Developer: Spellbound Entertainment
Publishers: JoWooD Entertainment, DreamCatcher Interactive
Genre: Action RPG
Platforms: Windows, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3
Released: October 2010 (Windows & Xbox 360), April 2013 announced for PlayStation 3
Version Used In Review: Windows, version 1.1.0.1433
Introduction
ArcaniA: Gothic 4 is fourth game in the Gothic franchise. I have played two previous games, Gothic 2 & 3, those games being the main reason I ended up buying the fourth game. And because it was in discount at Steam during the Holiday Sales.
To be honest, I never actually finished Gothic 4. I did try but, after about twelve hours or so, I was so convinced the quality of the game that I saw no reason to bother with this game anymore. And in this case I'm not talking about quality in positive meaning. Seriously, after Gothic 2 and 3 I felt this game to be a complete failure. Yes, it has positive things in it as well, but not even close to enough to compensate the negative things.
Graphics
Gothic 4 looks beautiful. Lots of details, almost making the world and characters to look realistic. Unfortunately, the illusion of beautiful graphic was shattered as soon as I touched the mouse and keyboard; especially the animations are very clunky. For a moment I was thinking that I was playing a game that was released during the first years of 21st century.
The flaws of animations are apparent in almost everything; the lip-synch is so bad the game would have been much better without it completely. In fact, it's so badly implemented I'm actually hesitating to call it "lip-synch" at all. Every gesture made by any character looks like out of place. The movement of any character or creature is affected by the same problems as well. You just can't call it smooth, not by any standards.
Besides the animations, there are other problems with the graphics as well; texture clipping, clear edges between textures and so on. Some objects you can pick up don't even blend to the rest of the world at all. The way these objects "glow" from the background is just way too annoying, especially when the general style tries to be realistic. The same goes with certain details of characters' faces; while the face itself looks even beautiful and, surprisingly, realistic, the eyes are like glowing white spotlights when compared to the rest of the face. Ugly? Perhaps. Annoying? Definitely!
There are other problems as well, especially one which kept happening all the time. I don't usually include pictures in reviews put this time I'm making the exception. Check the attached image, which I took myself, and you can see the problem.
[ATTACH]4523[/ATTACH]
Now, I know this game has been in development since 2007. I also admit that I didn't use best quality option for graphics. The later is because the game was nearly unplayable with best graphical setting in my laptop. There are two things, however, I don't understand.
First of all, why I'm able to run games that are more recent and those games look and work better at the same time? And why some older games are able to to achieve better representation as well? Yes, animations, I'm looking at you! Good examples of more recent games I play with my laptop which generally work and look better are Skyrim, The Witcher 2, Mass Effect 3 and, in some extend for the look, Borderlands 2. As for the older games, I could throw out games like Mass Effect 2 (same year but much earlier).
Secondly, while I may be able to understand the problems with my laptop, what I don't understand while more or less all of these problems occurs with my desktop as well? And seriously, if my desktop is capable of running Crysis 2 in highest settings, there is no reason any of these problems is caused by hardware not being powerful enough.
Audio
The music is good, I can't deny that. few times the music played during the fights took place when there were no enemies even close, but only few times. Unfortunately, that's more or less the only good thing I can say about audio.
First of all, voice acting is mediocre at best. There is almost no emotion present and most of the times it feels like the actors were instructed to speak as loud and clear as possible so that everybody would be able to understand it clearly without subtitles. Annoying by itself but when it's combined to the different accents, it's sometimes laughable, most of the times just plain annoying and only listenable at times. In fact, there were only few characters who had remotely good voice acting. And then there are those characters I don't want to hear speaking ever again. Seriously, if the voice of character (especially laughing) is capable of causing bad headache to me with her squeaky voice, how could anyone claim it to be better than terrible? Headache, to me, to a person who daily listens music like black metal, death metal, grindcore? Seriously?
