For me Gothic 2 (including the Night of the Raven addon) is one of the best games ever. Possibly the best. Gothic 1 is a classic as well.

Gothic 3 was a mess when it was released, but now I think it is great (with the fan patch). I actually think it is better than Risen (which I like, but the game world is a bit small and there was not enough to do).

Forsaken Gods is (was?) completely broken, and I did not play it for more than 15 minutes or so (twice). I will give it another chance now that the patch is released.

I have not tried Gothic 4 yet.

With the patch I must say that the game is fixed. Steam say that I played it for 7 hours and so far not a single bug, no broken quests.
I have found and explored 3 of the towns and have done lots of quests.

I doubt that any new to the Gothics player is going to like it, because the game is lagging no matter what, combat is frustrating and quests are dull. But since I liked Gothic 3, I like Forsaken God too, after the community patches ofcource.
Voice acting is meh, but there is nothing that beats the nameless one meeting for first time some one and answering their questions with "I am here to punch you in the face" lol
I love his violent attitude and the cocky way he acts no matter who the opponent is.

Basically it's one of those deals that you know you can't go wrong. The Gothic franchise offers countless hours of roaming in traditionally obscure and darkened fairy-tale like worlds.

I remember that the first time I came upon the Sleeper and his followers in G1 I almost pissed my pants and a couple of weeks ago I had a shiver or two while playing G2 - for the 10th or so time - and came upon a graveyard on the back side of the mountain you see in front of you after leaving Khorinis from the eastern exit.

I honored this Steam sale by buying the Forsaken Gods expansion (2.50 euros, meh), the rest of the games I already have.

PS: Needless to say that any gamer who hasn't played at least one of the Gothic games must be burned alive at the game-stake.

Gothic I was only able to play a small part of - I had a second hand copy and the speech files for the game were damaged somehow. The story seemed interesting, from what I could gather Controls were clunky, but functional. Graphics were okay. Overall I remember it as being frustrating at times, but fun.

Gothic 2 I found to be a fair refinement over the original - the controls were simplified (in a good way), graphics were improved, and everything worked for me correctly. A fun, challenging and unique game. Sadly, I don't have the Night of the Raven expansion.

Gothic 3 I apparently had quite a different experience with than most people did. It ran just fine for me from the day I bought it (just a few weeks after release, with no patches). Considering my computer at the time (Pentium 4 3.06GHz, 1GB RAM, nVidia GeForce 6200), that was kind of amazing. Overall I found it less interesting than Gothic 2, however the graphics were quite nice and the huge world was fun to explore. Didn't play Forsaken Gods.

Gothic 4 I have only played the demo version of. It felt clunky, performance was relatively bad and there were invisible walls everywhere. It also seemed somewhat like a console port. Didn't like it.

Risen is more of a Gothic game than Gothic 4 could ever hope to be. The style of the game reminded me of Gothic 2, in quite a good way. The story was good. Gameplay was initially a bit tricky until I worked out the timing in combat. Graphics and perfomance were both great. Overall a great experience. (I'm quite annoyed with the Australian Classification Board for banning it from sale here though -__- )

I'm definitely looking forward to Risen 2: Dark Waters.

The fan patch for Gothic 3 brings it to Risen and Arcania Quality of game... you NEED the fanpatch to make it playable... it removes nearly all the bugs and fixes the stun lock issues of the wild animals...

I have to say with the fan patch Gothic 3 is one of my top shelf games for a fun quick to jump into RPG exsperiance... Risen is next (horrible ending) and recently ive been falling in love with G4, so good... *hugs his copy*

lol some people are really pissed off at this series, like i said earlier dont even touch this game unless you are an harcore rpg gamer or else will end up raging like this
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1807019

I have only played Gothic 1 to 3 (no expansions). But I - maybe I'm just a crazy old RPG'er - loved the Gothic series more than I did The Elder Scrolls. So what if Gothic didn't feel as polished as TES. But I felt more part of the story with Gothic than with TES. TES are more open, but that just means that you feel you have to do the same quest over and over again, whereas Gothic felt more like a storyline - and yet, in no way too linear.

So there you have it: it's been a while since I played any of the Gothic titles, but I have fond memories of them. As they say: Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

I have my doubts about Arcania, but if I can get it for 5 euro, I'll buy it. For now I'm waiting for Risen to be below 15 euro's.

Gothic 1 and 2 are some of my favourite games. Gothic 2 with Night Of The Raven is incredible! I spent a whole summer indoors when Gothic 2 first came out.

Gothic 3 was terrible for me, it was far too easy to just click the mouse over and over so you'd swing your sword back and forth, back and forth, and you could pretty much kill anything the game offered you without any skill. I haven't tried it with the fan patch, could anyone tell me if the fan patch does anything for combat?

I've got Gothic 4 but I've yet to play it

That seemed to be the main battle cry for the better part of the decade. G3 is about right with the final fan made patches, but boy, did they screw up non their winning streak. And it happened just when things got interesting. Such a shame.

Hope the new Risen string goes along better. Risen is just like G1, but I couldn't get into it like I did for the latter. I still enjoyed every (non-final two hour of play) minute of it.

According to the changelog (and the manual), on top of fixing a ton of bugs for the combat system, they also implented a block system and greately expanded the AI (They'll actually try to circle you and they'll exploit the block system too). And yes, they'll be able to break your swinging combo and counter-attack (if I understood right).

After playing some more Forsaken Gods I am hooked again to Gothic.

I am planning after finish it, to start a new game in Gothic 3 with the latest community patch and may be the addon for quests if I can find info how to install it.

The world is so awesome and true, every building, hut looks like real one, full with small details. Castles are so nicely done, I can't stop walking inside them or look at them from afar.

Shame the fall of Gothic started after Gothic 3, because of crappy engine, no optimization and not really good RPG aspects.

Gothic 2 is the best game ever.

The start may be a bit slow, but the game is truly amazing when you get into it. Buy it, play it, love it.