Arcania: A Gothic Tale (AKA Gothic 4)

[mysterd]

So, JoWood announces who will be developing Gothic 4 for the PC and Consoles.

It'll be Spellbound Entertainment -- anybody ever heard of these guys?!?!?

Gothic 4 Developer [August 23, 2007, 11:07 am ET] - 10 Comments
JoWooD announces Spellbound Entertainment is the developer working on Gothic 4, the upcoming RPG sequel, saying a release date will be unveiled soon:

Liezen, Austria, 23rd of August: JoWooD Productions Software AG is proud to present Spellbound Entertainment AG as the official developing team for Gothic 4.

One of the most convincing and central arguments for choosing Spellbound, was the scope of RPG experience brought in by Spellbound team member Jochen Hamma, who was involved in creating the legendary „Nordland Trilogy“ based upon the Pen & Paper RPG „Das Schwarze Auge“.

Furthermore, Spellbound has created own tools for achieving exceptional standards in Quality and Quality Assurance. Both parties are confident to produce a game of highest quality, and Spellbound intends to focus on the traditional strengths of the brand, setting new standards in the original, authentic Gothic essentials.

At the Games Convention 2007 in Leipzig, Mr. Jochen Hamma, Spellbounds Executive Producer, is showing the first facts and plans to curious fans and special interest media, outlining which strengths are essentially to be intensified, and which weaknesses are tagged for elimination.

Gothic 4 is being developed for PC and Current Gen console systems, a release date will be announced in the coming weeks.

[mysterd]

Info
Gothic 4: Arcania info revealed

Gothic 4 Arcania first details (26.4.2008 15:15 - levis)

Few lucky subscribers have received the June issue of German PC Games magazine in advance and thanks to that, we've got the first details on Spellbound's upcoming RPG:

* Fully titled Gothic 4: Arcania (as opposed to the previous subtitle Genesis).
* Story set 10 years after the third title and located on various southern islands, each having different climate zones and its own flora & fauna.
* Same as in previous titles, there'll be a hidden place (temporarily blocked by a magical shield/barrier).
* Weather changes, full day and night cycle plus the ability to temporarily cast a spell and change the time of day (e.g. from day to night when you need to slip past guards unnoticed).
* Aside few NPCs from the previous title, some monsters will have a fresh look (however, trolls look the same as in Gothic III).
* With the ability to climb and ride on beasts.
* Aiming for continuity, developers have gone through fan wishes on the forums and are planning on integrating some of them.
* Fully DirectX 10 compatible with advanced shader technology: standing under a tree, not only light will be realistically dimmed, but looking up into the sky, you'll see the sun behind partially transparent leaves.

Gothic 4: Arcania for PC, X360 and PS3 hasn't got a release date yet, it'll be done "when it's done" and won't miss out on this year's Game Convention.
zdroj: PC Games magazine

Screens
Lots of G4 Screenies

[Elliot Kane]

Definitely looks gorgeous, I have to say.

[mysterd]

May 11, 2008 2:47:19 GMT Elliot Kane said:

Definitely looks gorgeous, I have to say.

Agreed.

Hopefully, Spellbound will do what Pluto 13 couldn't do -- get their Gothic game to run gorgeous, load times won't take an eternity, and make sure the game won't be too buggy, either.

Gothic 3 is a very pretty game, but hell -- even on my new 8800 GT video card w/ all the settings maxed-out in 1024x768 (and mind you, this game's 2 years old), the framerate's all over the place. One moment, it's fine -- over 30 frames. The next moment, for no reason what-so-ever as nothing else is even happening on-screen, stutters down to 10 frames for few secs, then right back up to 30+ frames.

[Elliot Kane]

On an 8800? My word! Goth 3 must have been a complete nightmare when it first came out!

I somehow doubt Goth 4 is aiming at the middle of the graphics card market with that look, though, I have to say... A little short sighted, perhaps, if they want maximum sales.

[mysterd]

May 11, 2008 3:02:47 GMT Elliot Kane said:

On an 8800? My word! Goth 3 must have been a complete nightmare when it first came out!

I bought G3 when it first hit $20 -- and at that time, it was still in a very poor Beta-like shape. I had to run the game in 800x600 w/ most stuff on low, to get it running worth a damn on my 6600
GT -- and of course, it had that stutter every now and then, too. 1024x768 was a no go, period.

