PorkyThePaladin
Arcane
- Joined
- Dec 17, 2013
- Messages
- 5,146
I first played Gothic games when they came out. Accidentally stumbled on Gothic 1 in an Electronics Boutique or a Gamestop (I bet many newer Codex members don't even know what those were, or their foreign equivalents, Electrokurwa or whatever). Remembered reading some bullshit lukewarm reviews on mainstream sites, got it anyway super cheap. Came home, had mind blown.
I wasn't playing PC games back in 1992, when Ultima VII: The Black Gate came out, the game which inspired Gothics and many others, but even in early 2000s, even when compared with the all time greats such as Planescape, Fallouts, Baldur Gates, this game was doing such amazing things. Day-night cycle, NPC schedules, go-anywhere open world, good 3D graphics (for the time), different factions to join and rise in rank, and the list goes on.
Naturally, purchased Gothic 2 as soon as it came out and completed it. That experience wasn't that great though, because I went the mage route. While that starts off really well, with the Monastery admission and all of that, magic isn't really well done in this series, and the entire play-through was too easy. Only years later have I completed it as a swordsman and experienced its true glory.
But anyway, I have completed both several times by now, but the last time was years ago. And although I praise these games every chance I get, once several years pass, you tend to forget some of the details. I fired up Gothic 1 again today (the gog version), and was once again blown away by not just how good the game is, but by how easily it draws you in, considering its age, the unconventional interface, and ancient graphics.
I bet if you conducted a survey among modern RPG developers, most of them have probably never played Gothic 1 and 2. And yet, there are so many lessons in these old games that are extremely relevant today.
For example, Gothic 1 was one of the earliest games to have fully voiced dialogue. I recently played Dragon Age: Origins, and the difference between these two games in terms of dialogue is so stark. In Gothic 1, NPCs talk in short segments, very similar to the real world. They tell you small bits of information, without unnecessary flavor speech or endless exposition and/or lore. Most of what they say has to do with some task you need to do, or is some sort of specific information that is useful for what you need to do. So far, the only lore I saw was in the Intro movie. This is so refreshing compared to DA:O and many other modern games, where I feared to click on any merchant lest he launch into the intricacies of his family tree's centuries old history.
The other reason these games draw you in so easily and naturally is the absence of mind-numbing tutorials and modern accessories such as quest compasses and nanny journals. You listen to NPCs, they give you intelligent instructions, then you use your mind and eyes and figure stuff out. Not rocket science by any means, but very player agency enabling.
The exploration is also so good. Every time I replay these games, I find something new. This time in Gothic 1, I found a whole new starter area off the starting path. Not the one with single molerat, but there is another one you can climb a couple of platforms to get to, which has a whole bunch of junior mobs. Totally missed it on previous playthroughs if I remember correctly.
True gems, these couple of games.
I wasn't playing PC games back in 1992, when Ultima VII: The Black Gate came out, the game which inspired Gothics and many others, but even in early 2000s, even when compared with the all time greats such as Planescape, Fallouts, Baldur Gates, this game was doing such amazing things. Day-night cycle, NPC schedules, go-anywhere open world, good 3D graphics (for the time), different factions to join and rise in rank, and the list goes on.
Naturally, purchased Gothic 2 as soon as it came out and completed it. That experience wasn't that great though, because I went the mage route. While that starts off really well, with the Monastery admission and all of that, magic isn't really well done in this series, and the entire play-through was too easy. Only years later have I completed it as a swordsman and experienced its true glory.
But anyway, I have completed both several times by now, but the last time was years ago. And although I praise these games every chance I get, once several years pass, you tend to forget some of the details. I fired up Gothic 1 again today (the gog version), and was once again blown away by not just how good the game is, but by how easily it draws you in, considering its age, the unconventional interface, and ancient graphics.
I bet if you conducted a survey among modern RPG developers, most of them have probably never played Gothic 1 and 2. And yet, there are so many lessons in these old games that are extremely relevant today.
For example, Gothic 1 was one of the earliest games to have fully voiced dialogue. I recently played Dragon Age: Origins, and the difference between these two games in terms of dialogue is so stark. In Gothic 1, NPCs talk in short segments, very similar to the real world. They tell you small bits of information, without unnecessary flavor speech or endless exposition and/or lore. Most of what they say has to do with some task you need to do, or is some sort of specific information that is useful for what you need to do. So far, the only lore I saw was in the Intro movie. This is so refreshing compared to DA:O and many other modern games, where I feared to click on any merchant lest he launch into the intricacies of his family tree's centuries old history.
The other reason these games draw you in so easily and naturally is the absence of mind-numbing tutorials and modern accessories such as quest compasses and nanny journals. You listen to NPCs, they give you intelligent instructions, then you use your mind and eyes and figure stuff out. Not rocket science by any means, but very player agency enabling.
The exploration is also so good. Every time I replay these games, I find something new. This time in Gothic 1, I found a whole new starter area off the starting path. Not the one with single molerat, but there is another one you can climb a couple of platforms to get to, which has a whole bunch of junior mobs. Totally missed it on previous playthroughs if I remember correctly.
True gems, these couple of games.