It's the bane of games like these. Sure AC games can be fun for a bit of mindless gaming, but even if you turn off the magical unexplained helpers it's just all so damned generic. Give me a world 1/100th the size, packed with interesting and interlinking goodies any day. Gothic 1 and 2 are true gems in this respect.
well they kinda do this with the "repair the eye of innos" questline. you ll be send to that stone circle but way later in the game. "exidently" finding the xbow once you dont even remember havin that quest. n image how many quest send you to that area. sagitta wants the sun aloe grow in the poop of a black troll. n that black troll is even painted on the map. the mage storyline leads up there too, n by following the shrines you probably miss that cave n run into the troll. i think there even was a hunter asking for a black troll fur. piranha rly know how to send you places n they did in all their games no matter if gothic 1-3, risen 1-3 or elex.
@@aigleincomments9532 yeah... no. it's usually up to the player if they find out where they have to go. the black troll on the map is totally understandable - I bet every NPC knows about the troll hence it's even on the map. and the rest? well not everyone is so well-oriented like you. at my first playthrough I had no fucking idea what to do or where to go even if I was given a HINT. Gothic doesl't hold your hand, but it does remain PLAYER-FRIENDLY. And if it didn't remain player-friendly, then it would become simply a shit game.
This is the greatness of games designed around not having a mini map. People always say "If you don't like it, turn it off!".. Blablabla. Problem is, those games are designed WITH SAID MINIMAP IN MIND. There are no descriptions in the quest dialog of how to get to the quest location in the majority of those games. So it's close to impossible to actually complete the quests without constantly running in a straight line towards that blip on the map.
So many triggers! Luring the Scavenger to Dragomir, luring the Lurker to Grimbald, not eaten apples in the inventory, the troll! By Innos'...I have to compensate this. You will find me at the castle-ring with a scroll of rain of fire and a potion of speed...
what about the quest near the new camp where you ahd to give water to the rice workers ? and by doing so you talked and discovered everyones past and hardships .. one of them even teach you that precious +5 strenght , you even rebel against the slave masters there and kill them .. Gothic 1-2 best fuckin rpgs games
to me I liked the "kill an orc and get me his axe" quest from the smith apprentice quest the most because there are multiple ways to deal with it as a new player there is no way you're really dealing with an orc that early (yes it's possible but only if you practice the combat system a lot) you can find one orc axe in the cave next to the barracks (technically there is another one in the cave with two shadow beasts but that's too far out and not worth the trouble), go hunting with the former apprentice of bosper and kill one with his help, or simply killing one with scrolls again technically you can lure the orc in the cave on the east gate to the guards but that's almost cheating the funny thing is if you say it's too hard to do for you he tasks you with clearing jacks light house from bandits which is even harder than killing a single orc, so the game is like: fuck you noob!
@@brohvakiindova4452 You are wrong. He doesn't task you to clearing jack's lighthouse. He tasks you with killing bandits in a cave near Akil's farm. Much easier. Little trickier to find though.
First playthrough of Gothic / Gothic 2 is just unforgettable. I finished both of them dozens of time, it never gets old, but the first playthrough is something unique. Discovering the world and mechanics... Best games ever.
Gothic 2 had something that I never experienced in a video game before, I just played it 3 years ago for the first time. I will not touch it for the next 5 years so that I hope I will forget most of it and might have an experience comparable to the first time. Hope it will work!
The best RPG experience I've ever had was in Gothic 1 back when it originally came out. I might be misremembering some of the details but it doesn't take away from the whole story. It happened at the stage of the game where you had to reach the tower of Xardas (or maybe some other place?) that was guarded by a golem. I remember I attempted passing by that golem before but he killed me pretty fast. So now I did all the quests I could, I got myself a new sword and a new set of armor. Went to the golem expecting to defeat him - and yet I still couldn't damage him. I thought maybe I messed up and should've leveled a mage. Or maybe I had to use some potions. But it was a clear cut dead end for me. I hopped online with my dial-up modem, found a walkthrough, but every page was loading for such a long time, and I didn't know that Ctrl+F was a thing, so I gave up on a walkthrough too. And then I remembered that I've encountered a library in game with a bunch of books. One of the books was a bestiary that I skimmed through at some point, but I don't remember if it had an entry about Golems on it. Regardless it was my only hope - so I went out seeking every library in the game I've been to, like Gandalf in the first LotR movie - and finally found that exact book. And after flipping through the pages - I found a golem entry. It said that golems are very weak against maces or hammers. Excited about this new information I remembered that there was a decent mace for sale in the swamp camp. I traveled to the swamp camp, got the mace, came back to the golem and boom! I defeated him in a couple of hits. That moment defined what is an RPG to me for the rest of my life. And unfortunately it hasn't been matched ever since. (except maybe by Archolos) Sometimes I do hit a dead end in RPG games but usually developers don't think these things through well enough. And the only solution ends up being looking up a walkthrough online, because a dead end is usually some poor gameplay mechanic that I missed or something that hasn't been explained properly in the tutorial.
Had the exact same experience with the golem, it was so great to figure it out, also it is one of the moments that I hate the most because it pushed the bar so high that it passed Plutos orbit :D
I think my favorite G2 memory is playing NotR for the second time. I had given up the first time because it was too hard and I misleveled (the game doesn't do a good job making the skill system clear). I was well versed in the G2 fighting system and was just exploring the builder's valley (addon story) shortly after joining the mercenaries and getting my first decent armor. Besides the few camps there, the addon world is almost complete wilderness. It's never really confusing though because the valleys make paths that intertwine and give orientation. There are some special places with enemies that are too strong and you remember those for later, but for the most part you just start exploring and making sense of the world while collecting all sorts of plants, scrolls, tablets and of course exp. You come onto a camp of very lovely renegades that has *the best* music. When the night comes, you enter the circle of the campfire after spending the day slaying monsters and searching for treasure in this strange new world. And you feel these guy's struggle because you get to know almost every single NPC in this camp as most have names. And it feels like every day, they could die to the threat that's looming above them. But similar to the colony in the first part, this party of outcasts makes the best of their situation. When playing in this world, I always try taking a few minutes to just relax at the campfire after a long play session and enjoy the atmosphere. Close second is returning to the once green valley of mines and seeing the paladins and militia in the sieged castle. The way Sengrath and Udar greet you really adds to it. Not really favorite quests, but favorite moments or moods. Favorite quest would be collecting the 5 stone tablets because it's so interwoven and allows the exploration of the entire addon map. It's like a much better, far less streamlined version of the focus stone quest! Similarly, but far less enjoyable is collecting the three mine reports for Garonth. The fact that the enemies there are so obviously weak to give the player an easier time is a deal breaker for me though. I'd rather have one companion Ganonth could spare and take on actual orcs like when Diego goes with me to the pass or I hire Biff. Milten for mages, The Jengorn for mercenaries and one of the Paladins for militia. Then you could fight actual orcs, even if it was mostly scouts, and it would be more fitting.
Gothic 1/2 are classics. The worlds are phenomenally designed. There are lots of great things hidden off the beaten path, so you are always rewarded for exploring.
@@Orimthekeyacolite I remember that game being an utter train wreck. Egregious load/save times, far inferior combat, and idiotic pre-seeded chest loot. Yuck. It was a huge step backwards from the first two games.
@@fred718 I guess a lot of what you're describing are problems that sound like raw unpolished nature of early unpatched originals. Whereas my first introduction was the gold edition with most of those problems already fixed. If anything, combat system was never the strong side of the series, but whatever version of G3 I played, combat felt smoother than I could ever have hoped in a Gothic game - and that speaking as someone who spent hundreds of hours struggling with the original. Be it as it may, the depth of the open world exploration and ineraction, that, on the contrary, always WAS the best that this series has to offer - that is on par with Gothic 1&2, given that the world is also much larger.
@@Orimthekeyacolite Because G3 is full of pointless quests with no purpose and useless rewards. Also there is nomain story, just vague predictions of what will happen in the end when you have chosen path. Read this also: thenocturnalrambler.blogspot.com/2018/01/gothic-3-sucks-critique-from-gothic-fan.html
@@Orimthekeyacolite I know - replying to old comment sucks. But let me explain as a guy whonot only finished and love both Gothic 1 and 2 [and NoTR DLC] but also is able to like and/or understand why people might like games that aren't "good" in certain series [Heroes of Might and Magic 4, Resident Evil 6, Jagged Alliance RAGE, Commandos Strike Force, etc.]. The MAIN problem with Gothic 3 is that instead of focusing on rather small but full of details worlds which you really want to explore every single corner [like mentioned in the video] that also naturally progress via another chapters and visiting new areas Gothic 3 is just... Plain. Empty. Where literally 90% of the world is just nothing more but empty space with couple of random beasts or herbs. In G3 there is almost never a situation where you want to explore more because you know that nothing is in there [as ALL chests are random literally shit to sell with no unique items whatsoever]. Another huge issue with it is that you actually have just like [if I remember correctly] between 6 to 8 MAIN quests. Every single other quest is copy/paste of just few types. Kill/bring/find/escort. And unlike G1/G2 there is no special reward, special dialogues that you remember, special twists - nothing. Just accept quest, do it, go to quest giver, collect reward and get some X% in Y City reputation. That is it. And if you not following any walkthroughs [and even with them] you have to repeat the same sentence X times to have single clue of what to do in single main quest. Instead of focusing on main or sub stories you have to play in a way: MAIN, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, MAIN, MAIN, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, MAIN and so on. It's boring AF. Also there is no real fair challenge, nor blocades as they were in G1 and G2. In those at the beggining you knew from start - DON'T ENTER FOREST, NOT NOW. And even later on [NotR mainly] it was not as obvious to go in there as you still had to be carefull. In G3 however you either killing everything or nothing. It's like you slashing everything on the way, forgeting about that it is RPG and then HUGE ROADBLOCK where you have to level up couple of levels to even try progressing further. It's just too long game for what it has to offer. And funniest part of this sentence? Even now, where I know how to beat Gothic 2 NotR with all shortcuts it's taking me 35-40 hours to do so. I beat Gothic 3 in 30 hours. And I feel is too long while G2NotR "is just enough long" for me. So maybe this will explain just a little bit why G3 sucks for huge fans of G1/G2
Same here. But I am in the habit of doing things differently every time I replay the game. So, I actually have had a ton of amazing experiences. This game, although appears simple, has so many intricacies that learning the game becomes extremely satisfying. You might know this, but beginners don't, but there are around 10 or 15 hidden item locations around the START of the game. In the tower, on the tower, and around the tower. The player could spend 20 minutes exploring just the mountains they started on, and they'd keep finding stuff. This is also why I love the developers so much. They knew VERY WELL it's fun exploring if you find items that are of use. Or if you end up experiencing an actual adventure.
@@TechSupportDave I have played through gothic 2 at least 15 times by now and I only discovered the lizards and the dex amulet behind the first bandit cave a few years ago after I already had 10 runs completed, some locations I even forgot about at some point it's one of the reasons why gothic 2 is superior to 1 because in 1 there are so many empty locations where you'd expect some hidden loot but get disappointed
Another thing I absolutely love about Gothic fetch quests is what happens when you actually find what you were send to look for. When someone really needs something and is willing to pay you for bringing it, you bet that thing is valuable and useful. Actually useful, not just "quest log says it's useful". When you're send for a paladin's sword, you have to make a decision. Do you really want to bring it back or keep it? It's a powerful sword, this could help you immensely. When you're sent to get some potions, you could keep them. They could make the exploration much easier. I love this aspect, you're actually faced with some real decisions that aren't clearly marked in dialogue or quest log. That's some real roleplay in an RPG.
played through G2 for the first time in a long time recently. What I never realized that whenever you finish any quest, that isn't ending with the NPC where you started it, you can almost always go back to that NPC and talk to them. Sometimes you get XP, but almost always you get relevant dialogue. It makes for such an immersive world.
I love how he's just casually picking up the sun aloe probably not knowing what it was, when that was always the hardest fetch quest for me 😂 But that aside, great explanation of your journey! They are indeed so many great fetch quests in Gothic 1+2, I often forget, that they are fetch quests at all. And you are always rewarded in a special way, even if you just get some mushrooms in the very beginning for a cook, he feeds you every day in return. I'd give so much to reexplore Gothic for the first time again without knowing every quest to its core and just doing the most efficient way on the way!
Most quests in mythology are fetch quests. The Holy Grail. The labors of Hercules. The Golden Fleece. Fetch quests can be great, but they need to be a spur to further adventure, not the core mechanic of the game.
The problem is quests becoming very short. Quests or adventures should take days to years. Those things you mentioned probably took that long to complete. And some aren't ever completed. Gothic tried to make quests more grandiose and long winded like that.
I don't even remember this quest, always was a "oh did I complete a quest?" thing for me, but the feelings you described followed me through almost all of my Gothic experience, making it one of my favorite games of all time. It's nice to see someone sharing this experience!
