Initial Arcania Thoughts

A while back, I picked up Arcania: Gothic 4 on a price drop.  I finally got around to trying it out Friday night.  I'm still early (3.5 hours in), but so far, it's held my interest - by a thread.  The game is light on the RPG elements so far.  There is a skill tree, and adding points unlocks new abilities.  Unfortunately, it doesn't go as deep as I'd like, but it's okay.  The voice acting isn't terribly good.  The combat is very routine (x - x - x - x, dead).  I think the biggest thing that annoys me is finding things.  There is a map, but it can sometimes be difficult to find your objectives.  I'm okay with this approach, as it does foster more exploration.  However, exploration can be boring and frustrating.  The game cycles between night and day, clear skies and rain.  Sometimes, it's very difficult to see where you're going.  Again, this wouldn't be so bad, but after you kill something, it's hard to find the corpse to loot.  I don't know, as I write this, I feel kind of bad.  No quest markers?  Can't see at night, or in the rain?  Isn't that somewhat expected?  Have we been dumbed down by the WoW approach of leading you exactly where you need to go?

All in all though, the game comes off as a poor man's Oblivion.  The game is, so far, merely okay.  This is actually good, as I was expecting it to be a mess that I'd abandon after an hour (hence my desire to pick up "off the radar" releases on the cheap). 

I picked up a couple games this weekend - Divinity 2 Dragon Knight Saga, Lord of Arcana for the PSP and Sports Champions for the PS3.