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Cool ideas meet mediocre implementation

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 9 / 10
Date: July 04, 2002
Author: Amazon User

There have been a lot of reviews posted for this game already, and they all seem to share the same basic sentiments: so close, and yet so far... Some are very original, some are just dry repeats of what's already been said. I will try to write this review in such a manner that it adds to the comments made, instead of restating them.

I bought this game after checking out the box on the store shelf. That was the only exposure to it that I had at the time. I finished it. Now I'm writing a review...

Many of the ideas packed into this game are original and creative, giving a whole new dimension to the gaming experience. The non-linear storyline is especially nice, as it allows you to follow your mood instead of trudging down a straight path with no deviations. This does have some issues, though, due to the implementation. Because you can take any path you choose to get where you need to go, it is very easy to circumvent points in the storyline by stumbling into areas of the map (via random exploring) that you otherwise would not find until much later in the game. This can create some real confusion when you get a quest in your journal, then talk to an/the NPC and IMMEDIATELY the quest is solved. This is a little sloppy -- it would have been better to either kill the quest, or just solve it the moment it is assigned, instead of making you go talk to another NPC.

By wandering the map aimlessly, I found places that were never mentioned otherwise but obviously had some significance based on what I found there. I have no idea what I missed or where.

The graphics are mediocre. Worse, though, is the very awkward interface. The repetetive actions are a tedium that most players will want to avoid, but alas it is unavoidable in many cases. Even allowing some kind of visual macro facility would have been helpful...

Another neat innovation is the intermingling of magic and technology. At one point my character attained some level of mastery in a magic discipline, after which I was repeatedly kicked out of blacksmith shops. Nice touch. There seems to be a little bit of an imbalance in favor of magic, but using technology is still fun and allows the player to try something really interesting in an RPG.

Some players are upset about the level-50 cap. Don't be upset about it, level 50 is high enough to finish the game quite easily. If you want to really go beyond that, there's a patch out there that lets you reach level 128, and at that point you're simply wasting your time because you're too powerful.

The distribution of new experience points for the player to allocate is one way in which a player can directly manipulate the character. The system seems a bit strange and awkward, giving one point at a time to allocate to one of dozens of options. You need to carefully consider how you allocate your points.

I must concur with one of the reviews I read -- this game caters to the male chauvanist pig, to the point of being a little offensive in a couple of areas.

Interaction with NPCs usually involves selection of canned statements. These can directly impact the game. This is a good thing. These same statements can be issued over and over and over and over, with no progress. This is a bad thing.

One interesting point is that the NPCs can get mad at you, and even leave your party, when you tangle with a game character that the NPCs seem to think is a "good person" -- even when said "good person" attacks you first. Not good. If you are the instigator, that's one thing. But when you're the victim, having your NPCs go turncoat is unacceptable.

So why should you buy this game? Well, you should buy it if you are extremely patient with software that sports poor interfaces, or if you have a lot of free time on your hands and the money's burning a hole in your pocket, or if you just want to try something very different in the RPG genre of games.

I give this game 3 stars for its innovations. It's a shame that such creative ideas are so poorly implemented in Arcanum. There are better RPG games out there; don't bother with Arcanum unless you want to experiment with the technology aspects.

Nothing Short of Epic (but look out for the learning curve)

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 7 / 7
Date: December 05, 2005
Author: Amazon User

I almost stopped playing Arcanum before I'd really begun because the interface was so intricate and...uh...arcane. This is not a game one can simply hop into without reading the manual. After a few frustrating false starts, I got the hang of it, and the fun began to commence.

The range of choice in this game is staggering. You can use a pre-made charcter, or create an entirely new one, and fully customize either. The maps are expansive and full of goodies, and there's no penalty for simply wandering around and collecting quests that don't particularly drive the main storyline. Depending on how you interact with people, and what quests you take, your character's good/evil alignment can change, opening different options and quests.

