Why is Gothic series so culty?

[Doktor Best]

If Gothic 1+2 are 7/10 then Morrowind is a 5/10 at best and Skyrim 3/10

How would you rate Oblivion, the Codex Top 101 classic?

Istillwantmymoneyback out of 10

 

[Arbiter]

Istillwantmymoneyback out of 10

I have the same sentiment for Diablo 3, a game that I bought on release for a full European price (60 EUR IIRC). I consider it a bigger disappointment than Oblivion.

 

[Egosphere]

In addition, you can improve the visuals of both Gothic and Morrowind, if that's the only thing holding you off from trying them, so even the "game is ugly" argument doesn't hold up.

MGE XE is mandatory for playing morrowind in this day and age imo. Turning off draw distance lets us see the landscapes as they were meant to be seen.

 

[agentorange]

In addition, you can improve the visuals of both Gothic and Morrowind, if that's the only thing holding you off from trying them, so even the "game is ugly" argument doesn't hold up.

MGE XE is mandatory for playing morrowind in this day and age imo. Turning off draw distance lets us see the landscapes as they were meant to be seen.

no, some tasteless graphics mod is not mandatory. no, that is not how the landscapes were meant to be seen. the developers knew what they were doing better than some modders coming in 20 years later. when you remove the fog it destroys the whole illusion of an expansive, mysterious landscape since you can then see absolutely everything just over the hill. you're not "improving" the graphics when you install any of these mods, you are changing the graphics--almost always to something worse.

 

[Berengar]

Nostalgia is longing for something from the past that you imagine in an idealistic way. Ie thinking fondly about the time your old gf gave you your first bj and dismissing the fact that she was generally a bitch or you thinking school was fun despite the fact you probably had to wear the dunce hat more often than not. Modern PC player having all the crpgs from last five decides within the reach of his palm and choosing to play some ahead of others has nothing to do with nostalgia, regardless of how old the games are. And someone enjoying a game from bazilion years ago now and thinking it is great does not mean they don't see its flaws or deem it spotless. Why would you even assume such utterly dumb and vague thing. Rhetorical question btw.

I'm so sorry you think that life ended after high school did

 

[samuraigaiden]

Imagine a game made by the same people who killed 6 million jews. Wouldn't you want to play it and see what it's about?

 

[boluch]

Imagine a game made by the same people who killed 6 million jews.

Wait, that was for real?

 

[coldcrow]

In addition, you can improve the visuals of both Gothic and Morrowind, if that's the only thing holding you off from trying them, so even the "game is ugly" argument doesn't hold up.

MGE XE is mandatory for playing morrowind in this day and age imo. Turning off draw distance lets us see the landscapes as they were meant to be seen.

no, some tasteless graphics mod is not mandatory. no, that is not how the landscapes were meant to be seen. the developers knew what they were doing better than some modders coming in 20 years later. when you remove the fog it destroys the whole illusion of an expansive, mysterious landscape since you can then see absolutely everything just over the hill. you're not "improving" the graphics when you install any of these mods, you are changing the graphics--almost always to something worse.

Are you sure the fog wasn't there because of limitations of GPU/CPU power?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

In addition, you can improve the visuals of both Gothic and Morrowind, if that's the only thing holding you off from trying them, so even the "game is ugly" argument doesn't hold up.

MGE XE is mandatory for playing morrowind in this day and age imo. Turning off draw distance lets us see the landscapes as they were meant to be seen.

no, some tasteless graphics mod is not mandatory. no, that is not how the landscapes were meant to be seen. the developers knew what they were doing better than some modders coming in 20 years later. when you remove the fog it destroys the whole illusion of an expansive, mysterious landscape since you can then see absolutely everything just over the hill. you're not "improving" the graphics when you install any of these mods, you are changing the graphics--almost always to something worse.

Are you sure the fog wasn't there because of limitations of GPU/CPU power?

of course it was, it just happened to also be the right choice
oblivion & skyrim would have had the same fog if it was done for artistic reasons

just because it happened to be the right choice doesn't mean they did it on purpose

 

[agentorange]

In addition, you can improve the visuals of both Gothic and Morrowind, if that's the only thing holding you off from trying them, so even the "game is ugly" argument doesn't hold up.

MGE XE is mandatory for playing morrowind in this day and age imo. Turning off draw distance lets us see the landscapes as they were meant to be seen.

no, some tasteless graphics mod is not mandatory. no, that is not how the landscapes were meant to be seen. the developers knew what they were doing better than some modders coming in 20 years later. when you remove the fog it destroys the whole illusion of an expansive, mysterious landscape since you can then see absolutely everything just over the hill. you're not "improving" the graphics when you install any of these mods, you are changing the graphics--almost always to something worse.

