Gothic 4 - Preview @ IGN

Dhruin

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IGN also has a preview of Gothic 4, covering similar ground to the GameSpot article although with better depth. The game is confusingly referred to as Arcania: A Gothic Tale and then Arcanium in various places, but I assume the latter is shoddy editing at the IGN end. Either way, the schizophrenic feature divide to suit both European and NA audiences is the central message:
Brian Gladman, Dreamcatcher's global product marketing manager, filled us on some of the challenges of making a game for two markets, as well as switching developers. "You could take a blank disc and put it in a paper bag and put Gothic 4 on the bag and you'd sell half a million units in Germany," he said. "The passion for the Gothic universe is at that level…The attachment to Piranha Bytes in German-speaking countries would be akin to the attachment to a BioWare in North America. Anything that Piranha Bytes does is gold in Germany, whereas here it's irrelevant. The decision to go with a new developer for this one was not taken lightly but taken with an eye to really reaching out."
More information.
 
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Two previews on two major sites - and both can´t remember the game´s name. Maybe JoWooD should see this as a subtle hint that the name Arcania: A Gothic Tale is weak because it sounds like many games before. Compare Arcanum, Realms of Arkania, etc.
 
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Eeek ? I was never the best Gothic player, but a thing that I liked was the mini-realism in that you had to make choices...

He also spoke about the possibility of reordering your character statistics, indicating something along the lines of the ability in World of Warcraft to pay a fee to reshuffle talent points. The notion of permanence in single-player RPGs has always been prominent; forcing you to consider carefully decisions made as you know it might bite you in the ass later on, and there'll be no easy recourse. While Podilchuk didn't say exactly how this kind of statistical redistribution aspect might be incorporated, he did maintain it to be an aspect still in consideration
 
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There are some interesting ideas being tossed around here, but it all sounds kind of up in the air and undecided for a game that's only a year and a half away, especially if they're going for XBox and PS3 versions, too. How are the fans seeing it in Europe?

Can't say I get this at all:
To better target the different North American and European audiences, there will also be some way to alter the overall graphical style. In the demo it was simply two buttons labeled Europe and North America. With the Europe button clicked the game took on more somber, darker tones. The game appeared lighter and more vibrant under the North American filter.
So we need better glowy stuff in NA??? I liked the dark look in Gothic and The Witcher. Sounds like they're aiming at a different audience for this one over here.

Still, I'd like to see this come off--hope it works out.

EDIT: just read everybody's opinions in the other thread(Gamespot) glad to see its not just me.
 
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So we need better glowy stuff in NA??? I liked the dark look in Gothic and The Witcher. Sounds like they're aiming at a different audience for this one over here.

Got to say it looks odd to me too, GTA IV seems to be selling the odd copy despite its 'European' colours - zero punctuation described it as shooting brown blobs in a brown blob factory.
 
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This idea of the shotgun approach even down to the graphics is just ludicrous to me. I didn't like the sound of the game when I heard it, and I like it even less now.
 
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@margerette: While reading your quote, I clearly had the feeling of what I call as "my mental alarm sirens ring !"

But I think that it is true that European gamers have a slight tendency to want a world to be darker and more "gritty" than anything else ... I could be wrong, though.

However, I believe that "the other colours" is just a weak try to gain more customers on the american market ... They wouldnt've done it if they didn't come to the perception that the dark colours were (at leastz in part) responsible for the game not selling very good on the north-american market (strange that no-one speaks of the south-american market, by the way).
 
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If they think it was primarily the looks of Gothic that held down sales here, they are being extremely simplistic. The main reasons imo that the Gothic series undersold in NA was marketing and combat controls.

This preview seems to suggest the devs are following the prevailing tendency of trying to create a game that appeals to a core niche audience(perceived as the supportive German fan base) and at the same time make a game that appeals to a broad, indiscriminating cross-platform audience(NA.) I don't agree with this approach, but it's becoming pretty common as making games becomes more and more expensive and having big sales seems mandatory for survival.

@Alrik--yes, the South Americans are seldom mentioned as a game market. They may have other worries. :)
 
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If they think it was primarily the looks of Gothic that held down sales here, they are being extremely simplistic. The main reasons imo that the Gothic series undersold in NA was marketing and combat controls.


Er....... what marketing?
 
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Yes, that what margerette meant. ;)
 
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Exactly. The first I heard of the game was when I saw it on the shelf at the now defunct CompUSA. :)
 
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Hey, at least it was on a shelf. The original wasn't even imported down here, had to order it from the UK!!
 
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