dbrown1986

Arcania. The newest installment in the Gothic series produced by JoWood exclusively, deviates quite far from the classic adventures that are apparent in the first three games. It seems that without Piranha-Bytes at their side, JoWood is not performing well and is slowly killing off the Gothic series with a plethora of bad sequels (Forsaken Gods and now Arcania). While the game has many a new features that fully complement it, there are still many things lacking or otherwise cut from the final production. First, THE PRO'S: You'll find that a wonderful new musical score, that complements the environments and certainly provides a good setting is present. Dialogue is somewhat well-performed for some of the NPC's. The Graphics are a shave close to that of some of the next gen style that is apparent these days. JoWood has included a WoW-Like quest-tracking feature as well as detailed direction in the quest lines. The inventory system is suppurb! The story is somewhat well fasioned. THE CON'S: Repetitive model use. Some dialogue is very shrill and annoying. There are numerous graphical glitches that are still apparent everywhere (Alpha Masking & Displacement), the quest lines and story are too linear and the story still cuts quite a huge deviation through previous canon throwing out a great deal of Gothic's history. The character development is too undercut and linear not opening up a lot of options or balance. OTHER NOTES: *Retail version does not load through Steam, which prevents the use of the Steam Overlay. X-Fire works fine however. *It handles being Alt + Tabbed. Final thoughts: Worth the time, but I would wait until the price tag goes down.

After having teamed up with JoWood, Piranha-Bytes set out to create the next title in the Gothic series. Gothic III. Unlike its predecessors, Gothic III brought numerous improvements that players had wanted since the first game. Piranha started from scrap creating an entirely new engine with incredibly immerse and WONDERFULLY realistic graphics. The forging system has been overhauled, as well as alchemy, hunting and others, what's even better is the new options to cook certain foods and recipes as well as PROSPECTING, YES you can now MINE minerals instead of endlessly hunting for them. The new lands present in this game are HUGE in content and the continent itself is GIGANTIC. Piranha went out on an arm and a leg for this one. Â Unfortunately, JoWood; interested only in their numbers forced Piranha-Bytes to GOLD the game before they had time to iron it out and perform a decent amount of QA (Quality Assurance), although the main quests and most of the side quests, as well as content, story and NPC's were ready, the game was RIDDLED with hundreds if not THOUSANDS of bugs that most players had to wait for the Enhanced Edition Community Patch to fix. Â It's worth the time and money to play, but you are DEFINITELY going to need to download the latest community patch to play this game. Â Fact: After JoWood forced the release. Piranha-Bytes left JoWood. JoWood still retaining the rights to Gothic, sold them to DreamCatcher, who released the Gothic Universe Boxset (Gothic 1, Gothic II Gold and Gothic 3). Dreamcatcher released Gothic 3: Forsaken Gods and it was horrible. To date, no Gothic game after Gothic 3 has ever been released by Piranha-Bytes. Â Now, I'm going to go play Gothic IV: Arcania to see if it's any good, will write a review on it later.

While still using the same basic engine that powered Gothic 1, Gothic II adds a few improvements in lighting, model detail and textures that were lacking in the first. The story is new but the land is somewhat familiar. There are very few bugs, but those that are apparent can be avoided. In addition, Piranha-Bytes offers the option to use a new control scheme, or stick with the familiar system used in the first game. You'll start out in a new land adjacent to that of the first and you will find yourself venturing between the two. Familiar characters make a return in Gothic II and it seems that their presence and influence have far more meaning than they did in the first game. A wonderful new adaptation to the Gothic Universe and if you have played the first, its definitely worth giving up some time to play it!!! 9 out of 10!

The game that started it all. Gothic may not have all the fancy graphics and may be further frustrating when it comes to controls. The bugs are minimal and the controls can be changed at any time during play. The story is intricate and well devised, the characters are easy to bond with and provide even more detail to the story. Overall the game is a worthy investment. Worth your time and your money. I give it an 8.5 out of 10.

First and foremost. I am an avid fan of the Gothic universe. I love all of the games... except this one. MORE bugs that require the download of a 1.5GB community patch, the dialogue is HORRIBLE, the voice actors are amateurs who did not take the time to put an effort into their emotions, the main story as well as the side quests lack any sort of direction and are entirely redundant and not very well planned or written. Aside from NPC's and Quests; there is hardly any new gear. This game is a disgrace to Gothic overall and shames Dreamcatcher/JoWood. THANK GOD Piranha-Bytes had nothing to do with it as it would have further tarnished their reputation after JoWood FORCED them to release Gothic III when it wasn't ready. BOTTOM LINE: Not worth your time, or money. If you want to give it a go, look at more of these reviews or go find it somewhere for free, but don't waste a single penny on this shabby attempt at a Gothic game, I'm stripping it from my library as a Gothic game, all the others are fine but I'm not even going to bother to sell this excuse for a game, it's going straight into the trash.