Game News THQ Nordic want to remake Gothic, playable teaser released to owners of previous Piranha Bytes games

[Colonel]

When watching the comparison video the original Gothic looks better than the remake.

 

[Lord of Riva]

my review
https://steamcommunity.com/id/Smejki/recommended/950670/

Don't get the comment about the females in game. It's a Penal colony for forced Labor, apart from the most powerful Men in the colony which probably got female convicts due to their extortion of the king there is no reason for them to have some female convicts there.

In fact I would argue that it would be counter productive to enable the convicts to just have "families" et all for the purposes the colony exists.

But yeah, from my point of view this "remake" is absolutely atrocious.

 

[Reader]

I'll add to comment about women.
It's not like people are living there for ages. Situation with the barrier is relatively new and two camps are trying to find the way to escape. For them this situation is temporary, so nobody cares much about women.
Also it is mentioned somewhere that some gals are handed down to lower henchmen eventually.

 

[Junmarko]

Since when Diego is a fucking musketeer from Duma's modern movie adaptations?

Agreed. Diego should only ever be portrayed as an homage to Sean Connery as Ramirez, from Hylander (loosely of course - no Quickening

)

Also it is mentioned somewhere that some gals are handed down to lower henchmen eventually.

Lol it was? I only remember Gomez and his Mafiosi having that luxury.

 

[Dexter]

This had to be done

I don't really see that much of a problem with that, since it's specifically not "SARCASTIC"/"RUDE"/"FRIENDLY" replies, it's just the same ol' 4 dialogue options hidden behind a first dialogue option ordered to be easily selectable with a controller, and you even see the full sentence at the bottom when you're hovering over a specific one.

I'll add to comment about women.
It's not like people are living there for ages. Situation with the barrier is relatively new and two camps are trying to find the way to escape. For them this situation is temporary, so nobody cares much about women.

They very much care about women, they care about them as whores, servants and currency though since they're in a prison colony with barely any of them. In fact they're specifically mentioned during the Original Gothic's intro as such as they're being brought down with the other cargo and Orry also talks about it:


And Gomez always had like 2 concubines standing around his throne and a few others scrubbing the floor or whatever in the castle, somehow I don't see this making it in a "modern" Remake of Gothic for some reason...

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

my review
https://steamcommunity.com/id/Smejki/recommended/950670/

2 people found this review helpful

Not Recommended
3.2 hrs last two weeks / 3.2 hrs on record
Posted: 14 Dec @ 12:09am
Updated: 15 Dec @ 12:06am

tl;dr/Conclusion:
This is a solid base for a mid-budget Witcher-like RPG. This is a terrible basis for Gothic.
Make something original! You already have the tools! Just hire a better writer.

Who is this for?!
It seems they want to take the Gothic setting and plot (while rewriting it) placed in a similarly shaped world, and hamfist it all into a game built around completely different framework. You’re making a poor man’s Witcher with bastardized Gothic plot. Guess what? Story is not why people love Gothic. If you still don’t get the point of the problem then imagine Wicther 3 story and quests made in Gothic1/2 using Gothic 1/2 game design. Yeah...


Gothic:
- total freedom of movement
- total freedom of interaction
- all NPCs killable
- clockwork-like daytime-driven AI life
- more or less concise dialogs
- traditional dialog UI
- simple and dynamic dialog-camera system with static cameras
- grounded dark fantasy
- somewhat arrogant hero, but not an annoying ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥
- mostly silent hero outside dialogs
- to-the-point intro section that's about 10 minutes long
- freedom after first intro dialog (2 minutes)
- masterclass usage of non-gated type (that is NOT Dark Souls) open-world level design
- world with areas full of dangerous high level enemies present from the start
- territorial hostile animals
- all NPCs (sans critical exceptions) are present from the start
- you were no match for any decently equipped man for a several hours. You had to skill up your hero and yourself.
- 3 different fighting styles based on skill level. Rookie could barely swing a sword.

