I hadn't played the original. My only familiarity with Gothic was the title itself. I knew it had once been a good and beloved series, but given its venerable age, I was unlikely to have gotten to know it more closely. So the remake immediately caught my attention. Experience a classic game wrapped in modern graphics? I jumped at the chance, and I didn't regret it one bit.

The game is difficult. No other game has thrown me into such a humiliating situation right from the start. After getting slapped in the cutscene, I took the hint that I would be getting hit a lot here. Resigned to the fact that the game world didn't like me and wasn't going to lead me by the hand, I began to learn.

And what a pleasure it is to develop alongside your character; it gives you the vivid feeling of being a pioneer. Overcoming tough fights, exploring the map, getting to know the local skill mechanics and leveling them up, I enjoyed this conquest. Even towards the end, with the best gear and almost maxed out skill levels, I didn't become an uber-machine for processing enemy XP. I was tough, but even at my level, there were enemies who happily sent me reloading whenever I made a mistake.

How many times has the loading screen told me that there's nothing wrong with lowering the difficulty from Gothic, but no. I would have loved this world a lot less if I hadn't gritted my teeth through every bit of it.

And there's a lot to love about the game's world. It's smaller than the worlds we're used to seeing in modern games. But its richness is astonishing. Once you stray from the main paths, the number of secrets, allusions, and even just hiding places with hidden objects increases exponentially. And such attention to detail was paid here. I have no doubt that each of the developers loved their work; I felt this love when I returned to the starting camps and realized that over the course of the game, these locations had become so familiar to me.

So many mechanics here feel like a breath of fresh air. After leveling up, I have to find a mentor for the skill I need, and before that, I have to decide whether pickpocketing is really important or whether I should spend my experience points on a good old one-handed weapon.

Thanks to the lack of a compass and minimap, I can confidently say that I only became more immersed in the Valley of Mines.

And finally, we were shown an interesting alternative to lockpicking. Yes, it's difficult, but the entire game doesn't spare the player. This system really looks good here. Hacking was a challenge for me until I decided to spend my experience leveling up my hack.

Personally, I didn't encounter a single insurmountable difficulty.

I should probably put something in the cons. It's hard when I'm still feeling elated after finishing the game, even though it's been a day.

The biggest drawback for me was the technical issues with the voice acting. Characters sometimes speak at completely different volumes, and sometimes I could only discern what someone was whispering to me through the subtitles. And in the final location, the sound completely disappeared. I think they'll fix this, but I watched the final scene in complete silence.

The AI ​​is a bit strange here. After reloading, pursuing enemies lose their targeting. And since you have to reload frequently, the image of enemies with Alzheimer's will be consistent.

I have a couple more quibbles, but they're so subjective that I don't want to dilute the review too much with them. For example, I felt the cooking mechanics weren't deep enough. And I didn't see much use for blacksmithing, as it was easier to just buy better weapons.

And in the entire 60 hours I played, I didn't encounter a single crash. There were a couple of bugs due to the aforementioned NPC path loss after reloading, but no softlocks. Technically, the game was almost perfect for me.

In conclusion, I'm satisfied. More than satisfied. The game was a challenge for me, which I overcame. A reboot of sorts. If remakes are going to be released, they should be of similar quality and with great developer love. Thank you!