Arcania - Fall of Setarrif

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Arcania - Fall of Setarrif
Studio GermanyGermany Spellbound Entertainment (Windows) Black Forest Games (Consoles)
GermanyGermany
Publisher AustriaAustria JoWooD / Nordic Games
SwedenSwedenAustriaAustria
Erstveröffent-
lichung		 Windows
October 25, 2011
PlayStation 3
May 28, 2013
Xbox 360
August 23, 2013
PlayStation 4
May 8, 2015
platform Windows , PlayStation 3 , Xbox 360 , PlayStation 4
Game engine Trinigy vision engine , PhysX engine
genre Action RPG , hack and slay
Subject Fantasy
Game mode Single player
control Keyboard , mouse , gamepad
system advantages
preconditions
medium DVD-ROM , download
language German , English , French , Italian , Spanish , Hungarian , Polish , Russian
Age rating
USK released from 12
PEGI recommended for ages 16+

Arcania - Fall of Setarrif ( spelling ArcaniA Fall of Setarrif ) is a linear action role-playing game from the former German development studio Spellbound Entertainment . The standalone - add to Arcania - Gothic 4 was originally the Austrian publisher JoWooD commissioned, but after delays and the bankruptcy of JoWooD until 25 October 2011 by Nordic Games released for PC. Console conversions for PlayStation 3 and 4 and Xbox 360 followed later .

action

Arcania - Fall of Setarrif continues the story of the nameless hero from Arcania . The game tells the story of the coastal town of Setarrif, which was already visible in the main game, but not accessible. The city in the east of the island of Argaan is haunted by a demon . To make matters worse, a volcano has also erupted in the nearby mountains . The game starts in front of the city walls of Thorniaras, where the main game ended. Thorniara itself cannot be entered in the add-on and so the hero has to leave to save Setarrif from the threat. In between, old friends from the predecessors can be played. With Gorn and Lester, the player slips into the role of two characters who have been known since the first Gothic part. In the course of the game, you first have to collect four keystones and then a few artifacts. Towards the end it goes to the volcano, where King Ethorn VI. being held captive. Finally, it is a matter of defeating the demon, whereupon the game ends.

While JoWooD originally advertised the game with a playing time of ten hours, Nordic Games later stated the game time as four to eight hours. The GameStar testers only needed three and a half hours according to their own information and ComputerBase speaks of a game time of four to five hours.

Game mechanics

The game works independently of the main game, but the player is given the option at the beginning to import the character from Arcania in order to continue playing in Fall of Setarrif . If you don't import a savegame from the main game, you have the choice between three character classes. As a fighter you have learned all hand-to-hand combat skills right from the start, the shooter has mastered all long-range combat talents and magicians have mastered the three spells right from the start. The further skill after leveling up is therefore limited to the other two skill trees . The central game element of the addon is the battles with action-packed gameplay. The blocking of enemy attacks is available as well as evasive roles. Fall of Setarrif offers new armor and weapons compared to the main game. These are carried into the field against various types of opponents such as minecrawlers, trolls , undead , zombie knights, fire warans and demon wolves . In between there are short dialogues with more or less funny sayings. There are a few side quests , but the overall gameplay is very linear and, in contrast to earlier Gothic games, the game world is very limited, so that it is hardly possible to explore beyond the given path. Large parts of the game take place in dungeons .

The game world includes areas in the east and northeast of the island of Argaan, which were not accessible in the main game. So also the eponymous coastal town of Setarrif, which could only be seen from the outside in Arcania . Setarrif, the troops of the king of Myrthana Rhobars III. was besieged under the leadership of General Lee, was the seat of Ethorn VI, who claimed control of the southern islands after a rebellion.

development

According to a JoWooD employee, Spellbound has been working on Arcania - Fall of Setarrif since March 2010 . One day after the release of the main game Arcania - Gothic 4 , Franz Rossler, CEO of JoWooD, announced on October 13, 2010 in an interview with the Austrian online stock market magazine Börse Express that they wanted to publish some add-ons for Arcania in the following year . In December 2010, publisher JoWooD announced Arcania - Fall of Setarrif as the first add-on for the action role-playing game. Despite the bankruptcy of JoWooD in January 2011, the add-on was retained. In February, JoWooD then announced March 25, 2011 as the release date for the PC version. Due to legal concerns, the release date has been postponed indefinitely two days before the planned release.