As for everything else, the best description I could think of is "lame". Sure, no problems most of the times, but there was just no sound effect or anything else that actually made me feel like "Wow! That was done well!", not even close.
ArcaniA: Gothic 4
ArcaniA: Gothic 4
"As we all know, holy men were born during Christmas...
Like mr. Holopainen over there!"
- Marco Hietala, the bass player of Nightwish
Like mr. Holopainen over there!"
- Marco Hietala, the bass player of Nightwish
Story and writing
The story of Gothic 4 is mediocre as well. Sure, there were good moments before I decided to quit, but not too many. Most of the time, it was just about old cliches recycled. Sometimes there were minor alterations but not enough. For example, in how many games you start the adventure by getting rid of rats infesting the fields of local farmer? Yup, in most games, though in Gothic 4 the rats were replaced by mole rats. The difference? None, just the name. Also, taken from the beginning of the game (SPOILER WARNING!), how many games starts from the situation where you were just going to get married when a group of soldiers attack your peaceful village, far away from the real conflict and without any apparent reason, slaughters everybody, including your wife? And, surprise surprise, you just happened to be the only survivor and only because you weren't there when attack took place? Well, not the only survivor, a stranger from distant land survived as well and just HAPPENED to be leaving and traveling towards the area where the real war takes place?
I could be able to stand the never-ending wave of cliches if the dialogues were good. Which those aren't. And I'm not talking about the voice acting, which only made the situation worse, but the actual content of dialogues. Almost all replies are short and unimaginative. Some lines even felt like those were written in hurry to get around the creative blockade the writers had. Not sure if that was the case in reality, at least I felt that way. And in the end it doesn't really matter, neither one will magically turn the dialogue more acceptable.
A good example right from the beginning of the game (MINOR SPOILER!); your character hears from another NPC that your soon-to-be wife is pregnant and she never told you about it. If such thing happened to me in real life, the discussion I would have with her wouldn't be only few lines long. In Gothic 4 the discussion ends almost immediately, and the way it happens is not fluent at all, almost like there were supposed to be more but most of the dialogue was removed and nobody bothered to tweak the new end much. And I could accept it if this happened only once or twice, but when more or less every dialogue has similar quality, I can't but wonder if the writers actually dared to ask money from their work? It almost feels like some random coder was hired to write the dialogues, or even the whole game, during his or her breaks from coding. In fact, that could explain the sloppiness in other things as well...
Gameplay
The controls of Gothic are very simple; look around with mouse and move with keyboard. Left mouse button attacks and right button blocks or, if the character is also moved, dodges by rolling. Every object is interacted with one key, other key draws or sheaths the selected weapon. Simple, perhaps even too simple. On the other hand, simple control system is the only thing which actually is able to negate other problems, though only partially. For example, there is no crosshair shown, unless ranged weapon or spell is equipped. Since the game is using 3rd person angle, it gets rather annoying to aim on anything. In fact, fighting with melee weapons is more or less clicking furiously and hoping that you have aligned your character precisely towards the intended target. On the other hand, avoiding hits by rolling is quite easy since you can see the incoming attack long before the enemy actually does it.
Now, since I'm talking about fighting, let's talk about other problems I had with it. First of all, once you initiate an attacked, which can be anything from rolling to swinging weapon, there is no way to cancel it. While this may sound good in paper, the problem is that even the most simple attack takes quite long. The more complicated attack or action, the longer it takes. Now, all of that could be accepted without one very "tiny" problem; once the animation begins, nothing can interrupt the action, except death. If I see that enemy is preparing to use the most powerful attack it has, and my character is still performing his own action, I can only hope my action ends and I can dodge away before the enemy hits me. It doesn't matter how many or how powerful hits I deal to the enemy, the attack can be only avoided by dodging or blocking it. And since the game tends to queue your clicks in memory and follow that queue without exceptions, there is hardly anything you can do to avoid the hit. Because of all these problems, the melee fights eventually began to follow the "one hit and dodge" tactic, repeated ad nauseam. And the "hit" part was more hoping that I didn't accidentally move the mouse at all and my character was able to react to the change of direction before I clicked the left mouse button.