What could/needed to be changed:
- graphics and animations
- bits of dialog here and there
- maybe some quest options here and there
- combat system (let's be honest)
- maybe some level design (expanded forests etc.)
- overall controls
- lots of voice over
- richer crafting options (Gothic 2)
- inventory management
- journal/quest log UI
- richer interaction with and among animals
- break-up the unbelievable sausage party by introducing some women (into the world) or explain how the ♥♥♥♥ all these men live without them or show how they are used as a valuable source. Just something! There were 3 women (strippers ffs) in swamp camp and that was it. This was always ridiculous.

This remake:
- extremely limiting cinematic Witcher 3-like dialog system relying on dialogs taking place at predefined positions (requires Witcher style quest design and masterclass writing and VO). Basically interactive mini-cutscenes.
- abysmal Fallout4-like dialog UI
- constantly (and pointlessly) moving dialog camera (introduced in and proven to be bad by Mass Effect 2 - camera movement is a film-language tool. If you can’t use it, don’t!)
- completely rewritten dialogs
- incredibly bloated dialogs (boring as a result)
- annoying hero who won't shut the ♥♥♥♥ up and doesn't take any situatuon seriously
- key NPC (Diego) changed heavily in personality
- over-reliance on cinematic feels at every step of the way
- subpar writing overall
- Witcher 3-like avatar controls and kinematic model with terrible consequences for interaction controls
- invisible walls everywhere
- predefined, obvious (and limiting) climbing spots
- wannabe bombastic but nonsensical set pieces with terrible acting and amateurish cinematographic execution (read "if you can't do expensive ♥♥♥♥ properly, don't do it at all")
- try-hard grittiness bordering on parody of the original
- Sneaking was an unlockable trait, here you have crouch from start (not that big of a sin, though, I guess)
- Some overly animated (read annoyingly time-wasting) menus
- you can kill a well-armed soldier fromt the start (FACEPALM). That really doesn't sell your rookie status. You didn't understand why the intro in the old game was structured the way it was, right?
- "Diego will remember that".... this is a parody right? Are you being serious here? OMG
- Some 2 hours long intro full of LOLdesign unworthy of Gothic:
• Limitations everywhere
• nigh-zero alternative solutions
• omniscient NPCs
• paused daytime
• terrible information flow
• One pack of wolves always sleeping at daytime, another always awake, because quest design!
• NPCs spawning in after quest started, because railroad quest design demands a cutscene! (HOLY ♥♥♥♥ING ♥♥♥♥!!!! Have you ever played Gothic?!)
• Non-pickable locks were an extreme exception, not here, because railroad design


What I like:
- graphics are decent
- decent char art (faces need a lot of work though)
- some fine animations (some dialog animations are overdone though)
- music fits perfectly (except combat which tries to emulate Witcher)
- decent basis for the inventory
- combat could work eventually
- crushing meatbus by stomping!
- new system of luring animals is promising


This is not a remake. This is a rip-off. It's a bad amalgamation of several diffrent games. It takes dialog setup system from Witcher 3, dialog cameras from Mass Effect 2, dialog UI from Fallout 4, dialog direction from D-grade impostors of W3/ME, quest design principles from whathever the ♥♥♥♥ is not Gothic, narrative style from any bigger spectacle riddled game, and combat system from For Honor. And then it uses the Gothic setting and plot, and botches the mood immensely. It looks like a soulless and desperate mashup of anything that was succesful in the past 10 years.

 

[Reader]

Lol it was?

Well, you're not seeing them on the streets exactly, i just believe someone mentions about their eventual miserable existence.

They very much care about women

I obviously meant that Gomez&Co aren't going to build some healthy society or to breed manpower. Neither they're gonna leave these women to their own devices which could lead to "breaking up unbelievable sausage party" as Smejki suggested.

concubines

You forgot the current Gomez's favorite bathing in his bedroom heh.
And yeah, scrubbing the floor probably won't make it to the remake.
But hey, it's a spain developer so you never know..