"It is unclear whether the game may be brought onto the market in its current form based on contractual agreements."

- Stefan Berger, Business Development Manager JoWooD : PC Games Hardware

In May 2011, Spellbound boss Andreas Speer stated in an interview that the game had been finished since mid-2010 and that only the bankruptcy of JoWooD intervened. On August 9, 2011, the German computer game magazine PC Games published a report that the Fall of Setarrif had been ready for sale for months. Photos showed pallets that, according to stickers, contained the game and should have been in stock since the end of 2010. The reason for the delay is a legal dispute between the insolvent publisher JoWooD and the investment fund BVT , which financed the main game Arcania - Gothic 4 . According to a JoWooD employee in a fan forum for the Gothic series, BVT was not involved in financing the add-on. The online magazine 4Players reported in various updates to the JoWooD press release from March that the background of the release postponement and the legal dispute between JoWooD and BVT was being discussed on various pages. After the restructuring process for JoWooD was discontinued and Nordic Games took over the JoWooD trademark in August 2011, Nordic Games announced the final release of Arcania - Fall of Setarrif for October 25th in September. According to PC Games, the game had been finished for some time at this point. On October 25, 2011, the title finally appeared as announced for Windows . The following year, developer Spellbound Entertainment also had to file for bankruptcy. For the PlayStation 3 , Fall of Setarrif only appeared in May 2013, together with the main game under the title Arcania - The Complete Tale . The implementation was taken over by the development studio Black Forest Games , which had been newly founded by former developers Spellbounds after the bankruptcy. On August 23, 2013, Fall of Setarrif was implemented for Xbox 360 . Arcania - The Complete Tale was also released for PlayStation 4 on May 8, 2015 .

As with the main game, the Mainz-based composition studio Dynamedion was responsible for the background music for Fall of Setarrif .

reception

reviews
publication Rating
4players 50%
GameStar 58%
GBase 5/10
Spieletipps.de 42%
Meta-ratings
Metacritic 41%

Arcania - Fall of Setarrif received mostly negative reviews. The German computer game magazine GameStar already described the game in the title of the online edition of their test as "dreary snitching". According to the author Kevin Stich, the add-on does not only inherit the weaknesses of the main game, it even "expands" them to some extent. The game world is “empty”, quests are in short supply, the story told is irrelevant and the battles are monotonous. The humor in the dialogues is "meanwhile very close to the pain limit of the infantile".

“But we can't recommend the title to anyone. Especially not Gothic fans. "

- Kevin Stich : GameStar

The online magazine 4Players gives the title a certain atmosphere. In conclusion, the author explains that Fall of Setarrif is rounder than the failed Arcania , but above all criticizes the limitations of the game world, which usually do not give the opportunity to deviate from the main quest.

"A would-be Gothic follow-up through which you can slaughter yourselves quite listlessly."

- Bodo Naser : 4Players

The trade magazine ComputerBase noted the technically perfect condition of the game. The testers did not find any serious bugs, but the visual possibilities of the technical framework were only played out occasionally. The "dungeons that were slapped without love" were criticized as well as the basic concept, which had absolutely nothing to do with the open world of its predecessor.

"The last addon for Gothic 4 is lame"

- Sasan Abdi : Computer base

In the technology check of the PC Games Hardware , the numerous rendering techniques of the game engine and the successful dynamic lighting are praised. Reload stutters are very rare. While there is a measurable advantage through more processor cores , the game mainly relies on a strong GPU . All in all, the Arcania Addon offers "more of the old in every respect".

The website GBase.de kept the game low compared to high-budget games price and the independent running ability benefits, however, criticized the lack of edge smoothing options. Vienna.at describes Fall of Setarrif as a technically very well made and coherent product, which is certainly not an RPG , but a "graphically delicious" hack and slay with RPG elements. The Hessische Niedersächsische Allgemeine also confirms that the Fall of Setarrif basically does not deserve the title role-playing game.

