Arcanum: Of Steamworks & Magick Obscura

The Good
If there was one RPG game that deserves an award in originality, story, concept, and everything else you can think of...this would be it.

I feel in love with the game almost instantly. It was odd, weird, unique, different, that was the feeling I got while the first cinematics played. It was unlike any game I've ever seen before...and I haven't even started playing yet. The music sank right in.

I must say I'm impressed by the Arcanum world. For some odd reason, no one really actually imagined a "modern" medieval world. It was either future or medieval. A world where they combined a world where technology and magic exists caught me off guard. I thought the concept was brilliant. Well, technically not that original, but it's worth the effort in my book!

I thought I was in love the first time around. Then I saw the character creation part. I don't remember the last time I felt this exited as far as RPG's go. Wow! They may have something going here. I always felt that the soul of RPG's is in either character creation or character development. They overdid themselves in the character creation department.

Ah, now we start playing. Oooh, stuff to pick up. Just like Ultima all over again. I'm really liking this game. Haha. They did a good job with the story line too. I felt almost like reading a book while I played the game. Well, close enough.

The Bad
Unfortunately, as much as I have respect for the game, as always, I must focus on the bad stuff that almost ruined the game in my perspective.

Well, the first thing mistake is mine. I have a habit of downloading patches before I play the game, and unfortunately I read a little to much information about the game than I should have. I knew the existence of the NPC's before I even played the game. This got me to a lot of thinking and planning. The problem is, when it comes to games, I'm a perfectionist. I MUST have it all. The though that there were NPC's that I couldn't bring a long was TOO much for my brain to handle. So I had to narrow it down to a few NPC's. It seemed that any NPC that had a voice was invaluable not to have. Then that stupid dwarf started complaining about the death knight as company, I started to get irritated. Oh well, restart game...let's try to be careful handling NPC's.

The more I learned about the game, the more I was a little put off. The fact that I found out there was a level limitation on my character kinda put me in the fits. This means I have to PLAN my character development. If I didn't browse the net, I wouldn't have known. Oh, well, restart game. Time to plan ahead.

Oh, it appears that having this ability at the start is much better than the other one. Oh, well, restart game.

Oh, it appears I should've solve the puzzle this way rather than that way. Oh, well, restart game.

Do you know that being a perfectionist is absolute TORTURE? Try restarting a game for 7-8 times, each lasts more than 10 hours long. You'll understand what I mean.

Then I realized something awful. I started comparing the game to Fallout 2. It started going waaay down hill after that. I discovered that combat was BORING. I had a hunch brushed aside, but I'll get to that later. I remember the extreme joy in Fallout 2, everytime combat initiated. The smell of blood, sounds of crushing bones and spilled guts. Hey, what happened? Suddenly combat was Ho-Hum. I actually resented that I had to fight. They took the fun out of combat. Must be the lack of sound or something. Whatever it was, it didn't feel the same.

Now comes to my hunch. Hmm...why are they making this game semi-real time/turned based. Why not either real-time or turned based why don't you. Why did you have to have both? Then it triggered another fishy hunch I had. Then a word popped up in my mind! Gasp! Diablo 2.

My god, is it me or is this a little similar with Diablo 2? Hey, Diablo's a great game, but honestly, as an RPG...welcome to pre-school. Diablo has incredible cinematics, but as an RPG...a kiddies game. My second fishy hunch was on character creation. They had an option for "quick" character creation. It bothered me to think that someone would actually play this game without going through the detailed character creation. Oh my god! It occured to me...they wanted non-serious gamers to also enjoy the game! NO! The shock was to much for me. Now I see it. That's what's wrong with the game...they bowed down to capitalist demands of the market! Well...not that I blame them, but they sure hell screwed up somewhere. Enough drama.

Then comes the bugs. Had to restart 3-4 times just because I found so many god dang bugs, that messed up my saved games. Well, eventually, all the stress said above and the bugs finally popped my rocker. I was so dang pissed. I really tried to play this game, but it wasn't easy. I finally retired the game, fearing my high blood pressure would get the better of me.

When you play this game, you'll know that is one of those games that comes once in a life time...but it didn't become the perfect masterpiece because they with-held it to become the masterpiece it could, should or would have been...for the sake of...well...the common folk.

Well, I tried. I really really tried.

The Bottom Line
As I said. Almost perfect. But unfortunately, I am sad to say that Fallout 2 is better. Maybe after my temper cools down, I'll pick up this game again...and finish it.

The Good
This game generally fulfilled its vision of a new setting and story with the same sort of flexibility that worked for the Fallouts. The number of possible character choices and development paths is significantly greater and more diverse than in the earlier games. The interplay of magic and technology, and the different feel of each, is interesting. The evocation of a Victorian English feeling (with some more modern conspiracies below the surface) is particularly wonderful.

Perhaps most promising, the developers seem to have mostly grown up since Fallout2. The sophomoric "humor" is mostly replaced by more interesting and better developed characters. There are moral dilemmas and issues to think about. Many of the factions are drawn in moral grays instead of melodramatic monochrome.