The stutter issue (which basically all G3 gamers have -- it's like the stutter issue Morrowind had when MW first came out, which MW got that issue stomped in a patch) and the load times keep me from playing this gem, as numerous bugs have been stomped since. There's a great game, to be had under this major technical mess -- if only someone can get the rest of them issues killed...

I somehow doubt Goth 4 is aiming at the middle of the graphics card market with that look, though, I have to say... A little short sighted, perhaps, if they want maximum sales.

In screenies, they usually show a game in its maxed-out look.

Who knows what the minimum system requirements will be for it. And who knows how well the game will or will not scale on those systems.

[mysterd]

Preview of G4 from IGN

This isn't news to JoWood and Spellbound, and one of their primary goals with Arcania is to make it more palatable for those on the western side of the Atlantic. The title change can be seen as part of that effort, an attempt to presumably separate in consumers' minds the fourth Gothic game from the third. Then there's also the fact that the Nameless Hero from Gothic 1 through 3 is no longer the protagonist. He's a king, and he's invaded the island of the new protagonist in an attempt to unite his kingdom.

Ooooh, that does sound interesting.

This is another change for the series, as it moves back to an island setting like in the first two games and away from the mainland featured in the third.

That's probably for the best -- G2 and G3 -- especially G3 -- was just too big for its own good. That game is still buggy as sin, so many years later.

I still think, by far, Gothic 1 was the best in the Gothic series, so far.

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."

Damn...
Too bad PB's Gothic games always turned out at the very least buggy -- and in G3's case, VERY VERY VERY VERY BUGGY.

"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."

Okay.

Though you'll be playing as a new Nameless Hero, the overall structure of Arcania's gameplay will be similar to that of the previous franchise iterations. You'll still quest for factions and be able to make a significant impact on the game world. You'll still gain experience, level up, and get points that must be spent at special trainers to improve your skills. You'll be able to craft armor and weapons and partake in an expanded and more user-friendly alchemy system. While we didn't get to see any of the game's menus, Dreamcatcher representatives impressed on us that they were focusing on delivering a more organized, streamlined, and comprehensive system that should make traveling around the world, inventory management, and keeping track of quest goals easier on the player. If you're one of those who hate the game helping you along in any way, there'll apparently be ways to customize your experience as well. "One of the things we decided to do which wasn't in Gothic 3 was put in a much more robust questing system and map," said producer Jay Podilchuk. "If you chose the quest of your quest log it would highlight those areas [and] give you an update of how many things you had [collected] for that quest."

Makes sense.

Gladman elaborated on the more user-friendly approach. "That's one of those things that's more North American-centric. A map that hand-holds you through…which you can turn off if you want to." Both Gladman and Podilchuk went on to talk about how if players dislike any kind of UI or map assists it all can be turned off. It's called Gothic mode, apparently, and is being implemented for the hardcore German audience.

I'm glad that G4's Map -- which sounds like the arrow in Bioshock -- can be turned off. Very cool.

The user interface in the demo, which will probably be changed around quite a bit before the game's release, had an eight-slot skill bar in the bottom left hand corner; stamina, life, mana, and experience bars in the middle; and a combat overlay in the bottom right. We did get a little bit of play time with the combat system, but the small, forested demo area Dreamcatcher loaded up for us didn't allow for much. The two humanoid enemies standing around didn't really have any AI, so we were just running and freely swatting at them with a sword. Combat is still very much tied to stamina, with stronger swings eating larger chunks of your stamina bar, so you can't just sit there and plug away endlessly with powerful attacks. There'll be combos, parrying, and various kinds of special swings like flurries. A loose lock-on system is built in as well; it activates when you look at an enemy long enough for their name to be highlighted. While Dreamcatcher is saying they've made strides to improve the fighting, we can't really say anything at this point until we can fight against an active target.

Okay.

In the finished game players should expect to find most of the popular Gothic enemies like lurkers, trolls, dragons, with the remaining orc population hanging around as well. Players will still be able to hunt more traditional types of animals to skin and collect teeth from for the trade portion of the game, in addition to picking flora for alchemy.

Good.

As for the interface and managing all these reagents, Podilchuk filled us in on how Spellbound is putting things together. "At this point we're now looking at WoW's [interface], where they've worked in so many things that people are so accustomed to having but we're trying to figure out ways to make them more playable…to take the tediousness out of the trade aspect of the game but still keep it in there for the players that love it."

Okay.

He went on to describe crafting, saying in Arcanium it's possible to switch in and out weapon components, such as hilts and blades, to achieve special effects, letting you better hold onto swords you like rather than tossing the whole thing out for a new one. 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.