I remember doing this quest the first time and how scared I was after going down the stairs near the stone circle. It was a big mistake, there were wargs there that killed me with one bite. I hoped for a short cut and got eaten so I returned the same way I came. And Gothic has other fetch quests like that. Hanna from the inn in town gives you a fetch quest to get some old map she accidently sold to cartographer but you got to keep the map and find the treasure with it. Even the easy quest at the beginning is satisfying when Hilda asks you to get her a frying pan. Chances are that you didn't encounter Canthar yet because you immediately went to check the shepherd at the side of the road and started exploring the farm, so once you get this quest you get to meet Canthar and you get offered a way into town. And with other fetch quests, chances are you have required things like meat or herbs already so you just have to hand it. You don't have to hunt for a specific animal to get the right meat, you just use the one you got from scavengers and wolves since the very beginning.
When you drowned that Black troll in the lake I thought what a waste of 1k exp and messing up the quest for it's hide! But really in our first playthroughs we messed up alot of things due to lack of knowledge. That is why Gothic 1 and 2 have such a strong replayability value. You always discover new things about them.
as an experienced gothic player I suffered when you "wasted" the destroy death scrolls on goblin skeletons, but then again I make my life unnecessary hard sometimes saving up items I end up never using
@@brohvakiindova4452 think again... were those goblin skeletons laying on the floor dead like any skeleton should... or were they running around *undead*?
When I was doing the orc weapon mission I remember that I made the orc chase me into the town, and the Lothar (the paladin) instead of taking out his sword and running towards the beast, like it happens with other enemies" he screamed "orc!" And took out a magic rune to take him down
Gothic 2 has the best world building I have ever seen. Whole game is designed like this. I remember when I was low level character, and went straight in the deeper forest. Two wargs and one nasty Orc attacked me, and I was scared shitless. Gothic 2 should be in a textbook for world building!
I remember how back when I was a kid I spent an entire saturday snooping around that area as a monastery novice, it's such an awesome part of the Gothic world map. I spent at least an hour beating the black troll with just a novice staff and running in circles around him dodging his deadly punch. When I finally got him after like a hundred plus hits and he fell the sense of accomplishment was HUGE. Thank you for reminding me of this detail in Gothic 2, the beautiful thing about the black troll is that he's a rare sight, theres only the one in the whole world. And how awesome is that the developers make him at least somewhat vulnerable in that he has huge hp but probably no armor since you actually can deal (minimal) damage to him.
yeah. I recommend replaying the game. it's what I'm doing. as a kid I loved the atmosphere g1 and g2 had, but I wasn't really very good at the game since I was a kid. so I often got stuck or ran away. coming back to it many years later as an adult, and managing to do things I wasn't able to do at first, and just reminiscing the good old times of carelessness and lack of responsibilities or awareness of anything happening around me (such as the fact I was living in poverty at the time), really makes gothic a special game for me personally. But don't get me wrong, I'm not really biased about the game. I actually like the game because of what the game is. I'm aiming to be a professional game designer and this game is just pure inspiration. The game is obviously not perfect, but it achieves far more than most modern RPG games do.
If you think about it, the very first quest from xardas is to get the eye of innos. And this extends beyond the first chapter, so you can truely say that a great proportion of the game is set around a fetch quest and it is genious. In this moment you just think: "okay, i have to leave xardas tower, get into the town and then get the eye of innos, alright". Shortly after that you stumble across your first loot, maybe a hidden cave, get on your way to the town across some NPCs with nice mini quests and as soon as you reach the town, you understand, that this will become a long journey... Great Game!
Oh, that Harad's 'Bring me an orc weapon' quest - i didn't know there's a way to get it easily and had have to reload the game billion times to finally shut that orc scout down... yeah, that one right between this cruel shadowbeast and a band of black goblins. Unforgettable experience.
@@Thermalfusi0n nah most of the time you do need to help him, atleast for me 90% of the time the Orc killed him, some time even the shadowbeast. But yeah if you help with a few hits you can beat the orc.
I think you're hitting the nail on the head on such an important part of quest design. by categorising quests so strictly (fetch, kill, etc) we miss part of their value. that mindset lets us only see the destination without keeping the journey in mind.
For sure. I think a lot of those terms come from MMO's where the quests are so bare bones there really isn't much to them other than what their name implies. And your probably just doing them for XP anyway so all you care about is the destination. But as games become more nuanced those phrases stop meaning much.
Yes, I love the dynamicity of the game design which allows alternative solutions. I once lured Sentenza to a group of Goblin skeletons. When he is done with the skeletons, he is left with 5% health then I quickly took him down and seized his weapon. After that I will talk to him from time to time to aggravate him to rob the apple (he will randomly spawn apple) from his inventory. In a way, that gives you unlimited strength legitimately (if you have the patience).
The best experience I had in gothic 2 was finding those pyramids and exploring the area there. later in (Nacht des Raben) the exploration of the new environment behind the temples portal. It all came together so nicely. Exploration as a driving factor of enjoiment and the deliberate decision to not push the player into completionism is what made gothic 2 so enjoyable. Modern RPGs with pointers, floating arrows and markers and fast travel ruin themselfs by having that stuff in my humble oppinion.
I watched this video at the right time. Doing my first G2 playthrough right now. I started getting frustrated with the quests. I just figured out it was because the game wasn't holding my hand. I don't know why it expected it. I loved that about G1. This video put me back on the right track. The vague clues lead to exploration and finding your own solutions. It's more rewarding that way.
Very good video, I used to watch my brother playing all gothic's when I was young. All your video's about this games really heartwarming and nostalgic, thank you!
@@GamedevAdventures I always saw the Wolf's Fang as a weak weapon. I mean, it grants 4%(?) to one-handed combat and has decent stats, but the range kills it for me. The quest never really standed out to me, since every time I played any of the Gothic games I've been cleaning the entire map in the first episode, so I didn't really "explore" any of it, I just looted everything as I came across them
@@remster1987 Exactly. Range, The nail club you can take from the bandits at the start has less damage I recall, but has normal range making fighting with it so much easier...
WOOHOO! I bumped the likes up to 1.1K. I'm special now :) Seriously though, there was a purpose for some of these fetch quests in Gothic and actually make sense. The first one where you need to gather turnips to get farmers clothes to be able to enter the city. It makes sense that a farmer would have farmer's clothes, he had work that needed done but was unable to do it himself. Why not hire a passerby to get the job done? Dragomir's Crossbow quest also makes sense. 2 Undead goblins spooked him, he dropped in order to escape but really wants it back. Who else is gonna do it besides someone adventuring? Also notice the crossbow was unceremoniously laying on the ground and not placed on a pillar (or in a chest) with a big sign saying "Ye Quest Item Be Hereth". Compare that to a fetch quest in Baldur's Gate where a dwarf in the Friendly Arm Inn wants you to go to his house in Beregost, kill the spiders there and bring back his boots. This quest raises too many questions. If spiders have infested your house, why did you not alert the local authorities? They would have an interest that the spiders don't infest other houses in the area and the job would have been done quicker than wait for an adventurer to come to you. Why did you run to the Friendly Arm Inn? It's a 16 hour trek from Beregost AND there are 3 inns there WITHOUT spiders in them. Why are you hiring a random adventurer? You don't know who I am, I could enter your house and pawn off all your shit for all you know. And why do you need your boots? Did you run 16 hours to the Friendly Arm Inn barefoot? This is one of the most laughable and poorly thought out quests I've seen in a game.
This was really interesting to watch as a veteran player. I've known where the crossbow is for so long, I'd totally forgotten about how this quest comes off the first time you do it.
I think my mistake was that my first RPG was Gothic 2. Never experience the same in any other RPG since. There are some good game like Diablo, Skyrim, Dark Souls, but never experience the same.
Gothic 2 proves that quest's content matter much less than its' context. My favorite questline is entering the monastery, its pretty simple if you know what to do, but man, that's a joy to figure out WHAT you need to do.
Yeah it felt really special when you figured out how to join, I remember spending ages trying to figure out how to do the trial of fire and become a mage, gothic really made you have to earn the right to be a magic user so it felt special, most other games just have magic easily accessible
I would love to describe my experience with that quest but the first time I've done it was probably in 2009 where Gothic 2 became "The Game" for me. I think what you described was a proper Gothic experience, much more appealing to me than the "powergaming" ones that most nowadays players seem to do (that is: totally optimized runs). Honestly, I envy you for being able to enjoy that game in this way, which I sadly cannot after so many years. I also think your video tells us quite a lot about Gothic's design and developers intentions, actually. I'm not playing modern games so I'm wondering if current-day developers also use the same techniques as Piranha Bytes did during Gothic 2. They were not the masters of storytelling but were (and probably still are) good at creating interesting, immersive worlds with simple, but decent quests (due to their well-thought design).
I don't see a lot of games using these techniques simply because open world games have trended larger and less restricted. Its hard to carefully plan a players journey through an area if there are tons of angles of approach.
However there are plenty of other ways to create high quality fetch quests. Many great games rewrite the rules on quest design which is why they stand out. I don't want to make it sound like other games should always do things like this.
@@GamedevAdventures It probably has gotten harder to plan the journey for the player. What the Gothic developers - apart from quest design - did so well in my opinion, is sealing off certain areas for later, just by using strong monsters. There are areas in khorinis (the forest north of the city being a prominent example) that you just can't exlore freely until very late in the game - at least not as someone playing the game for the first time. This is something I really miss in many other games, Skyrim being the best example: Due to the way enemies scale with your own strength, a lot of fights and a lot of exploring becomes less meaningful, at least to me. When I defeated my first Orc in Gothic2, this meant something (and was still a tough grind).
which also happened intentionly. so you cant finish that quest? well, we dont mean to spoil it to you but we willl spoil the solution to you by sending you there for a different reason way later so you probably forgot bout the quest in the first place.
Me also, I just stumbled upon it and stumbled upon the dialogue to close the quest later. My experience of Gothic 2 was exp hunting not doing quests, my character was so painfully weak I was farming every point of exp I could find and had little time for quests except for the exp reward in them. This is the price of power later and playing a mage.
That's another thing you can actually do another quest that will help you get the other quest done when you're too weak there's lot of these hot spots in the game.
When i played gothic II for the first time I didn't even remember about this quest, I just went searching for herbs for Sagitta, and forgot about every task just exploring the world and enjoying it, and then at some point the stone circle popped up and I remembered that I was searching for it the whole time. That made me feel truly accomplished.
I was in awe when I first discovered that part of the map in gothic 2, but I did that during the quest to become a mage. I took a wrong turn at the lake, which lead me to grimbald, the troll and later the stone circle. That was very cool, even though it was frustrating that it took me so long to realize that I took a wrong turn
PLAY IT! THERE'S SO MUCH MORE TO THE GAME THAN ANY RUclips VIDEO CAN OUTLINE. I remember when I first replayed gothic after 12 years. You won't regret it dude the feeling is AMAZING.
Awesome, Gothic 1 and 2 are my most favorit game of all times, games that I still play 2 decades later. I love how much attention gothic has been given for some time now. Hopefully more people will give it a chance and try out a truly great RPG game, even when graphics are not up to date. I loved the video. I really like the way you making game look! I was 9 years old when I played this game for the first time. I will never forget my first encounter with an Elite orc in the woods behind Okill's farm. I was around level 4-5 at that time and went exploring little bit to deep in to dangerous forest. It took me a while to be man enough to go to the same forest again :D I tried to look for Dragomirs crossbow at low levels, but hearing goblin skeletons running at me did what it supposed to. I found it later again while restoring the Eye of Innos :)
I have never loved a game more than Gothic 2. I love the way it encourages you to explore every nook and cranny. You are always rewarded for exploration and experimentation. I love that it is voice acted, I love that there are so many characters to meet and help (or not help!) I love that 20 years later, I am STILL finding things about this game that I didn't know before. I am so absoloutly and completely enamoured by it!
Another quest that I find interesting is Ignaz's story line . He is the alchimist in the port , making experiments with transformation scrolls . He asks you to test a spell for him. Further on , Fire Mage Karras asks you to get 3 spells for him , from Ignaz, as he is suspicious of his experiments . In the next chapter, you find out that he was poisoned , and as it turns out, the Fire mages considered his experiments were too dangerous and voted for his assasination . and when you confront them , they tell you that people will not believe you , and Lord Andre tells you that if this information got out , people would lose faith in the mages and that would be bad in this hard times, but he assures you that he will take some form of action on this matter . Later on , Karras will address you and tell you that you accomplished nothing by telling Lord Andre , and that he will keep a close eye on you . My story telling abilities are one of a kind , I know :)) haha , but I hope that it's understandable :D I find the connections ,and immersion rly complete , with small easter eggs everywhere . This is for you , Gamedev Adventures ! Trust me please when I tell you , Gothis 2 Returning 2.0 with Alternative Balance will take your breath away . The detail to lore in that mod is insane , and it fully respects ALL THE ORIGINAL STORY , even adds on the story to have it immerse more with the world , as for example, the merceants in town will not talk to you to take you as a aprentice , you have to find some clothes and get in good favours with the Harbor " influential people" first , and only after, the masters will speak to you . and some more like this , spreaded along the whole game . The fight with Raven , at half HP , he escapes , and you have to find him again , and you enter a different map , a (dream , nightmare) where you fight him and xardas saves you . but that is a more bigger (extension , of the story ) I tell you with all the good intentions , Play it and you will see how amazing it is ! I guarantee you :D
Wow. I completed G2 a few times, and only one as a fire mage. Never knew about that, still, I am aware of the Karras quest, but not the consequences in the chapter 4. I'm still sceptical about this Returning mod though - it sure contains some cool features by me, but the stuff like the Urizel sword (it was supposed to be lost after all!), remains of the Swamp Brotherhood around the map of Khorinis (which is incredibly stupid due to the fact their majority have become the Seekers after the fall of the Barrier according to game lore), enormous strength requirement for the armor, addition of new guilds whose existence in Khorinis is illogical (necromancers, assassins...), different gods karma system and all that crazy new locations and questlines kind of break the feeling of minimalistic wholeliness of the original game for me. I might be wrong since I have no precise info about the most recent version, but that's what I've heard. Returning is a very maximalist mod as I see it, might consider trying it out some day just for fun.
