Never seen much of this game but it looks pretty decent. If I played it should I play the first one first?
[QUOTE=tom1029;52729592]Never seen much of this game but it looks pretty decent. If I played it should I play the first one first?[/QUOTE]
I started with 2 and I never really felt confused about anything. In Gothic 3, any old NPC will answer questions about your past history with them in case you forgot or didn't play the previous game and I think that's the case with 2 as well.
Also yeah, IMO the game is fantastic. 3 was great too with some heavy patching, the publishers just did everything they could to ruin the game by rushing it out as fast as possible.
Wow I just realized how terrible Bethesda games are (considering Morrowind is considered to be the best TES)
Look at Arx Fatalis as well, if you want the closest to a combat focused game of that era
came out same time as Morrowind no less
[QUOTE=Ott;52729714]Wow I just realized how terrible Bethesda games are (considering Morrowind is considered to be the best TES)[/QUOTE]
Elder Scrolls games being the most popular WRPGs ever gives them a lot of retroactive praise. Everyone can remember Morrowind and can think it was a gleaming golden gem of a game for its time, but everyone also forgets that Final Fantasy X and Diablo 2 were released the year before, Anachronox and Kingdom Hearts were released the same year, and KOTOR and Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne would be released the year after.
[QUOTE=tom1029;52729592]Never seen much of this game but it looks pretty decent. If I played it should I play the first one first?[/QUOTE]
If you don't mind the somewhat clunky UI play the first one.
Not even for the story alone.
It just has one of the most unique gameworld feelings and atmosphere I've ever experienced.
The prison atmosphere is just... just experience it.
Don't play it if you like to play the usual shiny white armour knight hero character.
Also, get the Fanpatches. They are fantastic. Especially for 3. It's almost unplayable without the fanpatch.
[QUOTE=Ott;52729714]Wow I just realized how terrible Bethesda games are (considering Morrowind is considered to be the best TES)[/QUOTE]
IMO a lot of the "Morrowind #1" meme is just nostalgia goggles. Each of the 3 3D TES games have had their ups and downs. Morrowind had the weirdest and arguably most interesting story/setting but it was janky as fuck and had some of the worst gameplay I've ever seen in an RPG. Oblivion had some of the best quests in the TES series in terms of story mixed with gameplay mechanics, but the world was incredibly boring being basically just a big forest basin that looked kinda samey everywhere but the far edges of the map with some really uncanny valley tier faces. Skyrim definitely has the best combat mechanics of all the games with proper reaction animation states for taking heavy blows and much tighter hitboxes. Even the TES games before Morrowind had some interesting things lost afterwards, like you could talk to humanoid things like Scamps (who were rude af) and take heavy disadvantages (like extreme weakness to magic) to give yourself other perks in the character creator.
On top of all that, each of the 3 games gets slightly better as time goes on towards some of the points in the video, Morrowind started with a world containing basically static NPCs that don't give a fuck what you're doing short of hitting them or obviously stealing whereas in Skyrim they have schedules with varying degrees of complexity as well as significantly better reactions to your fucking about. Not that Bethesda ever really got some things as right as the Gothic series, you can still do some stupid shit like putting pots over people's heads to steal and nobody in Tamriel seems to understand the concept of a non-lethal take-down when someone is fucking with them. In Gothic if a guard beats you up and knocks you out they'll take your stuff, and once you recover you can go and beat them up to take your shit back. You also usually got a choice to kill anyone you beat in a fight. Sentient creatures wouldn't usually die when defeated, they'd just be downed for a significant time and you could opt to kill them by holding right click then left clicking to impale them
[QUOTE=Elspin;52729766]IMO a lot of the "Morrowind #1" meme is just nostalgia goggles. Each of the 3 3D TES games have had their ups and downs. Morrowind had the weirdest and arguably most interesting story/setting but it was janky as fuck and had some of the worst gameplay I've ever seen in an RPG. Oblivion had some of the best quests in the TES series in terms of story mixed with gameplay mechanics, but the world was incredibly boring being basically just a big forest basin that looked kinda samey everywhere but the far edges of the map with some really uncanny valley tier faces. Skyrim definitely has the best combat mechanics of all the games with proper reaction animation states for taking heavy blows and much tighter hitboxes. Even the TES games before Morrowind had some interesting things lost afterwards, like you could talk to humanoid things like Scamps (who were rude af) and take heavy disadvantages (like extreme weakness to magic) to give yourself other perks in the character creator.
