I don't mind saying this - I have thoroughly enjoyed the Gothic series. Well, 1 and 2, anyhow - 3 left a kinda sour taste in my mouth, mostly because the combat system in that? Well, it was broken. The best weapon you could have - the weapon that you could clear entire towns with - was a halberd, or a spear. The second weapon I picked up, I never dropped - not because I couldn't find more powerful weapons, but because issues with hitstun made it nearly impossible for enemies to fight a weapon that left you out of their reach.
Risen fixed this, and there is absolutely no doubt of this much in my mind. If you really are good enough, in this game, you can take out almost anyone with just a club and a whole heap of patience. Myself? I'm a veteran of the Gothic franchise, yet I still struggled with the combat system at first. But as you get better - which you do with time, and, unfortunately, as is the German way, the save game system - it becomes less and less of a hindrance. I'll discount that much - and also state that the XBOX problems were well documented (personally, I think of it as something of a comeuppance - if any of you guys have ever played Resident Evil 4 for the PC, which was a good game in itself until the quicktime events suddenly tell you to 'PUSH BUTTONS 1 AND 3!'.. where they're actually 'left control and 'a'', without you ever getting to be told this, even in the manual.. you'd understand where I'm coming from, PC gamer represent) throughout the dev's website, though that's by no means an excuse - I think it's actually shameful that they'd release a halfhearted port. Then again, if Capcom's allowed, then dammit, I'll let Piranha Bytes get away with it.
I'm by no means going to say this is a 5/5 sorta game. The music will be familiar to Gothic players, so will the sounds (well, some of them - at least they got rid of the voices all being in Yiddish, instead coming up with a host of Brits this time) - the creatures are differently named, but clearly the same. In fact, this really does scream 'Gothic 1 remake; only this time, we did it better'. In the end, I don't think that just because I've enjoyed the games before it means that I see the game with rose-tinted glasses. So, here's my personal thoughts on the game - which I'm putting out here because I feel that this game does deserve something of a chance for people to see the positive side of things..
Pros:
- No 'cakewalk'. Some might not feel this a positive - but while my level 20ish character is inanely good with a sword, I could still be taken down by a low level assailant were I not to have my wits about me. With them, though? I can cleave the things in two without a second blink. I'd actually liken the combat system to an old NES-era platformer, honestly, myself - Contra, you were fine if you knew how every enemy attacked, because they always attacked the same way. This is muchly the same. A lizard man will attack differently to an ogre, and you can always use the same technique for each - whilst they'll develop on the fly, you can usually take them down before they have the chance to properly adapt. (Just like.. y'know, any NES-style platformer, really!)
- Atmosphere is perfect. Unlike some RPGs where the 'collection' quests feel purely chore-esque - 'find five boar tongues' or somesuch - most all of these things have felt really, really intuitive. A few minor hiccups (like, say, a quest only triggering from raw meat as opposed to cooked meat, or.. indeed, having to speak with someone before I have the option to put a bloodied cow's head atop another person's pillow - yes, this really happened) do mar the immersion somewhat, but I can understand the collection quests, where I really haven't done in any games before it.
- Characters feel vibrant. I know this sounds strange - but I can understand the motivation behind the pirate's daughter, behind the big bad crime lord, behind the upholder of truth, justice and so on and so forth. They're not as one dimensional as you'd first think them to be, for the better part, which I really approve of.
Cons:
- Characters can run out of things to do. I've finished talking to said aforementioned pirate's daughter - and then.. all of a sudden, all she is is a merchant. Occasional new dialogue lines do present themselves, of course - but primarily, many characters do feel sorta throwaway after their quests are completed.
- Steep starting curve. Not really a learning curve, per se - everything is very intuitive, at least on the PC version - but at the same time, everything can - and will - kill you, if you don't get an idea of what's going on fast. Which is what I'd actually say may well have happened to the reviewer - it's hard to entice when you're kinda made to feel like either the game is bad, or you're bad at the game.
- Factions are very 'black and white'. You don't really get good moral choices - though admittedly, I felt most of the way that supporting the 'bad' guys was actually doing the better thing in the end - but most 'faction'-centric quests basically give you one way of doing things, then the exact opposite.. I think this is a con, but to some, it'd be an enticing reason to play the game through again - myself, it just makes things feel a little as though they've been done before.
- Speaking of? It's been done before. (No, really. If you've played Gothic 1 - even Gothic 2 - you've played this game before. Different names, different characters.. but in the end, you're a nameless (thankfully not amnesiac) man who has to go through a vibrant, sandbox environment with several options keeping things fun and enticing.. well, admittedly, the three camps in Gothic 1 were more divided, whereas they've just made two very stringent lines each way in this one.
I think this game's primary flaw is that they made a game for the previous game's fans, not to draw in new audiences. It's a big, big flaw, yes - but that doesn't make it a bad game. I'm finding it fun - really, you might too. But that much said.. if you think that a game like Gears of War is a challenging experience, outlining the human dichotomy in nigh-Shakespearian eloquency as the tragic Hero fights through swathes of Evil's fixtures in an attempt to rescue the maiden fair (or, indeed, destroy bug-kind with chainsaws)? Well, maybe this isn't the game for you.