Are you sure the fog wasn't there because of limitations of GPU/CPU power?

I have no doubt that's a part of it, but these things are complicated and often times the technical limitations aligned with or informed the visual choices (Silent Hill 2 is another good example of this, look up the HD remake of that game where they removed the fog because the newly in charge people thought it was only there to save the framerate). Clearly the area designers/visual designers knew about the fog and how it would be limiting visible distance and made decisions with that in mind (because unlike now when games are developed by 500 man teams with 70% of the workforce being outsourced to freelancers in Bangladesh, games used to be made by relatively small teams of people who talked to each other).

They were not designing the world while thinking "Ok this area looks like shit now, but oh man it's gonna look great once someone makes a view distance mod 20 years into the future." Instead they were thinking about how they could make the game look the best it could look with those factors in mind. "This looks awkward in the editor but it will look eerie in game with the fog," "I'll put this building here because it will look cool to approach it and slowly see it emerging out of the fog or dust" "You shouldn't be able to see this location from that location because a character talks about how far away it is, but in-game the fog and draw distance limitations will make it seem like it is far away," etc. Shocker, but the developers back in the day working on these games were far smarter and more talented than the bumpkins tinkering with them 20 years down the line.

 

[coldcrow]

MGE XE looks p. great though, with a cell drawing factor of 2 or 3. It's not a shitty graphic mod, it just calculates far textures (at least the main functionality).

 

[Camel]

These dense woods and swamps saved us from the Mongols.

"Please, take these offerings of woods and swamps."

Yeah, Western Europe was saved by the Mongol dynasty crisis which forced Batu khan to withdraw forces and to stop the conquest.

 

[Serus]

No it wasn't. Not the "conquest" part at least. Mongols probably had military might to defeat western rulers, that's correct. However there are geographical limits for any people and pre-industrial (land) empire to as far they can reach and keep the gains. Alexander the Great stopped at the gates of India. Ottomans never ventured farther than a season-long campaign with army starting in Tracia allowed. Romans ventured farther than the borders we learn in school, but never for long. Etc, etc... All empires "stop" somewhere. Even if they are as "mobile" and "modern" as Mongols were who had conquered more than others, the limitations still applies. Western Europe seems too far from centres of power of the potential conquerors. They would possibly defeat some HRE, perhaps even French armies. Then pillage, leave some mongol genetic material inside western women, etc... but wouldn't stay there for long. They could possibly bring some eastern/central Europe (Poland, Hungary, etc...) into their domain though. Probably for a significantly shorter period of time than Russia though. For the same reason as above.

TL;DR No, it is a matter of logistics, even for mongols.

 

[samuraigaiden]

Imagine a game made by the same people who killed 6 million jews.

Wait, that was for real?

Literally the same people.

 

[Serus]

Imagine a game made by the same people who killed 6 million jews.

Wait, that was for real?

Literally the same people.

I'd prefer a game made by people who killed tens of thousands of Jews (if they can be called as such at this point). Namely the Romans in late first century AD. Imagine games with the quality of Roman roads, no bugs!

 

[Egosphere]

In addition, you can improve the visuals of both Gothic and Morrowind, if that's the only thing holding you off from trying them, so even the "game is ugly" argument doesn't hold up.

MGE XE is mandatory for playing morrowind in this day and age imo. Turning off draw distance lets us see the landscapes as they were meant to be seen.

no, some tasteless graphics mod is not mandatory. no, that is not how the landscapes were meant to be seen. the developers knew what they were doing better than some modders coming in 20 years later. when you remove the fog it destroys the whole illusion of an expansive, mysterious landscape since you can then see absolutely everything just over the hill. you're not "improving" the graphics when you install any of these mods, you are changing the graphics--almost always to something worse.

MGE XE removes an element that was added solely due to technological limits of the time. The developers paid attention to botany and bio-diversity; they created dynamic weather, and crafted environment-dependant weather patterns like the sandstorms in ashlands. They most certainly did not slap fog on top of all that for some arbitrary artistic reason. Sunlit days and arid tracts of vvardenfell should be free of any impediment upon your LOS. The fog could stay near the marshes and the shallow coasts, and even then confined to specific times of day. If they could have gotten rid of it, they would have. The bitter coast in particular looks much better with the fog switched off, letting you see ruins like Ashurnibibi from land without having to approach.

 

[Humanophage]

These dense woods and swamps saved us from the Mongols.

"Please, take these offerings of woods and swamps."

Yeah, Western Europe was saved by the Mongol dynasty crisis which forced Batu khan to withdraw forces and to stop the conquest.

The Tatar-Mongol hordes as well as all the other Turkic nomadic conquests pretty much followed the natural landscape.

