newtmonkey
My only worry, esp. considering I just finished making a spur-of-moment Ode to Elminage: Gothic over in the new thread for E: Orig.'s English release on PC (MMM GRAPHICS!!)...
My only worry, although not really because, i mean, jesus I got real shit to worry about who gives a fuck whether someone enjoys E: Gothic or n--- OOPS I HAD A STROKE THERE SORRY:
I worry I may have hyped too much so I want to tell you EXACTLY what the experience will be:
It is not a game that features even mid-sized evolutions on the stuff you're already doing in E: Original. It is not a game that introduces many "new shit", and in fact it ONLY introduced one new thing, the SKILLS chosen on char-generation for each char, but to Starfish's credit (NOM NOM NOM) the skills
truly, truly, truly turn the entire game into a new thing both shiny and dusty in refracted light.
So, 1 new system, and it's a FUCKING AMAZING ADDITION, what else? Ok, here's what it DOES give you:
- The best designed dungeons in the Elminage series, ARGUABLY only challenged by Starfish's dungeon design in Wizardry Empire 2 (I put Emp 2's dungeons ahead of Gothics, but not by much).
- The absolute pinnacle of polish of every single part, parcel and moving part with which the Wizardry game play and legacy is comprised: you have done everything before, but in E: Gothic the itemization is the best I've ever experienced in any RPG, a full count of 716 items in the PC version (for reference that would be around 200 more than in E: Original) and no, obviously they dind't just spam the game with junk:
- It's truly a case of the developers unbridled love and zeal for making everything the absolute best, not just in technical ways but in the sense that they went through every Elminage play mechanic, staple, trope, what have you, and... did most of them
again except this time
actually done with an unwavering surety of authority that the auteur's grace not merely clings but rather infuses the game in its entirety with the following occupation of will:
- This is the culmination of 30+ years of Wizardry mechanics being refined over and over, and E: Gothic does not shock with "new shit" although it definitely has it, instead E: Gothic is the equivalent of a japanese blacksmith's final Katana made throughout most of the course of his life, and completed finally only 3 months after he loses his daughter in a terrible accident:
it is his ultimate expression, with the katana's hamon evoking the clouds and the swirling pattern of the under-steel tricking the light into forming waves upon its surface; a thing which could not have been made, could not exist, if not for the complete abdication of the blacksmith's purpose and self not to make a great weapon, but because it is his legacy.
That's E: Gothic, more of the same, but done on a level where where you immediately begin to appreciate the subtle reworkings of existing things/mechanics/ideologies, not in SUBVERSION (E: Gothic, while many things, is
not in way ever subverting any standard of the genre), but reworked...
in order to have everything, every single little aspect, be... complete; no further refinement is necessary, indeed, the notion itself would never materialize as what is already self-evidently complete is something that leaves ZERO ROOM for the ego, as it is simply itself, and evident to all, and complete. Some call that perfect.
EDIT: needless to say Gothic was "reworked" top to bottom, beginning with leaving behind the animu aesthetic and (read this in an interview with the lead designer of the first 3 Elminage games, who left Starfish halfway thru Gothic) they had always wanted to make a "true challenging Wiz-style game", as the last one they had made was... well, a Wizardry game, and Wiz Emp 2 came out in 2002 (Emp 3 came out in 2005 but by then Starfish was in money troubles and Emp 3 is a HUGE rush-job that is ltierally INCOMPLETE as a game, it is mostly a ghost-town of a dungeon crawler, though obviously still mechanically sound since it utilizes the same game play shit from Empire 1/2).
Gothic came out in 2014. That's 12 years of biding their time making Elmi: Original and Elmi 2 and 3, all 3 games HEAVILY concerned themselves with animu (I love animu, btw, but just pointing out), so Gothic was like their finally exploding and making the Wiz game they wanted to do for years.
No hand holding! No infinite maps! AGE MATTERS! FUCK UR PARTY HAHA UR FAIERY DIED!
OH, you're used to having the LONGSWORD be "Accurate" in Elminage: Original!?? FUCK U KEKEKE NOW LONGSWORD HAS A FUCKING NEGATIVE MODIFIER TO STRIKE !!!
Yes, in Gothic early game (fuck most of the game)
a lot of items feature real pros/cons, usually by manner of weapons having NEGATIVE accuracy modifiers, stuff like that.
Biggest change is they made Staves/Staff SHORT-RANGE. So... NO MORE OF UR CLERIC USING A MOP TO ATK FROM BACK ROW!!!
etc. God bless them for it.
