Arx Fatalis (PC)

I'm still going through titles beginning with A and today I've dug up another game from my epic pile of requests for you: classic PC/Xbox RPG Arx Fatalis.

I know next to nothing about this other than that it came out in 2002 (a couple months after Morrowind) and that it's the first game from Arkane Studios, the creators of Dark Messiah of Might and Magic and Dishonored, but hey that's enough to catch my interest. Well okay to be fair I haven't seen much of those two games either, though they seem like they could be cool, so maybe this will... seem cool too.

Arkane actually had another big project secretly in the works during the mid 00's, called Half-Life 2: Episode 4, but that didn't work out in the end; partially because Valve forgot to release Episode 3. Over six years we've been waiting for the resolution to that cliffhanger now in case you're wondering.

(Click the images to view their giant-sized doppelgängers.)

The game starts, as so many RPGs do, with an narrator running through the backstory, with his tale beginning with the mighty city of Arx. It's presumably named after the Latin word for 'citadel', so the game title actually means something like 'Fatal Fortress'. Don't ask me how this fantasy realm ended up with Latin as one of their languages; maybe a Roman scholar got sucked in through a portal a few years back, it's not really important or relevant.

In fact none of this is important or relevant, as this particular city of Arx doesn't actually have anything to do with the game.

You see, a few years back their sun began to decline, and so the citizens of Arx were forced to to relocate their entire civilization down into caverns underground to escape the eternal winter. Here they built a new city... which they called Arx.

Unfortunately before our narrator can explain how people have been growing food down here without sunlight, he gets assassinated mid-sentence! Seriously, that just happened. No more exposition for us.

Alright then, I suppose I should make some kind of hero then.

It's a bit hard to see the numbers under the icons in this small image (or at all), but at least it's better than what I ended up with when I tried taking the shots in Steam's built in screen capture tool. All that came out was an entirely blank book, no 3D face, no numbers, nothing. Never seen that happen before to a game.

I've got two separate pools of points to invest in the icons on the right hand page; one for the four attributes along the top and one to spend on the nine skills underneath. I'm liking how the numbers automatically adjust to show the effect of my choices, so when the descriptions tell me things like 'Constitution has an impact on Defence', I can see that impact myself as I put points into it. So far, so good.

But then I tried to change my appearance and... well, this seems to be it. Four faces, each as pale, human and masculine as the last.

Okay I'm going to sink my points into whatever increase melee attack damage and physical defence, plus a few into magic just in case, and then I guess I'll go with the blonde guy.

Our hero arrives in the game naked and sparkling, before falling over and being dragged off into a prison cell by goblins. So it's one of them 'starts in a prison cell' kinds of RPGs then?

Awesome, it's always nice when I get a few tutorial hints to start me off. Huh, I'll have to toggle between mouse cursor mode and regular first person camera movement? It's been a long while since I've had to do that.

Once in 'MOUSELOOK MODE' the game controls more like Oblivion than something like Legend of Grimrock; I can walk around my cell freely without taking steps on a grid. Though I have to switch back to CURSOR MODE and lock the camera again before I can use my cursor to pick up objects or interact with things.

I've got feet! It's always a pleasant surprise to find out that I'm not just a floating telekinetic camera when I'm playing a first person game. Alright I'll drag this loose brick from under the bars with left-click, then I'll double click the bars themselves to bend them out of the way, and then I'll... crap, the 'STEALTH MODE' they mention in the tutorial text up there isn't working.

I don't get this at all, it says that all I have to do is hold down the stealth mode button while clicking on an object and it'll appear in my inventory without me having to drag it there, but that just ain't the case.

Oh wait, I've figured it out. It turns that when I redefined the keys I bound stealth mode to a key that already had a use. Though the game didn't warn me that there was a conflict, or prevent me from using that key, or even show the key in the list of buttons that had been assigned to the other action; nope it just let me go ahead and waste my time.

I crept through the bars, grabbed a bone and now I'm faced with a goblin standing in-between myself and the way out of the cell block. I suppose I should heed the lessons of 2001: A Space Odyssey and go club him over the head with it, else the next guy's going to be finding pieces of me lying in the dirt.

