• Some users have recently had their accounts hijacked. It seems that the now defunct EVGA forums might have compromised your password there and seems many are using the same PW here. We would suggest you UPDATE YOUR PASSWORD and TURN ON 2FA for your account here to further secure it. None of the compromised accounts had 2FA turned on.
    Once you have enabled 2FA, your account will be updated soon to show a badge, letting other members know that you use 2FA to protect your account. This should be beneficial for everyone that uses FSFT.

Gothic 4 delayed

Riddleofsteel said:
Heh, well, I guess you'd have to read multiple forums to see several people saying it. I'll have to give the demo another try. It would crash on startup without fail even if I changed my sound device to 48khz.
Click to expand...

I tried the xbox 360 controller, it works pretty well, but I'm definitely having more luck with keyboard mouse.

A couple things about the game:

Definitely not PB's version of Gothic, but a solid lighter RPG.
Gothic difficulty is actually pretty hard. I like it.
I turned off all of the quest helpers, visual indicators, everything that makes it less Gothic as possible and it feels much better.
Ran into a few graphical bugs, nothing major, pretty impressive overall.
There are a few tedious fetch quests, for sure.
Invisible walls in bodies of water, "mountainous" areas, and on fences are painful.
Not being able to use beds to sleep until morning breaks immersion for me a little.
Only some of the voice acting is bad (a small % is VERY bad), most of it is in the average to decent range.
Bows etc are definitely overpowered, enemies need a charge attack to help counter.
Caves are well designed, other than the ones who have an exit near your quest turn in.
Runes are a good addition, some decent effects from them.


So far, I would give it about a 7.5/10 on the basis that I'm not trying to pretend it is a true Gothic game.
 
Last edited:
LeninGHOLA said:
I tried the xbox 360 controller, it works pretty well, but I'm definitely having more luck with keyboard mouse.

A couple things about the game:

Definitely not PB's version of Gothic, but a solid lighter RPG.
Gothic difficulty is actually pretty hard. I like it.
I turned off all of the quest helpers, visual indicators, everything that makes it less Gothic as possible and it feels much better.
Ran into a few graphical bugs, nothing major, pretty impressive overall.
Click to expand...


Pretty much how I feel about it. It's a good game in its own rights. :)
 
Q-BZ said:
^^ This is the kind of thing I'm not thrilled about, either, especially coming off an open free world like Risen or even its predecessor Gothic 3. In those games, you can go wherever you want, any way you want, any time you want, and basically do whatever the hell you want whenever you feel like it.

Risen is still a considerably better game than this. It's the real Gothic 4. Piranha Bytes did Risen and Gothic 3 and not this. It shows. I'm on the PB bandwagon all the way.

I like this game on its own merits but it does have some issues to quibble about.
Click to expand...

Yep, Risen is a better representation of Gothic by a good measure. Arcania is something like Fable II meets Diablo II and Oblivion.
 
Risen was as linear as this title is, Q-BZ.

Are you forgetting that Risen had no level scaling and that you would die in one second if you were to leave the intended road? Remember how Risen started - you climbed that hill to the farm. Okay, but if you were to take a left at the top of that hill, instead of a right, towards the farm, you would be killed by birds.

Are you forgetting that in Risen once you entered the Monastery you had to remain in the Monastery? Same deal with the town - once you entered you were stuck there for hours and hours. The world itself was actually quite small, and linear. You were on a path almost the entire time.

Arcania isn't the second coming, but it's not nearly as bad as some people are saying.

And I'll say it again, if you're not playing on Gothic then this title is going to be a tedious exercise. You have to fear the NPCs you meet. You have to build your character properly. You have to go out and pick fights you can win as to level up your character. If you're not playing on Gothic then when you finally earn your first new armor it won't feel special. I've pretty much discounted the reviews for this game because it's obvious that the reviewers blasted through this title in easy mode, thus missing out on the RPG elements entirely - the reviewers would have seen the game, but not played it.

Whenever I hear the level up music play I feel a huge sense of accomplishment, and can't wait to go to the level up screen.

Right now, I'm wandering through a huge wooded area. This area is far more open than anything I ever saw in Risen. The first area, before the bridge felt kind of flat to me. The second area was a lot more interesting. This third area is the best by far. For me, this game just keeps on getting better.
 