@@bassismdonesimply yea.... in all fairness ... it is huge :). it has some certain steps that need to be followed and some missions, need to be done, in order to even unlock some of the maps .... but... the nice part is that they are not rly a requirement, only an option , u can finish the whole game by making only the vanilla quests and it will still work ...( plus/minus 1 or 2... that might be modified a bit) . The original game is amazing , don't get me wrong, but this Returning mod.... it adds more immersion to it ...from my point of view .....for example...you will enter a ORC MINE... in valey of mines ... u fund the Orc Town , then ... in the town there is an entrance to their mine . In that mine, there are some slaves , 1 Paladin slave(Wenzel, sounds familiar? G3? and one slave is the son of Karl ... the Port Smith , you will be able to help them escape, but they will teleport str8 to the mainland ... and there are a lot more small ester eggs like that :D you learn about the Assassins of the Varant Desert , and a lot others . and there is 1 EXTRA CHAPTER , after the defeat of the Undead Dragon , u can chose to end the game, or return to Khorinis... and Orcs have Invaded the town, killed everyone ... and there are a lot of cool stuff happening , u find out how the MAGIC WAS LOST (it turns out that because all 3 gods gave you their power in order to defear the Guardians , they weakened their connection to all the other people , and that is why you are the only one that is still able to use magic, and the runes have stopped working. if you can remember from G3 ... the king lost the was cuz they suddenly lost the magic... but in G3 ... apparently Xardas did something to take their magic ) Personally ..I find the Returning plot much more whole and complete:D OK enough ... i can go on for days :)) but yea... it is not perfect.... it has it's faults... but overall , it is a great addition to the games story . when you do decide to play , i got one advice :))be pacient :) try to make all the quests from all chapters to explore the whole storyline of the mod and.... become Harads aprentice :)) Mining is most profitable thing to make gold :D . HAVE FUN !
5:11 "I dashed in ... and quickly grabbed the stone tablet.." If you have played gothic 1 or more times, you know that trolls are slow af. They always do a greeting animation, when they see you haha
Hi! I'm from Poland, place, when Gothic is something like a religion, and I'm really happy that people from other regions that those where Gothic is the most popular (Germany and eastern Eu) also find beautiful details in this rpg. I love that everybody plays Gothic in a little different way
Great video I've enjoyed the Gothic games years ago when I was still in school and I know exactly what you're talking about, especially playing the games for the first time, exploring these areas not knowing what treasures waited for me with unspeakable dangers luring around the next corner to challenge my inexperienced nameless hero. Today I am a Game Master of a Pen and Paper Adventure Group, creating adventures on my own and I guess great RPGs llike the Gothic series really influenced the way I design characters, quest plots and the world itself. It is something about the mood of this game that still to this day makes me want to explore foreign worlds.
Never thought about this quest in such a way. I always just picked up Dragomir's Crossbow when the story led me to that location (much later). What is interesting is that you find a crossbow somewhere before the bridge you cross which I believe has a highwayman guarding it. I was jebaited into thinking that was his crossbow.
It's always nice to see someone new discovering (and then describing a fundamental part of it so well) that old "Gothic feel" I love so much. Almost twenty years, and the closest we got to that kind of game design recently was... Elex, by the same devs. Here's hoping to more and more people discovering the genius of this game and trying to apply some of its design philosophy to new games - and fingers crossed for that Gothic remake that's in the works.
Well said brother, I have finished Gothic 2 not a long time ago so it's still in my mind. There is one more mechanic on the boss that you did not mention and that's always walking behind his back and attacking him while doing so. This might take some time and practice but its eventually the cheapest way to kill him. And thanks from bringing back memories. My favourite quest in G2 gold was collecting the portal shards for water mages and missing people. Not gonna spoiler it for you if you havent been there yourself but try them out, finish them and you will see that they are amazing. The whole DLC of G2 is just an amazing addition to an already amazing game.
I still play this game today...! Glad to see there is still an active community here and on reddit. 2 of my most memorable moments: 1st. I used to play the game with a friend of mine. We took turns on progressing the story. We were at The Valley of mines trying to kill some dragonsnappers by luring them away from the horde one by one. It lowered my HP to a critical point until I heard someone draw his sword. We thought it was a paladin coming for the rescue Until I hear a "Machocho" and an Orc started hitting me from behind, Scarring the crap out of us. 2nd. We were exploring the Valley again until we reached a huge mountain filled with Lizardmen. We were early chapter 2 so we could not possibly touch them...but we were curious. We drank a speed potion and started climbing the mountain, avoiding the lizardmen and golems all the way to the top. Just before we reached the top though we glitched to a wall and we got attacked, dying instantly. I moved the camera a bit to see the surroundings until we see our first dragon, Feomathar! We looked at each other and screamed together "DRAGON!!!" (We scared the dog and she pooped the carpet. The end.)
Great analysis. I never thought about it in such terms, but yes, Gothic games and other good RPGs are exactly like that. They give you a "mundane" quest to go explore an area where you can of course ignore everything and just focus on the quest but...of course you will try to punch the troll or steal stuff he is guarding :) What is interesting this specific quest has not other role than to just give a player reason to explore that area as it does not provide any other bonuses except the exp.
and in gothic language grimbalds warning is a warning that if you really walk ahead you can reload a save unless you know what you're doing :D something about the directness and honesty in those dialogues is just lovable
I remember it was difficult for me to find Dragomir s crossbow and I give up, but in chapter 3 when I go to search the Eye of Innos I was very happy to see that I find the crossbow and for me personally was an interesting and amazing how the quest link togheter (sorry for my bad English)
When I first did the quest I arrived at Grimbald's location, "helped" him with the snappers (aka watching him take them out for easy experience). I saw the Troll and decided to pass on taking him on, until after buying the Shrink scroll from the merchant in the city (which is a spell I had used in Gothic 1 and something I knew would work because of my experience from the first game). Nowadays, I know you can even kill the Black Troll with the very first weapon on level 1, if you know how to circle him during the fight, evading his attacks and relying on minimum damage to take him out slowly. But of course back then, I didn't. So then I went directly to the left, because I had studied the map and it showed a circular structure there. On the way, I diverted off the path to a small alcove in the mountains and found a cave with two Fallen Paladins and a few Skeletons. Since I had saved up my Kill Undead scrolls so far, I was able to take out the small number of them and was rewarded with some trinkets and a great two-handed sword: 'Drachenschneide' [DE] / 'Dragonedge'? [EN]. After that I went back to the path and found the Goblin Skeletons which I killed using Fire Arrow and Fire Ball scrolls. That's my story!
I totally missed that little cave with the Dragonedge on my first playthrough! But I'm kinda glad I did. Because I didn't have nearly enough destroy dead scrolls to take them all out. I just had barely enough to get to the circle. Thanks so much for writing this all out!
This is why I absolutely adore Gothic 2. I've played the game far too many times to really be surprised, but I *do* often come across something new that I hadn't been aware of before. Maybe a cave, maybe a loot stash, maybe even a quest. It highly rewards taking your time between chapters as there are quests that pop up from time to time that only are doable in that chapter and will not be doable again. They may take you to a place that was completely worthless to you in the past. For example, while not exactly an optional area when taking the mage path, the area where you found the locked chest is the place where the clues lead you to to pass the trials of Fire. This quest in particular took me hours to finish and solidified the path of Fire Magician as CLEARLY the hardest one. Not necessarily because it is harder to play, but because you have to actually *THINK* and listen to the lore of the Gods in the game. There's a quest to kill an unkillable Golem.. and you have to contemplate how you do this. It tells you nearly nothing straight up. It is really hard, but extremely charming. All quests of the game are made this way. Fetch quests are only tedious a tiny, tiny portion of the times. Usually if they are tedious, our nameless hero makes a point of this and he is not exactly happy about doing them for most part. But even then they are not marked on your map or you're given a route to trek through. It is all, once more, only doable if you learn the lay of the land. Another thing I love about the game is that anyone that has played through the game as either Mercenary or Knight will find a completely different game as a Fire Magician. Even the behavior of the protagonist changes *somewhat* , but it could just be he's sarcastic as he never really becomes pious even as a "priest". Though there are times one can wonder if he is actually changing as a result of becoming a Fire Magician, but still retains his sarcastic attitude. All in all, it is one of the best RPGs made of the early 2000s. Quest design and general design. It is a very fun and rather fantastic game. It deserves a remake or continuation.
I'm actually really glad I played G 1 and 2 before I had access to the internet. It forced me to really take in the experience and explore everything on my own volition with no guides or video walkthroughs to hand me the solution. For a game to still be fun despite clunky controls and lots of stuff you could easily miss truly speaks for its design. Buying a new area map was always a highlight for me and meeting someone by the side of the road almost always meant either some interesting conversation or a quest that needed doing. The only thing that peeved me back then (and still does, watching you now) is that you get no experience for some of the more "creative" solutions to difficult enemies such as letting the troll fall to his death or luring enemies to an NPC.
This video explains why the game I love bores me now. I already did those quests hundreds of times, lived those adventures and explored those places. Playing now gothic for me is a go there and then there to end here. The exploration, the fear, the spectation is no more :( need to find new games like this one.
My absolute most memorable expierence in Gothic2 maybe 16 years ago was the first time I had to find the rune stone for the quest to become a fire mage. Coincidentally it revolves around the cave with the blue lights you were in. I searched for it so long, found it and got lost really bad. I searched the whole area to find a way to get back, but wasn't succesful. I played through the whole ingame-night without succes, only to finally climb over a hill and on the other side I fell down on the backside of alkors farm. It felt like an real adventure and I remember it to this day. Gothic2 is one of my all time favorite games exactly because of these moments and because of the kind of atmosphere and worldbuidling. It kind of resembles the soulsbourne games in the feeling of wonder and adventure.
Speaking of fetch quests. I remembered when blacksmith master tells you to get him and orc axe as a sign of strenght. And there is at least 2 ways of aquaring this axe. There might be even more.
Someone talks about Gothic on the internet - I will click and listen. It's interesting in what different ways players tackle things like this quest. It made you basically explore the whole northern part of the map just to reach your goal :) For me, when I get a quest that seems to be far off my current path and where I have no clue where it might be and how I could get there, I usually just ignore these quests and save them for later. So in my first playthrough I think I just found the crossbow hours after getting the quest, without really looking for it
When the game doesn't give you a quest marker or a glowing item, but just tells you what to fetch and let you find out where to look. I actually came up with an idea on something like that: Imagine a quest tells you to find a specific book. The questgiver NPC even tells you that it is in his office. So you go there, and find many books. But instead of having the right one marked with a quest item description or a glow on it, it would require to go through each book,and read a few lines to find out which one to grab.
Actually, there is a slightly different "3rd path" to the area. You can jump into the river at the Monastery, then swim east, arriving at the area with the lurker you showed in that video. This is how I stumbled into that area in my first playhthrough. I was barely able to fight scavengers, so exploring this area made me sh*t my pants back then. But it's probably the best compliment that I can still remember this small scene more than 15 years later. Map and quest design were just great in this game.
In my opinion one of the biggest strenghts of Gothic 1, Gothic 2 and Risen 1 (from the same developer) is how small and compact their worlds are. You have described how much stuff you found just stumbling around in a small area - and it's like that everywhere. Every nook and cranny can have a cave, some plants or other valuable loot (as resources are limited thanks to no respawns), some -walking XP- enemies or a quest objective. While there are a few larger plains many areas are small, almost claustriphobic, to make sure you aren't overwhelmed with options and can explore piece by piece. Imagine this quest in the area around Whiterun in Skyrim - everything is open, flat and uninteresting. In a huge but empty world like this you need an arrow to point you towards the few interesting things so you don't get bored. In Gothic 2 you don't need a helper like that because you will constantly find new stuff and almost anything you encounter is worth finding. In a world like this quests aren't a simple checklist but true adventures.
one of my favourite quests is your final exam quest when you decide to become a mage. this quest has 3 parts. in one you have to steal from the monastery to obtain a special hammer to kill and otherwise unkillable golem. one teaches you how to craft runes for spells and the last one leads to that room in the cave you found. the best part about that is that you are not alone on that journey to find that room and you are told that only one of you can complete that journey and become a mage. so you compete with other novices during that quest and they even try to sabotage you along the way. if you haven´t already i highly recommend playing the game at least once for each faction because everytime you learn new stuff about the lore and have different quests.