Second issue I had was with the "flurry" attack. After first attack you are able to do second, more powerful attack which also costs some stamina. This attack could be initiated only at the certain moment, which usually was so short it was easy to miss it. There is an option to make the weapon glow when this "flurry" attack can be initiated. The problem is, most of the time my character was positioned in the way that I couldn't see the weapon and thus not the glow. And even if I was able to see it, the time frame was so short it was already over before I managed to react. To reliably initiate the flurry attack I had to trust my instinct and luck. And because of that, I usually had at least one attack in queue, which means no dodging immediately. On the other hand, the flurry attack was powerful enough to make it tempting to trust my luck.
The lack of crosshair also made it difficult to pick up items. You character had to be positioned rather precisely to be able to pick up anything. Finding the correct angle was quite often just about getting near the object i thought I could be able to pick up and then move my mouse in growing circle to find the correct angle, if the object could be picked up at all. I also had moments where the exact location of dead enemy was one for inner mechanisms of the game and another for graphics. I could be right next to the corpse and look at it and no option to loot it was given, until I took few steps back and turned my character to face the exact opposite direction.
Finally, the movement control was clunky. Partially this was caused by my laptop, though the problem was still clearly apparent with my desktop. Just like with the animations, I was wondering at times whether I was playing a game from late 90s?
As for the rest of the gameplay, it was okay. Although I have to mention few things about the inventory. First of all, there is no such thing as carrying weight in Gothic 4, or at least I never encountered one. This is both good and bad thing; it does make the game feel like dumped, more or less every recent RPG with inventory limits the carrying of items in at least some way. It has even become a standard in some way, especially if the game tries to be even remotely credible. Gothic 4 has no such thing. On the other hand, at least there won't be such problems like The Witcher 2 had. Problems where all the crafting materials were taking so much space that you couldn't carry anything else. Since crafting is integral part of Gothic 4, carrying enough materials is more or less mandatory.
The inventory interface itself is very clean and simple. You change between different item categories with one click and the grid used to show the list is so big you can see all the items at once without scrolling. A huge plus. Besides, the short description that appears when you move the cursor over the item works without problems and it appears quickly enough. The equipping is also made easy; in case of equipment, you just click once with right mouse button. If the item is consumable, right click uses one item from the stack and placing the item to quick slot is done by dragging it. Also, since equipment and consumables never occur under same list, there possibility to be mistaken is very small.
In general, every interface in Gothic 4 radiates the feeling of simplicity. Yes, most of the time I would call it dumping down, but not n Gothic 4. The game has so many problems in almost every other category that having simple interface is actually a positive thing. After all the problems I had with the game I wouldn't have been able to accept and figure out complicated interface with more problems.
The story of Gothic 4 is mediocre as well. Sure, there were good moments before I decided to quit, but not too many. Most of the time, it was just about old cliches recycled. Sometimes there were minor alterations but not enough. For example, in how many games you start the adventure by getting rid of rats infesting the fields of local farmer? Yup, in most games, though in Gothic 4 the rats were replaced by mole rats. The difference? None, just the name. Also, taken from the beginning of the game (SPOILER WARNING!), how many games starts from the situation where you were just going to get married when a group of soldiers attack your peaceful village, far away from the real conflict and without any apparent reason, slaughters everybody, including your wife? And, surprise surprise, you just happened to be the only survivor and only because you weren't there when attack took place? Well, not the only survivor, a stranger from distant land survived as well and just HAPPENED to be leaving and traveling towards the area where the real war takes place?
I could be able to stand the never-ending wave of cliches if the dialogues were good. Which those aren't. And I'm not talking about the voice acting, which only made the situation worse, but the actual content of dialogues. Almost all replies are short and unimaginative. Some lines even felt like those were written in hurry to get around the creative blockade the writers had. Not sure if that was the case in reality, at least I felt that way. And in the end it doesn't really matter, neither one will magically turn the dialogue more acceptable.