Although some have complained about the "sexism" in the game, including both the lack of female art for two of the playable races (a production cost decision) and the inclusion of some gender discrimination in the world and character reactions (an integral part of the success in producing a Victorian flavor for the game world), I did not find the game particularly prejudiced, and in fact there is a strong subplot around issues of racism and racial exploitation.

The Bad
Not all characters are created equal - there were some balance issues.

One of the most interesting side quests was unfinished, and just leaves the player dangling.

The desire to make a "toolbox" game was not carried far enough to really catch on - in particular third-party adventures can't have a world map - but it was carried far enough to limit options for game scripting.

There were some annoying bugs in the UI even in the final patch.

Managing NPCs in your party was done well in general, but a technical character was not allowed to purchase items for magical followers and vice versa - shopkeepers refused to interact with opposite-aligned characters entirely.

The game was a slug on the best machines available when it shipped.

The Bottom Line
A fine, though not perfect, game and a landmark in CPRGs.

The Good
Let me preface this review by admitting that my relationship with Arcanum is... strained. It has taken me multiple attempts at playing the game over a period of nearly seven years finally to muster up the will to play the game to its conclusion. Perhaps this difficulty stems from a case of excessively impossible expectations on my part. Ever since I first read a preview of the game in late 2000, I had incredibly high hopes for the first CRPG by (the now defunct) Troika. After all, Troika was founded by the creative masterminds behind Fallout, perhaps my favorite game of all time, and the company's maiden voyage into the realm of PC role-playing seemed destined for greatness. It promised all of the elements that had made Fallout such a legendary game: a uniquely interesting game world, an intuitive and deeply flexible “classless” character creation system, and tactical turn-based combat should my in-game actions necessitate armed conflict. Even after receiving my preordered copy in late 2001, I was still unable to play the game for a few months due to a lack of free time to commit to such a massive RPG. Nevertheless, I found myself glossing through the game's massive manual, elaborately envisioning what sort of character I was going to create when I finally got the chance to venture into the world of Arcanum. It was just short of borderline obsession with a game I had yet to install on my computer's hard drive.

Perhaps it was simply inevitable, then, that my actual experience with the game fell far beneath my lofty expectations. Regardless, there remains a definite conflict within me as to just exactly how I feel about Fallout's half-brother, and this review is partly my own attempt to reconcile that conflict. At its core, I find Arcanum to be a mind-boggling mix of ingenuity and mediocrity, a rather peculiar blend that manages simultaneously to please and to repulse the gaming palate. Out of respect for my younger self's initial optimism for this “unique” RPG (not to mention the requirements of the MobyGames review format), let's start with the appealing elements of the game.

There are certainly plenty of things that Arcanum does right. First and foremost, the game world – or at the very least its premise – is one of the more appealing and well-conceived settings in any RPG period. Like Fallout before it, the world of Arcanum is highly innovative: a steampunk setting based on the real-world circa 1885 mixed with Tolkienesque high fantasy, elves and all. It is a world of conflict (and what good setting isn't?), but this conflict is more ideological than anything else. Technology – Victorian-era devices such as the steam engine and the locomotive – has revolutionized the world, and the old order of feudal kingdoms, chivalrous knights, and eccentric wizards is giving way to what one in-game personality loosely refers to as “pistol-brandishing cowards.” Of course, the technological-magickal conflict has a physical element as well: the two forces do not mesh, causing direct conflict not only between the forces themselves, but also between their respective adherents. Powerful mages are denied passage on trains due to the possibility of malfunction, there is animosity between the magickal elves and the tech-minded dwarves, and healing magicks have little to no effect upon those who practice technology. Even if it is not implemented as well as it could have been, the ideas such as these behind Arcanum's setting stand as a testament to innovation in game design.

Also like Fallout, Arcanum possesses a deep and flexible character creation system. In fact, Arcanum's system is quite possibly the most in-depth and intricate system I've ever seen, providing an unprecedented amount of freedom for players to create the kind of character they want to play. Want to be the best fighter ever to walk the land of Arcanum? Build up your Strength, Dexterity, and Melee and Dodge skills. Aspire to be the greatest, most feared necromancer who ever lived? There is a bevy of spells to choose from. Simply wish to dabble a bit in both roads to power so as to maximize your ability to get rich? Balance your skill point distribution among select spell colleges and technological disciplines as you see fit. The number of combinations of skills and attributes – not to mention special character backgrounds that provide both a special benefit and a drawback – is ridiculously high. Of course, it would be easy to feel a bit overwhelmed by such a daunting number of options (more on that later), but to those who invest the time and effort, the character system is one of the best ever devised.

Of course, the most skillfully crafted settings and characters mean nothing without a compelling reason to explore them. Fortunately, Arcanum delivers in this area as well, starting players off with an intriguing action-filled beginning that provides a definite adventure hook. The zeppelin on which the player's character is riding is gunned down, and the only other survivor dies shortly after giving the character a mysterious ring and instructions to “find the boy.” The player is then informed by a bystander – a neophyte religious devotee – that he is the reincarnation of an ancient elven deity. Shortly thereafter, mysterious assassins begin targeting the player. The opening is a magnificent call to adventure, and despite its propensity for disappearing for extended periods of time, the main storyline is highly compelling. It touches on a number of robust issues, from the costs of technology and resource usage, to race relations, to the philosophical implications of death and banishment. Though several key plot points are eventually dropped or forgotten, there can be no denying that the tale woven by the designers is if nothing else a wonderfully fitting excuse to explore and adventure in a strange new world.

