The trilogy is meant to be played in order.
G1->G2->Archolos.
But what about Gothic 3?
I replayed them just some time ago. Gothic 1 & 2 being one of the best RPGs ever released engrossed me once again even if I completed them multiple times over a decade ago. Once again I had so much fun as with few other games. Then it became time for Gothic 3.
It's even worse than I remember it and I didn't finish it when I bought it on release, nor I am going to finish it now. It's extremely buggy, bland and boring. Even if you use Community Patch 1.75.
Remember how amazing storytelling and quests were in Gothics? How much attention to details was given? How even simplest tasks had a story you could recall and inscribed memories? Gothic 3 throws it all out the window for copy-pasted quests and locations.
I do not mean it figuratively. The entire world is filled with many towns. You can traverse through three different kingdoms/areas - from their farms to their capitals. The problem is: They all have the very same quests to get +++ reputation, so you can meet the leader, do a quest for him and get an artifact that you need to collect from another fed-ex quest (from Xardas/Rhobar). ALL quests are extremely simplistic and devoid of story. You meet many people, no matter if these are old friend NPCs, the king or just random people on the street - they all have only very few uninteresting lines that just tell you what to do for their fed-ex quest, and after you complete it you forget about them. There are no stories told. Have you seen the outro of Gothic 2 and you had many questions? Now when you meet Xardas he only says "I devoured the power of dragons! Now bring me 6 artifacts". The same if you meet the king himself: "We lost the war, so now I need 6 artifacts!".
Instead of faction choice, now you get +++ points in factions by doing the same extremely basic tasks or freeing towns (where you just kill all orcs in a town). Mentioning orcs, I should also add that the terrifying orcs of Gothic 1/2 with their own language and tribal culture were replaced with "intelligent" orcs that are exactly like humans, but bigger and greener/more blue.
The main story I cannot criticize because it doesn't exist. You are just thrown into the world with copy-pasted everything repeating same quest over and over again. By chance you should gather all the artifacts at some point and bring them somewhere to finish the game, but I had no patience to do so. I endured through a lot of trashy games, but this one is too much. Except decent music it has no positive aspects. There is literally no motive to play it, MMOs are way more varied in quests and elaborate in their story.
If only at least it was a decent walking simulator. However, all surroundings and environments are also just copy-paste and there is no reason for exploration. This game is the opus magnum of copy-paste. It is the embodiment of repeatability. I have never in my life played a game that is even half as protracting. Even for a fan of original Gothics this game is pure garbage. And ports? None whatsoever, apparently Khorinis had the only port in the known world.
I won't even go through trouble of describing how technically bad this game is and constantly sutters for 1-3 seconds even on a modern NVMe SSD with 4 core CPU and decently powerful GPU.
I cannot recommend it to anyone. Not for any price, not for any time. Gothic 3 is just terrible game in practically every aspect and playing it feels like an unrewarding chore. It it beyond my grasp how people who made original Gothics could make this junk. It is one of the worst RPGs I have ever played.
And Arcanaina? Just forget this exists?
Fetch quest upon fetch quest.
-I need to speak with lord of the castle!
- Orks imprisoned him, our great hero! Our army can't stand against them! Go, you deal with them!
Great hero: Of course! I will go and free him or I will never come back!
*goes to orks*
Guard at the gate: I can't let you speak with my leader! Until you get me booze from a shaman, go get it!
Shaman: I can't give you booze until you find some ork!
Some ork: I can't go back until you return my amulet from another ork!
Another ork: I will not give you amulet! *fights* Ok, I'll give you amulet!
The great hero now needs to go back through the chain of NPCs, but actually duck that, I don't give a potato anymore. Literally, every quest is like this.
In addition, this game is not open world at all. Small island areas open up along with the quest line. Moreover the game is full of bugs and if you try to explore and go off the path to ie. a forest, then the character will start sliding over environment and then randomly die. If you jump into shallow water you instantly die, and so on.
