Windows

Arcanum: Of Steamworks & Magick Obscura

Trivia

The official Sierra game servers were shut down on 1st November 2008.

Contributed by Sciere (118149) on Oct 10, 2008.

The soundtrack to Arcanum was composed by Ben Houge for string quartet. It was provided in its entirety on Computer Gaming World's May 2001 demo CD.

Both the soundtrack and its sheet music are still available as a free download, courtesy of Sierra and Troika games:

http://www.terra-arcanum.com/sierra/media/media-soundtrack.html

There's actually a reference to Bill Gates and Microsoft stealing the ideas for their Windows operating system from Apple's MacOS. One of the most influential and wealthy of people in Tarant is Gilbert Bates (Swap the G and B in Gill Bates and you have Bill Gates) because he brought the power of the steam engine to mankind. Another steam engine developer, called Cedric APPLEby is spiteful of Bates's success and claims that he invented the steam engine first and that Bates had stolen the idea off him.

One of the original developers has labored to produce a mod for this game that addresses some balance issues, makes it overall a little more challenging, and replaces the entire opening area and quests. This latter is important because the opening area was used in the demo, and many players have just seen it too many times to want to start a new character any more, despite the near-infinite possibilities for character design. The URL is http://www.terra-arcanum.com/~chris/download.htm.

For players who feel that Arcanum's interface takes up too much of the screen, Arcanum comes with a "Full Screen" start-up icon which reduces the interface to the minimum of stats and relies on keyboard shortcuts for the rest.

Contributed by Terrence Bosky (5237) on Mar 14, 2003.

There's an interesting Fallout reference in the walled city of Tulla. Apparently one of the students had to venture out in the Wastes to find a Water Gem. He has since returned and the Mages fear how the journey changed him and the influence he might have on other students. Plus, he's... gasp... wearing mechanized armor.

Contributed by Terrence Bosky (5237) on Mar 14, 2003.

A portion of the Stillwater giant quest contains a major (and fairly obvious) reference to "Monty Python and the Holy Grail", specifically the part where you have to trace the beast to a cave and capture it. In fact, the whole sequence plays just like in the movie, you follow some giant footprints, enter a dark cave filled with bones and dead bodies, and then find... well I won't spoil it for you! :)

Also of note is the fact that despite the result of the quest, the Stillwater giant DOES exist. You can find it on a random encounter between Stillwater and the pass to the elven city.

There's a graveyard in Arcanum with lots of funny epitaphs written on the graves. However, many of them are taken directly from Baldur's Gate!

Contributed by Unicorn B. Lynx (61192) on Oct 23, 2002.

A hidden graveyard, containing tombstones of Arcanum's most diehard fans, can be found at the location W: 1060 S : 809 on the world map.

Following on the tradition started in the Fallout manuals, Arcanum's manual includes an actual cooking recipe! This time it's Grandma Cookhill's Three Bowl Bread.

There's a location in the game called the "Isle of Despair" which is a penal colony which holds it's inmates in a remote island behind a magical barrier that makes it impossible to escape. Now, when you ask the generic npcs for its location they answer:

"You mean the Black Isle? I'm not quite sure..."

Black Isle Studios is the name of Interplay's rpg division, and the former home of Arcanum's development team... Meaow!!!

On January 7th, 2002, the development team released a free "Mod pack" containing six new and exclusive adventures. You can download it here:

http://www.fileplanet.com/index.asp?section=1992&file=83276

Contributed by phlux (4157) on Jan 27, 2002.