The Bad
Though the creative elements of Arcanum are mostly praiseworthy, the technical elements (i.e. the gameplay) leave a terrible aftertaste. For every ingenius design decision as far as setting, character flexibility, and so on, there is an equally bafflingly terrible decision in the implementation thereof. I'm not quite sure whether this is better described as Newton's third law of gaming or as Murphy's law of gaming, but the fact remains that there are just as many (if not more) things that Arcanum does wrong as it does right.

For starters, the combat system in Arcanum just plain sucks. Why the designers of Fallout, which had one of the best RPG combat systems ever, were unable to implement something better than this is beyond me. The biggest contributor to this lackluster gameplay element is the fact that combat can be run in either turn-based or real-time mode, as Sierra insisted that the game not be solely turn-based for marketing reasons. On the surface, this appears to be yet another way of providing choice to the player, but such a choice is ultimately deceiving. Instead of being tactically sound like Fallout's or strangely addictive like Diablo's, Arcanum's combat systems are horrible shadows of the ones in those games. Combat becomes tedious, ridiculously easy, and flat-out pointless very quickly, as enemies seldom do anything other than charge into melee with the character. This battle conundrum is certainly due to the fact that it is difficult enough to balance a single combat system; trying to balance two separate ones within the same title is a near impossibility.

This lack of balance is without a doubt the game's biggest issue, not only in combat but in all aspects of the design. A lot of this problem comes from the designers' sheer ambition in providing unprecedented freedom in character development. There are so many things to choose from that it's simply impossible for all of them to be equally useful and/or represented in the game world. Some skills are useful maybe once in the entire game, while others (such as Melee and Dodge) are practically indispensable. In fact, pure melee characters have an almost ridiculously easy time with their adventure in Arcanum, due to the fact that experience is gained not for defeating an enemy, but rather for each successful attack. Melee characters thus level up at an alarmingly fast rate, and therefore obviously have a distinct advantage – a fact that even the game's manual is quick to admit. Other character types have a much more difficult time of things. “Hybrid” characters? Forget about it. Sure, they CAN be played, but the game is so ridiculously unbalanced against them that it's not advisable. Such is the double-edged sword nature of open-ended “free” game design, I suppose.

There is, however, ample evidence of a lack of polish and sufficient care in crafting the game that leads me to believe that there were certainly just plain bad decisions made in the game's design. Many gamers have often cited the outrageous number of bugs – not only in Arcanum, but in every game that Troika ever made – as a major drawback. There are definitely quite a few annoying bugs; I had issues with a random memory leak that slowed animations to a near crawl, as well as the fact that the game would fail to reset my display's brightness upon exiting the program, leaving my desktop a strangely luminescent white color until I manually went back in and reset it. There was nothing game crippling, but the bugs were annoying nonetheless.

The bugs, however, are minor compared to the overall lack of quality control that plagues Arcanum. Aside from the usual underdeveloped areas, quests, and NPCs (especially late in the game), there are many things that happen in gameplay that simply don't make any sense. For example, right before confronting the Schuylers about their dealings, I recruited the dwarven tech specialist, Magnus, who also had a beef with them. Without spoiling anything, I will simply say that Magnus and I decided to put an end to them, and emerged victorious in combat. Magnus thanked me for siding with him and permanently joined my party. Months of game time later, however, I asked Magnus to wait for me for a few minutes while I took care of a minor quest in one of the game's towns. When I asked him to rejoin me less than five minutes of real time later, he angrily refused. “Wait a minute,” he exclaimed, “you've been off making friendly with those Schuylers behind my back, haven't ye?” Umm, no Magnus, we killed them about nine months ago in game time, remember? Weird scripting errors like this one litter the game world. Characters remind me of things that we never talked about previously, I am given dialogue options detailing things that have never been mentioned in the game, and so on. While a few instances of this sort of thing are to be expected in any game of this magnitude, the sheer number of such errors in Arcanum falls just short of offensive.

The Bottom Line
I'm still not quite sure what to think about Arcanum. On the one hand, it's extremely appealing and outstanding; on the other, it's maddeningly inconsistent, poorly actualized, and sadly mediocre. Perhaps the best way for me to sum up Arcanum is as an ambitious failure, a flawed experience that is nevertheless appealing. I have made no secret of my mixed feelings toward this once-promising game, but after seven years and numerous playthrough attempts, I can finally say that this game has been an overall positive experience for me. This game certainly doesn't hold a candle to the upper echelon of CRPGs like Fallout or Planescape: Torment. Due to its incredibly unique and immersive world, though, it is still worth experiencing and enjoying – if its faults can be overlooked, that is. If you admire it for what it's trying to do and what it represents instead of what it ends up doing a lot of the time, you will find that it's a gem of an RPG, albeit an unpolished one.