 

[Deleted Member 22431]

You had to post this video, don't you? Now I feel the urge to play Gothic again. I wasn't supposed to play cRPGs this month. I will stop visiting this fucking site, you fucking people.

 

[Lord of Riva]

They very much care about women, they care about them as whores, servants and currency though since they're in a prison colony with barely any of them. In fact they're specifically mentioned during the Original Gothic's intro as such as they're being brought down with the other cargo and Orry also talks about it:

The actual truth is that they will not be eaten by Lurkers like any other male in the colony. Not sure if scrubbing the floor and prostituting yourself is comparably worse for them.

EDIT: Also them being a spanish developer is not something that points to an interesting Dynamic when it comes to the sexes. Spain has some of the most feminist friendly laws (read unjust) in Europe.

 

[Smejki]

In fact I would argue that it would be counter productive to enable the convicts to just have "families" et all for the purposes the colony exists.

None of this is in the game
Stop using headcanon. It's a shitty approach for excusing holes in story, plot, or world building.
And considering how sequels handled female NPCs, the state of Gothic 1 is not a coincidence. The disproportion of women in population (about 20:1) of Gothic 2 and 3 is laughable.
Wasn't Gothic about building a believable world? Immersion? I had no idea it was meant to sell me the immersion of being in a gay bar.

Gothic 1:
1) Shows a woman descending down the elevator right at the start. This implies she's either a convict or requested prize (by Gomez)
2) Gomez has a painting of himself surrounded by scantily clad women. This implies approprietly fucked up relation to women
3) Then there are the 3 strippers in Swamp camp (EDIT: and 2 in the castle)
And that's it. Nobody talks about this interesting issue anywhere in the game. In this state it would be better if there were no women at all. Then you could assume it's a male-only prison or that the young team didn't have the resources to create females NPCs.

 

[Smejki]

And Gomez always had like 2 concubines standing around his throne and a few others scrubbing the floor or whatever in the castle, somehow I don't see this making it in a "modern" Remake of Gothic for some reason...

I suspected Gomez to have them in the castle physically but I wasn't sure. Thx for the correction

 

[Junmarko]

And Gomez always had like 2 concubines standing around his throne and a few others scrubbing the floor or whatever in the castle, somehow I don't see this making it in a "modern" Remake of Gothic for some reason...

A positive thing about this dev team at least, they are clearly fans as the demo is restricted to people who already own Gothic on Steam. Releasing a vertical slice this early to one specific audience is at least a good indication that they want to get this remake done right with proper feedback.

This is not a full game. Its a playable teaser version to a potential approach for a new Gothic game. Nothing is set in stone.

So your feedback is essential to turn Gothic into a modern game. Therefore, and to reward your loyalty, Gothic - Playable Teaser is totally free for all fans who already have any of the titles in the Gothic saga or developed by Piranha Bytes!

 

[Elhoim]

Gameplay video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzR-faBQT2g

Definitely a lot of decisions in the bad direction.

- Main character talking all the time, and what's worse, it's just commenting on what's he's doing.
- Cutscenes galore, again with the MC talking all the time trying to be funny.
- NPCs as friendly lore dispensers, speaking to the player, not the character.
- Cinematic dialogue, which to makes matters worse, has bad writing.
- Floating health bars definitely look bad in games of this type, as they move around too much and distract. Even Skyrim got that right.
- Devs, you are not forced to use every post-effect UE4 offers you. Pick and choose.
- Lens flare for torches... I'll let the game say it for me:

And I could go on...

 

[Psquit]

Obligatory

 

[toro]

Obligatory

Old.

 

[Smejki]

Timeless

 

[thesecret1]

my review
https://steamcommunity.com/id/Smejki/recommended/950670/

break-up the unbelievable sausage party by introducing some women (into the world) or explain how the ♥♥♥♥ all these men live without them or show how they are used as a valuable source. Just something! There were 3 women (strippers ffs) in swamp camp and that was it. This was always ridiculous.