On top of all that, each of the 3 games gets slightly better as time goes on towards some of the points in the video, Morrowind started with a world containing basically static NPCs that don't give a fuck what you're doing short of hitting them or obviously stealing whereas in Skyrim they have schedules with varying degrees of complexity as well as significantly better reactions to your fucking about. Not that Bethesda ever really got some things as right as the Gothic series, you can still do some stupid shit like putting pots over people's heads to steal and nobody in Tamriel seems to understand the concept of a non-lethal take-down when someone is fucking with them. In Gothic if a guard beats you up and knocks you out they'll take your stuff, and once you recover you can go and beat them up to take your shit back. You also usually got a choice to kill anyone you beat in a fight. Sentient creatures wouldn't usually die when defeated, they'd just be downed for a significant time and you could opt to kill them by holding right click then left clicking to impale them[/QUOTE]
Morrowind was never renowned for mechanics like stealth, combat or the NPCs' ability to know their bedtime. Obviously it won't fare well in comparisons based around that. It's praised for being a weird and wonderful world that's filled with stuff to do. It's a lot of fun if you do some exploration for yourself, largely due to it not scaling permanent rewards to your level - a crap staple of Oblivion and Skyrim.
For example's sake, say you want to explore in Skyrim. You'll almost definitely find enemies and generic loot that's scaled to your level. If you're lucky you might find a quest with a reward like the Gauldur artifacts, except tough shit because you're level 12 and you're stuck with weaker rewards than if you did the quest at level 36. There's barely any incentive to explore because there isn't much beyond scaled loot that can make you lose out in the long-run. But in Morrowind there's a clear incentive because what you'll find will always vary. When you enter a dungeon you have to take care because you don't know its difficulty. Or you might enter a generic tomb and find a ridiculously overpowered artifact. The game doesn't punish you for that, it just lets you enjoy your reward because you've earned it. That's also the point of having no instant fast travel or quest markers, you're meant to explore and get lost because if you do you might find something cool.
Gothic 2 is a good RPG. When You beat the game, there's that nice expansion Night of the Raven that adds lots of new items, completely new map and quests + it makes game harder than Gothic 1. Atleast in my experience it was harder than 1st Gothic.
[QUOTE=Elspin;52729766]IMO a lot of the "Morrowind #1" meme is just nostalgia goggles. Each of the 3 3D TES games have had their ups and downs. Morrowind had the weirdest and arguably most interesting story/setting but it was janky as fuck and had some of the worst gameplay I've ever seen in an RPG. Oblivion had some of the best quests in the TES series in terms of story mixed with gameplay mechanics, but the world was incredibly boring being basically just a big forest basin that looked kinda samey everywhere but the far edges of the map with some really uncanny valley tier faces. Skyrim definitely has the best combat mechanics of all the games with [B]proper reaction animation states for taking heavy blows[/B] and much tighter hitboxes. Even the TES games before Morrowind had some interesting things lost afterwards, like you could talk to humanoid things like Scamps (who were rude af) and take heavy disadvantages (like extreme weakness to magic) to give yourself other perks in the character creator.
On top of all that, each of the 3 games gets slightly better as time goes on towards some of the points in the video, Morrowind started with a world containing basically static NPCs that don't give a fuck what you're doing short of hitting them or obviously stealing whereas in Skyrim they have schedules with varying degrees of complexity as well as significantly better reactions to your fucking about. Not that Bethesda ever really got some things as right as the Gothic series, you can still do some stupid shit like putting pots over people's heads to steal and nobody in Tamriel seems to understand the concept of a non-lethal take-down when someone is fucking with them. In Gothic if a guard beats you up and knocks you out they'll take your stuff, and once you recover you can go and beat them up to take your shit back. You also usually got a choice to kill anyone you beat in a fight. Sentient creatures wouldn't usually die when defeated, they'd just be downed for a significant time and you could opt to kill them by holding right click then left clicking to impale them[/QUOTE]
Come now, I'd hardly call 2 stagger animations only done on power attacks that are extremely slow compared to the actual blow proper reaction states. Enemies don't react from 80% of swings. I'm not saying this to say morrowind's is better (it's not) but even morrowind had more reaction animations for getting hit, problem is you never see them because of the chance to hit.
