The Chronicles of Myrtana: Archolos - Review

The Chronicles of Myrtana: Archolos is an open-world action-adventure role-playing game, based on the popular Gothic series, which was originally developed by Piranha Bytes in the early 2000s. As a total conversion mod for Gothic 2, created by fans and released near the very end of 2021, Archolos offers a full-length, standalone experience with up to 100 hours or more of content in an all-original map and story, plus tons of new mechanics and upgrades to the existing Gothic formula. It's therefore worth stressing that this isn't just a mod for Gothic 2, but it's an entirely new game altogether, one so extensive and professional in quality that it could easily be confused for an official Gothic game. It is completely free to download and play, so long as you have a copy of Gothic 2: Gold Edition on which to run it. The mod was originally written in Polish and features professional Polish voice acting, but includes English subtitles as well as other language options for the interface and subtitles.

While you could conceivably play Archolos as your first introduction to the Gothic series, due to it occurring chronologically first and being a mostly separate adventure that requires no prior knowledge of the Gothic series to understand, it's an experience that's probably best enjoyed if you've already played Gothic 1 and 2 so that you can appreciate the extra refinement that it brings to the established formula, in addition to all the small references and Easter eggs that set up future events in the series. 

The game takes place during a tipping point in the orc war against humanity, several years before the start of Gothic 1, as the orcs begin to seize the upper hand and as the war's effects begin to be felt among the common folk in the outer reaches of the kingdom. You play as a young man named Marvin, fleeing from your hometown with your brother Jorn to the island of Archolos, in hopes of escaping the war and starting a new life. While trying to integrate yourself with the local farming village, your brother is mysteriously kidnapped, thus instigating the main quest to track him down and learn more about the people responsible. The rest of the game involves exploring a densely-structured open world map where enemies and loot do not scale to your level; completing side quests for various NPCs and communities to gain their trust and earn valuable rewards; and leveling up your character by investing skill points in different categories so you can get better at fighting all the difficult enemies that populate the world. 

If you're familiar with the early Gothic games, then you'll feel right at home with Archolos, since it's based on the same engine and uses all of the same core mechanics, even reusing a bunch of the exact same audiovisual components. That simple basis does a lot of heavy lifting in terms of achieving that authentic Gothic feel, since it shares more of the same fundamental DNA than every other Piranha Bytes game to have come out since Gothic 1 and 2. However, Archolos does feature a certain "je ne sais quoi" in its design that extends a little deeper than simply copying those superficial aspects -- it really achieves an authentic feel in the tone and atmosphere, the early game difficulty and progression, the world design and exploration, as well as the general quest design and character interactions, with the added benefit of a lot of key improvements to various mechanics that weren't necessarily problems in the original games, but are all the more welcome to see in Archolos. This includes things like new quality of life improvements, new evolution on existing mechanics, all-new features and systems, and corrections for certain issues that Piranha Bytes never had the chance to address originally. You could even argue that some things are done even better than the originals, which is facilitated by the developers having 20 years of fan feedback from the original games to incorporate into Archolos. So in a way, it does kind of feel like "Gothic 2: Night of the Raven, But Better."

No One Lives Forever: Review + Full Series Retrospective (Replay)

Note: I had previously reviewed the full series back in 2016; you can read the original review here. This review is an updated version that's been largely re-written with updated and expanded thoughts, along with a full video version, seen here. 

The Operative: No One Lives Forever and its sequel, No One Lives Forever 2: A Spy in HARM's Way, are a series of first-person shooters developed by Monolith Productions in 2000 and 2002, in which players take the role of 1960s secret agent Cate Archer trying to stop a villainous criminal organization from taking over the world. Typical gameplay involves combinations of run-and-gun action as you fight off hordes of enemy henchmen; sneaky stealth action as you try to infiltrate facilities undetected; exploring varied level environments to find hidden intelligence and bonus equipment upgrades; going undercover and mingling with civilians to meet with informants or interview suspects, occasionally even picking dialogue choices; riding vehicles through exotic locations; and watching cutscenes that progressively tell the game's lengthy story as Cate trots the globe to diverse and exotic locations to complete a variety of different objectives en route to saving the day. Both games also feature a strong humorous component with lots of genre-spoofing dialogue and jokes, thus lending them a much more whimsical and lighthearted tone than your typical shooter. Oh, and there's also Contract JACK, a stand-alone spinoff from 2003 that's loosely connected to the series, but uh, there's a reason it's not discussed much when it comes to the NOLF series and is perhaps better forgotten about, but don't worry -- I'll explain why in due time. 

 

Originally PC exclusives before seeing the first game ported to the PlayStation 2, the NOLF series received critical praise at the time but only ever achieved moderate financial success, having been overshadowed by so many other major releases in the surrounding years, and was soon abandoned by Monolith in favor of new series like FEAR and Condemned a few years later. A series of publisher acquisitions and mergers subsequently allowed the copyright to fall into no man's land, with none of the companies who MIGHT own it actually knowing for sure if they do or not, and none of them having any apparent interest in finding out, despite developer Nightdive Studios' best efforts in recent years while attempting to file for the license in order to do a remake. The games have therefore never been re-released beyond their initial run, nor made available for digital download on modern distribution platforms like Steam or GOG, while any attempt at a remake or legacy sequel has been shut down due to all the legal uncertainty, thus cementing the series legacy in the annals of video game history as lost, forgotten gems. 

Slay the Spire - Review 2025 | Why is this game so addicting?

Slay the Spire is a deck-building roguelike card game in the style of a turn-based dungeon-crawler, in which you choose one of four characters and try to ascend through a series of increasingly difficult combat encounters and random events so you can defeat the heart at the end and slay the titular spire. As a roguelike game, you will go through a different path every time, with randomized encounters therein, while also gaining different upgrades along the way, thus making each run feel totally unique, but with permanent progress being gained each time towards unlocking new types of content. As a deck-building game, you will always begin with the same starting deck of basic cards, and then progressively add new cards from a wide selection to hone that deck's advanced specialization for that one run. The challenge stems from seeing a bunch of different variables thrown at you each game, figuring out how best to adapt your current strategy to fit the current situation, and trying to play your cards just right, literally, to survive long enough to stand a chance at defeating the final boss. Win or lose, you will still earn some kind of reward for your efforts, perhaps the most important being lessons learned about strategies, tactics, and mechanics that you can apply to future runs so that you can hope to do better next time. 

To better understand the context for everything else I'm going to say in this review, let's start with an overview of how the game works and what you actually do in it. If you're already familiar with the basic gameplay concepts, then you can skip ahead to just get more of my thoughts on the game as a whole.