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Incline Gothic turns 15 years

Carrion

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"Any action RPG with good combat" makes it seem like such games are common, when said description only really applies to a handful of games. Blade of Darkness has great combat, but calling it an action RPG is a bit of a stretch (yeah, it has levels and primitive character development, but even shooters like Jedi Knight and No One Lives Forever 2 have more involving RPG systems), and while the Souls games do have a satisfying combat system, they don't really blend player skill and character skill nearly as well as Gothic does.

Gothic's combat is pretty simple, but it really does everything it needs to do. It requires enough player skill so that mindless button mashing gets you nowhere, but you also feel your character growing in power more clearly than in almost any other game. Most (a)RPGs just tweak the numbers like weapon damage and accuracy as your character gets stronger, meaning that a low-level character doesn't feel that much different from a high-level one aside from the amount of damage he can deal, but in Gothic improving your skills completely changes the way your character behaves in combat, the different attacks that he can make and the way he moves around. For this thing alone the developers should be given a goddamn medal, and while the combat might arguably be more enjoyable with a different control scheme or some more encounter variety, there are hardly any real flaws to speak of — it's a simple but very functional system that manages to blend action combat with character development in an exemplary way.

All in all, the combat system is just another addition to the lengthy list of things that Gothic managed to get right but which other developers haven't understood to take inspiration from.
 

sullynathan

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"Any action RPG with good combat" makes it seem like such games are common, when said description only really applies to a handful of games. Blade of Darkness has great combat, but calling it an action RPG is a bit of a stretch (yeah, it has levels and primitive character development, but even shooters like Jedi Knight and No One Lives Forever 2 have more involving RPG systems), and while the Souls games do have a satisfying combat system, they don't really blend player skill and character skill nearly as well as Gothic does.

Gothic's combat is pretty simple, but it really does everything it needs to do. It requires enough player skill so that mindless button mashing gets you nowhere, but you also feel your character growing in power more clearly than in almost any other game. Most (a)RPGs just tweak the numbers like weapon damage and accuracy as your character gets stronger, meaning that a low-level character doesn't feel that much different from a high-level one aside from the amount of damage he can deal, but in Gothic improving your skills completely changes the way your character behaves in combat, the different attacks that he can make and the way he moves around. For this thing alone the developers should be given a goddamn medal, and while the combat might arguably be more enjoyable with a different control scheme or some more encounter variety, there are hardly any real flaws to speak of — it's a simple but very functional system that manages to blend action combat with character development in an exemplary way.

All in all, the combat system is just another addition to the lengthy list of things that Gothic managed to get right but which other developers haven't understood to take inspiration from.
The only thing that I'll agree to is that gothic's combat system allowed the player to actually feel a sense of character growth. Other than that the rest isn't convincing. Even after improving your character, the combat system does not change or even reach the level of any of the games I mentioned. Gothic's combat has a lot of parallels with souls combat, difference is that the latter has fun combat and controls very well. All in all, it felt like crap at times, I can clearly tell that they wanted to greatly improve the combat system with each iteration, I believe that they had a good thing going with gothic 3 combat if they tweaked it more.
 

T. Reich

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Let's not go crazy. Gothic combat isn't particularly interesting. It's basically a simple action minigame you learn for each enemy and a functional test of how much armor and damage you've RPG'd up. Risen is a little more robust and there's plenty of headroom above that.

I've played Risen for the last week. Its combat is NOT robust.
It's basically a simple action minigame you learn for each enemy and a functional test of how much armor and damage you've RPG'd up.

To be more specific, you basically spam-click (no need to time your strikes as in G1+2!) LMB for a sequence of quick 1-2 attacks to catch an enemy off-guard between their attack animations. Then they counter-attack, and you simply have to block that with shield (or try to jump back or roll to the side and catch the blade with your flesh instead). Rinse and repeat. Charged strikes that you eventually get break the tedium of the excercise and speed up the combat greatly because now you can simply force through the block AND stun the enemy instead.

And there's next to zero variation between enemies' attacks once you've learned to use the shield and their attack patterns.

Oh, and lateral attacks are basically gone. You're still forced to gradually move forward when you attack, even when performing "lateral blows". All those additional "parries" and "counter-parries" are also basically little things that semi-automatically allow you to save a bit of HP and finish the combat faster.

P.S.: You guise should stop arguing with retards. It's not like he's going to change his mind.
 

Somberlain

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You can attack a lot faster if you time your strikes. Just spam clicking makes you attack so slow that enemies can interrupt you.
 

Junmarko

† Cristo è Re †
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If gothic 1 - 3 were remade today with modern graphics but similar art style and far better controls, combat and technical fixes, would the codex buy such a game?

I know that gothic 3 was severely flawed but I think the liberation mechanic had something good going on for it.

No. They would also be remade with all the added modern bullshit and updated with modern "values", and with a number of new dumb bugs and technical limitations absent in the original.
And that's even besides the fact that what made G1+2 so good is not just the sum of the parts that made up the games, it's them being available at that particular time, with then-us being different people than now.
You can't enter the same river twice.
If it were handled in the same manner that Homeworld Remastered was, I'd gladly pay for it.
 
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Arrowgrab

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False. When was the last time you played Risen?

Actually, he's right. Mindless clicking WILL make your attacks slower than they are with proper timing. And if you want to challenge me with the same question, I've finished replaying it last week, as it happens.
 