You know, in RPG's, I never really ever used the "reshuffle my points" thing. I usually stuck w/ what I chose. I never even touched the one in say Titan Quest.

What do you guys think of such a feature?

Gladman says he's very aware of how these types of changes could affect the hardcore Gothic player base. "It's always a challenge when you're working with an established IP [intellectual property] in maintaining the expectations that come along with that IP while still moving it forward at the same time…There was a lot of things with Gothic that are very Gothic-esque and as long as we maintain those, we should be alright."

We can say little tweaks are being made to ensure combat feels less sluggish. Quaffing potions, for example, no longer requires your character to put away his weapons and enter a lengthy drinking animation that more often than not gives your attackers time to interrupt. It's not going to be Diablo-quick, but the system will speed up the process significantly.

Cool.

As mentioned with regards to the title change, Arcania will make magic a more significant element of combat. Unfortunately we didn't actually get to actually see any spells, just a hand-held glowing orb used to show off some of the game's lighting effects. According to the demo representatives, Arcania's Nameless Hero will have the power to change the weather, alter night and day, and blast out fireballs among other things.

I remember Shivering Isles had the "change the weather skill." Cool.
Altering day and night spells sounds interesting.

"However you try to play the game, we're going to try to come up with a system of magic that accentuates that play," said Podilchuk. "If you want to be a battlemage we're going to have your buff spells and your weapon spells and stuff like that…If you want to play it as an archer then you'll want to have a system like druid-type where you can control plants and animals."

Sounds like the usual assortment of RPG-stuff.

More interesting than that is the fact that Spellbound is now building in individual bits of equippable armor. In Arcania you won't be donning a single suit of protection, but instead be equipping yourself with many pieces which, hopefully, allows for more interesting customization options. "We're aiming really, really high for this. A real medieval layered armor system where you wear some sort of quilt, then chain mail, then plate armor."

Oooh, I like the sound of this -- sounds very Morrowind-like and Oblivion-like.

The developer is also toying with the idea of armor piece inscription, allowing you to decorate equipment and shields with faction heraldry. From the screens released it's clear some work is being put into authentic-looking weapon and armor designs. "In Austria there's this armory that has tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of pieces of ancient medieval armor and the Spellbound team has been out there and photographed a lot of the stuff," said Gladman. Podilchuk added, "All the metal textures and stuff being used in game are actually coming off medieval weapons and stuff like that."

That sounds cool.

Those who played Gothic 3 will remember the questing structure through which they'd gain favor with one particular town and eventually be tasked with destroying another. This kind of system is being augmented in Arcanium according to Podilchuk. "I found in Gothic 3, you could pretty much do all the quests if you tried hard enough. They had that faction sort of thing but…it took me a couple of towns to realize what I was doing, which I found really frustrating. Not knowing what the consequences of my actions were, it wasn't communicated properly." From what was described, it sounds like the quest structures will be more intertwined, with quest lines that lead to more quest lines that work to illuminate the motivation or reasoning behind the original given quest, and more frequently tie into the overarching story. "Part of the frustrating part of Gothic 3 for me is there was so much to do and it wasn't tied together properly," said Podilchuk. "It didn't necessarily feel like I was doing a quest for the paladins or I was doing a quest for the orcs. Why would I be doing quests for the orcs?"

Okay.

In an interesting twist, we might also see the inclusion of special housing for the Nameless Hero. It isn't in the game right now, but the idea is floating around at Spellbound to include a place where the player can always retreat for rest, for storage, and for crafting purposes. "In Gothic you have these stations," said Podilchuk, "your alchemy stands…blacksmithing one…and we've come up with a fletching table where you can sit, put your bow down and restring it with whatever you find. The next natural progression was why can't we have this? We called it the fortress of solitude idea. This place where you could gather your good stuff and have a place to relax."

Cool. I really liked in Oblivion, that could buy houses and locations -- and store lots of junk (you don't want to sell) there.

As for how the game looks, we can say the demo stage was quite pretty, though not exactly on par with some of the screens released. It uses Trinigy's Vision Engine, and the style appears similar to previous Gothic games. The demo stage featured plenty of trees covered in leaves that swayed in the wind, and changed color depending on the intensity of light hitting them. Mornings came along with a pink sky, shadows moved across the ground as day progressed, and there was a very naturalistic, organic quality to the overall look. A wooden cabin sat in the middle of the demo's small forested area, with logs and debris scattered around out front, a thatched roof, and a dirty interior with a rickety ladder leading up to an attic.