WabeWalker said:
Risen was as linear as this title is, Q-BZ.

Are you forgetting that Risen had no level scaling and that you would die in one second if you were to leave the intended road? Remember how Risen started - you climbed that hill to the farm. Okay, but if you were to take a left at the top of that hill, instead of a right, towards the farm, you would be killed by birds.

Are you forgetting that in Risen once you entered the Monastery you had to remain in the Monastery? Same deal with the town - once you entered you were stuck there for hours and hours. The world itself was actually quite small, and linear. You were on a path almost the entire time.

Arcania isn't the second coming, but it's not nearly as bad as some people are saying.

And I'll say it again, if you're not playing on Gothic then this title is going to be a tedious exercise. You have to fear the NPCs you meet. You have to build your character properly. You have to go out and pick fights you can win as to level up your character. If you're not playing on Gothic then when you finally earn your first new armor it won't feel special. I've pretty much discounted the reviews for this game because it's obvious that the reviewers blasted through this title in easy mode, thus missing out on the RPG elements entirely - the reviewers would have seen the game, but not played it.

Whenever I hear the level up music play I feel a huge sense of accomplishment, and can't wait to go to the level up screen.

Right now, I'm wandering through a huge wooded area. This area is far more open than anything I ever saw in Risen. The first area, before the bridge felt kind of flat to me. The second area was a lot more interesting. This third area is the best by far. For me, this game just keeps on getting better.
Click to expand...

You're a lot further along than I am. I suspect as I get more into this I'll probably feel more or less the same way you do about it. I do remember those limitations in Risen.
 
I disagree about risen. you could get out of the town. you could take a back door to the rest of the continent. the only things you could not do were to get into the monastery early or to get into the final tombs.
 
jiminator said:
I disagree about risen. you could get out of the town. you could take a back door to the rest of the continent. the only things you could not do were to get into the monastery early or to get into the final tombs.
Click to expand...

^^ This is also true.


Don't get me wrong: I don't think Arcania is a bad game at all. :)
 
That's not true at all. Your memory is playing tricks on you. You couldn't go anywhere and do anything in any order. Chapter Two was fairly open. But that long first chapter was very linear.
 
I did everything I described while in the first chapter. I was hoping to kill everything then save a game and play a mage based on the same game. I found out I was wrong to do that, because there was not enough stuff left to level up the mage side. :) Getting out of the town, you could jump off the lighthouse into water, or down rocks. Into the second area, I think there were a series of caves to do that. The enemies were brutal but it could be done.
 
jiminator said:
I did everything I described while in the first chapter. I was hoping to kill everything then save a game and play a mage based on the same game. I found out I was wrong to do that, because there was not enough stuff left to level up the mage side. :) Getting out of the town, you could jump off the lighthouse into water, or down rocks. Into the second area, I think there were a series of caves to do that. The enemies were brutal but it could be done.
Click to expand...

I was basically footloose and fancy free myself just like that. I replayed the game a month ago so I can assure everyone my memory is quite fresh and intact. :)

I could explore and go anywhere I wanted...at my own peril. ;) You start out SO weak in that game. It's pitiful.

The thing doesn't put you on rails, really, until about chapter 3 or so when you're stuck down in the caves with the Inquisitor and that whole bunch and you're moving towards basically the end portions of the game at the drop of a hat. Now even then, I could pretty much walk away or teleport back and forth and still do basically whatever I wanted any time I wanted.

I'm past the "demo" area in Arcania now and things are a little bit more opened up. I'm pretty happy with it. Combat is good. I think I'd give this game a 7.5/10 myself.
 
Just finished it. Decent game, but not quite up to par with RPG juggernauts like Dragon Age. In fairness, if you liked Dragon Age and enjoy less complex and less gimmicky combat with challenge conjured out of bullshittiness then you'll probably really enjoy it.
 
The area I'm in right now, which is the big wooded area where you need the permit to get to, is better than anything I saw in Risen. Graphically, this is one of the most immersive areas in an RPG I've ever played through. This entire forest area is simply jaw dropping, and lumbering my character through the woods in his armor is sheer bliss. I could do this for hours. I fear that I'm going to finish this soon.
 