Murk

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I literally just booted up the game and tested it to confirm my memory and yeah, timing is faster (albeit subtly so) than spamming click. It's not as huge as in g1/2 where fucking up would kill the combo, but it makes a difference when trying to stun-lock enemies or to interrupt their own attacks.
 

T. Reich

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Well, I can buy "subtly" alright, because for the last week I haven't felt any real difference between "mash the attack button occasionally when enemies open up" and "time attack button presses instead".
All enemies folded effortlessly anyway, with 3 exceptions (lizardman elites, ashbeasts, ogres) that still required actually some careful thought put into endgame combat. Actually, you might strike the ashbeasts out, because they're in this list only by the virtue of their beefiness and behave like your standard Risen animals otherwise.

Since there's no significant difference - why care about it?
Pumping str to 200 and axe to 3->6->8 solves all the problems the game might throw at you.
 

Old One

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Timing button presses is only a part of Gothic's combat, though. The reactivity of your opponents and their different types of attacks play into it as well. Some enemies are stupid, and will charge straight at you. Some are more clever, and will try to dance out of the way of your attacks, or block them if they're able. That gives every encounter a lot of variability. While it might not be the best combat ever (and I don't think anyone is claiming that it is), it's pretty good, and it's a lot more than a mini-game.

More importantly, it's better combat than you get it Morrowind, NWN, or The Witcher.
 

ghostdog

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Well, G1&2 combat is better combat than any other free roaming RPG. It's simple, not twitchy but requires skill and it depends on stats. So while that doesn't make it the best real time combat ever, combining it with the fact that Gothic also has the best world structure from any other free roaming RPG and thus the best exploration, this simply makes G1&2 the best free-roaming RPGs. So that's that.
 

sullynathan

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Well, G1&2 combat is better combat than any other free roaming RPG. It's simple, not twitchy but requires skill and it depends on stats. So while that doesn't make it the best real time combat ever, combining it with the fact that Gothic also has the best world structure from any other free roaming RPG and thus the best exploration, this simply makes G1&2 the best free-roaming RPGs. So that's that.
Dragons Dogma has better combat than every Gothic game. This excuse of Gothic taking "skill" is outrageous and is being used by codexers that don't want to say that Gothic had bad combat and bad controls.
 

Metro

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Considering Dragon's Dogma came out over a decade later is that really surprising? What do you think a 2000 version of Dragon's Dogma combat would look like?
 
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Gothic 1/2 melee combat is great. Sure it's fairly simple and potentially could be a lot better, but if we were to judge it against the other existing action RPG combat systems, it blows most of them out of the water. The way you time your parries against humanoids and counterattack, creating a nice movie-like swordfighting flow is just miles ahead of RPGs like Morrowind, Oblivion, Skyrim, UU-Arx Fatalis, The Witchers, Dark Messiah. Maybe some more recent games are better, but Gothic 1 came out in 2000.
 

T. Reich

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Gothic 1+2's combat system is great, period.
You may or you may not like it, but it doesn't become bad just because you don't.
Anyone who shits on it is a retard who has no taste in games and who's wrong in the head.
That much is obvious because when asked with providing the examples of good combat system in an action RPG they go on to list the games with objectively shitty or primitive combat systems, or non-RPG games, or their examples are immediately being called shit by other retards who galled the G1+2 combat system shit.
Ergo, the mouthbreathers who diss the G1+2 combat system can't provide a single legit example of better combat system, and that means that G1+2 combat system is not inherently bad, it's simply inconvenient for decline enablers who can't muster enough brain power and manual dexterity to press more than one button at a time, or grasp the idea that to be good at combat you have to, you know, have the skills for it (in the game).
 
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sullynathan

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I actually named multiple games with far better combat systems but codexians want to playmind games by saying that said games did not release in the same year.
 

Darth Roxor

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Damn, I've never realised just how much content NotR adds to the base game areas. I'm still in Khorinis atm, but the amount of new people and quests (big ones, too) is seriously fucking huge.

meanwhile modern """expansions"""...
borealesad.jpg
 

janior

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I actually named multiple games with far better combat systems but codexians want to playmind games by saying that said games did not release in the same year.
You mentioned only ONE game released in the same year, rest was decade(or more) newer.
 

Declinator

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I actually named multiple games with far better combat systems but codexians want to playmind games by saying that said games did not release in the same year.
You mentioned only ONE game released in the same year, rest was decade(or more) newer.
Better is better. The age of the game is irrelevant. This "must be released close to it" seems like shifting goal posts.

I think Gothic has okay combat. It had potential but ultimately there were few encounters worth remembering and the bosses were unremarkable. No matter how good a combat system a game has it is largely worthless without good enemies. Of Gothic 2, I only remember killing probably close to a hundred orcs (though it wasn't necessary), the small wingless dragons, and the big black cave panthers or whatever the hell those were.

Severance Blade of Darkness actually has a very similar problem. I'd say neither of them comes close to even being able to touch any of the Souls games.
 

Murk

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If you want g2 with better combat, play Risen 1. I never played severance, but it's combat in this video looks about on par with Risen 1 if not somewhat floatier in its movements.



Gotic combat is at its best against other humanoid enemies who dodge/strafe/combo you. Orcs give a little of this, but their AI seems to be more focused on rushing you. Humans, on the other hand, will show more versatility.
 

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