Hey, that fight went pretty well. Alright, here's what I've learned about hitting people:

1. I have to switch to a separate combat mode.
2. I can use stronger attacks by holding the mouse button longer.
3. I have (slowly) regenerating health.
4. Enemies have an inventory of their own, but they barely carry anything and I can't take what they're wearing.
5. 'DOUBLE DAMAGE!!!!' is so much easier to get when I'm smacking a dead enemy across the floor like this than when they're fighting back.

Hitting the lever on the floor released a prisoner from the cell next door as well and he came out to speak with me. He seems to already know that I'm an amnesiac... though I don't remember ever telling him that. Actually this is the first time I've been told about it.

Alright then, I guess I'll be known as 'The Man with No Name' from now on. I can live with that.

My cell block was locked shut and the guard wasn't carrying a key, so I had to smash through a floor panel to get to this dungeon below. It's working out well for me so far though, as I've found a skeleton here with a new pair of trousers and some magic runes for me to add to my spell book.

Spells are constructed out of the runes I have found, with these two combining to form a fire spell. Not a fireball spell, or a flame thrower spell, or even a firestorm spell, just a fire spell. You know, for lighting torches.

But to actually cast the spells I have to stop what I'm doing and draw each of the shapes on screen with the mouse, like I'm playing a Nintendo DS game. Or a Kinect game now that I think about it; wow, that's actually a sensible use for the thing.

I'm not a big fan of gesture based... anything really, but it seems to work well enough and I can store up to three of these spells up for later so that I can avoid drawing shapes in the middle of a fight (and I really want to avoid doing that).

Oh and for people keeping track, so far we're up to: mouselook mode, cursor mode, combat mode, stealth mode and magic mode.

I've found an elevator over here, a few corridors into the dungeon, but the mechanism is missing a rope to connect its wheels together. I have no idea what could be powering the thing, but it seems like that won't be something I have to worry about. All I need to do is find some rope.

There's so much fog down here that I can barely see the other side of a room sometimes. This is with the distance set to max as well, it can actually get much worse than this. Not that it's hindering my rope search all that much, I just felt like whining about it.

Hey I've found a new use for my fire spell. I can use it to light... fires!

Lighting a campfire seems useful, as now I can throw raw meat into it to cook it. Getting the meat back out again those is a little tricky though as it usually disappears under the logs where I can't see it any more. I've been having to wave my mouse cursor around the bonfire waiting for the game to tell me I'm pointing at something.

Cooked food seems potentially useful too, but I'm still waiting to on the game to tell me why. I'm not seeing any obvious hunger meters.

OH SHIT IT'S A SPIDER!

Wait, hang on a minute, let me count. Yeah there's definitely enough legs on that thing for it to be a genuine actual spider and it's actually gone and poisoned me! I'd go over there and club it with my trusty bone, but the thing just snapped in my hands. Plus I already broke all of the other bones I'd scavenged by fighting rats along the way here. Weapon degradation, man; it rarely fails to bring a frown to my face.

Awesome, my fists aren't even connecting with these arachnids, even when I try crouching at the same time. Well I'm utterly screwed then, seeing as they've got me backed up against a wall.

You know what the worst part of this is? Getting killed and eaten by giant spiders obviously. But it's also pretty annoying that I actually just found the rope I need to get out of here hidden in a barrel inside the room they chased me into.


SOON.

Alright, one visit to the load screen, a quick sprint back to the rope barrel, and a bit of a hike later, and the elevator is now repaired. Quick saves are always handy. I even earned myself a level up this time by hitting some more rats along the way.

Character improvement during a level up works identically to the initial character generation, at least for level two: I get two pools of points, I can click on icons to make their numbers go up, that's it. Seeing how most of my problems so far have been solved by hitting things, I think I'll increase my physical damage and defence related skills again.

Oh by the way, the game uses a 3.5-inch floppy disk for its save and load icons. This is in fact awesome.

I realise that I'm the only person on Earth who cares about them, but I love floppy disk load icons; especially when they turn up in fantasy RPGs released at the tail end of the CD era, with an interface otherwise made up of ornate gems, weathered books and leather bags.


A FEW MINUTES LATER, BACK ON THE FLOOR ABOVE.

