Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magic Obscura

**Azathoth** · 11-13-2009, 05:18

I played it a couple of years back but quit a few hours in for some reason.

I remembered it and decided that I was still interested in the premise, and researched it a bit online.

So, basically, people are comparing this to Planetscape: Torment, and it seems to have a huge and active fanbase. Anyone ever hear of this game?

**Meneldil** · 11-13-2009, 11:23

Yes. I also couldn't make it far into the game. For some reason, it didn't catch my attention like BG1&2, NWN2 or even IWD. Looks like a great game, but I think it missed something.

I looked up for informations about it lately, and saw that a lot of unnofficial patches have been released.

**rvg** · 11-13-2009, 14:23

One of the greatest RPGs ever made. Despite its horrendous graphics, the storyline made it a very good game.

**econ21** · 11-13-2009, 16:32

Arcanum had an absolutely wonderful atmosphere. The premise was fun - magic and fantasy races in a Victorian type era industrialising world. The opening movie sets the scene - ogres in biplanes shooting down the zeppelin you are travelling in. And the execution of the premise was superb - in large part due to the evocative "courtly" style of dialogue (instead of just saying "yes", an random citizen would say "Indubitably, madam" or some such) and some lovely evocative music. I had great fun running around the main city, doing interesting quests. It's less talky and morbid than PST, which I confess I found a good thing.

The character creation system allows lots of options - rather like Fallout's SPECIAL or, at more of a stretch, the Morrowind/Oblivion system. There's also quite an interesting crafting system. So, lots of stats and stuff.

The main failing was the combat, which was rather jerky and frenetic, with lots of unbalanced stuff (magic>tech; fast low level weapons> slow higher level ones; grenades + ogres>all etc). The combat was not nearly as well done as the turn-based Fallout style or the Infinity Engine pausable real time approach. Something to be endured and got past, rather than enjoyed or used to devise fun tactics etc.

I think there was also more work done on the first half or so of the game, with the end game tailing off. The earlier areas are rich and vivid, but things get much more empty and rushed towards the end. I gave up on it once I had done with the main city and initial quest hub.

The closest comparator for me would be with Fallout 1 and 2. Not as good as them, but sharing sufficient virtues for it not to be ashamed to be put in their company.

I think it was a Troika game, an outfit involving many of the staff who had made Fallout (and PST?). They went on to produce Temple of Elemental Evil which gets every thing right that Arcanum got wrong (combat) but gets every thing wrong that Arcanum got right (atmosphere, plot and questing). They finally struck gold with Vampires Bloodlines, which was so good it made the company go bust. People just don't recognise quality.

**gollum** · 11-13-2009, 16:35

Originally posted by econ21
People just don't recognise quality.

On the contrary they do it very well which is how/why they manage to avoid it so consistently.

**Lemur** · 11-14-2009, 08:18

I enjoyed the heck out of that game back in the day. Yes, combat wasn't great, but it scored so well on the originality front, I couldn't get too grumpy.