Arcania - Walkthrough Videos @ Gametrailers

Dhruin

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Over at Gametrailers there are two Arcania developer walkthrough videos on offer. The two clips show the mages' guild and a swamp area and some combat. The seamless indoor-outdoor areas are clearly in, although the dev voiceover mentions seven "unlockable" areas "GTA" style, so it sounds like gameplay area is broken down more than previous entries. Combat and the general presentation looks more hack'n'slash to my eye and although the Gothics' famous NPC reactivity is mentioned, there is no sign of it - obviously, this is an early build but it doesn't look much like Gothic at this stage.
Thanks, Kostaz!
More information.
 
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Very early days but that left me disappointed. Where was the AI? The combat looks like hack'n'slash with big floating XP numbers and flashing icons. Fire Mages in big trees? Big clumps of monsters that guards don't react to?

There was little sign of the realism of a Gothic world. Looks more like an arcade Two Worlds, at this stage.
 
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While I can cosign Dhuin's post about ArcaniA resembling Two Worlds I have to say that I liked the videos.
The things that I liked:

  • Good Visuals
  • Great Animations
  • The rain and the effects are impressing
  • Combat exactly what I expected,besides could anyone point me to a game with better medieval combat?
  • Attention to detail
The turn-downs:
  • HUD
  • All that colorful numbers that made the game resemble an MMO
  • The fact that dead creatures turned into meat
  • The fact that you could see the character's/creature's name and level.
  • The lack of any AI whatsoever but I guess/hope that's because of the early build.

All in all,I think it depends on one's expectations I expected a good Action-RPG in a medieval setting and abandoned the Gothic idea since they changed the name.
While I don't see it taking F3's direction in termes of similarities to the prequels I only expect it to turn out a good game not a Gothic game.

Oh and during one of the videos I actually felt it was a Gothic.... strange.
 
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Dear Green Place
After watching the two videos the only question I have is, 'is this an RPG?...'
 
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Very early days but that left me disappointed. Where was the AI? The combat looks like hack'n'slash with big floating XP numbers and flashing icons. Fire Mages in big trees? Big clumps of monsters that guards don't react to?

There was little sign of the realism of a Gothic world. Looks more like an arcade Two Worlds, at this stage.

Those are some of the more glaring problems. They have a lot of work left.
 
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While I can cosign Dhuin's post about ArcaniA
  • Combat exactly what I expected,besides could anyone point me to a game with better medieval combat?



  • Mount and Blade
 
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It looked like the AI might have been partially off so he could do his presentation without being attacked when getting close to the enemies. The text probably can be shut off like in pretty much every rpg in existence. Most games have the abality to show names and experience gained but are disabled by default. Monsters turning into meat when killed looked like a place holder since for one it didn't look very realistic and two the graphical quality of the meat was lower then everything else.

The comment on "GTA style" unlocking of areas could have been Gothic 2 style unlocking of areas and even Gothic 3 did that. (I don't know about the first one since I didn't play it very much. The last thing is that combat seems very much like the combat in "The Witcher" but this games combat looks better.
 
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Regardless, anything disabled means it could not have been working right or else all you have to do is enable a "god" mode which would make a much better presentation.

Its kind of a waste to just presume as its actively in development anyway.
 
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Mount and Blade
That came to my mind but I can't really see how it's gonna be done with monsters.
Its kind of a waste to just presume as its actively in development anyway.
It's Build .7xx IMO it's not too early but it's not too late either as they have ~6 months till the release.
The thing is whether they want to change things.
 
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Dear Green Place
It looked like the AI might have been partially off so he could do his presentation without being attacked when getting close to the enemies.

Could well be. Might be worth mentioning in the voiceover, no? Afterall, he did specifically mention the reactivity the series is famous for.

The text probably can be shut off like in pretty much every rpg in existence. Most games have the abality to show names and experience gained but are disabled by default.

Sure. But if so, it displays a lack of understanding of the Gothic series. Overall, this had a distinctively "arcade" appearance (does anyone disagree?) and the Gothic series is known for "realism" - even down to not being able to quaff potions in the middle of combat.

The comment on "GTA style" unlocking of areas could have been Gothic 2 style unlocking of areas and even Gothic 3 did that. (I don't know about the first one since I didn't play it very much. The last thing is that combat seems very much like the combat in "The Witcher" but this games combat looks better.

Yep. But Gothic II had one unlockable area, right? The old territory? Otherwise, everything was completely open. We'll have to see but this sounds more constrained with seven unlockable areas.

Beats me how you could think the combat looks better than The Witcher on the basis of the basic button-mashing we saw here.
 
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Yeah, Two Worlds comparison works ... but I also agree that most times when AI is turned off it is mentioned by the devs.
 
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I'm going to add trees that disappear in your field of view especially as bad as this is not a good tactic for gaining fps.
 
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There doesn´t seem to be any enthusiuasm put in the game.
Even the narrator dude sounded bored.

If there´ll be one decent rpg by the end of the year, color me surprised.
 
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If there´ll be one decent rpg by the end of the year, color me surprised.
Risen,Dragon Age,Divinity 2....
I think you're just being negative.
 
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Dear Green Place
According to JoWooD's Community Manipulator the E3 videos show the US color set and the newbie HUD. All annoying parts of the HUD can be disabled.

He promised to come up with a brand new screenshot showing the Euro colors over the weekend. It will be from a version later than the one shown at the E3.



G3 FG:
- new patch is almost finished
- mod kit is being worked on
 
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Ugh.....I have to fully agree with Dhruin, the names and XP floating above the monsters looks terrible. Why would you be able to see all that information about enemies that you're not even focused on anyways? I seriously hope that's getting changed before the final version.
 
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With all this negativity its amazing they bothered catering to the hardcore at all.
 
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