A good example right from the beginning of the game (MINOR SPOILER!); your character hears from another NPC that your soon-to-be wife is pregnant and she never told you about it. If such thing happened to me in real life, the discussion I would have with her wouldn't be only few lines long. In Gothic 4 the discussion ends almost immediately, and the way it happens is not fluent at all, almost like there were supposed to be more but most of the dialogue was removed and nobody bothered to tweak the new end much. And I could accept it if this happened only once or twice, but when more or less every dialogue has similar quality, I can't but wonder if the writers actually dared to ask money from their work? It almost feels like some random coder was hired to write the dialogues, or even the whole game, during his or her breaks from coding. In fact, that could explain the sloppiness in other things as well...
Gameplay
The controls of Gothic are very simple; look around with mouse and move with keyboard. Left mouse button attacks and right button blocks or, if the character is also moved, dodges by rolling. Every object is interacted with one key, other key draws or sheaths the selected weapon. Simple, perhaps even too simple. On the other hand, simple control system is the only thing which actually is able to negate other problems, though only partially. For example, there is no crosshair shown, unless ranged weapon or spell is equipped. Since the game is using 3rd person angle, it gets rather annoying to aim on anything. In fact, fighting with melee weapons is more or less clicking furiously and hoping that you have aligned your character precisely towards the intended target. On the other hand, avoiding hits by rolling is quite easy since you can see the incoming attack long before the enemy actually does it.
Now, since I'm talking about fighting, let's talk about other problems I had with it. First of all, once you initiate an attacked, which can be anything from rolling to swinging weapon, there is no way to cancel it. While this may sound good in paper, the problem is that even the most simple attack takes quite long. The more complicated attack or action, the longer it takes. Now, all of that could be accepted without one very "tiny" problem; once the animation begins, nothing can interrupt the action, except death. If I see that enemy is preparing to use the most powerful attack it has, and my character is still performing his own action, I can only hope my action ends and I can dodge away before the enemy hits me. It doesn't matter how many or how powerful hits I deal to the enemy, the attack can be only avoided by dodging or blocking it. And since the game tends to queue your clicks in memory and follow that queue without exceptions, there is hardly anything you can do to avoid the hit. Because of all these problems, the melee fights eventually began to follow the "one hit and dodge" tactic, repeated ad nauseam. And the "hit" part was more hoping that I didn't accidentally move the mouse at all and my character was able to react to the change of direction before I clicked the left mouse button.
Second issue I had was with the "flurry" attack. After first attack you are able to do second, more powerful attack which also costs some stamina. This attack could be initiated only at the certain moment, which usually was so short it was easy to miss it. There is an option to make the weapon glow when this "flurry" attack can be initiated. The problem is, most of the time my character was positioned in the way that I couldn't see the weapon and thus not the glow. And even if I was able to see it, the time frame was so short it was already over before I managed to react. To reliably initiate the flurry attack I had to trust my instinct and luck. And because of that, I usually had at least one attack in queue, which means no dodging immediately. On the other hand, the flurry attack was powerful enough to make it tempting to trust my luck.
The lack of crosshair also made it difficult to pick up items. You character had to be positioned rather precisely to be able to pick up anything. Finding the correct angle was quite often just about getting near the object i thought I could be able to pick up and then move my mouse in growing circle to find the correct angle, if the object could be picked up at all. I also had moments where the exact location of dead enemy was one for inner mechanisms of the game and another for graphics. I could be right next to the corpse and look at it and no option to loot it was given, until I took few steps back and turned my character to face the exact opposite direction.
Finally, the movement control was clunky. Partially this was caused by my laptop, though the problem was still clearly apparent with my desktop. Just like with the animations, I was wondering at times whether I was playing a game from late 90s?
