User reviews

Gothic 1 & 2 are my favorite RPG games, and although not as good, Gothic 3 would definitely be deserving sequel to the franchise if it was actually playable. You might hear that it has "no loading screen" as a positive aspect but combine all of the stuttering, lag, random freezes etc. and you will have greater wait time then in a Sims 2 game.

Combat system also feels very unsatisfying since it boils down to spamming single button and stun-locking enemies which in turn makes wild boars one of the most fearsome enemies in the game, and orcs (supposed biggest threat to land) weakest (dare I even say laughable), but it would still be passable if my game would actually not freeze every time I made any "sudden" movements...

That being said there are mods that mostly fix these issues, so if you take your time and install them (Community patch + Content mod + Gothic 3 Clean Up tool) you will have a very good game to play, but without them it's an unplayable mess.

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Cons:

• Poor optimization
• Clunky combat
• Main story in some points is not very logical
• Ending is meh
• Lee vs King confrontation disappointing (considering the build-up that spanned for both Gothic 1 & 2)
• Some areas are empty and feel unfinished - mostly desert area around Ishtar
• Temples are very generic and somewhat unsatisfying once you open them (they are essentially just copy pasted with almost same enemies)
• Lack of enemy variety - what i mean by this is that there are technically different animals look-wise but they have same animations, attack and movement patterns leading them to feeling like a same enemy. Also in some areas like Nordmar it feels like every second enemy is ice-wolf or sabertooth, you might get an Ogre or Shadowbeast here and there but you already seen them in other areas before.

Pros:

• Graphics are very good
• Magic/Mage very fun
• Memorable music
• Freeing settlements unique and interesting
• Your actions while you do quests actually impact the world
• NPC's have shifts / schedules
• Unique crime system that tried to do something different
• Each town has it's own arena