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《哥特王朝》的世界极其逼真——人们的交流神态、人物的内心动机、人物的所处环境，甚至小到我们所选择的色调，都是为了打造一个栩栩如生的世界，与同类型游戏常用的史诗奇幻风大相径庭。
The world of Gothic is much closer to reality – the way people talk, their motivations and surroundings, even down to the colour palette we choose, is all about creating a world that is a step away from the high-fantasy fare that we see so often in the genre.
Kai Rosenkranz
《哥特王朝 2》美术和编曲Kai Rosenkranz,
Gothic II's artist and composer
与其他 RPG 游戏相比，《哥特王朝》系列的战斗场面要少得多，但每一个敌人都很致命，存在感十足。他们也许是任务目标，也许是前进道路上的“拦路虎”，但绝对不是“炮灰”。
The Gothic series has less combat than most other RPGs, but every single enemy is meaningful and can be deadly. They are used as objectives or obstacles, not as cannon fodder.
敌人种类繁多，每种敌人都有专门的动画模组。对于玩家而言，成功战胜敌人带来的成就感并不来自于角色升级后的奖励，而是玩家自身游戏技术提高的真实反馈。当然，正是因为《哥特王朝 2》有许多匠心独具的地图设计，许多恰到好处的战利品，才能让玩家在花上 20 个小时才杀死一只怪物后，仍能获得极大的满足感。若非如此，战斗机制的魅力恐怕会大打折扣。
魔法大幅削弱了战斗的多样性。一般来说，用最称手的毁灭系法术对敌方实施“地毯式轰炸”，就能轻而易举赢下战斗。如果你不喜欢亲自战斗，那就索性召唤一支不死大军，所向披靡。
不过，游戏世界观及其呈现方式弥补了这种看似破坏平衡性的设定。并不是说，一旦成为法师，主角就可以拿着火球怼天怼地。你必须前往修道院，缴付一笔天价费用后才能入内。接着你还要花大量时间做一件件鸡毛蒜皮的跑腿任务，这样才能有机会接触魔法秘术。
《哥特王朝 2》继承前作独特的角色系统，你要找到训练师来提升角色属性与技能。
Given the diverse number of enemies, each with their own animation sets, learning to duel successfully feels like an earned skill by the end rather than a reward for your avatar's numbers going up. Of course, the combat wouldn't be half as effective at feeling rewarding if it wasn't for the world being filled with expertly crafted locations and hand-placed loot that makes it all the more satisfying when you finally beat that enemy that blocked the path 20 hours ago.
Magic sidesteps a lot of the combat's complexity, usually devolving into slinging your favourite damage spell or summoning an army of undead critters if you want to avoid fighting altogether.
However, its merits lies in world-building and presentation. You don't just pick the Mage class and start shooting fireballs left and right; you have to go to their monastery, pay an exorbitant entrance fee and then spend your time doing mundane quests before being allowed to practise the mystical arts.
Gothic II keeps its predecessor’s unique character system. You’ll have to find trainers to improve your stats and skills.
现在《哥特王朝》的玩家社群仍在制作 mod。在 2021 年，一个波兰团队发布了《米尔塔纳编年史：阿克罗斯（The Chronicles of Myrtana: Archolos）》，这是一个出色的完全颠覆性 mod，在 Steam 上收到了超过 4000 个好评。
There's still a community of Gothic players creating mods. In 2021, a Polish team released The Chronicles of Myrtana: Archolos, a fantastic total conversion mod that got over 4,000 positive reviews on Steam.
与前作一样，《哥特王朝 2》给玩家灌输这样的概念：魔法神秘莫测、极为隐秘，必须要花大功夫才能驾驭。
事先提醒，每一款《哥特王朝 2》的英文移植版都自带《渡鸦之夜（Night of the Raven）》扩展包[1] 。后者以原作为基础，开放一个新地图，新增大量优质任务。但由于老玩家抱怨原作游戏不够难，所以移植版难度也大幅提高。新手必须要做好心理准备，游戏前期玩家要有毅力，否则将难以为继。
如果说，《哥特王朝 2》的内容质量自始至终都扎实过硬，那我肯定是在说谎。很多与我一样的《哥特王朝》爱好者都认为游戏后期的内容明显退步——地下城探险可谓乏善可陈，探索的乐趣性也大幅削弱。但即便如此，这款游戏仍值得我们从头到尾细细品味。因为哪怕放到现在，这款游戏的开放世界设定仍称得上无与伦比，虽然难度较大，但质量优秀。《上古卷轴（The Elder Scrolls）》系列为当代开放世界 RPG 游戏的发展奠定基础。如果拥有这般影响力的游戏系列不是《上古卷轴》，而是《哥特王朝》，那么如今开放世界 RPG 游戏又会呈现出怎样的面貌，这一点耐人寻味。
模组：
系统包（System Pack）：更新《哥特王朝》的游戏引擎，渲染距离更远，分辨率更高，稳定性更好，还附带几个额外模组。
D3D11-渲染器（D3D11-Renderer）：优化引擎的图像功能，增加游戏场景的植被量，增设动态阴影，性能更佳。
寒冬（L’Hiver）：大型模组包，加入新道具、新敌人，全新高清材质，对原版游戏做出微调，引入饥饿值、口渴值等新功能。由于该模组对游戏改动颇大，所以建议多周目玩家游玩。
薇拉雅 - 勇者传说（Velaya - Tale of a Warrior）：一款流行的民间任务模组，故事发生在《哥特王朝 2》后，讲述一个女子追寻荣耀的故事，游戏时长约为 40 个小时。
Just like its predecessor, Gothic II goes to great lengths to instill the mysterious and esoteric nature of magic and that it's something that needs to be earned.
A word of warning: every English release of Gothic II comes with the Night of the Raven expansion. It adds a new region and quite a few quality quests to the base game, but also raises the difficulty significantly in response to fan complaints. Newcomers should be aware that perseverance is key in the early parts.
I'd lying if I said that Gothic II maintains its level of quality throughout; indeed, many fans like me bemoan the fact the end tends to degenerate into mediocre dungeon-crawling and exploration is a lot less satisfying. But even with that in mind, the game is still more than worthy of being experienced from start to finish for its still-unmatched, harsh-but-fair exercise in open-world design. One can only wonder how open-world RPGs would look like today if Gothic instead of The Elder Scrolls had shaped their progress.
Mods:
SystemPack: A patch that updates the Gothic engine, allowing for better draw distances, higher resolutions, more stability and the use of several mods.
D3D11-Renderer: A huge graphical update to the engine, adding more vegetation, dynamic shadows, better performance and other improvements.
L’Hiver: A large mod pack that adds new items, enemies, HD textures, tweaks and features like hunger/thirst.
It brings some heavy changes to the game, so might be better if kept for a second playthrough.
Velaya - Tale of a Warrior: A popular fan-made adventure set after the events of Gothic II. It tells the story of a women in search of glory and lasts about 40 hours.
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3 《哥特王朝》有一个大型社区，玩家在这里发布模组，但大多数模组都是德语版。
《电脑 RPG 游戏史（The CRPG Book Project）》原书信息
英文原版主编：Felipe Pepe
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这本书历时四年，由 119 名志愿者共同完成。
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