I became an apprentice of Bosper the bowyer after bringing him half a dozen wolf pelts that I hunted in the starter area. And the help of Bartok the drunk hunter who I hired for 50 gold. Unfortunately Bartok died during the quest since he ran into my fine short sword that I nabbed the night before from the tower next to Matteo's house. Unfortunately I haven't received the exp for completing the hunt quest, but I've got my gold back with some extra after checking for Bartok's pulse in his pockets. He didn't make it. Bosper instructed me to go around the world and hunt for pelt's so I did go around the world and hunted out everything while ignoring most of the other quests. I came back here and there to sell my pelts and level up my skills during my journey. It was fun. Especially when I figured out a way to deal with groups of enemies or when I killed a shadowbeast at lvl7 just with a bow and arrows while luring the beast to a big rock where I was safely positioned.
I have a little Story that has to do with that Path leading to the Northern Mountains. When I played the Game for the first Time, for the longest Time I could not find the Monastery, because the Path to it was so hidden between the Trees (and I rarely looked at any Map) -- it was that mysterious Place that People talk about, but I wondered whether it even really was in the Game. Then I treaded that Path to the Northern Mountains, but I was still underleveled and could not fight all the many Lurkers and the other Animals on that Path, so I had to run and at one Point saw no other Way than to jump off a Cliff and land in the River. I was safe again, floating down the River and wondering where it may lead... then I started hearing Churchbells in the Background, and as I swam through a giant Rock Arch, the Monastery appeared, like a Palace and high up above me. That Place I had already considered nothing more than a Piece of Lore with no Location igame, it revealed itself to me at such an unexpected Moment, and in the most majestic Way I could think of. That's my Story related to that Path. Thank you for this Video. :)
Another type of fetchquests I like are those that require items that you might use yourself for your own gain. You have to weigh the options which give you a better return. Also Items that are picked up throughout the entire game and are not generated speciffically for the quests. Like picking mushrooms for Constantino, he doesn't need VERY speciffic mushrooms that are only generated here and there for collecting purpose.
I simply set aside that quest for so long that I had forgotten about it until I found the crossbow when I went to the circle of stones doing a main quest.
I just stumbled across the crossbow during the quest, where you get the eye of innos back, so nothing special for me there lol. The most interesting moment during a Gothic playthrough was to find a bandit camp, where also Quentin is. Even though it didn't add anything major to the game, it was a neat secret to find out there are other camps living the barrier, where you don't play a role in.
I finished the game 3 times,each guild,every time i killed black troll different ways,sword,magic,bows,this is the magic of gothic games,it lets you choose what,when and how you do things
I don't remember what I did when I've reached that point for the first time. Gothic, like many/all the other RPGs, lets you have multiple quests open at the same time and I doubt I have actually focused on that exact quest right after learning about it. There is a chance, that I've event found that crossbow before I've meed Dragomir. Of Gothic 2, a place that lingers in my memory is some cemetery hidden in the forest and a cave near it. It had some skeletons or skeleton goblins running around , which made it hard to approach at first. Iirc. graves had something more than just names engraved on them and inside that cave, was some knight's grave?? and some sword maybe? I can hardly remember that after all these years since last playthrough. I love both first and second Gothic. Terrible controls (G1), generally poor graphics and UI (both), but this climate and overall mechanics, those were just perfect. Like that simple method of placing "soft walls" on players' path, so that they don't go where they shouldn't instead of "walls out of nowhere" from Assassin's Creed or similar solutions from e.g. Need For Speed games (totally different genre, same mechanism :/ ) Now question is, will the new Gothic play like the original G1 or G2? Or will be filled with the currently standard crap fedex quests? (Well, originals had them too, but somehow it did not feel that bad then).
While listening to you describe the dragomir crossbow quest and smoking a big one(getting all philosophical) I realized what WoW did wrong with the quests, the questgivers explain too much so we dont have to think for ourselves. Speculating and finding out if youre right is actually really really fun!
If you want to go deeper on this, go back and think about Gothic 1: Diego sends you to grab the list from Ian at the old mine, which introduces you to a new location that has to be revisited later. But if you boil it down, it's "just" a fetch quest. Similar to how Mordrag and Baal Parvez leading you out of the old camp into their respective camps are "just" escort quests.
Dragomir's Bow is just one of many quests that lead you to explore the northern area where the black troll lives. E.g. there is a healer living in a cave near the mercenaries' farm who asks you to bring her the Sun Aleo, a rare plant that only lives near a black troll's cave. You incedently pick it up at 5:10. So I would argue that the great level design came first and that it was crafted to give players an exquisite time exploring it, no matter their reason for going there. Then in a next step the designers planted some hooks around the island to get you interested in exploration. Certainly the placement of these hooks isn't coincindental either, but they are just this. In the new area that you can travel to in the add-on, there are some monster infested ruins and deserted pyramids that you can see from the mountain path. I didn't need a quest to explore it, I just wanted to find out what great adventure awaited me there, and I was rewarded with a new sword. But I agree that the black troll itself is a masterpiece of game design. You have to be creative to beat him. A friend of mine lured the troll back to the city and let the city guards take care of him. I simply shrunk him.
4:39 the room you found is for a quest when you decide to join the monastery as your faction of choice and the troll if part of a quest you get from raoul, one of the mercenaries, you bet with him that you could take down a black troll and he sends you to bring him the pelt of one (this one).
The first time I played this game I found this Dragomir guy at his camp. He gave me the quest and I had no idea where to go or where to look. I knew I wasn't strong enough to go north so I forgot about it and didn't even go back to it in chapter 1.
I spent a good 5 minutes just circle staffing the black troll and slowly chipping away at it's health. I imagine the troll must have ben quite dizzy in the end as he just kept spinning around on the spot as I ran round him to slap his backside over and over haha.
Playing Gothic 2 is like having Adhd you go somewhere with a plan but then find something other on the way and explore and then find something another again and again and again hours pass and then you are reminded that you were supposed to do something entirely else haha I love them I'm playing Chronicles of Myrthana: Archolos I see the fans captured its world perfectly with few upgrades
One characteristic about the (fetch-)quests in Gothic is that there are no questmarkers. No notes on the map, no arrow pointing to a quest location - and that is what makes them so special. You have to actually listen to the clues the npcs are giving you and can start exploring - with this in mind i would say that many areas in Gothic are built like the northern mountains you described.
Also, in their context, they make sense and are believable they could take place. How believable is it to have a random NPC walk up to the PC and say "Hey, I need this done and you better do it cos you need the XP and this item you won't find anywhere else in this game"
The other thing what is brilliant, all those things you encountered are there even if you go there for something else. It feels like the world is made out of "small scenes" that you can discover. And they all give some new info or reward. And the best part most of these scenes have some progression, with chapters or with dealing quests. At one point that guy you helped is dead because seekers are there. Or he is leaving his camp because of orcs. All kind of little story. You can also encounter them any other way, heck you can even kill everyone, and not finnish any of those quests, keep the cross bow. You can do a lot things, and the game lets you do it. You can get the Crossbow by accident, when you search for the eye of innos. And meet Dragomir after.
Im a fan of the gothic series for quite some time. I got sucked so hard into it, that i spent at least 600hours on the gothic 2 base game in various playthroughs and more than 3000hours on the community mod (returning 2.0 alternative balance) that expands on all the good parts that make this game sooo great. After playing cyberpunk now i realised why gothic 2 is so great and immersive in comparison. Because it is not about the tasks alone, but the stuff you experience on the way to that task. Also, you do everything on your own. There are not 100 cutscenes, so that the game just feels like an interactive movie. You are truly free to do whatever you like. If you walk off in an area that is way too dangerous for you it is your own fault, but also the type of moment you will remember every single time you get there. If you like the game i highly suggest giving the community mod a chance. It adds so many new quests that don't just feel out of place and make gothic 2 one of the best rpgs i have played so far.
Yeah Piranha Bytes are quite good at world and quest design, at least when they put their mind to it and aren't rushed too much :P Gothic 1 already hinted at that with some stuff, but was clearly never completely finished. Gothic 2 (especially with the Raven's Night Addon) has a few of these gems, and also a lot of rewards for exploring (quite apart from the loot and exp). Like, in the valley of mines, you can (quite early on, if you're exploring) meet a guy in a set of armor made from minecrawler plates. Meeting him can trigger a quest to get that armor, which is (as I think) independent of your guild and possibly the strongest set you can get before joining an "advanced guild". Gothic 3 is a dark spot on PB's record, but even there the world "as it is" hints at all the ideas and the loads of thought that went into it, and to this day it is (next to Skyrim) the most beautiful world I've played in, aesthetically. For example, I've for some time been annoyed by the chests and corpses seemingly placed in the world at random. However, if you think about it - the war against the Orcs has been raging for years, and for at least a few weeks or even months, they've been crushing all resistance. Besides, most towns and villages seem quite emptied of people, and there's loads of ruined and abandoned places. The chests (and the skeletons surrounding them) are those unlucky refugees who didn't make it and propably ran into a pack of wolves or snappers. They returned to form in Risen and have been going reasonably strong ever since - I think Elex especially: it rewarded you highly for exploring, with both powerful loot, quest items and cool background information and lore. What PB also do very well (as with the troll or the minecrawlers you met) is showing you which areas are "a bit much still" when going on an adventure early on. The moment you meet a few vargs or a shadow beast in the dense forest, you know you went too deep - but you also know to come back later, with more experience and better gear, and most likely find something worth returning. Great video. As many mentioned before, being from the Vaterland it is quite pleasing to see the international fame this little game made in Germany is getting, even after so many years! :)
Gothic is one of the very few games that can make 'accidentally getting lost in the woods' a fun and rewarding experience. There is an obscure and hidden patch of land over there, that feels abandoned and it's not drawn on the map? You can bet your left cheek that there is either a fun side quests or some awesome loot over there - often guarded by some fearsome foes. They were well ahead of their time.
It is kinda strange to hear about it, mainly cose i never had any adventure like this during this quest - in general, I never focused on it. I always went to the northern part of the map with Lester, who will escort you half of the way (bit more than to the first bridge, with bandit). Than I go bit further on my own (to Grimbald), but never to the stone circle itself. So I usually visit it in 3 chapter, when main plot lead you there - and do Dragomir's quest then. Sooo... But if we talking about great fetch quests in G2... ork axe for Harad. Not really the side quest (you can skip it, but it kinda is part of the main plot). Other great example, this time from main plot of Night of the Raven - 5 stone tablets for Saturas. The colored ones. +green one for... Franko? Leader of the swamp part of bandit camp. Back to the sidequests - pack of swamp weed for Andree/Cipher. I also really like those small, on the side fetch/delivery quest that are made to complete while you doing somethink else. I love the one with the paladin's ring - in Mine Valley, one of the members of the mining team give you a ring and ask you to give it to one of the defenders of the castle (I don't remember they names, unfortunatelly). It is literatery 4 lines of dialog and single line in questlog... but is suit the whole Mine Valley atmosphere so well.
Now imagine the same quest with a magical arrow pointing to the crossbow...
Hell no.
It's the bane of games like these. Sure AC games can be fun for a bit of mindless gaming, but even if you turn off the magical unexplained helpers it's just all so damned generic. Give me a world 1/100th the size, packed with interesting and interlinking goodies any day. Gothic 1 and 2 are true gems in this respect.
well they kinda do this with the "repair the eye of innos" questline. you ll be send to that stone circle but way later in the game. "exidently" finding the xbow once you dont even remember havin that quest. n image how many quest send you to that area. sagitta wants the sun aloe grow in the poop of a black troll. n that black troll is even painted on the map. the mage storyline leads up there too, n by following the shrines you probably miss that cave n run into the troll. i think there even was a hunter asking for a black troll fur. piranha rly know how to send you places n they did in all their games no matter if gothic 1-3, risen 1-3 or elex.
@@aigleincomments9532 yeah... no. it's usually up to the player if they find out where they have to go. the black troll on the map is totally understandable - I bet every NPC knows about the troll hence it's even on the map. and the rest? well not everyone is so well-oriented like you. at my first playthrough I had no fucking idea what to do or where to go even if I was given a HINT.
Gothic doesl't hold your hand, but it does remain PLAYER-FRIENDLY. And if it didn't remain player-friendly, then it would become simply a shit game.
This is the greatness of games designed around not having a mini map. People always say "If you don't like it, turn it off!".. Blablabla. Problem is, those games are designed WITH SAID MINIMAP IN MIND. There are no descriptions in the quest dialog of how to get to the quest location in the majority of those games. So it's close to impossible to actually complete the quests without constantly running in a straight line towards that blip on the map.
all that troll's exp lost...
I was mad at that waste on a wolf and you tell me there’s more than that?
1000 exp. Yeah... that's just sad.
So many triggers! Luring the Scavenger to Dragomir, luring the Lurker to Grimbald, not eaten apples in the inventory, the troll! By Innos'...I have to compensate this. You will find me at the castle-ring with a scroll of rain of fire and a potion of speed...
@@Faxe90 Not eating apples is wise. It's better to keep them for the moment when you no longer want to spend any point on strength
A completionist's worst nightmare xD
Honestly, probably most rememberable fetch quest of all time is "pick up 20 turnips" five minutes after you are told to save the world :)
what about the quest near the new camp where you ahd to give water to the rice workers ? and by doing so you talked and discovered everyones past and hardships .. one of them even teach you that precious +5 strenght , you even rebel against the slave masters there and kill them ..