Are you retarded? This was all explained right there in the game. It was a penal colony, ie. only for men that'd do hard labour (mining) for the state. It was never intended for women and was never used as such. The fact there were any women at all in the Old Camp was used as an example of how Gomez managed to turn the situation around thanks to the barrier and is now extorting the king for special favours – the rule of no women in the colony was broken so as to placate Gomez, and they're all strippers because Gomez wanted sluts to fuck. The only thing ridiculous here is you, who pretends to be an authority on Gothic while not knowing the most basic thing about the setting (that it's a penal colony used for hard labour).

 

[Metro]

At the very least it seems like the combat system is universally disliked. Hopefully they change it.

 

[krist2]

wow, must be something of the worst thing I have ever tried, and I played Daikatana

Terrible FOV, bad effects,

And the way the game and history is presented/built up, I must come to the conlusion that the makers of this abomination has never played a Ghotic game, except maybe Arcania a gothic tale...

 

[cvv]

The disproportion of women in population (about 20:1) of Gothic 2 and 3 is laughable.

Now it's been a while since I last played G2 but I'm fairly sure there are loads of women in Khorinis and the surrounding farms. It's certainly not 20:1, unless you're counting the orcs too.

 

[JDR13]

The teaser left a lot to be desired, but the hyperbole here is kind of funny.

 

[Psquit]

I'm doing my part chief. Who knows maybe the games is going to be fine like new vegas.

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

Played it for about an hour.

I was right.

This is a Thi4f-tier trainwreck.

 

[Smejki]

The disproportion of women in population (about 20:1) of Gothic 2 and 3 is laughable.

Now it's been a while since I last played G2 but I'm fairly sure there are loads of women in Khorinis and the surrounding farms. It's certainly not 20:1, unless you're counting the orcs too.

Well, the ratio is off but still justifiable. After all a bunch of men escaped the colony not too long ago.
But even with that considered, there are about 10-15 women in Khorinis (some 3-5 traders, 2-3 brothel whores, the thief guild leader, the cook in shanty town, some upper town no-names) and some 3-6 more on the farms.
Men? My bet is on over a hundred. That's a genetic cesspool. Although G2 is better than G1 in this regard it still hurts (not ruins) the immersion for me.
Gothic 3 is the worst in this regard. There are like 3 women in the entire Nordmar. I wish I was kidding. Not to mention the abysmal quests with various dancers in Varant where some 15 dancers are the only female population.
I played Gothic 3 back in September so this is fresh in my memory.

 

[Lord of Riva]

The disproportion of women in population (about 20:1) of Gothic 2 and 3 is laughable.

Now it's been a while since I last played G2 but I'm fairly sure there are loads of women in Khorinis and the surrounding farms. It's certainly not 20:1, unless you're counting the orcs too.

Well, the ratio is off but still justifiable. After all a bunch of men escaped the colony not too long ago.
But even with that considered, there are about 10-15 women in Khorinis (some 3-5 traders, 2-3 brothel whores, the thief guild leader, the cook in shanty town, some upper town no-names) and some 3-6 more on the farms.
Men? My bet is on over a hundred. That's a genetic cesspool. Although G2 is better than G1 in this regard it still hurts (not ruins) the immersion for me.
Gothic 3 is the worst in this regard. There are like 3 women in the entire Nordmar. I wish I was kidding. Not to mention the abysmal quests with various dancers in Varant where some 15 dancers are the only female population.
I played Gothic 3 back in September so this is fresh in my memory.

Your point being?

There were no bespectacled Fat Neckbeards either, you don't see me complain.

It's great to see that the standard still seems to be absolutely arbitrary and you ignore the narrative reasoning as well. Women never faced (and still don't face) the same harsh corporal punishments men do and that is consistent in the setting as well.

Gothic 3 was the worst in all regards so that's no surprise there.

You also really, really missed the point I made in the post above.