Hmm, that doesn't sound awfully convincing. I'm all for immersion but crashing through the underbrush in heavy armor for hours doesn't strike me as great entertainment. I need to get this demo to work.
 
krameriffic said:
Just finished it. Decent game, but not quite up to par with RPG juggernauts like Dragon Age. In fairness, if you liked Dragon Age and enjoy less complex and less gimmicky combat with challenge conjured out of bullshittiness then you'll probably really enjoy it.
Click to expand...

More or less: How many hours would you say you got out of it?
 
The demo should have taken place in The Valley of Blood - an incredible area.

Q-BZ, my recommendation is to set nHancer to 8x anti-aliasing. It cleans up the jaggies.
 
Q-BZ said:
More or less: How many hours would you say you got out of it?
Click to expand...

About 15 hours with 80% or so of the sidequests done. Some of them I just couldn't do (spiderwebs in the marsh can fuck off) and others seemed to be bugged. I didn't waste my time exploring every square inch of the game for the three statuette quests either. This was on the hard difficulty, not Gothic. It started off kinda hard, but once I got a weapon with life leech like from the demo I facerolled through the rest of the game. It's very overpowered to recover 20-30 health per hit and swing a couple times per second.

It's a lot of fun (probably why I dumped 15 hours into it in two days of release), but I just can't put it in the same category of polish and quality as similar games like Dragon Age or NWN1. I can't speak to how it compares to the previous Gothic games, Risen or the Witcher as I have played none of them.
 
Last edited:
krameriffic said:
About 15 hours with 80% or so of the sidequests done. Some of them I just couldn't do (spiderwebs in the marsh can fuck off) and others seemed to be bugged. I didn't waste my time exploring every square inch of the game for the three statuette quests either. This was on the hard difficulty, not Gothic. It started off kinda hard, but once I got a weapon with life leech like from the demo I facerolled through the rest of the game. It's very overpowered to recover 20-30 health per hit and swing a couple times per second.

It's a lot of fun (probably why I dumped 15 hours into it in two days of release), but I just can't put it in the same category of polish and quality as similar games like Dragon Age or NWN1. I can't speak to how it compares to the previous Gothic games, Risen or the Witcher as I have played none of them.
Click to expand...

Dragon Age? Polish?

What do you mean by that? This engine blows the Dragon Age engine out of the water. This area I'm in right now, The Valley of Blood, or whatever it's called, is like an ultra souped up version of Oblivion. Personally, I find it it to be stunning.

Wait a minute. What are your specs?

Also, I have to believe you made a mistake in claiming that you finished the game in 15 hours with 80 percent of the side quests completed. I've just finished my 15'th hour, and if I'm to judge by the size of the map then I'm a quarter of the way through. The developer said 50 hours including side quests, and that to me appears correct.

What level was you character when you finished?
 
Last edited:
I ran into a glitched rabbit in the 3rd area. It had I'd guess in the range of 20k hit point and didn't run away from my character. I thought maybe it was an easter egg, so I hacked at it for like 5 min straight with my best 2 hander.....and was rewarded with the usual single piece of meat for loot.
 
I've now entered the 4'th area, beyond The Valley of Blood, and am now going up against Orcs.

On the Gothic setting, the non level scaling is superb. Just as you start to feel too powerful, you advance into the next area, and the game humbles you. I was starting to feel that my bow was too powerful. Uh, yeah, right. Try saying that when you have to go up against your first Orc captain on Gothic.

You can't just button mash. You have to maneuver and strike at the perfect time. If an Orc gets two hits on me then I'm dead.

Right now I'm wandering along a massive field which rises up out of the silver lake. Just another awesome area. This game just keeps on getting better and better. Unless things fall apart, this game is going to be better than Risen, and is shaping up to be my game of the year.

And 15 hours? Like... what?

That just completely baffles me. I'm at the 16 or 17 hour mark and appear to be nowhere close to finishing? 15 hours? That's utter nonsense.

Edit: it's now three o'clock in the morning, and I've been at this since noon - it's been years since I gamed like that; for me, that's a huge testament to the game.
 
