I never was a fan of the Gothic series. It’s OK, but it’s not my universe. I played the first one a little, I almost finished the second one because I had nothing better to play, and Gothic 3 was the drop that filled the glass. The overwhelming number of bugs disgusted me. I tried to play it for weeks, but my efforts were in vain. Anyway, I got over that morbid moment, although I must say I enjoyed a bit of German-style, old-school roleplaying. Now here comes Forsaken Gods, a stand-alone add-on entangled in mystery. Why do I say that? Because, for the first time, a Gothic game is produced by someone other than Piranha Bytes. The current developer goes by the name of Trine Game Studios, and I don’t understand how JoWood had the guts to let these imbeciles create a game in the Gothic franchise. The JoWood series is interesting, nothing to object here. With a torturingly high difficulty in the beginning, a lot of content,  a pretty challenging game mechanic, a solid story and so on, every game in the series seems to fail when it comes to development. The number of bugs in all JoWood games is usually higher than average, but in the Forsaken Gods add-on, they are eating the game alive. Sometimes you can’t help but wonder if you’re playing the beta version of the game. Other times you are almost sure you’re playing the alpha version. And there are times when you’re just not playing the game at all, because the damn game won’t let you play it. Anyway, you got the point.

Oh my fucking skull!

It wouldn’t be so bad if the game was in the same situation as Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, which in spite of the buggy engine, it was one of the best games I played for the story, atmosphere, characters and so on. No, Gothic 3 – Forsaken Gods is old and dusty… maybe a slightly better fighting system and some interesting quests. The producers let the game rot like an empty cow carcass in the middle of the road. I see the first cut-scenes as gracious as a degenerating melanoma. They are fucking slide-shows! Even Heroes 3 in 1999 had more animated cinematics. Oh well. After the first 'cut-scene', I wake up in a village where a dude with crazy hair on his head bores me while repeating to me exactly what the cinematic just said. Brilliant. After the dialogue finishes, I get out of the house I was in, and the game crashes as I instantly see the wallpaper on my desktop.

I try to play it again, I skip the cinematic, I speed up the first conversation, I get out of the house and I grab some quests I could find, and again, the game crumbles into a most beautiful crash. Of course, there were no signs of a save file… I enter for the third time and I repeat the same things I did before. I open my inventory and look at the stats, my character started at level 10. Hurray. After all the prestige I gained in Gothic 3, I thought I’ll be treated better, but no, not at all. I’m worth as much as a rotweiller’s saliva. To earn a loaf of bread and a little respect, I have to be the henchman of all the rednecks in the village. I know I have some bad opinions about Gothic, but let’s be honest, three games have already been made before this one. Couldn’t we forget about the cliché with the poor, known-by-nobody weak guy who becomes a dragon-slayer in the end? Or maybe an orc-slayer, whatever suits him. After another hour of exploring the map in all directions, another crash takes place. The uninstalling was inevitable. Quite a short adventure in the new Gothic, don’t you think? I didn’t even understand, until I put my hands on the game, why the Germans criticized the game so badly on the internet. Where I'm from, we have an old saying: “You can’t be a prophet in your own country”, but apparently Trine Games aren’t prophets at all. And they will never be, because Gothic 4 is already in the works by the anxious hands of another developer, Spellbound. It’s not worth explaining this any more, it's a hysterical Gothic 3 game that wants to gain attention, but suffers badly because of its phthisis.

No matter of what big Gothic fan you might be, don’t touch Forsaken Gods. It’s not worth the money even if they included a Thai massage in the package. JoWood said that this add-on will be the connection between Gothic 3 and the fourth part of the series. You must be a masochist to actually finish this abomination. Patches seem to be made, but so far nothing makes it playable. Fuck it. I'm gonna go shove a spoon in my ass, just to distract myself from the pain of playing Forsaken Gods.

1/5