There were a couple issues that caused the game to rate at a 4 rather than a 5 overall: (downloading the patch from the Arcanum website seems to have solved some of them) Most of the problems seemed to be with non-player party members--occasionally someone wandered away from the party into the thick of enemy territory to pick up a random old pair of boots (!?) or something of the like, and I had to dive in and rescue them from the hoarde of baddies they'd just trundled obliviously through. Also, a couple of times the NPCs noticed an enemy behind a wall, they all clustered there, unresponsive, waiting to fight, until I picked a lock to open a door or ran around back and killed the enemy myself. Frustrating.

Despite these few annoyances, Arcanum has infinite replay value, and I *highly* recommend it to anyone looking for an incredibly flexible RPG with an immersive story and intricately crafted world.

A Breath of Fresh Air for Veteran RPGers

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 7 / 7
Date: June 28, 2004
Author: Amazon User

After nearly a decade of not playing CRPGs, I can honestly say that Arcanum sucked me back into the CRPG world. What makes Arcanum great is the flexibility. You can choose to be good, evil, start out good and become evil later (or vice versa - although becoming evil is a bit harder to recover from), become a technologist, or a mage or neither, or a bit of both. What seperates this game from many of its predecessors is the lack of restraints. You don't feel like you MUST do quest A then B then C. You can blunder around aimlessly and pick up a plethora of side quests that have branches of their own.
Another thing to note is the cleverness of the world created and the mystery of the main plot kept me guessing all the way until the end. The atmosphere of the game is unique that has been cleverly adapted with a combination of Victorian England meets the Wild West. The story is not lacking or flat and the dialogue allows you to be as gallant, devious, or just plain ornery as you want to be. The main shortcomings of this game really are the odd tendency to CTD (crash to desktop), so save early and often to avoid losing much. The other shortcoming is the pathfinding of the NPCs leaves a bit to be desired. All in all a very nifty game with a brilliant world that has few constraints. As an aside, their are some clever little mods out there that can enhance the gameplay experience. The most useful of which are those that allow your character to continue to grow and gain experience. The game, as shipped, caps your character at level 50. During my first go, I found myself only 80% through the main quest before I found out that I couldn't advance my character further in experience.

FABULOUS!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 8 / 9
Date: September 09, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I have been playing RPGs religiously since I first got a computer (Yes I was one of the psycos that couldn't tear herself away from D&D). I have played almost every game on the market and very sadly there are very few that were actually worth my time of day as a woman that loves to roll play (not to mention the money I spent buying them blindly...). However, as all the other reviews stated, this game is fantastic. It easily takes you to a world unlike our own to a time that was really not that long ago. The thousands of side quests are all differant and unique by the character you create. The character database could be a little bit more detailed, however, it is worth it and the character point system for upgrading your character is FABULOUS and VERY unique.
One draw back is that you have very little control of other characters that join your party. They simply run blindly into absolutly ALL battles whether you like it or not! Very irritating if they die in the process!
The game has a few bugs when it comes to my computer but never has been worth quiting over. I have actually NEVER beaten this game I have six characters I play around the clock with, going after side quests and completely forgetting the maine plot to the whole story.
All in All ONLY for die hard RPGers that are willing to give up sleeping and eating for this FABULOUS masterpiece of a game!

Windows XP Users Beware!

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: May 04, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I picked up a copy of Arcanum back when I was still using Windows ME for my system (hey, somebody had to buy it!). I played it seemingly nonstop for a few weeks. The game is great, from the storyline to the graphics and gameplay. Then disaster hit. I thought I'd upgrade my computer to XP. Let's just say that Arcanum will not seamlessly transfer over to the new operating system. I contacted Sierra support and was told (many days later), "Arcanum was not designed for Windows XP and at this time there are not immediate plans to release a patch." Translation: we feel you pain, but we could care less. Kind of a strange point of view about an operating system that more and more people are upgrading to. So, in short, loved the game until the upgrade.