Last edited:
WabeWalker said:
On the Gothic setting, the non level scaling is superb. Just as you start to feel too powerful, you advance into the next area, and the game humbles you. I was starting to feel that my bow was too powerful. Uh, yeah, right. Try saying that when you have to go up against your first Orc captain on Gothic.

You can't just button mash. You have to maneuver and strike at the perfect time. If an Orc gets two hits on me then I'm dead.
Click to expand...

Again, I'm only in the first "area" after the demo part but I'll basically concur with this.


Right now I'm wandering along a massive field which rises up out of the silver lake. Just another awesome area. This game just keeps on getting better and better. Unless things fall apart, this game is going to be better than Risen, and is shaping up to be my game of the year.
Click to expand...

No way. I definitely disagree with that. At least so far.

Not going to be my GOTY or on the list. Unless I get further along and really pleasantly shocked I just can't see that. If I change my tune on that I'll post it. ;)

I still think I like Risen better at least in some ways. I wasn't stuck in some "areas" in that game, for example. Especially thanks to teleporting.

Games like Red Dead Redemption, Assassin's Creed 2, and the new Fallout will easily be ahead of this thing on my GOTY list when it's all said and done.


And 15 hours? Like... what?

That just completely baffles me. I'm at the 16 or 17 hour mark and appear to be nowhere close to finishing? 15 hours? That's utter nonsense.

Edit: it's now three o'clock in the morning, and I've been at this since noon - it's been years since I gamed like that; for me, that's a huge testament to the game.
Click to expand...

Way overkill. Burn out much?
 
Last edited:
Q-BZ said:
Again, I'm only in the first "area" after the demo part...
Click to expand...

As long as you're playing on Gothic, then this title will draw you further in with each new area.

You're just starting out. Your character is nothing. The first area is kind of bland.

If you're playing on any other setting than Gothic then I'm afraid to say you're not playing an RPG.
 
WabeWalker said:
As long as you're playing on Gothic, then this title will draw you further in with each new area.

You're just starting out. Your character is nothing. The first area is kind of bland.

If you're playing on any other setting than Gothic then I'm afraid to say you're not playing an RPG.
Click to expand...

I am playing on Gothic difficulty at present.
 
Okay, good. Get back to me after you enter the valley of blood, a magnificent wooded area. You'll face Goblins and wolves here.

My advice:

In this game, on Gothic, find a balance between bow skills, and melée skills. Some enemies are impossible without a bow. A swarm of flies need to be dealt with using a bow - just constantly back off.

Other, larger animals, need to be stunned with magic, and then you move in with your two hander and hit them once with your power up. Essentially, you need just one point pumped into electricity damage (or the bottom skill on the level up screen). That will allow you to stun the creatures. Then go for the melée power up.

Without that stun ability it can be friction' impossible to kill some of these huge beasts - it took me about six hours of frustration to figure that one out.

After the valley of blood, the country opens up again - a wonderful change of pace after being in that wood, and you'll face Orcs and larger versions of those velociraptors you saw in the earlier areas.

Q-BZ, Risen didn't actually work for me until about hour seven or eight. Same deal here. That area you're in right now, and also because your character hasn't grown, is kind of slow.

Get back to me when you've reached the point where I'm at right now and be prepared for your jaw to hit the floor.
 
WabeWalker said:
Okay, good. Get back to me after you enter the valley of blood, a magnificent wooded area. You'll face Goblins and wolves here.

My advice:

In this game, on Gothic, find a balance between bow skills, and melée skills. Some enemies are impossible without a bow. A swarm of flies need to be dealt with using a bow - just constantly back off.
Click to expand...

I'm noticing that already. You almost HAVE to use different weapons at different times for different enemies. Good.

Other, larger animals, need to be stunned with magic, and then you move in with your two hander and hit them once with your power up. Essentially, you need just one point pumped into electricity damage (or the bottom skill on the level up screen). That will allow you to stun the creatures. Then go for the melée power up.

Without that stun ability it can be friction' impossible to kill some of these huge beasts - it took me about six hours of frustration to figure that one out.
Click to expand...

In other words: Real strategy. ;)


After the valley of blood, the country opens up again - a wonderful change of pace after being in that wood, and you'll face Orcs and larger versions of those velociraptors you saw in the earlier areas.