As for the rest of the gameplay, it was okay. Although I have to mention few things about the inventory. First of all, there is no such thing as carrying weight in Gothic 4, or at least I never encountered one. This is both good and bad thing; it does make the game feel like dumped, more or less every recent RPG with inventory limits the carrying of items in at least some way. It has even become a standard in some way, especially if the game tries to be even remotely credible. Gothic 4 has no such thing. On the other hand, at least there won't be such problems like The Witcher 2 had. Problems where all the crafting materials were taking so much space that you couldn't carry anything else. Since crafting is integral part of Gothic 4, carrying enough materials is more or less mandatory.
The inventory interface itself is very clean and simple. You change between different item categories with one click and the grid used to show the list is so big you can see all the items at once without scrolling. A huge plus. Besides, the short description that appears when you move the cursor over the item works without problems and it appears quickly enough. The equipping is also made easy; in case of equipment, you just click once with right mouse button. If the item is consumable, right click uses one item from the stack and placing the item to quick slot is done by dragging it. Also, since equipment and consumables never occur under same list, there possibility to be mistaken is very small.
In general, every interface in Gothic 4 radiates the feeling of simplicity. Yes, most of the time I would call it dumping down, but not n Gothic 4. The game has so many problems in almost every other category that having simple interface is actually a positive thing. After all the problems I had with the game I wouldn't have been able to accept and figure out complicated interface with more problems.
"As we all know, holy men were born during Christmas...
Like mr. Holopainen over there!"
- Marco Hietala, the bass player of Nightwish
Like mr. Holopainen over there!"
- Marco Hietala, the bass player of Nightwish
Character Development
The character development is more or less completely relying on the skill system. Each character starts the game from same stage and what eventually makes them different from each other is the skills taken. There are no classes in Gothic 4, which is good thing. Unfortunately the skill tree is quite linear and simplified. There are only eight different skill groups, each group containing one to five unique skills. To unlock better skills one must spend skill point to previous skill and then improve it with additional points.
Since each group, or more specifically line, is concentrating on specific thing (melee, magic, sneaking, bow, etc.), the options to specialize the character are quite limited. Again the simplicity is the keyword, but this time it can't be considered as a positive thing.
Items and spells can help in making the character different but in the end nothing is able to compensate the simplicity of skill system.
Anything Else?
What was actually a surprise to me was that I never experienced bugs that made the game unplayable. There are bugs but nothing that is game breaking. But that's only a mild comfort in a game that otherwise fails in so many aspects.
Scoring
I have been bashing ArcaniA. Gothic 4 without mercy. And, if I'm really honest, I could have kept doing so even more but what would have been the point of doing so? I think the game is terrible, which should be obvious already. The only good things are the user friendly interfaces and graphics. And graphics as long as you don't do anything, although the cinematics were visually beautiful. on the other hand, if I want to watch beautiful cinematics, I will open Netflix and watch movies instead. Based on my own experience, I can't understand those who claim this game to be visually stunning. Although, at the same time, some people still insist that Oblivion is the best RPG ever made...
There are three reasons why I'm not giving the lowest possible score to Gothic 4; as far as I know the developers never made any blatant lies about the game (like claiming it to be FPS and then using 3rd person angle), there were no bugs that made the game completely unplayable and, finally, I found one purpose for the game. The purpose is that, whenever I think I have found a game that is the worst I have ever played, I just restart Gothic 4 and the other game won't probably be even close to as bad as I originally thought.
Seriously, don't buy this game. I did, the price tag of 15€, and I also got ArcaniA: Fall of Setarrif as well. Seven euros and fifty cents for a game and even that was a waste of money. The only reason anybody should get this game is if someone else is paying or it comes bundled together with better games. Otherwise, not worth of playing.
My Score System: 4/10
GameBanshee Score System: 2/5
The character development is more or less completely relying on the skill system. Each character starts the game from same stage and what eventually makes them different from each other is the skills taken. There are no classes in Gothic 4, which is good thing. Unfortunately the skill tree is quite linear and simplified. There are only eight different skill groups, each group containing one to five unique skills. To unlock better skills one must spend skill point to previous skill and then improve it with additional points.
