Gothic - Retrospective @RPS

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RockPaperShotgun looks back at Gothic and finds that in many ways it is unparalled today.

The game itself is set within a microsociety built entirely on the situation its inhabitants find themselves in. A succinct introduction describes a war between humans and orcs, because of course it does. But instead of the war itself, Gothic is about some of its consequences. The humans need weapons, so seal off a prison mine behind a one-way magical barrier, and begin shoving convicts in. The idiot mages get their sums wrong and trap themselves too, and more poetically, the prisoners revolt and take over, and rationally extract demands from the King in return for his precious ore. The result is a sensible arrangement in which the prisoners continue to mine and export in exchange for their choice of goods from the outside world.

Even mentioning that here's where the player comes in feels like an afterthought. You're a convict booted across the barrier who happens to become relevant by chance. You're no Chosen One, merely The One Who Happened To Be Standing There.

All this setup demonstrates an ongoing thoughtfulness that's key to Gothic's appeal. After the revolt, the prisoners split into three camps - one honouring the agreement with the King, the others working on separate escape plans. It'd be easy to set these camps up as novelty playgrounds, extreme poles of Good, Bad, and Stupid Wizard Hat, but Piranha Bytes were smarter. The Old Camp devotes everything to maintaining ore exports, and protecting the resulting imports from the rebellious New Camp, whose theft and raids supplement their rice crops. Meanwhile, the third Sect camp pray to a dormant god in hope of liberation, and trade off the excess of their holy drug, along with plants and tinctures.

The camps feel not like interchangeable markers to swap loot for new tasks, but like societies. Each has a reason to exist, a means of providing for itself, a social order, and a long term goal. They're visually and culturally distinct despite the limitations of geography, but the distinctions aren't exaggerated. The New Camp are the nasty faction on paper, but in practice just want independence from the King and his toadies, and only cause as much trouble as is needed to keep their escape plan in motion. Given the opportunity, they wouldn't wipe out or even wage war on the others because, well, needlessly murdering dozens of people crosses a lot of lines, y'know? Rivalry doesn't have to mean total destruction. Besides, the other camps provide useful goods.
[...]

It'd be easy to depict an overthrown penal colony as a hellhole full of bloodthirsty maniacs, but the prevailing attitude is that everyone's stuck there together. The communities and their inhabitants, both en masse and individually, act in ways that make sense given their circumstances.

In a word, Gothic is sensible.

There are few saints or pointlessly evil monsters. More common is pragmatic robbery or limited kindness - more people will help you out a little and few will screw you over for the hell of it. Think about it: if you were trapped in a village and went round stabbing people for larks, how long would the rest of your peers put up with you? Fights with humans are seldom unprompted, and even less commonly lethal - losing leaves you prone while the winner rifles through your pockets, or you theirs. Most NPCs won't hold a grudge afterwards, and accept loss with admirable grace. You're free to do likewise, although I can never resist the temptation to bully and rob a particular pair of miners every time I pass by. Some have friends who'll enact swift reprisals, but there are many opportunities to brawl, and some situations require a beating to get your point across. I lost my patience with one self-important cultist who tried to foist an odd job onto me before handing over something I wanted, so gave him a solid whack with a hammer and took it instead.

It's an interesting contrast to most games, where casual murder is the norm, and even those with a "pacifist run" tend to hand wring or fall over themselves admiring us for the enormously noble act of not massacring people. In Gothic, fights are fights, not murder-offs, and once someone's beaten, the matter is considered settled. It takes a deliberate, conscious decision to kill, and doing so triggers an unequivocal animation where you carefully crouch astride a helpless person and slay them. Even then, you're not irrevocably changed from NOT_MURDERER to MURDERER status, and not everyone will care, but it's remarkable how your perceptions and behaviour change when killing a nameless mook has social consequences. Even the hateful Rice Lord left a perennial stain on my conscience when I snuck past his goons and mercilessly skewered him in his sleep. Seeing peasants change from cheering on your fight to backing off in horror isn't the power trip it might sound like.
More information.
 
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I love Gothic ... and were it not for Gothic II (my entry point into the series) I would never have gotten involved with RPGDot :)
 
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Interesting read, and it's no secret I agree with it. Brilliant game.
 
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The most sad thing is that designs from Gothic games are not accepted in recent RPG openworlds.
Not sure why, everyone is trying to make singleplayer MMO. Maybe because it's easier, maybe because it's dictated by a publisher? Or maybe they're all just incompetent.
 
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The most sad thing is that designs from Gothic games are not accepted in recent RPG openworlds.
Not sure why, everyone is trying to make singleplayer MMO. Maybe because it's easier, maybe because it's dictated by a publisher? Or maybe they're all just incompetent.

It's all of these things. Developers nowadays shy away from taking the challenge of programming complex npc AI, world simulation, factions and association, tracking player decisions and providing realistic or at least competent choices and consequences.

It is easier for developers to go for flashy graphics, stupid AI for few hours of gaming and charge the same entry price for a fraction of the work.
 