Q-BZ, Risen didn't actually work for me until about hour seven or eight. Same deal here. That area you're in right now, and also because your character hasn't grown, is kind of slow.

Get back to me when you've reached the point where I'm at right now and be prepared for your jaw to hit the floor.
Click to expand...

Glad to know this opens up a bit more. :)
 
WabeWalker said:
And 15 hours? Like... what?

That just completely baffles me. I'm at the 16 or 17 hour mark and appear to be nowhere close to finishing? 15 hours? That's utter nonsense.

Edit: it's now three o'clock in the morning, and I've been at this since noon - it's been years since I gamed like that; for me, that's a huge testament to the game.
Click to expand...

Well clearly the difficulty difference is immense between hard and gothic. As I said, I facerolled through the second half of the game after visiting the monastery and stealing the 2h sword with the life leech.

strend said:
Sprint mod=instantly better game (for me anyway)

http://forum.jowood.com/showthread.php?t=172798

Shame, but it doesn't take stamina unless you have a spell out. It is nice to be able to run with a weapon drawn though.
Click to expand...

And I used this, which significantly reduced travel times. Perhaps you'll find it immersion breaking to sprint all the time without using your rune of the winds.
 
strend said:
Sprint mod=instantly better game (for me anyway)

http://forum.jowood.com/showthread.php?t=172798

Shame, but it doesn't take stamina unless you have a spell out. It is nice to be able to run with a weapon drawn though.
Click to expand...

I like that and I like that static camera mod, too.

Nice to see mods already starting to come out for this. Got to love the PC. :)



http://forum.jowood.com/showthread.php?t=172636

^^ Lock target for KBM.

http://forum.jowood.com/showthread.php?t=172760

The ins and outs of the input.xml file if anyone here is feeling frisky.
 
Last edited:
What's the static cam mod?

Don't link me to the official forum, because I was banned for liking the game. One of the moderators hates Arcania, and he banned me for trolling, saying that nobody could like this game as much as I did. Just... bizarre.

Actually, it's not bizarre. The moderators are die hard Gothic fans. Always a mistake, I think, to allow fans to moderate. Too biased. I mean, obviously. LOL!
 
WabeWalker said:
What's the static cam mod?

Don't link me to the official forum, because I was banned for liking the game. One of the moderators hates Arcania, and he banned me for trolling, saying that nobody could like this game as much as I did. Just... bizarre.

Actually, it's not bizarre. The moderators are die hard Gothic fans. Always a mistake, I think, to allow fans to moderate. Too biased. I mean, obviously. LOL!
Click to expand...

It reads laughably. You get banned off the official Gothic forum for liking their game "too much." Alllllrighty then.


Static Camera
This mod makes the camera static, i.e. no more camera zooming out when you enter a battle etc. The bow zoom feature should work, but let me know if it doesn't.
Click to expand...





SilverSliver said:
The ending is retarded.
Click to expand...

You beat it already? About how many hours would you say you got out of it?
 
Q-BZ said:
You beat it already? About how many hours would you say you got out of it?
Click to expand...

Tough to say. I picked up a trainer just to speed up the endless running around at a snails pace. I'd say a good 40% of the game is spent briskly jogging from point a, to point b, then to point c, then back to point a, then to point b again, to finally end up at c once more before heading to d.
 
SilverSliver said:
Tough to say. I picked up a trainer just to speed up the endless running around at a snails pace. I'd say a good 40% of the game is spent briskly jogging from point a, to point b, then to point c, then back to point a, then to point b again, to finally end up at c once more before heading to d.
Click to expand...

That's a lot of games, though, if we really get down to it. Just sayin'. ;)

I'm surprised you actually bothered since you seemed to dislike the demo and pretty much dislike the game in general.
 
anyone know if there is some sort of subtitle mod for the absolutely horrible voice overs? That way I can either play without headphones or just skip the actual blahblah after reading the text...
 
Anyone wanna help me out and tell me where the "crypt key" is in the stewark farm area.
 
Jap1987 said:
Anyone wanna help me out and tell me where the "crypt key" is in the stewark farm area.
Click to expand...

Keys are always given to you by npcs so that you can complete a quest. The quests in that region are chiefly provided at the baron's castle.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top