Gothic 1-2 best fuckin rpgs games
How about the one before that "come into this isolated dark cave my buddy wants to talk to you"
to me I liked the "kill an orc and get me his axe" quest from the smith apprentice quest the most because there are multiple ways to deal with it
as a new player there is no way you're really dealing with an orc that early (yes it's possible but only if you practice the combat system a lot)
you can find one orc axe in the cave next to the barracks (technically there is another one in the cave with two shadow beasts but that's too far out and not worth the trouble), go hunting with the former apprentice of bosper and kill one with his help, or simply killing one with scrolls
again technically you can lure the orc in the cave on the east gate to the guards but that's almost cheating
the funny thing is if you say it's too hard to do for you he tasks you with clearing jacks light house from bandits which is even harder than killing a single orc, so the game is like: fuck you noob!
@@brohvakiindova4452 You are wrong. He doesn't task you to clearing jack's lighthouse. He tasks you with killing bandits in a cave near Akil's farm. Much easier. Little trickier to find though.
@@MlaJak oh yeah thanks for pointing it out, no idea why I confused these quests
First playthrough of Gothic / Gothic 2 is just unforgettable. I finished both of them dozens of time, it never gets old, but the first playthrough is something unique. Discovering the world and mechanics... Best games ever.
Gothic 2 had something that I never experienced in a video game before, I just played it 3 years ago for the first time. I will not touch it for the next 5 years so that I hope I will forget most of it and might have an experience comparable to the first time. Hope it will work!
I am totally agree, if I just could visit it ofr first time again. Even the path from Xardas tower to farm was something great.
@@Empobaer and now imagine that you played Gothic for the first time when you were 8 years old, 20 years ago
The best RPG experience I've ever had was in Gothic 1 back when it originally came out.
I might be misremembering some of the details but it doesn't take away from the whole story.
It happened at the stage of the game where you had to reach the tower of Xardas (or maybe some other place?) that was guarded by a golem. I remember I attempted passing by that golem before but he killed me pretty fast.
So now I did all the quests I could, I got myself a new sword and a new set of armor. Went to the golem expecting to defeat him - and yet I still couldn't damage him.
I thought maybe I messed up and should've leveled a mage. Or maybe I had to use some potions. But it was a clear cut dead end for me.
I hopped online with my dial-up modem, found a walkthrough, but every page was loading for such a long time, and I didn't know that Ctrl+F was a thing, so I gave up on a walkthrough too.
And then I remembered that I've encountered a library in game with a bunch of books. One of the books was a bestiary that I skimmed through at some point, but I don't remember if it had an entry about Golems on it. Regardless it was my only hope - so I went out seeking every library in the game I've been to, like Gandalf in the first LotR movie - and finally found that exact book. And after flipping through the pages - I found a golem entry. It said that golems are very weak against maces or hammers.
Excited about this new information I remembered that there was a decent mace for sale in the swamp camp. I traveled to the swamp camp, got the mace, came back to the golem and boom! I defeated him in a couple of hits.
That moment defined what is an RPG to me for the rest of my life. And unfortunately it hasn't been matched ever since. (except maybe by Archolos)
Sometimes I do hit a dead end in RPG games but usually developers don't think these things through well enough. And the only solution ends up being looking up a walkthrough online, because a dead end is usually some poor gameplay mechanic that I missed or something that hasn't been explained properly in the tutorial.
Had the exact same experience with the golem, it was so great to figure it out, also it is one of the moments that I hate the most because it pushed the bar so high that it passed Plutos orbit :D
I think my favorite G2 memory is playing NotR for the second time. I had given up the first time because it was too hard and I misleveled (the game doesn't do a good job making the skill system clear). I was well versed in the G2 fighting system and was just exploring the builder's valley (addon story) shortly after joining the mercenaries and getting my first decent armor. Besides the few camps there, the addon world is almost complete wilderness. It's never really confusing though because the valleys make paths that intertwine and give orientation. There are some special places with enemies that are too strong and you remember those for later, but for the most part you just start exploring and making sense of the world while collecting all sorts of plants, scrolls, tablets and of course exp.
You come onto a camp of very lovely renegades that has *the best* music. When the night comes, you enter the circle of the campfire after spending the day slaying monsters and searching for treasure in this strange new world. And you feel these guy's struggle because you get to know almost every single NPC in this camp as most have names. And it feels like every day, they could die to the threat that's looming above them. But similar to the colony in the first part, this party of outcasts makes the best of their situation.
When playing in this world, I always try taking a few minutes to just relax at the campfire after a long play session and enjoy the atmosphere.
Close second is returning to the once green valley of mines and seeing the paladins and militia in the sieged castle. The way Sengrath and Udar greet you really adds to it.
Not really favorite quests, but favorite moments or moods. Favorite quest would be collecting the 5 stone tablets because it's so interwoven and allows the exploration of the entire addon map. It's like a much better, far less streamlined version of the focus stone quest!
Similarly, but far less enjoyable is collecting the three mine reports for Garonth. The fact that the enemies there are so obviously weak to give the player an easier time is a deal breaker for me though. I'd rather have one companion Ganonth could spare and take on actual orcs like when Diego goes with me to the pass or I hire Biff. Milten for mages, The Jengorn for mercenaries and one of the Paladins for militia. Then you could fight actual orcs, even if it was mostly scouts, and it would be more fitting.
Gothic 1/2 are classics. The worlds are phenomenally designed. There are lots of great things hidden off the beaten path, so you are always rewarded for exploring.
Sure are, but why exclude Gothic 3 though? I always loved it just as much and don't get why people hate on it...
@@Orimthekeyacolite
I remember that game being an utter train wreck. Egregious load/save times, far inferior combat, and idiotic pre-seeded chest loot. Yuck. It was a huge step backwards from the first two games.
@@fred718 I guess a lot of what you're describing are problems that sound like raw unpolished nature of early unpatched originals. Whereas my first introduction was the gold edition with most of those problems already fixed. If anything, combat system was never the strong side of the series, but whatever version of G3 I played, combat felt smoother than I could ever have hoped in a Gothic game - and that speaking as someone who spent hundreds of hours struggling with the original. Be it as it may, the depth of the open world exploration and ineraction, that, on the contrary, always WAS the best that this series has to offer - that is on par with Gothic 1&2, given that the world is also much larger.
@@Orimthekeyacolite Because G3 is full of pointless quests with no purpose and useless rewards. Also there is nomain story, just vague predictions of what will happen in the end when you have chosen path. Read this also: thenocturnalrambler.blogspot.com/2018/01/gothic-3-sucks-critique-from-gothic-fan.html
@@Orimthekeyacolite I know - replying to old comment sucks. But let me explain as a guy whonot only finished and love both Gothic 1 and 2 [and NoTR DLC] but also is able to like and/or understand why people might like games that aren't "good" in certain series [Heroes of Might and Magic 4, Resident Evil 6, Jagged Alliance RAGE, Commandos Strike Force, etc.]. The MAIN problem with Gothic 3 is that instead of focusing on rather small but full of details worlds which you really want to explore every single corner [like mentioned in the video] that also naturally progress via another chapters and visiting new areas Gothic 3 is just... Plain. Empty. Where literally 90% of the world is just nothing more but empty space with couple of random beasts or herbs. In G3 there is almost never a situation where you want to explore more because you know that nothing is in there [as ALL chests are random literally shit to sell with no unique items whatsoever]. Another huge issue with it is that you actually have just like [if I remember correctly] between 6 to 8 MAIN quests. Every single other quest is copy/paste of just few types. Kill/bring/find/escort. And unlike G1/G2 there is no special reward, special dialogues that you remember, special twists - nothing. Just accept quest, do it, go to quest giver, collect reward and get some X% in Y City reputation. That is it. And if you not following any walkthroughs [and even with them] you have to repeat the same sentence X times to have single clue of what to do in single main quest. Instead of focusing on main or sub stories you have to play in a way: MAIN, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, MAIN, MAIN, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, FETCH, MAIN and so on. It's boring AF. Also there is no real fair challenge, nor blocades as they were in G1 and G2. In those at the beggining you knew from start - DON'T ENTER FOREST, NOT NOW. And even later on [NotR mainly] it was not as obvious to go in there as you still had to be carefull. In G3 however you either killing everything or nothing. It's like you slashing everything on the way, forgeting about that it is RPG and then HUGE ROADBLOCK where you have to level up couple of levels to even try progressing further. It's just too long game for what it has to offer. And funniest part of this sentence? Even now, where I know how to beat Gothic 2 NotR with all shortcuts it's taking me 35-40 hours to do so. I beat Gothic 3 in 30 hours. And I feel is too long while G2NotR "is just enough long" for me. So maybe this will explain just a little bit why G3 sucks for huge fans of G1/G2
As a veteren of the game, I usually think 'Oh, I'll save that for later' but your experience sounded way more fun.
Same here. But I am in the habit of doing things differently every time I replay the game. So, I actually have had a ton of amazing experiences.
This game, although appears simple, has so many intricacies that learning the game becomes extremely satisfying.
You might know this, but beginners don't, but there are around 10 or 15 hidden item locations around the START of the game. In the tower, on the tower, and around the tower.
The player could spend 20 minutes exploring just the mountains they started on, and they'd keep finding stuff.
This is also why I love the developers so much. They knew VERY WELL it's fun exploring if you find items that are of use. Or if you end up experiencing an actual adventure.
@@TechSupportDave I have played through gothic 2 at least 15 times by now and I only discovered the lizards and the dex amulet behind the first bandit cave a few years ago after I already had 10 runs completed, some locations I even forgot about at some point
it's one of the reasons why gothic 2 is superior to 1 because in 1 there are so many empty locations where you'd expect some hidden loot but get disappointed
Another thing I absolutely love about Gothic fetch quests is what happens when you actually find what you were send to look for. When someone really needs something and is willing to pay you for bringing it, you bet that thing is valuable and useful. Actually useful, not just "quest log says it's useful". When you're send for a paladin's sword, you have to make a decision. Do you really want to bring it back or keep it? It's a powerful sword, this could help you immensely. When you're sent to get some potions, you could keep them. They could make the exploration much easier. I love this aspect, you're actually faced with some real decisions that aren't clearly marked in dialogue or quest log. That's some real roleplay in an RPG.
played through G2 for the first time in a long time recently. What I never realized that whenever you finish any quest, that isn't ending with the NPC where you started it, you can almost always go back to that NPC and talk to them. Sometimes you get XP, but almost always you get relevant dialogue. It makes for such an immersive world.
I love how he's just casually picking up the sun aloe probably not knowing what it was, when that was always the hardest fetch quest for me 😂 But that aside, great explanation of your journey! They are indeed so many great fetch quests in Gothic 1+2, I often forget, that they are fetch quests at all. And you are always rewarded in a special way, even if you just get some mushrooms in the very beginning for a cook, he feeds you every day in return. I'd give so much to reexplore Gothic for the first time again without knowing every quest to its core and just doing the most efficient way on the way!
Most quests in mythology are fetch quests. The Holy Grail. The labors of Hercules. The Golden Fleece. Fetch quests can be great, but they need to be a spur to further adventure, not the core mechanic of the game.
Okay. Now keep supporting the current thing!
The problem is quests becoming very short. Quests or adventures should take days to years. Those things you mentioned probably took that long to complete. And some aren't ever completed. Gothic tried to make quests more grandiose and long winded like that.
I don't even remember this quest, always was a "oh did I complete a quest?" thing for me, but the feelings you described followed me through almost all of my Gothic experience, making it one of my favorite games of all time. It's nice to see someone sharing this experience!
loool I heard of some way to kill the black troll without a spell or a strong weapon, but drowning it was new to me xD nice one
My most favorite Quest in Gothic:
D'you want some swampweed?
I remember doing this quest the first time and how scared I was after going down the stairs near the stone circle. It was a big mistake, there were wargs there that killed me with one bite. I hoped for a short cut and got eaten so I returned the same way I came.
And Gothic has other fetch quests like that. Hanna from the inn in town gives you a fetch quest to get some old map she accidently sold to cartographer but you got to keep the map and find the treasure with it. Even the easy quest at the beginning is satisfying when Hilda asks you to get her a frying pan. Chances are that you didn't encounter Canthar yet because you immediately went to check the shepherd at the side of the road and started exploring the farm, so once you get this quest you get to meet Canthar and you get offered a way into town.
And with other fetch quests, chances are you have required things like meat or herbs already so you just have to hand it. You don't have to hunt for a specific animal to get the right meat, you just use the one you got from scavengers and wolves since the very beginning.
great, I never thought about this nice design around Canther!
When you drowned that Black troll in the lake I thought what a waste of 1k exp and messing up the quest for it's hide! But really in our first playthroughs we messed up alot of things due to lack of knowledge. That is why Gothic 1 and 2 have such a strong replayability value. You always discover new things about them.
as an experienced gothic player I suffered when you "wasted" the destroy death scrolls on goblin skeletons, but then again I make my life unnecessary hard sometimes saving up items I end up never using
The first time I played the game, a long time ago, I approached the stone circle, saw the undead and said "Nope!" and ran away
Following in Dragomir's footsteps I see. :D
@@GamedevAdventures dragomir is a wise man, because he's still alive.
were there undead at the circle? I only remember goblin skeletons but could be different due to expansion
@@brohvakiindova4452 think again... were those goblin skeletons laying on the floor dead like any skeleton should... or were they running around *undead*?