[QUOTE=Bread_Baron;52729896]Morrowind was never renowned for mechanics like stealth, combat or the NPCs' ability to know their bedtime. Obviously it won't fare well in comparisons based around that. It's praised for being a weird and wonderful world that's filled with stuff to do. It's a lot of fun if you do some exploration for yourself, largely due to it not scaling permanent rewards to your level - a crap staple of Oblivion and Skyrim.[/QUOTE]
I mean that's basically what I said just paraphrased to be a lot more subjectively positive about Morrowind. If you care more about the setting than gameplay mechanics, polish, and interactivity as well as being particularly into that kind of weird environment then it'd be totally reasonable to prefer it to the other games. I pretty carefully chose to start the post with "Each of the 3 3D TES games have had their ups and downs" because honestly I think based on your personal game preference it'd be totally reasonable to prefer any of the 3, but if you wave away the faults of each of the games you're not being reasonable about their actual quality IMO
[QUOTE=Bloodshot12;52729989]Come now, I'd hardly call 2 stagger animations only done on power attacks that are extremely slow compared to the actual blow proper reaction states. Enemies don't react from 80% of swings. I'm not saying this to say morrowind's is better (it's not) but even morrowind had more reaction animations for getting hit, problem is you never see them because of the chance to hit.[/QUOTE]
I was comparing the TES games specifically at that point in the post, they're obviously not as good as some other RPGs. Morrowind had some animations for staggering but they weren't very dynamic, things would just snap in and out of animations with not much in the way of transition or weight.
But that's my point, skyrim's are just as bad in a different way. There's no weight to them, they always happen the same no matter the swing type and they are way too slow, there's nothing really notable about them either except as an indicator to say "hey i am staggered" its janky but in a different way
[QUOTE=Bloodshot12;52730121]But that's my point, skyrim's are just as bad in a different way. There's no weight to them, they always happen the same no matter the swing type and they are way too slow, there's nothing really notable about them either except as an indicator to say "hey i am staggered" its janky but in a different way[/QUOTE]
I'm not sure if it's just been a while since you played Skyrim or are maybe thinking of Oblivion, but in Skyrim when you stagger people they don't just do an animation and then warp back to attacking halfway through it, they actually stop and stumble often shifting in position. The reactions are very lacking for sharp blows as opposed to blunt ones but the differences in quality of the reactions between Morrowind and Skyrim are enormous.
Can Gothic 2 do THIS
[media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Lo0qD6rOz8&[/media]
Honestly, looking the the 2 games, Morrowind looks like it came out in the 90s, Gothic 2 looks like an early 2000s game easy but not Morrowind, at all.
Bethesda being lazy shits with their game though really, that's the extent of it.
Both games are great in their own right
[QUOTE=Elspin;52730133]I'm not sure if it's just been a while since you played Skyrim or are maybe thinking of Oblivion, but in Skyrim when you stagger people they don't just do an animation and then warp back to attacking halfway through it, they actually stop and stumble often shifting in position. The reactions are very lacking for sharp blows as opposed to blunt ones but the differences in quality of the reactions between Morrowind and Skyrim are enormous.[/QUOTE]
I didn't mean to say they weren't higher quality than mw, just that the actual staggers themselves are not indicative of the swings you do and don't feel very good anyway
[QUOTE=Bread_Baron;52729896]Morrowind was never renowned for mechanics like stealth, combat or the NPCs' ability to know their bedtime. Obviously it won't fare well in comparisons based around that. It's praised for being a weird and wonderful world that's filled with stuff to do. It's a lot of fun if you do some exploration for yourself, largely due to it not scaling permanent rewards to your level - a crap staple of Oblivion and Skyrim.
For example's sake, say you want to explore in Skyrim. You'll almost definitely find enemies and generic loot that's scaled to your level. If you're lucky you might find a quest with a reward like the Gauldur artifacts, except tough shit because you're level 12 and you're stuck with weaker items than if you did the quest at level 36. There's barely any incentive to explore because there isn't much beyond scaled loot that can make you lose out in the long-run. But in Morrowind there's a clear incentive because what you'll find will always vary. When you enter a dungeon you have to take care because you don't know its difficulty. Or you might enter a generic tomb and find a ridiculously overpowered artifact. The game doesn't punish you for that, it just lets you enjoy your reward because you've earned it. That's also the point of having no instant fast travel or quest markers, you're meant to explore and get lost because if you do you might find something cool.[/QUOTE]
This was true for my enjoyment of the game as well. I had played it with the physical vvardenfell map that came with the game and I would basically look at a cool detail and be like "Hey that looks like daedric ruins, I bet there is something cool there." and I'd find an artifact or quest at the location and repeat that for about 300 hours or so.