Mixed feelings on Arcanum

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 7 / 8
Date: January 06, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Arcanum takes you to a world where magic and technology rival each other. You enter this world as a noticably shaken former passenger of a zeplin that has just crashed. You are left to explorer this world to the extent you see fit. It's a good sized world with a rather large number of places to explore, some that you are directed to as a part of a bigger mission and some that you will merely happen across while traveling. The graphics are decent althoght a bit repetative in the character models at times and in the spells used. The sound effects are cool, and the interaction with NPCs is some of the best I've seen including a little humor thrown in with good timing. Some of the missions grow long and tedious at times, as you are often only a delivery boy. However on the technical side this game has some issues. First and foremost, this is a very unbalanced game. Early on you discover ways to cheat the system. Now if your an honest gamer you will avoid these cheats(I didn't). Second you can not Alt+Tab out of it, and if you do have another program come to the front, it is rare that you don't lose your cursor and have to try to find a way to save so you can restart. Also the game interface is not really designed for quick combat, especially if your a mage. I have also found that this game is very taxing on your computer no matter how good it is. I was running it on a Pentium 1Mhz with 128MB of RAM and if I tried to play music in tha background as I often do, the game was slowed drastically. Finally the last and most frustrating ofr me personally, is that at times you are unable to get the dialogue options to finish missions. Now dialog options are effected by Charisma and Intellegence, but after a few runs that isn't all. There are times when you are never offered to appropriate words to finish certain missions. There are also times where you may have collected an item before meeting the person that sends you to get it, that will make it very challenging for you to have a conversation with that person.

In my opinion, overall this game is conceptualy very good. The word designed is as believable as can be expected, they include many allusions to help keep it in perspective, and the humor is worth the effort.Unfortunatly this game as agreat many technical problems, some of which I feel are debilatating for the game, especially the balance within the player character.

If you do buy this game the very first thing you need to do is download the most up to date patch. You will most lily enjoy the game, but learn the quikest route for you to save in case you ever have another program come to the front, and email me if you wanna know a couple easy steps a t Character Generation to beat the game easily

victorian england never had it so good

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 9 / 13
Date: January 16, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Pros?
The world of arcanum is excellet. Vicorian costumes, language, and sensibilities.
Make the character you want. Tired of 3 to 6 differnt classes that dont fit your style of game play? Arcanum allows you to alot skill points into literally anything you want to.
Numerous quests
Cons?
Load times that can really start to suck.
And, to be quite frank, you dont get enough skill points by far. To build a good party you need a 20 charisma which eats up 12 count them 12 skill points (you only get one skill point a level except every 5 levels where you get 2) then you need good dodge weapoon (melee bow fire arm) plus if you are a spell caster your spells or your technical shcmeatic etc. (f they had doubled the amount of skill points it would have been a much more satisfying experience.

Bottom Line?

Good game that is well worth plonking your money down for.

Love CRPG's? You will love Arcanum.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 8 / 11
Date: August 28, 2001
Author: Amazon User

I've been playing CRPG's since the days of Ultima and 8-bit Zelda. There typically isn't a year that goes by that I don't play most every CRPG released on the PC in addition to a handful of console RPG's. You've already read what this game is about so here's my 2 cents. Arcanum combines many of the best elements from some great CRPG's like Fallout, Diablo, and even Baldur's Gate. Many people are griping about the graphics. As I seen them, they are better than the Fallout games, about equal to Diablo 2, and nowhere near as good as Baldur's Gate 2. However, like I said, Arcanum has many elements of Fallout, Diablo, and Baldur's Gate. If that doesn't sound appealing to you as a CRPG fan......seek professional help.

if it's as good as the demo- then this game rocks!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 11 / 18
Date: May 14, 2001
Author: Amazon User

I just played the demo for about 6 hours, and thought it was fabulous. Now I'm not an expert @ PC games- i come from the nintendo/playstation genre of RPG, namely Final Fantasy series. And I like that kind of feel to my games. So when the full version is available i will definetly buy it.

Arcanum rocks???

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 5 / 5
Date: October 02, 2001
Author: Amazon User

This would have been one of the better computer role-playing games of recent years if it weren't so buggy. Many of the problems can be fixed by downloading the most recent patch. The game system is quite interesting, and the storyline is engrossing. Technology and magic have been masterfully seperated then combined again. If you like thinking about how you can complete a quest without much info, this is the game for you. There always seem to be another way to solve the puzzle you are on. Just be careful you don't go about it the wrong way, or you could get stuck. Save often.

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