Since each group, or more specifically line, is concentrating on specific thing (melee, magic, sneaking, bow, etc.), the options to specialize the character are quite limited. Again the simplicity is the keyword, but this time it can't be considered as a positive thing.
Items and spells can help in making the character different but in the end nothing is able to compensate the simplicity of skill system.
Anything Else?
What was actually a surprise to me was that I never experienced bugs that made the game unplayable. There are bugs but nothing that is game breaking. But that's only a mild comfort in a game that otherwise fails in so many aspects.
Scoring
I have been bashing ArcaniA. Gothic 4 without mercy. And, if I'm really honest, I could have kept doing so even more but what would have been the point of doing so? I think the game is terrible, which should be obvious already. The only good things are the user friendly interfaces and graphics. And graphics as long as you don't do anything, although the cinematics were visually beautiful. on the other hand, if I want to watch beautiful cinematics, I will open Netflix and watch movies instead. Based on my own experience, I can't understand those who claim this game to be visually stunning. Although, at the same time, some people still insist that Oblivion is the best RPG ever made...
There are three reasons why I'm not giving the lowest possible score to Gothic 4; as far as I know the developers never made any blatant lies about the game (like claiming it to be FPS and then using 3rd person angle), there were no bugs that made the game completely unplayable and, finally, I found one purpose for the game. The purpose is that, whenever I think I have found a game that is the worst I have ever played, I just restart Gothic 4 and the other game won't probably be even close to as bad as I originally thought.
Seriously, don't buy this game. I did, the price tag of 15€, and I also got ArcaniA: Fall of Setarrif as well. Seven euros and fifty cents for a game and even that was a waste of money. The only reason anybody should get this game is if someone else is paying or it comes bundled together with better games. Otherwise, not worth of playing.
My Score System: 4/10
GameBanshee Score System: 2/5
"As we all know, holy men were born during Christmas...
Like mr. Holopainen over there!"
- Marco Hietala, the bass player of Nightwish
Like mr. Holopainen over there!"
- Marco Hietala, the bass player of Nightwish
I got it for 75% off or something on steam. Same impressions. I did get a nice 6 hours or so of 'newness' fun, but then quit it. It's sort of on the back back back burner ha!
Right Speech has four aspects: 1. Not lying, but speaking the truth, 2. Avoiding rude and coarse words, but using gentle speech beneficial to the listener, 3. Not slandering, but promoting friendliness and unity, 4. Avoiding frivolous speech, but saying only what is appropriate and beneficial.
You know, after reading that review I thought it was going to get less than 4 out of 10.. 
That's about what I would have given it.. maybe a bit more if for nothing more than shear "playing" time.
It's got quite a lot of surface area to explore, and some pretty tough battle sequences that I remember (..though I also remember having some annoyance with the interface as well - maybe that was what made it tough ).
It is total grind-fest though with a plot so generic you'd think it was created by Walmart, not a gaming studio.
What should be noted is that the "real" (if there is such a thing) Gothic 4 is NOT Arcania, but rather Risen.
Risen also has some serious problems, and yes mole-rates.
On the other hand it was so difficult (excellent AI), with a good interface, and a few other interesting elements - including better looking graphics, that I overlooked most of its problems (..one of which was an utterly absurd ending).
While I'd give Arcania a 4 to 4.5 (and I don't remember having any real problems with the game), I'd give Risen (flaws in all) about 7.5.
A quote I like from a member I tried to help on the forums with Arcania:
"Thanks for your help Scottg. You are right, this game is mediocre, and I dislike it immensely.."
From here (though it has a multitude of spoilers so beware):
http://www.gamebanshee.com/forums/threa ... -4.118347/
That's about what I would have given it.. maybe a bit more if for nothing more than shear "playing" time.