@@Heroesflorian think again, you know exactly what I meant no need to be all smarty pants about it
When I was doing the orc weapon mission I remember that I made the orc chase me into the town, and the Lothar (the paladin) instead of taking out his sword and running towards the beast, like it happens with other enemies" he screamed "orc!" And took out a magic rune to take him down
Gothic 2 has the best world building I have ever seen. Whole game is designed like this. I remember when I was low level character, and went straight in the deeper forest. Two wargs and one nasty Orc attacked me, and I was scared shitless. Gothic 2 should be in a textbook for world building!
I remember how back when I was a kid I spent an entire saturday snooping around that area as a monastery novice, it's such an awesome part of the Gothic world map. I spent at least an hour beating the black troll with just a novice staff and running in circles around him dodging his deadly punch. When I finally got him after like a hundred plus hits and he fell the sense of accomplishment was HUGE. Thank you for reminding me of this detail in Gothic 2, the beautiful thing about the black troll is that he's a rare sight, theres only the one in the whole world. And how awesome is that the developers make him at least somewhat vulnerable in that he has huge hp but probably no armor since you actually can deal (minimal) damage to him.
yeah. I recommend replaying the game. it's what I'm doing. as a kid I loved the atmosphere g1 and g2 had, but I wasn't really very good at the game since I was a kid. so I often got stuck or ran away.
coming back to it many years later as an adult, and managing to do things I wasn't able to do at first, and just reminiscing the good old times of carelessness and lack of responsibilities or awareness of anything happening around me (such as the fact I was living in poverty at the time), really makes gothic a special game for me personally.
But don't get me wrong, I'm not really biased about the game. I actually like the game because of what the game is. I'm aiming to be a professional game designer and this game is just pure inspiration. The game is obviously not perfect, but it achieves far more than most modern RPG games do.
If you think about it, the very first quest from xardas is to get the eye of innos. And this extends beyond the first chapter, so you can truely say that a great proportion of the game is set around a fetch quest and it is genious.
In this moment you just think: "okay, i have to leave xardas tower, get into the town and then get the eye of innos, alright". Shortly after that you stumble across your first loot, maybe a hidden cave, get on your way to the town across some NPCs with nice mini quests and as soon as you reach the town, you understand, that this will become a long journey... Great Game!
Oh, that Harad's 'Bring me an orc weapon' quest - i didn't know there's a way to get it easily and had have to reload the game billion times to finally shut that orc scout down... yeah, that one right between this cruel shadowbeast and a band of black goblins. Unforgettable experience.
Always bring Bartok for this. He makes quick work of them. Haha
@@Thermalfusi0n yep
@@Thermalfusi0n nah most of the time you do need to help him, atleast for me 90% of the time the Orc killed him, some time even the shadowbeast. But yeah if you help with a few hits you can beat the orc.
I think you're hitting the nail on the head on such an important part of quest design. by categorising quests so strictly (fetch, kill, etc) we miss part of their value. that mindset lets us only see the destination without keeping the journey in mind.
For sure. I think a lot of those terms come from MMO's where the quests are so bare bones there really isn't much to them other than what their name implies. And your probably just doing them for XP anyway so all you care about is the destination. But as games become more nuanced those phrases stop meaning much.
Yes, I love the dynamicity of the game design which allows alternative solutions. I once lured Sentenza to a group of Goblin skeletons. When he is done with the skeletons, he is left with 5% health then I quickly took him down and seized his weapon. After that I will talk to him from time to time to aggravate him to rob the apple (he will randomly spawn apple) from his inventory. In a way, that gives you unlimited strength legitimately (if you have the patience).
Oh thats great haha. Yea there are some crazy ways to get some early weapons. Honestly I never really pushed all the ways to get gear from NPCs.
Damn I didn't know that one.
The best experience I had in gothic 2 was finding those pyramids and exploring the area there. later in (Nacht des Raben) the exploration of the new environment behind the temples portal.
It all came together so nicely.
Exploration as a driving factor of enjoiment and the deliberate decision to not push the player into completionism is what made gothic 2 so enjoyable. Modern RPGs with pointers, floating arrows and markers and fast travel ruin themselfs by having that stuff in my humble oppinion.
I watched this video at the right time. Doing my first G2 playthrough right now. I started getting frustrated with the quests. I just figured out it was because the game wasn't holding my hand. I don't know why it expected it. I loved that about G1. This video put me back on the right track. The vague clues lead to exploration and finding your own solutions. It's more rewarding that way.
So, how was the game? Have finished it yet?
@@couchpotatoe91 I loved all of it
Very good video, I used to watch my brother playing all gothic's when I was young. All your video's about this games really heartwarming and nostalgic, thank you!
Thank You!!!
Seein you going around those zone with a Wolf Fang hurts me inside xD
Haha I feel that. It was my first playthrough what can I say.
@@GamedevAdventures I always saw the Wolf's Fang as a weak weapon. I mean, it grants 4%(?) to one-handed combat and has decent stats, but the range kills it for me. The quest never really standed out to me, since every time I played any of the Gothic games I've been cleaning the entire map in the first episode, so I didn't really "explore" any of it, I just looted everything as I came across them
@@remster1987 Exactly. Range, The nail club you can take from the bandits at the start has less damage I recall, but has normal range making fighting with it so much easier...
WOOHOO! I bumped the likes up to 1.1K. I'm special now :)
Seriously though, there was a purpose for some of these fetch quests in Gothic and actually make sense. The first one where you need to gather turnips to get farmers clothes to be able to enter the city. It makes sense that a farmer would have farmer's clothes, he had work that needed done but was unable to do it himself. Why not hire a passerby to get the job done? Dragomir's Crossbow quest also makes sense. 2 Undead goblins spooked him, he dropped in order to escape but really wants it back. Who else is gonna do it besides someone adventuring? Also notice the crossbow was unceremoniously laying on the ground and not placed on a pillar (or in a chest) with a big sign saying "Ye Quest Item Be Hereth".
Compare that to a fetch quest in Baldur's Gate where a dwarf in the Friendly Arm Inn wants you to go to his house in Beregost, kill the spiders there and bring back his boots. This quest raises too many questions. If spiders have infested your house, why did you not alert the local authorities? They would have an interest that the spiders don't infest other houses in the area and the job would have been done quicker than wait for an adventurer to come to you. Why did you run to the Friendly Arm Inn? It's a 16 hour trek from Beregost AND there are 3 inns there WITHOUT spiders in them. Why are you hiring a random adventurer? You don't know who I am, I could enter your house and pawn off all your shit for all you know. And why do you need your boots? Did you run 16 hours to the Friendly Arm Inn barefoot? This is one of the most laughable and poorly thought out quests I've seen in a game.
This was really interesting to watch as a veteran player. I've known where the crossbow is for so long, I'd totally forgotten about how this quest comes off the first time you do it.
Once you play Gothic enough you just do the Dragomirs Crossbow quest while you're there for the Sangrittas weed, Mages trials and black trolls skin
I think my mistake was that my first RPG was Gothic 2. Never experience the same in any other RPG since. There are some good game like Diablo, Skyrim, Dark Souls, but never experience the same.
Gothic 2 proves that quest's content matter much less than its' context. My favorite questline is entering the monastery, its pretty simple if you know what to do, but man, that's a joy to figure out WHAT you need to do.
Yeah it felt really special when you figured out how to join, I remember spending ages trying to figure out how to do the trial of fire and become a mage, gothic really made you have to earn the right to be a magic user so it felt special, most other games just have magic easily accessible
I would love to describe my experience with that quest but the first time I've done it was probably in 2009 where Gothic 2 became "The Game" for me. I think what you described was a proper Gothic experience, much more appealing to me than the "powergaming" ones that most nowadays players seem to do (that is: totally optimized runs).
Honestly, I envy you for being able to enjoy that game in this way, which I sadly cannot after so many years.
I also think your video tells us quite a lot about Gothic's design and developers intentions, actually. I'm not playing modern games so I'm wondering if current-day developers also use the same techniques as Piranha Bytes did during Gothic 2. They were not the masters of storytelling but were (and probably still are) good at creating interesting, immersive worlds with simple, but decent quests (due to their well-thought design).
I don't see a lot of games using these techniques simply because open world games have trended larger and less restricted. Its hard to carefully plan a players journey through an area if there are tons of angles of approach.
However there are plenty of other ways to create high quality fetch quests. Many great games rewrite the rules on quest design which is why they stand out. I don't want to make it sound like other games should always do things like this.
@@GamedevAdventures It probably has gotten harder to plan the journey for the player. What the Gothic developers - apart from quest design - did so well in my opinion, is sealing off certain areas for later, just by using strong monsters. There are areas in khorinis (the forest north of the city being a prominent example) that you just can't exlore freely until very late in the game - at least not as someone playing the game for the first time. This is something I really miss in many other games, Skyrim being the best example: Due to the way enemies scale with your own strength, a lot of fights and a lot of exploring becomes less meaningful, at least to me. When I defeated my first Orc in Gothic2, this meant something (and was still a tough grind).
I found the crossbow by accident way later in the game when the mages are doing a ritual to repair the Eye of Innos.
which also happened intentionly. so you cant finish that quest? well, we dont mean to spoil it to you but we willl spoil the solution to you by sending you there for a different reason way later so you probably forgot bout the quest in the first place.
@@aigleincomments9532 english please?
Me also, I just stumbled upon it and stumbled upon the dialogue to close the quest later. My experience of Gothic 2 was exp hunting not doing quests, my character was so painfully weak I was farming every point of exp I could find and had little time for quests except for the exp reward in them. This is the price of power later and playing a mage.
That's another thing you can actually do another quest that will help you get the other quest done when you're too weak there's lot of these hot spots in the game.
When i played gothic II for the first time I didn't even remember about this quest, I just went searching for herbs for Sagitta, and forgot about every task just exploring the world and enjoying it, and then at some point the stone circle popped up and I remembered that I was searching for it the whole time. That made me feel truly accomplished.
I was in awe when I first discovered that part of the map in gothic 2, but I did that during the quest to become a mage. I took a wrong turn at the lake, which lead me to grimbald, the troll and later the stone circle. That was very cool, even though it was frustrating that it took me so long to realize that I took a wrong turn
I can totally relate to that feeling of frustration and awe that comes from making a wrong turn.
This video makes me want to play it again after 15 years.. I even don't remember any of these quests anymore.
PLAY IT! THERE'S SO MUCH MORE TO THE GAME THAN ANY RUclips VIDEO CAN OUTLINE.
I remember when I first replayed gothic after 12 years. You won't regret it dude the feeling is AMAZING.
@@TechSupportDave will do soon!
Awesome, Gothic 1 and 2 are my most favorit game of all times, games that I still play 2 decades later. I love how much attention gothic has been given for some time now. Hopefully more people will give it a chance and try out a truly great RPG game, even when graphics are not up to date.
I loved the video. I really like the way you making game look! I was 9 years old when I played this game for the first time. I will never forget my first encounter with an Elite orc in the woods behind Okill's farm. I was around level 4-5 at that time and went exploring little bit to deep in to dangerous forest. It took me a while to be man enough to go to the same forest again :D
I tried to look for Dragomirs crossbow at low levels, but hearing goblin skeletons running at me did what it supposed to. I found it later again while restoring the Eye of Innos :)
graphics are alot better with new patches.
@@kievb8221 for sure. But i dont need no graphical overhauls, the game is as beautiful as it needs to be in the original version! ;)
Gothic 2. My favorite game of all time.
I have never loved a game more than Gothic 2. I love the way it encourages you to explore every nook and cranny. You are always rewarded for exploration and experimentation. I love that it is voice acted, I love that there are so many characters to meet and help (or not help!) I love that 20 years later, I am STILL finding things about this game that I didn't know before. I am so absoloutly and completely enamoured by it!
I really appreciate everyone who comments on my videos, but if you want to get a heart answer the question at the end of the video.
Gothic 2 was first game I ever played. And it still is my favourite game even after more than 5 year. I wish I could play this game "firstfeel" again.
Another quest that I find interesting is Ignaz's story line .
He is the alchimist in the port , making experiments with transformation scrolls . He asks you to test a spell for him. Further on , Fire Mage Karras asks you to get 3 spells for him , from Ignaz, as he is suspicious of his experiments . In the next chapter, you find out that he was poisoned , and as it turns out, the Fire mages considered his experiments were too dangerous and voted for his assasination . and when you confront them , they tell you that people will not believe you , and Lord Andre tells you that if this information got out , people would lose faith in the mages and that would be bad in this hard times, but he assures you that he will take some form of action on this matter . Later on , Karras will address you and tell you that you accomplished nothing by telling Lord Andre , and that he will keep a close eye on you .
My story telling abilities are one of a kind , I know :)) haha , but I hope that it's understandable :D
I find the connections ,and immersion rly complete , with small easter eggs everywhere .