Okay, I've found a staircase leading back up to the level I was on before, except without a pesky cell block door in my way this time. Seems like I've got some scope to explore up here, though I have to be careful as my dagger's warning light is already on orange. I'll get a few more hits out of it, but then I'll be left smacking people with my pathetic fists again.

Is the weapon durability feature having a positive influence on my enjoyment of the game experience so far? I'm gonna have to say... nope.

Oh fuck, this wasn't part of any of my plans! I can kill a regular goblin or two, as long as I back away out of range when it's their turn to hit back, but this thing hits a whole lot harder and refuses to die in a timely manner.

This is all a bit awkward as I kinda need a minute of peace to grab those lockpicks off that table in the corner and get to work on that locked exit door. By the way even if I did stop to fight him, there's about five other dudes right behind him (we've been running laps around this floor for a while now.)

And he's just turned the Man with No Name into the Man with No Head. Back to the load screen.

Well there's the door again, and the pillar I was standing next to a few seconds ago, only the goblins haven't noticed me yet this time. The little creeping man icon in the bottom left above the health gem means I'm hidden from sight right now, probably because I'm standing in the shadows.

The game's kind enough to let me know in a tutorial hint that I can sneak past enemies, or lure them out of my path by throwing an object to distract them, but as I'm standing in the only corridor leading off the room I'm not seeing where I can lure them to.


SOON.

Hey, it turns out that the door wasn't actually the exit I was looking for as there's another staircase over on the upper right side of this level. I guess I didn't have to go in all those other rooms killing all those goblins after all. Ooops.

Speaking of goblins, one of them's hitting me in the back right now as bringing up this map screen doesn't pause the game.


SOON, ON THE NEXT FLOOR UP.

Whoa, I have to say I was not expecting that staircase to lead to a cave network with an entire bloody castle sitting in it. It looks like someone's gone and killed them all of the knights though. So sad.

I'll grab their swords and carry on exploring these the caves.

Aww, look at the little dog patrolling this door I found at the other end of the cavern. The poor creature has been left out here all on his own but he keeps on marching back and forth regardless. I'm not letting my guard down though, as whoever lives past that solid reinforced door has decorated their entrance with the head of a dead pig and I'm presuming that's not a good sign.

Oh this is a tavern? Next door to a tiny castle and a goblin lair and a whole lot of nothing else? I guess I should probably tell someone here that the fortress got attacked and all their customers are dead then.

Actually they seem to be doing fine with the customers they already have. The place is practically packed to capacity right now.

I did try talking to the bartender, but found that our hero had nothing much he wanted to say. No questions about his identity or where he is, no warning about the attack on the cave castle, and definitely NO dialogue choices.

So I left the bar and had a go at that roulette game instead. You basically just put your tokens down on up to three numbers on the table to indicate where you want to place your bet, then you spin the wheel and lose. Well that's how I play it anyway.

Ah, this conversation's going a lot better than they usually do. I still can't make any dialogue choices, but I'm getting a bit of information on the situation. This Guild of Travellers sounds like it could be worth investigating, as it's possible I used to belong to it. I'm certainly not from around here as none of these people have a clue who I am.

I guess I should go check out the fort then, seeing as there's nothing else I can do around here. Well, there's a locked door downstairs but they ask me for the password whenever I go near it.

No, you can't come with me! I'm going off into danger, fighting off goblins and stealing bones... oh I see what you're after now. Well alright then, welcome to the team.

Wait, where are you going? No don't run back to the... tavern... fuck! Well that didn't take long before my new dog deserted me. Whatever, it's for the best really; he probably wouldn't have lasted a minute out there anyway. I usually don't.

Seems that there's a whole lot of dead people inside the castle too, but at least the farm animals survived the slaughter. Hang on, are those crops over there? They're growing carrots in a cave underground, how does that work? I guess a wizard must have done it.

Hey, there's someone still alive in here, though he looks in bad shape.

Instead of screaming out in pain or asking me to bring him a doctor, Captain Ortiern here instead tries to recruit me for a standard RPG quest and our amnesiac hero is quick to make it clear he wants no part of it. No matter how many times we say no, he seems hilariously unwilling to accept that a complete stranger might not want to go on a incredibly dangerous mission for him.