Cool.

No word on the new Nameless Hero's character model yet because it hasn't actually been finished. The protagonist we saw was actually a placeholder graphic of the old Nameless Hero, so we can't say if the new guy will continue the tradition of unflinching devotion to traditional goatees.

Okay.

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.

A way to change the graphical stuff b/t NA and Euro filters graphically?
Ummm....why??

That just sounds.....odd....

There'll also be extras like procedural cloth and fur animations, straw swaying in the wind, and other effects built on middleware that hasn't yet been announced.

Once the entirety of the new island is available for exploration upon the game's release, we're told it'll be slightly small than the land mass in Gothic 3. Dreamcatcher representative commented that there'll be easier ways to move through the world, though didn't specify exactly what they meant.

Maybe some sort of fast travelling thing like Oblivion?
By horse?
By magical teleportation portals like Two Worlds?

There will still be different climate zones including desert, snow, forest, and large underground areas filled with molten lava. Since weather will play a larger part in this game and the skies can be manipulated by the player, you'll be able to do neat tricks like instigate a torrential downpour, triggering guard NPCs to take shelter in houses and giving you a clear avenue past a guard post or into a town.

That's very interesting, hehe.

As for how lengthy an experience players should expect, "We're aiming at 60 to 80 hours. It's the full epic RPG," said Podilchuk. "We're not looking at something of the Fable variety here."

Nice!!!
Make it long and of course good -- and of course, keep the bugs out -- and I'll come looking for it.

[mysterd]

Gothic 4: Arcania preview on GameSpot.

A lot of the same was already said on IGN, but I'll throw down some different or additional info.

Arcania picks up ten years after the events of Gothic 3. The Nameless Hero from the original games has vanquished the orcs from the land and has ascended to the throne. But as the king, our former hero has become consumed with power and is no longer held in favor by much of the population, including the Witches of Fate that started him on his noble journey in the first place. Betrayed, the witches find a new Nameless Hero, most likely a humble fisherman, and charge him with righting the wrongs of the new king. Of course, being a Gothic game, you can do pretty much whatever you want, be it join the king, overthrow him, convince him to change his evil ways, or set up shop as a mercenary and mind your own business.

Cool.

Arcadia will be packaged under Microsoft’s Games for Windows brand and we wouldn’t be surprised to see at least an Xbox 360 version as Dreamcatcher used an Xbox 360 wired controller during our demo. Of course, that’s more than a year away, and at this point we are just excited to see the promise of Arcadia in action. Much like Gothic 3, the game shows potential. But will it deliver? We’ll know more later this year.

If G4's working on a X360 Controller on the PC, I'll bet you there'll likely be a 360 version eventually.

[Elliot Kane]

Decent size at 60-80 hours. Proper size for an RPG. Just wondering what the copy protection will be like...

I agree that the graphics filter idea is truly bizarre. I hadn't thought it made a difference where you are in the Western world as to what you liked your games to look like. They're all kinda 'medieval europe' and that's that.

As for buying back points... Honestly, I only think it needs to be a feature if your build system is broken and you put in a lot of totally useless skills or skills that won't work until the game is patched. The idea of any RPG is that you build a character, after all - not that s/he is some sort of disposable mannequin for hanging 'powers' off.

Have I got the build wrong and had to restart games in the past? Surely have. But that's all part of the fun

[mysterd]

RPGGamer.com has impressions on Arcania: A Gothic Tale (AKA Gothic 4) from E3 2009.

Also, Gaming Excellence has their E3 2009 Impressions on Arcania: A Gothic Tale, as well.

GT.com Vids
GameTrailers.com E3 2009 Game Dev Walkthrough - Part 1
GameTrailers.com E3 2009 Game Dev Walkthrough - Part 2
GameTrailers.com E3 2009 - Firemage Demo

[mysterd]

New preview from HookedGamers.

Ranged Combat

To distance Arcania's combat from Gothic 3's button mashing fest, Spellbound has implemented a lock-on system akin to the The Witcher's in certain ways. For ranged combat, locking on a target is simple and self-explanatory, though not always the best option - hitting a target outside of the lock-on system deals more damage.

Melee Combat

In terms of melee combat, the nameless hero's weapon will glow blue for a small period after a slash. Hitting the attack button during that time produces a chained attack, and players with quick enough reflexes can continue chaining attacks.