replay potential, if you can deal with the grindy slow sections every time you do another run. Highly recommend the community patch to clear the many many bugs the original game has.

It's just perfect! It's something much more than a game. After a few months I still remember the plot, the game's world (unique!), the characters and, well, I'm kind of missing all of that... It is definitely one of the most impressive game experiences I ever had.

I cannot believe I missed this gem growing up! Think classic fallout meets steampunk meets oblivion (if it were in classic fallout style), and you get gun-toting knights, or a Doc Holiday type, or a classic Mage character, or even a Gnomish merchant if you want. I absolutely love the character creation and the leveling up. It is the type of game where I can keep starting new characters, spend hours and hours on each and still not even finish 1% of the main story, there is just that much to do. I recommend this to any RPG fan. There is simply not enough space given for these reviews for me to list all the things I enjoy about this truly underrated and amazing game. I really wonder what Fallout 3 would've been like if these guys won the rights over Bethesda, and Bethesda has released some of my all time favorites, which this game Arcanum, is now one of.

An old classic worth buying again.

Probably the RPG that holds the dearest place in my heart, this game hit every button for me from the first time I opened it. Like Fallout, or Planescape torment - I left my experience with Arcanum wowed. The open world, the details in each city, the freedom which can be found in games like the elder scrolls was wonderfully put together in Arcanum... pickpocketing keys and plundering store owners... Plus the ambiance, characters, story.. These days, there is a little clunkiness to it but the game is still perfectly playable, the story is great, and the open world aspects of the game were done perfectly. On the bright side, the very long load times are no longer present on modern machines Wish someone would pick up a sequal to this baby. The world they created in Arcanum deserves to be revisited.