[Vaana]

GOTHIC - CONSOLE PORTS

As some of you might know, a console port of Gothic was announced at one point. As this port was never released, it has been largely forgotten and people that even know about it seem to regard it just as it being marketing-talk nonsense and not a real game.

However, I would like to take a second look at this supposed port and consider everything that we know about it.

---

In 2001, the publisher Xicat Interactive was chosen to be the publisher of Gothic in North America. After the English version of Gothic, which was released November of 2001, it seems that Xicat had more plans for Gothic than just a translation.

These plans were revealed in March of the following year, when Nintendo of America stated in a press release that Gothic would be released on the Nintendo GameCube by Xicat. [ign.com]

A short while later in May at E3, we learn that Gothic would also be released on the Xbox as can be seen from a "Planned Releases" press document from Xicat.

Spoiler:(zum lesen bitte Text markieren)

[Bild: 9A30PDp.jpg]

[Bild: xicat2.jpg]

[Bild: xicat3.jpg]

Enter the world of Gothic on Xbox

Embark, on a timeless adventure in Gothic a brilliantly woven action-RPG of epic proportions. In the dark land of Myrtana, a rebellious insurrection has begun, isolating the people in an unpenetrable barrier. Meanwhile, the armies of evil are mounting the neighbouring lands, ready to take the Kingdom by storm. You are the one warrior who can unite the land, and save Myrtana from total destruction.

Now the classic RPG is making it's way to Xbox. With all new quests and adventures, the already expansive world of Gothic is now larger than ever. Feel the complete immersion with 3D positional audio. Experience the real-time living environments using the full graphic capabilities of the Xbox. With over 250 characters to interact with in a fully working world, Gothic will be one of the most anticipated RPGs for Xbox this year.

The Xbox port was supposed to feature "all new quests and adventures" (whatever that means ). A release date of Q4 2002 was set, which was later changed to March 2003.

In September of 2002, the Creative Director of Xicat, John Linn, had an interview over on xboxexclusive.com in which he talked about the console ports of Gothic as well a several other games. [xboxexclusive.com]

Gothic is an epic RPG, quite similar to Morrowind, but with a little more emphasis on a progressive, non-linear storyline, and interaction with the environment. Gothic has been released on PC, and is going to be launched on Xbox, PS2, and GameCube simultaneously (with the Xbox version seeing the best graphics, of course).

In the instance of Gothic and Top Angler, the developers are really pushing the XBox's power. Both games will feature much better frame rates, textures, and graphical effects; We're focusing on the really atmospheric areas of the games; the sky, water and weather being the primary concerns. Gothic will also feature a more robust soundtrack thanks to the XBox's Dolby Digital encoding. Both Metal Dungeon and Blackstone are being developed with Xbox in mind, so the games will reflect this. Both are definitive Xbox experiences.

When asked if these console ports (including Gothic) would have Xbox Live capabilities:

4. Are they going to be online with Xbox live?

The above mentioned games are not going to use Xbox live connectivity.

As you can see here, the game would also be ported to the PlayStation 2 along with Xbox and GameCube.

In October of 2002, Gameswelt reported that Xicat was also looking at the possibility of porting Gothic 2 to the consoles, however nothing was set in stone yet. [gameswelt.de]

Erst kürzlich kündigte Xicat Interactive an, 'Zanzarah: The Hidden Portal' für GameCube, Xbox und PlayStation 2 umzusetzen, doch dabei will man es offensichtlich nicht belassen. Wie im offiziellen Forum der Entwickler, welche den Zuschlag für die PC-Version von 'Gothic 2' nicht erhielten, nämlich nun bekannt gegeben wurde, arbeitet man derzeit daran, die Konsolen-Rechte am Titel zu sichern. In trockenen Tüchern scheint allerdings noch nichts. Sollte jedoch alles glatt gehen, dürfen sich womöglich auch Besitzer von GameCube, Xbox und PlayStation 2 auf ein Rollenspiel der Extraklasse freuen.

In March of 2003, when the game was supposed to release, a Xicat representative reassured the fans that an Xbox port was still in the works. [rpgdot.rpgwatch.com]

This title was never set to be released soon. I am not quite sure why EB and Gamestop would have been listing it for a presale when it is over a year away. To ease you mind, the project has NOT been cancelled.

However, here is where the story mostly ends.

Special thanks to Nex for finding some of this info

---

The question now becomes whether or not any work on this port was ever started. If the ports were announced in an official capacity even by Nintendo themselves it seems that it would have been a serious project. However, I know nothing more.

If you have any info relating to this topic, regardless of how major or minor it is, I would urge you to share here.

The Gothic series and consoles seem to have a complicated history. Gothic 3 was also supposed to make an apperance on the Xbox 360 but this was ultimately not possible due to technical reasons.

[Jazz Jackrabbit]

I think the limited amount of RAM was the biggest challenge in bringing Gothic to consoles and ultimately the reason it never came out. Gothic 1 on PC had a minimum RAM requirement of 128 MB, the original Xbox had only half that much, the other consoles had even less than that. Also to further complicate things the entire game would have to be streamed from the DVD. Maybe the memory consumption could be reduced by deacreasing the draw distance, with some clever texture streaming running in the background and by breaking up the level into chunks that can be loaded and unloaded while you play. But even if they got it running I think people would have complained that it doesn't look as good as other games on the Xbox.