Morrowind also had absurdly good music composed by Jeremy Soule.
[media]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSr2Aj3RtaA[/media]
Tacking on exploring and you're hearing these songs play when your running by the small way side of giant mushroom and trees and flowers. Really gets you immersed in the game itself. Morrowind may not be perfect, but it's a great game. But I've never played any of the Gothic games to really compare
Well I guess I'm buying the Gothic bundle when it goes on sale now.
I tried Arx Fatalis and just kinda burned out on how constricted it was physically.
You know what's funniest for me. My Godfather got me into playing RPGs when I was just a kid, he got me to play Baldur's Gate or Fallout games. I bought Morrowind when it came out myself and asked him if he played it, he did play and thought the game was pretty mediocre, buggy. At the time I thought Morrowind was the shit, years later I've come to realize how shitty it actually is and overpraised, because everyone else just like me fell for Bethesda's tricks.
The only reason anyone would ever praise morrowind for its combat even in its time is to do so completely ironically
if it wasn't for the plot and atmosphere of Morrowind, Bethesda wouldn't be where it is today. Go figure... they abandoned what made them great
[editline]30th September 2017[/editline]
[QUOTE=Elspin;52730133]I'm not sure if it's just been a while since you played Skyrim or are maybe thinking of Oblivion, but in Skyrim when you stagger people they don't just do an animation and then warp back to attacking halfway through it, they actually stop and stumble often shifting in position. The reactions are very lacking for sharp blows as opposed to blunt ones but the differences in quality of the reactions between Morrowind and Skyrim are enormous.[/QUOTE]
Doesn't help how emulated and fake everything feels in skyrim even then
skyrim feels like a slog to fight in with melee weapons
[QUOTE=J!NX;52732077]The only reason anyone would ever praise morrowind for its combat even in its time is to do so completely ironically
if it wasn't for the plot and atmosphere of Morrowind, Bethesda wouldn't be where it is today. Go figure... they abandoned what made them great
[editline]30th September 2017[/editline]
Doesn't help how emulated and fake everything feels in skyrim even then
skyrim feels like a slog to fight in with melee weapons[/QUOTE]
Realistically Morrowind attributes some of it's nostalgia factor to some the dumbest shit you can do, that was never patched, even by the community. In Morrowind,Oblivion, and Skyrim you can make potions. Skyrims is a lot more basic in terms of potion making, and Oblivion's is a healthy mix. However Morrowind allow you to break the game in the way potions were made.
Alchemy was based around the intelligence stat. So if you had say 50 intelligence and 30 alchemy, you can make a fortify Intelligence potion. End result is that your magic pool and stats relating about magic and alchemy will go up by a few points. However an unintended side effect was that when you boosted your intelligence and alchemy score you ended up making BETTER fortify attribute potions. See where this is going? Repeat the process til you have nearly 500 intelligence and you're making potions that sell for thousands. Then you can go find a random mudcrab in the southern part of the game world and sell him these potions because he has the most gold and buys all items for base price.
There's all sorts of wackiness with it's game engine that allows the player to basically become a demi-god through engine exploits while not actually being an exploit. While being as basic as it is, it's still a roleplaying game, even more so than Skyrim because if you ever joined ANY of the factions in Morrowind you'd notice some interesting stuff.
You can only join 1 Great House
Joining any of these Great Houses affects your disposition towards other factions and overall disposition of even the commoner NPCs.
Of course there are ways around these disposition change but at it's heart it's an RPG. If you're wanting to be wizard but not be a spy you join House Telvanni, or if you don't care for House politics you join the Mages Guild. You can make your own overpowered spells that have large AOEs or long status effects.
Plus you can kill essential NPCs, it'll warn you that it was a bad idea, but you can kill just about everyone in the game because you can.
I still remember doing some dumb shit in Morrowind like getting tons of lockpicks and trying to break into the palace where Vivec was in to try to kill him.
Morrowind's two main flaws were that it was buggy (something which hasn't changed with new TES games), and the combat system. Aside from these two, I personally thought it was a great game. And I can say that because I had a great amount of fun playing it on the original Xbox, it was one of my favorite games on the Xbox
Man, I remember reading a comic in an ancient Game Informer or EGM or maybe Playstation Magazine issue that riffed on how the setting was apparently pretending to be an alien world but everything was just a real life thing given a brown insect makeover and a nonsense name.
It's weird seeing people's contemporary opinions and then realizing how wrong they were even at the time.
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