This is for you , Gamedev Adventures !
Trust me please when I tell you , Gothis 2 Returning 2.0 with Alternative Balance will take your breath away . The detail to lore in that mod is insane , and it fully respects ALL THE ORIGINAL STORY , even adds on the story to have it immerse more with the world , as for example, the merceants in town will not talk to you to take you as a aprentice , you have to find some clothes and get in good favours with the Harbor " influential people" first , and only after, the masters will speak to you . and some more like this , spreaded along the whole game . The fight with Raven , at half HP , he escapes , and you have to find him again , and you enter a different map , a (dream , nightmare) where you fight him and xardas saves you . but that is a more bigger (extension , of the story )
I tell you with all the good intentions , Play it and you will see how amazing it is ! I guarantee you :D
Wow. I completed G2 a few times, and only one as a fire mage. Never knew about that, still, I am aware of the Karras quest, but not the consequences in the chapter 4. I'm still sceptical about this Returning mod though - it sure contains some cool features by me, but the stuff like the Urizel sword (it was supposed to be lost after all!), remains of the Swamp Brotherhood around the map of Khorinis (which is incredibly stupid due to the fact their majority have become the Seekers after the fall of the Barrier according to game lore), enormous strength requirement for the armor, addition of new guilds whose existence in Khorinis is illogical (necromancers, assassins...), different gods karma system and all that crazy new locations and questlines kind of break the feeling of minimalistic wholeliness of the original game for me. I might be wrong since I have no precise info about the most recent version, but that's what I've heard. Returning is a very maximalist mod as I see it, might consider trying it out some day just for fun.
@@bassismdonesimply yea.... in all fairness ... it is huge :).
it has some certain steps that need to be followed and some missions, need to be done, in order to even unlock some of the maps .... but... the nice part is that they are not rly a requirement, only an option , u can finish the whole game by making only the vanilla quests and it will still work ...( plus/minus 1 or 2... that might be modified a bit) .
The original game is amazing , don't get me wrong, but this Returning mod.... it adds more immersion to it ...from my point of view .....for example...you will enter a ORC MINE... in valey of mines ... u fund the Orc Town , then ... in the town there is an entrance to their mine . In that mine, there are some slaves , 1 Paladin slave(Wenzel, sounds familiar? G3? and one slave is the son of Karl ... the Port Smith , you will be able to help them escape, but they will teleport str8 to the mainland ... and there are a lot more small ester eggs like that :D
you learn about the Assassins of the Varant Desert , and a lot others .
and there is 1 EXTRA CHAPTER , after the defeat of the Undead Dragon , u can chose to end the game, or return to Khorinis... and Orcs have Invaded the town, killed everyone ... and there are a lot of cool stuff happening , u find out how the MAGIC WAS LOST (it turns out that because all 3 gods gave you their power in order to defear the Guardians , they weakened their connection to all the other people , and that is why you are the only one that is still able to use magic, and the runes have stopped working. if you can remember from G3 ... the king lost the was cuz they suddenly lost the magic... but in G3 ... apparently Xardas did something to take their magic )
Personally ..I find the Returning plot much more whole and complete:D
OK enough ... i can go on for days :)) but yea... it is not perfect.... it has it's faults... but overall , it is a great addition to the games story . when you do decide to play , i got one advice :))be pacient :) try to make all the quests from all chapters to explore the whole storyline of the mod and.... become Harads aprentice :)) Mining is most profitable thing to make gold :D . HAVE FUN !
5:11 "I dashed in ... and quickly grabbed the stone tablet.." If you have played gothic 1 or more times, you know that trolls are slow af. They always do a greeting animation, when they see you haha
Hi! I'm from Poland, place, when Gothic is something like a religion, and I'm really happy that people from other regions that those where Gothic is the most popular (Germany and eastern Eu) also find beautiful details in this rpg. I love that everybody plays Gothic in a little different way
Great video I've enjoyed the Gothic games years ago when I was still in school and I know exactly what you're talking about, especially playing the games for the first time, exploring these areas not knowing what treasures waited for me with unspeakable dangers luring around the next corner to challenge my inexperienced nameless hero.
Today I am a Game Master of a Pen and Paper Adventure Group, creating adventures on my own and I guess great RPGs llike the Gothic series really influenced the way I design characters, quest plots and the world itself.
It is something about the mood of this game that still to this day makes me want to explore foreign worlds.
Never thought about this quest in such a way. I always just picked up Dragomir's Crossbow when the story led me to that location (much later). What is interesting is that you find a crossbow somewhere before the bridge you cross which I believe has a highwayman guarding it. I was jebaited into thinking that was his crossbow.
Your reviews are great, but I particularily like the way you narrate your quests. Keep up the great work!
nice to see more Gothic content from you! great video
It's always nice to see someone new discovering (and then describing a fundamental part of it so well) that old "Gothic feel" I love so much.
Almost twenty years, and the closest we got to that kind of game design recently was... Elex, by the same devs. Here's hoping to more and more people discovering the genius of this game and trying to apply some of its design philosophy to new games - and fingers crossed for that Gothic remake that's in the works.
Well said brother, I have finished Gothic 2 not a long time ago so it's still in my mind. There is one more mechanic on the boss that you did not mention and that's always walking behind his back and attacking him while doing so. This might take some time and practice but its eventually the cheapest way to kill him. And thanks from bringing back memories. My favourite quest in G2 gold was collecting the portal shards for water mages and missing people. Not gonna spoiler it for you if you havent been there yourself but try them out, finish them and you will see that they are amazing. The whole DLC of G2 is just an amazing addition to an already amazing game.
I still play this game today...! Glad to see there is still an active community here and on reddit.
2 of my most memorable moments:
1st. I used to play the game with a friend of mine. We took turns on progressing the story. We were at The Valley of mines trying to kill some dragonsnappers by luring them away from the horde one by one. It lowered my HP to a critical point until I heard someone draw his sword. We thought it was a paladin coming for the rescue Until I hear a "Machocho" and an Orc started hitting me from behind, Scarring the crap out of us.
2nd. We were exploring the Valley again until we reached a huge mountain filled with Lizardmen. We were early chapter 2 so we could not possibly touch them...but we were curious. We drank a speed potion and started climbing the mountain, avoiding the lizardmen and golems all the way to the top. Just before we reached the top though we glitched to a wall and we got attacked, dying instantly. I moved the camera a bit to see the surroundings until we see our first dragon, Feomathar! We looked at each other and screamed together "DRAGON!!!"
(We scared the dog and she pooped the carpet. The end.)
Great video!
I always remember the chap at he merc camp who gets mad when you say you can kill a black troll.
Great analysis. I never thought about it in such terms, but yes, Gothic games and other good RPGs are exactly like that. They give you a "mundane" quest to go explore an area where you can of course ignore everything and just focus on the quest but...of course you will try to punch the troll or steal stuff he is guarding :)
What is interesting this specific quest has not other role than to just give a player reason to explore that area as it does not provide any other bonuses except the exp.
and in gothic language grimbalds warning is a warning that if you really walk ahead you can reload a save unless you know what you're doing :D something about the directness and honesty in those dialogues is just lovable
I remember it was difficult for me to find Dragomir s crossbow and I give up, but in chapter 3 when I go to search the Eye of Innos I was very happy to see that I find the crossbow and for me personally was an interesting and amazing how the quest link togheter (sorry for my bad English)
When I first did the quest I arrived at Grimbald's location, "helped" him with the snappers (aka watching him take them out for easy experience).
I saw the Troll and decided to pass on taking him on, until after buying the Shrink scroll from the merchant in the city (which is a spell I had used in Gothic 1 and something I knew would work because of my experience from the first game).
Nowadays, I know you can even kill the Black Troll with the very first weapon on level 1, if you know how to circle him during the fight, evading his attacks and relying on minimum damage to take him out slowly. But of course back then, I didn't.
So then I went directly to the left, because I had studied the map and it showed a circular structure there.
On the way, I diverted off the path to a small alcove in the mountains and found a cave with two Fallen Paladins and a few Skeletons. Since I had saved up my Kill Undead scrolls so far, I was able to take out the small number of them and was rewarded with some trinkets and a great two-handed sword: 'Drachenschneide' [DE] / 'Dragonedge'? [EN].
After that I went back to the path and found the Goblin Skeletons which I killed using Fire Arrow and Fire Ball scrolls.
That's my story!
I totally missed that little cave with the Dragonedge on my first playthrough! But I'm kinda glad I did. Because I didn't have nearly enough destroy dead scrolls to take them all out. I just had barely enough to get to the circle. Thanks so much for writing this all out!
@@GamedevAdventures It was fun thinking back to it! Great video
This is why I absolutely adore Gothic 2. I've played the game far too many times to really be surprised, but I *do* often come across something new that I hadn't been aware of before. Maybe a cave, maybe a loot stash, maybe even a quest. It highly rewards taking your time between chapters as there are quests that pop up from time to time that only are doable in that chapter and will not be doable again. They may take you to a place that was completely worthless to you in the past. For example, while not exactly an optional area when taking the mage path, the area where you found the locked chest is the place where the clues lead you to to pass the trials of Fire. This quest in particular took me hours to finish and solidified the path of Fire Magician as CLEARLY the hardest one. Not necessarily because it is harder to play, but because you have to actually *THINK* and listen to the lore of the Gods in the game. There's a quest to kill an unkillable Golem.. and you have to contemplate how you do this. It tells you nearly nothing straight up. It is really hard, but extremely charming.
All quests of the game are made this way. Fetch quests are only tedious a tiny, tiny portion of the times. Usually if they are tedious, our nameless hero makes a point of this and he is not exactly happy about doing them for most part. But even then they are not marked on your map or you're given a route to trek through. It is all, once more, only doable if you learn the lay of the land.
Another thing I love about the game is that anyone that has played through the game as either Mercenary or Knight will find a completely different game as a Fire Magician. Even the behavior of the protagonist changes *somewhat* , but it could just be he's sarcastic as he never really becomes pious even as a "priest". Though there are times one can wonder if he is actually changing as a result of becoming a Fire Magician, but still retains his sarcastic attitude.
All in all, it is one of the best RPGs made of the early 2000s. Quest design and general design. It is a very fun and rather fantastic game. It deserves a remake or continuation.
I'm actually really glad I played G 1 and 2 before I had access to the internet. It forced me to really take in the experience and explore everything on my own volition with no guides or video walkthroughs to hand me the solution. For a game to still be fun despite clunky controls and lots of stuff you could easily miss truly speaks for its design. Buying a new area map was always a highlight for me and meeting someone by the side of the road almost always meant either some interesting conversation or a quest that needed doing. The only thing that peeved me back then (and still does, watching you now) is that you get no experience for some of the more "creative" solutions to difficult enemies such as letting the troll fall to his death or luring enemies to an NPC.
This video explains why the game I love bores me now. I already did those quests hundreds of times, lived those adventures and explored those places. Playing now gothic for me is a go there and then there to end here. The exploration, the fear, the spectation is no more :( need to find new games like this one.
Yea I feel that. Gothic is best when you don't know everything.
My absolute most memorable expierence in Gothic2 maybe 16 years ago was the first time I had to find the rune stone for the quest to become a fire mage. Coincidentally it revolves around the cave with the blue lights you were in.
I searched for it so long, found it and got lost really bad. I searched the whole area to find a way to get back, but wasn't succesful. I played through the whole ingame-night without succes, only to finally climb over a hill and on the other side I fell down on the backside of alkors farm. It felt like an real adventure and I remember it to this day. Gothic2 is one of my all time favorite games exactly because of these moments and because of the kind of atmosphere and worldbuidling. It kind of resembles the soulsbourne games in the feeling of wonder and adventure.
good shit, always enjoy some gothic content
Speaking of fetch quests. I remembered when blacksmith master tells you to get him and orc axe as a sign of strenght. And there is at least 2 ways of aquaring this axe. There might be even more.
Someone talks about Gothic on the internet - I will click and listen.
It's interesting in what different ways players tackle things like this quest. It made you basically explore the whole northern part of the map just to reach your goal :)
For me, when I get a quest that seems to be far off my current path and where I have no clue where it might be and how I could get there, I usually just ignore these quests and save them for later. So in my first playthrough I think I just found the crossbow hours after getting the quest, without really looking for it
When the game doesn't give you a quest marker or a glowing item, but just tells you what to fetch and let you find out where to look.
I actually came up with an idea on something like that:
Imagine a quest tells you to find a specific book. The questgiver NPC even tells you that it is in his office.
So you go there, and find many books. But instead of having the right one marked with a quest item description or a glow on it, it would require to go through each book,and read a few lines to find out which one to grab.
Actually, there is a slightly different "3rd path" to the area. You can jump into the river at the Monastery, then swim east, arriving at the area with the lurker you showed in that video. This is how I stumbled into that area in my first playhthrough. I was barely able to fight scavengers, so exploring this area made me sh*t my pants back then. But it's probably the best compliment that I can still remember this small scene more than 15 years later. Map and quest design were just great in this game.
What an amazing journey ❤ thank you for the video :)
In my opinion one of the biggest strenghts of Gothic 1, Gothic 2 and Risen 1 (from the same developer) is how small and compact their worlds are.