 

[Cat Headed Eagle]

How do we get from a thread about Gothic's cult status to a commentary on the Mongol invasions?
I'm not against it, btw. Speaking of Morrowind (since this is a multi topic thread now), do you guys think Unarmored works as intended in vanilla or is it buggy? Because if you wear one (1) piece of armor, like boots, the bonus stops working. Also, i think the gog version includes the 4gb patch, which is what you want really. Mostly to avoid having the game crap itself when alt tabbing.

 

[Harthwain]

How do we get from a thread about Gothic's cult status to a commentary on the Mongol invasions?

The argument was that the whites in Europe (probably Germans and everyone who likes Gothic) have a sense of place as "locations have a sacred meaning" followed by an example of "dense woods and swamps saving them from the Mongols", therefore they appreciate backtracking more than the whites in America (I am guessing this means rusty), who lack that sense of place and therefore have no idea why locations have meaning.

 

[JDR13]

Imagine a game made by the same people who killed 6 million jews.

Wait, that was for real?

I heard it was only 4 million and the Jew-controlled media inflated it to 6 million.

 

[bobocrunch]

I saw "backtracking" as a good thing.

These people are completely brainwashed.

Are there still people who doubt my theory about the german government operation?

It's probably the colonial trauma speaking in you. Whites in North America do not have a sense of place. Their psyche tells them to stay mobile and flee when things get sour. "Philly fell to blacks, why defend it, just move to Chicago. Chicago fell to blacks, why defend it, just move to LA. LA fell to mestizos, why defend it, just flee to Texas. Texas fell to mestizos, why defend it, just flee to Oregon." And so on. Meanwhile, whites in Europe stand their ground till the bitter end and would not even surrender locations when they were stolen decades ago by a fairly similar people, as in Kosovo or Constantinople.

To the whites in Europe, locations have a sacred meaning, including nature. The history of a place is their history as a people - in fact, even more ancient and primordial. This is the forest where Arminius led the pre-Germans to fight Caesar. These are the mountains where Thor fought the giants or where Dacians made blood sacrifice. When our ancestors spoke of dryads or rusalkas, these are the rivers and groves where they lived. These dense woods and swamps saved us from the Mongols. This can get very particular down to the specific cellar.

But to whites in America, not even cities matter. Location to them is generic, defined not by its cultural meaning, but by its abstract physical traits, like for a tourist in Africa. Look at this very huge red canyon! Wow, what a large gorgeous waterfall! That's a really old unique big tree! It has an appeal to an "outdoorsy" person or some kind of a global hippie tree hugger, but it is largely bereft of its völkish meaning. The forest in America is more of a reverse of it, since it is Indian and it is the abode of alien spirits, culturally speaking. At most, it has a connection with southern identity, the Civil War, and the Puritans, but it does not stretch out far into the truly mythological or even medieval. The US white cannot say earnestly, my biological ancestors lived in this location 2000 years ago, and you will never take this land away from me, alien POC filth. When a white from America feels a connection with the land, it is often in Europe. He goes to Scotland and he understands it, for example, in a typical Lovecraft fashion. But in America, locations are basically generic and when they are not, they are long since discarded and not liked (like NYC).

This lack of appreciation for temporal depth in a location makes US whites less capable of appreciating Gothic, and makes them partial to big empty open world games where location has no real meaning.

(Or it could be something about piracy and consoles, idk)

hitler lost so hard ur defending running around in swamps and fending off wolves in digital germany as an aryan spiritual experience

 

[Faarbaute]

hitler lost so hard ur defending running around in swamps and fending off wolves in digital germany as an aryan spiritual experience

I think it's a valid point though, even if Humanophage lays it on a bit thick.

The proverb "home is where you hang your hat" immediately comes to my mind, as an example of what he's talking about.

edit: That is to say, that there is no sentimental attachment to the land, other than perhaps an abstract idea of "where you hang your hat".

 

[ELEXmakesMeHard]

We need to redouble our gatekeeping efforts, men! The new generation is embracing our classics!



I'm not pointing fingers, but they're already within our midst!

 

[samuraigaiden]

We are taught that settling down and abandoning nomadic life was an essential step our Civ, but actually the Mongols dominated everyone of the settled people they could get their hands on precisely because they were nomads and thus were able to maintain the largest and best trained cavalry in the world.

Everything is backwards.

 

[Konjad]

We are taught that settling down and abandoning nomadic life was an essential step our Civ, but actually the Mongols dominated everyone of the settled people they could get their hands on precisely because they were nomads and thus were able to maintain the largest and best trained cavalry in the world.

Everything is backwards.

Yeah, but they didn't have Gothic

 

[Anthedon]

How did a Gothic thread turn into a discussion about the superiority of Nomads over weak willed farmers cowering behind their puny walls?