“Boring expansion with a game world just as empty as the last third of the main game. Despite the short playing time, the opposite of entertaining. "

- Spieletipps.de

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Arcania: Fall of Setarrif - All information, release, PC system requirements. In: GameStar . Retrieved August 19, 2019 .
  2. ↑ David Martin: Arcania: The Complete Tale for PS3 in the video - Technically as weak as the two-year-old Xbox 360 version. In: PC Games . April 23, 2013, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  3. ↑ a b ArcaniA - Fall of Setarrif. In: Xbox Marketplace. Retrieved August 19, 2019 .
  4. ^ A b Steven Wilcken: Arcania The Complete Tale in the short test. In: Playstation 4 Fan. Inwave media GmbH, May 31, 2015, accessed on August 19, 2019 .
  5. ↑ a b Raffael Vötter: Arcania Fall of Setarrif: Downsampling shots and impressions from the Gothic 4 addon. In: PC Games Hardware . October 13, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  6. ↑ a b The-Khoa Nguyen: Arcania: Gothic 4 - Fall of Setarrif - Standalone-Addon is now available. In: PC Games . October 26, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  7. ↑ Hanno Neuhaus: Arcania: Fall of Setarrif - release date is fixed. In: GameStar . February 14, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  8. ↑ a b Sebastian Thöig: Arcania: Fall of Setarrif - Addon for Gothic 4 appears via Nordic Games. In: PC Games . September 22, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  9. ↑ a b c d e Kevin Stich: Arcania: Fall of Setarrif in the test - dreary add-on Schnetzelei. In: GameStar . October 26, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  10. ↑ a b c Sasan Abdi: ArcaniA: Fall of Setarrif in the test: The last addon for Gothic 4 is lame. In: ComputerBase . October 26, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  11. ↑ M-Venom, Community Manager - JoWooD Group: Answers from the Questions-to-Jowood Reloaded thread. In: World of Players. December 17, 2010, accessed August 20, 2019 .
  12. ↑ 'Operationally, I expect a profit in the fourth quarter'. Interview with Franz Rossler. (No longer available online.) In: Börse Express. October 13, 2010, archived from the original on February 26, 2016 ; accessed on August 19, 2019 .
  13. ↑ David Martin: Arcania Gothic 4: Fall of Setarrif - Jowood announces the first addon for the role-playing game. In: videogameszone.de. December 9, 2010, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  14. ^ Arcania: Fall of Setarrif Release in March. In: insidegames.ch. February 15, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  15. ↑ a b Andreas Link: Arcania - Fall of Setarrif: Gothic-4-Addon is delayed indefinitely. In: PC Games Hardware . March 23, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  16. ↑ Petra Fröhlich: Jowood theme week, day 7: Spellbound boss Andreas Speer: "No updates for Arcania". In: PC Games . May 25, 2011, accessed August 20, 2019 .
  17. ↑ Daniel Herbig: Arcania: Fall of Setarrif - Addon has been ready for sale for months. In: PC Games . August 9, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  18. ↑ M-Venom, Community Manager - JoWooD Group: Answers from the Questions-to-Jowood Reloaded thread. In: World of Players. December 15, 2010, accessed August 20, 2019 .
  19. ↑ Julian Dasgupta: Arcania - Fall of Setarrif: Release postponed. In: 4Players . March 24, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  20. ↑ Yves Günther: Spellbound Entertainment AG - German developer files for bankruptcy. In: Gameswelt . March 22, 2012, Retrieved August 19, 2019 .
  21. ↑ ArcaniA - The Complete Tale for PS3 - New name, new system, new luck? In: World of Gothic. Retrieved August 19, 2019 .
  22. ↑ M-Venom, Community Manager - JoWooD Group: The addon "ArcaniA Gothic 4 - Fall of Setarrif" is now official. First answers to the addon. In: World of Players. December 10, 2010, accessed August 20, 2019 .
  23. ↑ a b Arcania: Fall of Setarrif for PC Reviews. Based on 10 reviews. In: Metacritic . Retrieved August 19, 2019 .
  24. ↑ a b c Bodo Naser: Test: Arcania: Fall of Setarrif. In: 4Players . November 10, 2011, accessed August 19, 2019 .
  25. ↑ a b Arcania - Fall of Setarrif. In: Spieletipps.de . Retrieved August 19, 2019 .
  26. ^ A b Daniel Boll: ArcaniA - Fall of Setarrif: Review. Conclusion. In: GBase.de. October 29, 2011, accessed August 20, 2019 .
  27. ↑ Alf Waibel: Demon Hunt: Arcania "The Fall of Setarrif". In: Vienna.at. November 2, 2011, accessed August 20, 2019 .
  28. ↑ Fall of Setarrif: Insignificant Carnage. In: HNA . October 27, 2011, accessed August 20, 2019 .