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Gothic has a special place in my heart, it was the first rpg i truly enjoyed and finished, 2003 was the year i think; til then didnt paid much attention to rpgs. And i remember after i finished, got from a friend gothic2 (Which i didnt even knew existed) and fapped for a month :biggrin:.
 
Indeed, I'm waiting for a MMO that would use more logical world than the world that we see in most RPG games nowadays. In almost 100% of RPG you have to kill hundreds of people to... deliver package to the right person, fix the injustice and return amulet to the rightful owner, to defend yourself from robbers, to defend yourself from fools and so on...

I would like to see a game where death of the person does not mean the end of the life of this person. Let this person be "magically" reborn somewhere in the world without damage to health, gear, appearance and purse. And let not only the persons but creatures be reborn too. Let me kill that pesky goblin with red pet and a scar across left eye 5 times and let me be killed by the same goblin 3 times. We can even start to recognize each other at some point in time and even have a possibility to befriend. Not sure if it makes any sense, but at least it will ease my mind a bit.
 
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I was a late comer to this game, but to this day it still sits on my hard drive, and I take it out for a spin every so often. It's like visiting with a good friend.
 
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I was a late comer to this game, but to this day it still sits on my hard drive, and I take it out for a spin every so often. It's like visiting with a good friend.

I too was a late comer to the game and find Gothic to be in my top 5 RPGs of all time. There was some deep thought given into this game like few other have even come close to trying.
 
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I played it a year or two ago for the first time, loved it. So many great ideas in the game that I wish other developers of RPGs would take note of and try to build on with their own games. Since they didn't sell billions I guess they aren't considered much today. Sad, because the first 2 Gothic games have great, GREAT ideas in them.
 
Hey, guys, I have a doubt. Everybody seems to love Gothic (which I didn't play yet) but loathe Risen (which, too, I haven't played). They're from the same developer, isn't? So how come Piranha Bytes got so bad? Can any of you please explain that regression?
 
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G1 & 2 are two of the all-time greats. Every time I play them, it's like visiting a favorite town and old friends.
You felt like you really accomplished something when you advanced a level. What I also loved was being able to use terrain to your advantage in combat. I could climb up high and snipe enemies at leisure or just explore and see what I could find. There were always little surprises hidden away.
 
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Risen isn't really a regression at all. It's a very good game and pretty similar overall to Gothic.

Maybe Risen 2 is considered more of a departure since it's more of a pirate theme and the world is segmented into islands. I thought Risen 2 was also really good, though, and had a lot of fun with it.

I'd rate them something like - G1, G2, Risen, Risen 2 - those are the 4 that I played. All very good games, imo.
 
Gothic was the game that introduced me to a whole new way of looking at RPG games - those absolutely clunky, chunky, yet totally endearing European titles that just draw you in and dont let go til the end. I loved the world, the characters, and even the graphics I wouldnt change to this day. They have a unique style of their own.

Anyone who is worth listening to has it in their top 10 RPGs of all time
 
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Hey, guys, I have a doubt. Everybody seems to love Gothic (which I didn't play yet) but loathe Risen (which, too, I haven't played). They're from the same developer, isn't? So how come Piranha Bytes got so bad? Can any of you please explain that regression?

After Gothic 2 the dev tried to inject some Elder Scrolls into the Gothic series with G3. Unfortunately they bit off more thanb they could chew, and had a publisher who lost patience and forced the game out. The question who is to blame is quite complex.

After that PB created a new franchise with Risen. The first Risen is still basically a Gothic. They needed to create product quickly, so they stuck to the old formula, just with a comfortable interface. Most people here will tell you Risen is either okay or good. Risen is the easiest way to check out whether the classic Gothic formula is for you - and if you would suffer through a 15 minute learning curve (-> Gothic's controls make sense but they're non-intuitive) in Gothic to get 10-20% more fun.
Risen 2 suddenly became much more mainstream and felt consilified, at least compared to their older games. The "open" world was suddenly divided into separate islands, the interaction ratio in the world was lower, a few QTEs were added, the new pirate setting painted everything colourful and light. This package shocked many older players and scared others away.
As it often happens, punishment comes a generation later. ;) Although many people consider Risen 3 as better than R2, and more than one step back into the right direction, the game didn't really get traction. Winning fans back is hard. IMHO Risen 3 is a good game. Still a bit light compared to a heavy-weight like Gothic 2 Gold, though.
We're talking Piranha Bytes games here, mind you. We're complaining on a good to great level. Compared to other RPGs only Risen 2 is mediocre and Gothic 3 (with the community patch) a 2$ dice roll.
 
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Hey, guys, I have a doubt. Everybody seems to love Gothic (which I didn't play yet) but loathe Risen (which, too, I haven't played). They're from the same developer, isn't? So how come Piranha Bytes got so bad? Can any of you please explain that regression?

I loved Gothic 1, 2, and 3 (by the time I played 3 the bugs were all worked out). I also loved Risen. In my personal experience I have never come across anyone who said they loathed it but instead I came across many who really liked it.
 
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I'd rate them something like - G1, G2, Risen, Risen 2 - those are the 4 that I played. All very good games, imo.

Play Risen 3. It's better than Risen 2.
 
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