Gothic 3 doesn’t require gamers to have played previous versions, despite there being a connection between all three. This time round, gamers will travel to the mainland after an invasion from the Orcs who have enslaved the human kingdom and are now seeking other aims. With the destruction and the continuation of Orc invasions being widespread, there are a number of factions who are acting as a resistance to the Orcs, who also hope to foil their future plans and destruction. The story and its development are probably the game’s most appealing features. You begin the game completely oblivious to the mysteries behind the destruction, but as you progress by fulfilling quests and talking to characters you’ll understand the story and the aims of all the six factions you meet along the way. Probably the most exciting aspects of this, though, is that depending on whom you interact with and do quests for, you’ll begin to learn the story from a different perspective.
You see, gamers can progress through the story forming relationships with a number of factions, which will ultimately change the way the game plays and finishes. You can decide to become a part of the rebellion that are trying to force out the Orcs or, if you wish, you can side with the Orcs and help them with their motives. There’s not a great deal of linearity to the story, with a number of quests branching you off into different directions, but all help in concluding the story. If you so wish you can be a cunning and backstabbing character or someone who’s noble and honest. You can decide to side with the rebellion just for your own personal gains, but always have the best interest of the Orcs. For instance, the Rebels have spies in certain Orc towns that are undercover trying to understand the Orc’s plans - with the Rebels usually asking you to receive their reports and report back to the Rebel leaders. You can do that, and receive a few extra gold pieces, but then you can also go back to the Orc leader and reveal the identity of these spies to gain loyalty with the tribe. In this sense, the game constantly relies on how you decide to play and how you want to approach certain situations, laying out a number of paths for gamers to choose.
Most towns are quite diverse and offer lots of detail.
The meat of the game requires gamers to travel across the land and fulfill certain quests, which will eventually uncover key elements in the game’s story. Gothic 3 plays very similar to any MMO on the market, but without the inclusion of other players. This is a good thing though, since you’ll be able to alter how the game pans out and the relationships you form with key characters. There are all sorts of quests, some being more important than others. There will be optional quests to build reputation with certain factions, and others that will help you uncover more and more of the story. Quests such as killing bandits, wild animals and recovering equipment will prove to be mere distractions compared to other quests where you’ll have to slay massive creatures and infiltrate heavily guarded locations. Within the first hour you’ll find yourself with about twenty or so quests already in your logbook to finish, meaning that the game allows exploration and freedom early on. Fulfilling quests is usually quite enjoyable, with the rewards opening up a number of different paths for your character. For instance, a certain tribe may be seeking a new blacksmith and ask you to find one for them. Say, for instance, you go to an area and kill some enemies to save a blacksmith. You can then ask him to come back and join this tribe to be their blacksmith - allowing you to now learn some blacksmithing skills. This also comes into play when you want to begin learning alchemy skills and hunting skills.
You can customise your character quite heavily too. You can take up certain professions and devote your time and skill in improving these skills by fulfilling quests and earning money. You can become a thief who merely starts out with the ability to pick locks, but if you keep at it you’ll be able to pick the pockets of other characters. Also, as you level up you can put skill points into new abilities in several areas, such as to learning new spells or profession skills. There’s plenty of spells and abilities to learn, ranging from transformation abilities all the way to unleashing powerful fireballs, as well as there being plenty of weapons to use too.
There’s plenty of variety and interaction with NPCs, with almost all of the characters reacting to your actions in towns. For instance, if you steal from their house they’ll try to kill you and rob your own items. And if you rob from a leader of a town, then guards will constantly try to attack you as you enter or leave a town. There’s plenty of diversity between characters in regards to their attitude and their spoken dialogue. In fact, there’s quite a lot of voice acting and a lot of variety between each of the game’s voices. There’s a lot of spoken dialogue and it helps to create an atmosphere and setting for the game, and the characters that populate it.
To accompany this deep and open story is the vast locations that gamers will come across. A lot of the time you’ll be running through long-grassed fields, dark woods and eerie caves and even some great looking deserts. The game’s landscape is actually quite large and has you running from one side to the other just to fulfill quests, providing gamers with plenty of exploration. This variety in locations also provides gamers with the attraction of a number of unique creatures too.
Not a very happy bloke, is he?
Gamers can expect to have a troublesome time with the game’s combat system though. Much like the previous versions, the game still provides one of the dullest combat structures available in the genre. All that the combat requires you to do is press the left or right mouse button and to side-step incoming attacks, with everything else being a complete mess. There’s also a very slow reaction time between using abilities such as spells. You see, when trying to use these abilities there’s always a pause in your character's reactions before executing a spell. So, when you’re using your sword and wanting to finish off your enemy with a quick fire blast, it’s actually quite difficult to do so due to the time delay between pressing the hotkey to use the ability and the time the character uses it. This time delay also reflects on when you want to use consumables such as healing potions – which is probably the biggest crime of the game. Say, for instance, you were running low on health during the midst of a hard, intense battle and needed a health potion; it would be impossible to do so. There’s absolutely no swiftness with the transition of using a potion or similar action. If you were swinging your sword your character will actually pause there and then slowly reach for a potion and drink it, with absolutely no urgency. So, to effectively use a potion, you’ll have to flee from battle, run to a safe distance and then drink your potion. It’s a big issue later in the game when you want to run through battles quite quickly, and with these slow reactions between spells and potions apparent it just bogs the entire game down.
That’s another issue with Gothic 3 – it’s released in probably the most bug ridden state possible. There’s a heap of quest text just left out of the dialogue, and there are graphical glitches such as flickering textures and objects disappearing through others. The framerate is very choppy at times, and the game features a very frustrating saving structure. It would’ve been much more convenient to have the game incorporate some sort of auto-save system to avoid having to reload a previous save file after dying in battle. And if you dislike the idea of a trial-and-error structure, then be prepared for a very frustrating game. The list of bugs goes on, and it’s a very questionable decision on the developers behalf to let the game out in such a terrible state. While most of these bugs will no doubt be fixed with upcoming patches (thank god for PC gaming), a lot of the other issues within the game are doubtful to be fixed. While the good things certainly outweigh the bad quite significantly, the issues within the game are just so primitive, resulting in a very average experience.
Rain of fire!
To add to the frustration of combat is the game’s AI system. Enemies won’t always run in to attack you, and will often just stand still as their fellow members are under attack right in front of them. Party AI is also another issue. Some of the missions will require you to have another member to join you, however, these members are usually quite unsuccessful in providing any assistance at all.
Graphically, Gothic 3 does quite often impress with long draw distances and the variety shown between locations such as the Orc towns, caves and forest settings. However, as mentioned previously, the game often suffers from some horrific framerate drops, and quite frequently too. Animation can sometimes be an issue for a lot of the game’s enemies and there are far too many minor flickering texture issues that are far too obvious. Music as a whole is done quite well, with some atmospheric tunes playing in the background, rising and lowering as the tension picks up.
There’s probably a reason why the Gothic series isn’t as well received as Elder Scrolls, and it’s probably to do with the fact that the Gothic series still suffers from the same issues that have plagued previous versions. Questionable AI, a very dull combat system and a choppy interface all contribute to the game’s downfall. While the game has an absolutely outstanding amount of depth and character customisation, it feels wasted when the aforementioned issues just hinder the game’s success and fun factor. Of course, if you’ve enjoyed previous Gothic games then this is probably a leap forward in your eyes, but otherwise it’s a poorly executed game that could’ve been a lot better if the developers took the time to fix the game’s issues.
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