It's got quite a lot of surface area to explore, and some pretty tough battle sequences that I remember (..though I also remember having some annoyance with the interface as well - maybe that was what made it tough
). It is total grind-fest though with a plot so generic you'd think it was created by Walmart, not a gaming studio.
What should be noted is that the "real" (if there is such a thing) Gothic 4 is NOT Arcania, but rather Risen.
Risen also has some serious problems, and yes mole-rates.
On the other hand it was so difficult (excellent AI), with a good interface, and a few other interesting elements - including better looking graphics, that I overlooked most of its problems (..one of which was an utterly absurd ending).
While I'd give Arcania a 4 to 4.5 (and I don't remember having any real problems with the game), I'd give Risen (flaws in all) about 7.5.
A quote I like from a member I tried to help on the forums with Arcania:
"Thanks for your help Scottg. You are right, this game is mediocre, and I dislike it immensely.."
From here (though it has a multitude of spoilers so beware):
http://www.gamebanshee.com/forums/threa ... -4.118347/
I didn't even know there was a fourth Gothic. Looks like it evaded the masses for a good reason..
[INDENT]'..tolerance when fog rolls in clouds unfold your selfless wings feathers that float from arabesque pillows I sold to be consumed by the snow white cold if only the plaster could hold withstand the flam[url="http://bit.ly/foT0XQ"]e[/url] then this fountain torch would know no shame and be outstripped only by the sun that burns with the glory and honor of your..'[/INDENT]
Scottg wrote:You know, after reading that review I thought it was going to get less than 4 out of 10..
Yeah, perhaps less than 4 would have been fair. On the other hand, to get 2 or 3 out of 10 the game usually have to contain some serious bugs that at least partially prevent me to finish the game, like important scripted event never happening related to the story.
Tricky wrote:I didn't even know there was a fourth Gothic. Looks like it evaded the masses for a good reason..
I remember seeing some ads back when this game was released. On the other hand, since even the hardcore fans have disliked this, I'm not surprised it disappeared from public more or less completely.
"As we all know, holy men were born during Christmas...
Like mr. Holopainen over there!"
- Marco Hietala, the bass player of Nightwish
Like mr. Holopainen over there!"
- Marco Hietala, the bass player of Nightwish
Kipi wrote:Yeah, perhaps less than 4 would have been fair. On the other hand, to get 2 or 3 out of 10 the game usually have to contain some serious bugs that at least partially prevent me to finish the game, like important scripted event never happening related to the story.
I can think of game or two that's "worthy" of less than 4 without being truly broken and unplayable (..which if it were I'd give a 0
).Here is one:
[url='http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeons_%26_Dragons:_Daggerdale']http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeons_&_Dragons:_Daggerdale[/url]
-it's not absolutely retched, but it's certainly "worthy" of a 2.
It's earlier RTS game (at least in single-player gaming mode):
[url='http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeons_%26_Dragons:_Dragonshard']http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dungeons_&_Dragons:_Dragonshard[/url]
-might net a 3 on a day I was feeling generous.
For the most part though I'd just like to take the publisher of each out back and beat them with a hose. Fortunately for me - it's the same publisher, so I wouldn't have to swing the hose twice as much.
On the bright side though, with Arcania you didn't spend 45 US. I did.
Regarding Daggerdale, it's actually not that terrible game. Yes, I'm playing it right now since you woke my interest and I realized I had it in my Steam account already (who knows why)...
But more about that later, I'll review it when I'm finished.
But more about that later, I'll review it when I'm finished.
"As we all know, holy men were born during Christmas...
Like mr. Holopainen over there!"
- Marco Hietala, the bass player of Nightwish
Like mr. Holopainen over there!"
- Marco Hietala, the bass player of Nightwish
Kipi wrote:Regarding Daggerdale, it's actually not that terrible game. Yes, I'm playing it right now since you woke my interest and I realized I had it in my Steam account already (who knows why)...
But more about that later, I'll review it when I'm finished.
Alright, but be prepared for some oh-so-scathing alternate commentary.