You have described how much stuff you found just stumbling around in a small area - and it's like that everywhere. Every nook and cranny can have a cave, some plants or other valuable loot (as resources are limited thanks to no respawns), some -walking XP- enemies or a quest objective. While there are a few larger plains many areas are small, almost claustriphobic, to make sure you aren't overwhelmed with options and can explore piece by piece.
Imagine this quest in the area around Whiterun in Skyrim - everything is open, flat and uninteresting. In a huge but empty world like this you need an arrow to point you towards the few interesting things so you don't get bored. In Gothic 2 you don't need a helper like that because you will constantly find new stuff and almost anything you encounter is worth finding.
In a world like this quests aren't a simple checklist but true adventures.
one of my favourite quests is your final exam quest when you decide to become a mage. this quest has 3 parts. in one you have to steal from the monastery to obtain a special hammer to kill and otherwise unkillable golem. one teaches you how to craft runes for spells and the last one leads to that room in the cave you found. the best part about that is that you are not alone on that journey to find that room and you are told that only one of you can complete that journey and become a mage. so you compete with other novices during that quest and they even try to sabotage you along the way. if you haven´t already i highly recommend playing the game at least once for each faction because everytime you learn new stuff about the lore and have different quests.
To be honest I ignored that quest until i had to go to that stone circle as part of the main quest line anyway. :D
Never saw the special area with the two statues and even didn't know how you can kill the black troll in an other way off :D Good Video :)
I became an apprentice of Bosper the bowyer after bringing him half a dozen wolf pelts that I hunted in the starter area. And the help of Bartok the drunk hunter who I hired for 50 gold. Unfortunately Bartok died during the quest since he ran into my fine short sword that I nabbed the night before from the tower next to Matteo's house. Unfortunately I haven't received the exp for completing the hunt quest, but I've got my gold back with some extra after checking for Bartok's pulse in his pockets. He didn't make it. Bosper instructed me to go around the world and hunt for pelt's so I did go around the world and hunted out everything while ignoring most of the other quests. I came back here and there to sell my pelts and level up my skills during my journey. It was fun. Especially when I figured out a way to deal with groups of enemies or when I killed a shadowbeast at lvl7 just with a bow and arrows while luring the beast to a big rock where I was safely positioned.
I have a little Story that has to do with that Path leading to the Northern Mountains. When I played the Game for the first Time, for the longest Time I could not find the Monastery, because the Path to it was so hidden between the Trees (and I rarely looked at any Map) -- it was that mysterious Place that People talk about, but I wondered whether it even really was in the Game. Then I treaded that Path to the Northern Mountains, but I was still underleveled and could not fight all the many Lurkers and the other Animals on that Path, so I had to run and at one Point saw no other Way than to jump off a Cliff and land in the River. I was safe again, floating down the River and wondering where it may lead... then I started hearing Churchbells in the Background, and as I swam through a giant Rock Arch, the Monastery appeared, like a Palace and high up above me. That Place I had already considered nothing more than a Piece of Lore with no Location igame, it revealed itself to me at such an unexpected Moment, and in the most majestic Way I could think of. That's my Story related to that Path. Thank you for this Video. :)
Great vid. You cannot kill Black troll with bow though. He has infinite piercing damage resistance. Other than that. Top tier! Keep it up mate
Another type of fetchquests I like are those that require items that you might use yourself for your own gain.
You have to weigh the options which give you a better return. Also Items that are picked up throughout the entire game and are not generated speciffically for the quests.
Like picking mushrooms for Constantino, he doesn't need VERY speciffic mushrooms that are only generated here and there for collecting purpose.
I simply set aside that quest for so long that I had forgotten about it until I found the crossbow when I went to the circle of stones doing a main quest.
I just stumbled across the crossbow during the quest, where you get the eye of innos back, so nothing special for me there lol.
The most interesting moment during a Gothic playthrough was to find a bandit camp, where also Quentin is. Even though it didn't add anything major to the game, it was a neat secret to find out there are other camps living the barrier, where you don't play a role in.
I expected the Saturas fetch quest, when he pretty much trolls you sending you across the map to annoy you xD
I finished the game 3 times,each guild,every time i killed black troll different ways,sword,magic,bows,this is the magic of gothic games,it lets you choose what,when and how you do things
I don't remember what I did when I've reached that point for the first time. Gothic, like many/all the other RPGs, lets you have multiple quests open at the same time and I doubt I have actually focused on that exact quest right after learning about it. There is a chance, that I've event found that crossbow before I've meed Dragomir. Of Gothic 2, a place that lingers in my memory is some cemetery hidden in the forest and a cave near it. It had some skeletons or skeleton goblins running around , which made it hard to approach at first. Iirc. graves had something more than just names engraved on them and inside that cave, was some knight's grave?? and some sword maybe? I can hardly remember that after all these years since last playthrough.
I love both first and second Gothic. Terrible controls (G1), generally poor graphics and UI (both), but this climate and overall mechanics, those were just perfect. Like that simple method of placing "soft walls" on players' path, so that they don't go where they shouldn't instead of "walls out of nowhere" from Assassin's Creed or similar solutions from e.g. Need For Speed games (totally different genre, same mechanism :/ )
Now question is, will the new Gothic play like the original G1 or G2? Or will be filled with the currently standard crap fedex quests? (Well, originals had them too, but somehow it did not feel that bad then).
Underrated content. I'd love to see more gothic related videos.
While listening to you describe the dragomir crossbow quest and smoking a big one(getting all philosophical) I realized what WoW did wrong with the quests, the questgivers explain too much so we dont have to think for ourselves. Speculating and finding out if youre right is actually really really fun!
If you want to go deeper on this, go back and think about Gothic 1:
Diego sends you to grab the list from Ian at the old mine, which introduces you to a new location that has to be revisited later. But if you boil it down, it's "just" a fetch quest. Similar to how Mordrag and Baal Parvez leading you out of the old camp into their respective camps are "just" escort quests.
Dragomir's Bow is just one of many quests that lead you to explore the northern area where the black troll lives. E.g. there is a healer living in a cave near the mercenaries' farm who asks you to bring her the Sun Aleo, a rare plant that only lives near a black troll's cave. You incedently pick it up at 5:10.
So I would argue that the great level design came first and that it was crafted to give players an exquisite time exploring it, no matter their reason for going there. Then in a next step the designers planted some hooks around the island to get you interested in exploration. Certainly the placement of these hooks isn't coincindental either, but they are just this.
In the new area that you can travel to in the add-on, there are some monster infested ruins and deserted pyramids that you can see from the mountain path. I didn't need a quest to explore it, I just wanted to find out what great adventure awaited me there, and I was rewarded with a new sword.
But I agree that the black troll itself is a masterpiece of game design. You have to be creative to beat him. A friend of mine lured the troll back to the city and let the city guards take care of him. I simply shrunk him.
all the way back to the city, damn. I remember my brother doing that with the orc from the cave but he's nearby.
and that one guard died
mika
4:39 the room you found is for a quest when you decide to join the monastery as your faction of choice and the troll if part of a quest you get from raoul, one of the mercenaries, you bet with him that you could take down a black troll and he sends you to bring him the pelt of one (this one).
Thank you very much for this, I was wondering what that cave was about.
The first time I played this game I found this Dragomir guy at his camp. He gave me the quest and I had no idea where to go or where to look. I knew I wasn't strong enough to go north so I forgot about it and didn't even go back to it in chapter 1.
I spent a good 5 minutes just circle staffing the black troll and slowly chipping away at it's health. I imagine the troll must have ben quite dizzy in the end as he just kept spinning around on the spot as I ran round him to slap his backside over and over haha.
Great video about of the great video game. Thank you!
Playing Gothic 2 is like having Adhd you go somewhere with a plan but then find something other on the way and explore and then find something another again and again and again hours pass and then you are reminded that you were supposed to do something entirely else haha I love them I'm playing Chronicles of Myrthana: Archolos I see the fans captured its world perfectly with few upgrades
One characteristic about the (fetch-)quests in Gothic is that there are no questmarkers. No notes on the map, no arrow pointing to a quest location - and that is what makes them so special. You have to actually listen to the clues the npcs are giving you and can start exploring - with this in mind i would say that many areas in Gothic are built like the northern mountains you described.
Also, in their context, they make sense and are believable they could take place. How believable is it to have a random NPC walk up to the PC and say "Hey, I need this done and you better do it cos you need the XP and this item you won't find anywhere else in this game"
The other thing what is brilliant, all those things you encountered are there even if you go there for something else. It feels like the world is made out of "small scenes" that you can discover. And they all give some new info or reward. And the best part most of these scenes have some progression, with chapters or with dealing quests. At one point that guy you helped is dead because seekers are there. Or he is leaving his camp because of orcs. All kind of little story.
You can also encounter them any other way, heck you can even kill everyone, and not finnish any of those quests, keep the cross bow. You can do a lot things, and the game lets you do it. You can get the Crossbow by accident, when you search for the eye of innos. And meet Dragomir after.
And you just lost 1000 XP and 500 gold from letting Black Troll die like that🤣
He lost even more XP. Dot forget about the Quest from Raoul.
I just love watching Gothic videos and reading comments.
I found that crossbow after the ritual, but I was glad to give it back to him; I think one of the devs has that surname, like me.
Im a fan of the gothic series for quite some time. I got sucked so hard into it, that i spent at least 600hours on the gothic 2 base game in various playthroughs and more than 3000hours on the community mod (returning 2.0 alternative balance) that expands on all the good parts that make this game sooo great. After playing cyberpunk now i realised why gothic 2 is so great and immersive in comparison. Because it is not about the tasks alone, but the stuff you experience on the way to that task. Also, you do everything on your own. There are not 100 cutscenes, so that the game just feels like an interactive movie. You are truly free to do whatever you like. If you walk off in an area that is way too dangerous for you it is your own fault, but also the type of moment you will remember every single time you get there. If you like the game i highly suggest giving the community mod a chance. It adds so many new quests that don't just feel out of place and make gothic 2 one of the best rpgs i have played so far.
Oh, damn, I think this was the one quest I never finished. Glad I watched this.
Yeah Piranha Bytes are quite good at world and quest design, at least when they put their mind to it and aren't rushed too much :P
Gothic 1 already hinted at that with some stuff, but was clearly never completely finished. Gothic 2 (especially with the Raven's Night Addon) has a few of these gems, and also a lot of rewards for exploring (quite apart from the loot and exp). Like, in the valley of mines, you can (quite early on, if you're exploring) meet a guy in a set of armor made from minecrawler plates. Meeting him can trigger a quest to get that armor, which is (as I think) independent of your guild and possibly the strongest set you can get before joining an "advanced guild".
Gothic 3 is a dark spot on PB's record, but even there the world "as it is" hints at all the ideas and the loads of thought that went into it, and to this day it is (next to Skyrim) the most beautiful world I've played in, aesthetically. For example, I've for some time been annoyed by the chests and corpses seemingly placed in the world at random. However, if you think about it - the war against the Orcs has been raging for years, and for at least a few weeks or even months, they've been crushing all resistance. Besides, most towns and villages seem quite emptied of people, and there's loads of ruined and abandoned places. The chests (and the skeletons surrounding them) are those unlucky refugees who didn't make it and propably ran into a pack of wolves or snappers.
They returned to form in Risen and have been going reasonably strong ever since - I think Elex especially: it rewarded you highly for exploring, with both powerful loot, quest items and cool background information and lore.
What PB also do very well (as with the troll or the minecrawlers you met) is showing you which areas are "a bit much still" when going on an adventure early on. The moment you meet a few vargs or a shadow beast in the dense forest, you know you went too deep - but you also know to come back later, with more experience and better gear, and most likely find something worth returning.
Great video. As many mentioned before, being from the Vaterland it is quite pleasing to see the international fame this little game made in Germany is getting, even after so many years! :)
Gothic is one of the very few games that can make 'accidentally getting lost in the woods' a fun and rewarding experience. There is an obscure and hidden patch of land over there, that feels abandoned and it's not drawn on the map? You can bet your left cheek that there is either a fun side quests or some awesome loot over there - often guarded by some fearsome foes.
They were well ahead of their time.
It is kinda strange to hear about it, mainly cose i never had any adventure like this during this quest - in general, I never focused on it. I always went to the northern part of the map with Lester, who will escort you half of the way (bit more than to the first bridge, with bandit). Than I go bit further on my own (to Grimbald), but never to the stone circle itself. So I usually visit it in 3 chapter, when main plot lead you there - and do Dragomir's quest then. Sooo...
But if we talking about great fetch quests in G2... ork axe for Harad. Not really the side quest (you can skip it, but it kinda is part of the main plot). Other great example, this time from main plot of Night of the Raven - 5 stone tablets for Saturas. The colored ones. +green one for... Franko? Leader of the swamp part of bandit camp. Back to the sidequests - pack of swamp weed for Andree/Cipher.
I also really like those small, on the side fetch/delivery quest that are made to complete while you doing somethink else. I love the one with the paladin's ring - in Mine Valley, one of the members of the mining team give you a ring and ask you to give it to one of the defenders of the castle (I don't remember they names, unfortunatelly). It is literatery 4 lines of dialog and single line in questlog... but is suit the whole Mine Valley atmosphere so well.