http://www.gametrailers.com/video/e3-09-arcania/51098.
Make of it what you will....Looks overdone in the graphics department and not enough in the gameplay..
(Thanks for the link, Arkose)

It certainly looks interesting. But there isn't much shown about the gameplay.
I'll wait and see...

Talks some about cool features but shows nothing. I'd much rather have them sacrifice graphical detail for gameplay, content and making world come alive (animation, npc scedules etc.).
Edit: replaced lot with some :P

Did you watch a differen't video to me? I think he talked about puddles and graphics for 90% of both the videos.

Ok, lot is exaggerating :P some would be more precise.
NPC's reacting to time of day (schedules?), weather and everything. Ok one cool feature :P but the video it self doesn't show any of it as there's no NPC's yet :P Graphics and physics look and sound nice but they don't tell much about content not to mention my computer probably will choke if I try to play the game with any decent settings.

I'm excited about Arcania, if only because it's part of the Gothic series. Don't forget though, that we also have a new Gothic style RPG straight from Piranha Bytes themselves with their game Risen.

I don't know if it's just me but this game looks too much like Oblivion. And it's not so good. I'm afraid the old Gothic is gone and the new one is not going to be that exciting. Hope i'm wrong but I'm not holding my breath for that one.

There a recent preview (in French, unfortunately) here: http://www.jeuxvideo.com/articles/0001/00010960-arcania-a-gothic-tale-e3-2009-preview.htm
And there are some interesting points:
- There are some instant-travel monuments and a mini-map, but if you don't want to use them (and play like the old Gothic), they're optional and you can turn them off (something I'm sure some would've love to in games like Oblivion).
- The combat system has been revamped. There's not too much details about it, though. You can lock on your enemies, but you can also choose not to (and you get a damage bonus if you don't lock on).
- The combat seems similar to Revenant. You have an endurance bar and you have many different fighting moves that takes more or less endurance that you can chain in combos.You can also use side-moves (attacking on the sides) if you're against a group of enemies (the combat is said to be harder than Gothic 3).
- Spellbound seemed to have incorporated weather effects in the gameplay. It seems that in some way, you can control weather and NPCs will be affected (one of the examples given is that you can make a guard leave his post by starting a rainstorm.
That's all I could find in that preview in particular. It looks promising, but it's still a preview and a few things may change. It certainly looks like Spellbound is on the right track.
And if this one fails, there's still Risen.

well, to be fair, all the gothic games did have instant travel in terms of the teleporter stones. In the first two you didn't get them until a little later, but gothic 3 you got them whenever you found a new city (if you found them), so in that respect its not any different.
i'll check it out when it comes out, but if its like gothic 3 release I'll stay far away.

Wow, I had only been judging it on the idea of another company developing and the shitty teaser trailer before (oh, and the really really really bad "expansion" that was supposed to fix all the bugs of G3 made by another team), but this doesn't actually look so bad. It doesn't really look like Gothic, to be sure, but it still looks like it could be a fun romp. A lot of what he said was hyperbole, you could tell, and the comment about trying to make it accessible to American consumers where the series isn't well-known was a little ominous (dumbing down???).
I hope they get the same 5 voice actors who played every character in the three Pirahna Bytes games. Love those guys. :)
Risen looks to be very promising. I wish JoWood didn't pressure PB into rushing the development of Gothic 3 so much, though, and then blame the massive buggy levels on them before firing their asses. PB are good, if clumsy, developers.

Gothic 4 is also supposed to feature Thorniarra, the generic medieval whore....with more sex scenes than Alpha Protocol!!

From what I understand, he becomes a jerkface after stay with xardas so long and acts like a dick to everyone around him.
I hope gothic 4 will be good at least. If not, I'll pick it up two years latter at $6 at biglots.

After having played the Risen demo -- I don't see what Spellbound has left to work with. I'd feel bad if I didn't know JoWood are jerks...I bet they regret it now. :P

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2V1l3Fuu3g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLHvChSPXhM