A few days ago the german website PCGames published an elaborate preview on Arcania. The preview was first published in PC Games 08|09 print magazine (20.06.2009). Certain parts from the preview were translated and included in this extract here on WoG.


With Arcania: A Gothic Tale, developed by the German studio Spellbound, publisher Jowood wants to win back many Gothic fans. In the mean time Piranha Bytes, the original Gothic development team, is working on Risen, a new role playing brand in the spirit of Gothic.

It will be a thrilling duel. Many RPG-fans are discussing which game will be the better, the new and true Gothic. The authors of the preview decided to be fair and make their own opinion. So they got onto the train to Kehl am Rhein to knock on Spellbounds door and have a thorough look at the game.

The biggest part of the Arcania game is set on a completely new island, where a fresh Nameless Hero steps into the spotlight. The young adventurer discovers that his village is destroyed by the troops of King Rhobar the third. He vows to take revenge and sets out to become strong and able to push King Rhobar from his throne.
The new hero will meet several known game characters from the previous games. Among them are Diego and the wizard Xardas. In Arcania one will find its way on two islands, of which one constitutes about 90% of the game world. The game world isn’t bordered by any invisible barriers except that the NH cannot swim and will not go beyond a certain depth in the water.

The biggest island is divided in ten parts which can be unlocked and explored progressively. The player for example has to advance to a certain point in the main quest before gaining access to a new zone. The motto of the developers was to give the player ‘a focus ahead’. Generally speaking: one shouldn’t be forced to run back and forth between already explored areas all the time. But that doesn’t mean that the game will have a fixed linearity. On the contrary, one moves around in a coherent freely accessible world, which allows the player to return to previously unlocked zones at any given time.

Other than in Risen the player cannot become a member of a guild, although there are five of them: fighters, magicians, traders, rangers and alchemists. Also the fractions are no longer directly related to the main quest. The game will have many side quests but only one end. There will be more freedom regarding character development: Anyone can become a magician, archer or a swordsman. Skill points can now be freely invested in ‘close combat’, ‘long range combat’ and ‘magic’ skills without the need of a teacher. The completion of special quests undertaken for guilds however, will yield special points that can only be used for improving one of these skills.
To learn any possible craft one will still need to visit a teacher. According to PCGames crafting will now clearly play a more important role than in the previous Gothic games, which means that some of the best items are only accessible through crafting.

In general the hero moves more quickly during close combat and fluid sword strokes can be sent in any direction. For attacks the left mouse button is used, to block one needs the right button. Combo attacks can be learned as the game progresses and an especially powerful stroke will be available as well. There will be less magic spells compared to the prequels, but the spells that are included can be improved. A fire ball at the most simple level is a small projectile, but at level three is has mutated into a gigantic wave that harms opponents in a wide radius.

At the moment the huge lovely crafted landscape is still almost completely devoid of humans and animals. Some NPC’s are present in the four greater cities and the many small villages, but they do not walk around yet.
Many houses will be accessible in the final game, but not all. Because of the war the windows and doors of a number of houses were sealed off with wooden planks. It hasn’t been decided yet by JoWooD und Spellbound whether such houses can be opened up and filled with NPC’s and additional quests at a later stage, by means of mini-updates.
When exploring a city one can see clearly what is also still missing: the interiors of many houses need furniture and other decorations. But no panic, the game has not even entered the Alpha-Phase.

It is for certain that teleporter stones will be present at fixed positions spread over the world, like in Two Worlds. Once activated, one can travel from one to the next. Travelling this way takes a few seconds because of a loading time. Otherwise the game world will be streamed completely and thus will be devoid of loading times.

At the moment lots of things are still unclear: Will the dialogs be typically rough and cynical, is the story good, are the quests credible and richly faceted, is the game world lively, is the balancing fair at all times? One can only speculate at the time. Many elements of Arcania have already been developed but have not yet been inplemented in the game. Once they are, one can judge what really works and what doesn’t. So the release term of winter 2009 should be taken with care.


Translations by bigsnappy

To read the whole preview (in german): Arcania Preview on PCGames