	A civilian?... I am Ortiern, captain of the King's armies and commander of this outpost. Are you a mercenary? Can we count on your help?
	Find someone else to help... I have my own problems to deal with...
	You are my only hope! I cannot trust the rabble at the tavern! I'd sooner trust a total stranger.
	I just told you that...
	You have to go to the castle and tell the King what has happened here! This is of vital importance! Since the last earthquake, the path to the castle has been blocked by a cave-in and we have been unable to get through. You must tell him that the Ylsides have declared war on us!...
	This is ridiculous! You have just told me that the path leading to the castle is blocked!
	You should be able to go through the goblins' caves, two levels down, and find a way back up to this level. It's dangerous and roundabout, but we have no choice! You are our only hope brave mercenary!

Fine then, I guess I'm going back down to the Goblins caves then. Wow, I've always wanted a chance to go and speak the King in a fantasy RPG!

First though I'm going to steal every single object inside this fortress, of which there are surprisingly few. Just as well too, as my inventory grid is getting a little crowded down there. I can't just drop an item onto another item to quickly swap them, so I have shuffle stuff around and make sure there's a free space of the correct shape before picking an item up if I have any ambitions of taking it with me.

By the way, if there's any way to sell inventory items in the game, then I'm not aware of it yet. Though I do have money, so there's a fair chance I'll find a merchant eventually.

The game does have a quest journal, but it's as limited as they come and... well try clicking the picture and see if you find that the full sized version is any easier to read.

Oh, the bookmarks along the top bring up the character, magic and map tabs in case you've been wondering about them. It took me way too long to learn that I can use the F keys to flip to them instead or close the journal entirely. So many times I've been caught in a fight with a book stuck in my face, struggling to click the tiny icon to get rid of it.

Oh, I wasn't expecting to see a goblin guarding the stairs leading from the human fortress and the caves back down to the dungeon. But I am prepared for it.

You see, my character eventually got through to Captain Ortiern that he's an escaped prisoner that the goblins tend to attack on sight, and so he gave me a cunning disguise. Well actually he gave me a piece of paper identifying me as a gem trader, but that's kind of like a disguise, right?

It was enough to get me past this guard at least. Back down to the cell blocks then.

Oh shit, they remember me! Even with the pile of swords I had in my backpack this was still an incredibly one sided fight. Damn, does that mean that I actually screwed the game up by being spotted here earlier when I was supposed to sneak through? Or am I actually expected to win this fight? Who knows?

I decided to turn the game off here, seeing as I'm past my self-inflicted screenshot limit and I've got a good idea about how the game plays now, but... my curiosity won't let me off the hook that easily. I have to know if it's still possible for me to get through the goblin dungeon and open that bloody door.

I gave it another shot and this time around I didn't find it so hard to wipe the goblins out one or two at a time, take their key, and finally open up the forbidden door.

This is basically all that's behind it: a big cave with a thing in it. My first instinct is that it's a teleporter, but I can't find the 'on' switch. It doesn't seem like there's much else for me to do in this cavern.

Well, okay I did find one other person in here...

...a troll who speaks in the third person and hasn't heard of the word 'is'. He seems friendly enough, but he wants a birthday present and I haven't got a clue what to give him. I have to admit though, the idea that I might have to sit through more conversations like this has destroyed the last shred of my interest in the game for now, so I'm calling it a day.


CONCLUSION

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I can't say that I got much entertainment out of Arx Fatalis really, which is a shame because I was hoping this would be one of the good ones. Maybe it really is, it has grown on me a little now that I've got my head around the awkward control system, but it didn't make a great first impression and I'm not so keen on sticking with it to see if it improves.

The game sort of feels like a cross between Morrowind and something like Ultima Underworld, which makes sense as the game was originally meant to be Ultima Underworld III, until they failed to get a license to use the name. It's been very dour, dark, confined and claustrophobic so far and considering that the whole game has to be set underground in a world of eternal night I don't see that changing any time soon. Not necessarily a bad thing I know, but it's so similar to an Elder Scrolls game that I kept hoping to finally get out of the tutorial dungeon and into the proper game world.

So I won't give it a star, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't have the potential to one day earn a star once I've played it some more. I just want to like this game I guess.

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Well that's what I thought about the start of Arx Fatalis, but if you've got any opinions of your own you'd like to share, then there's a comment box all set up for you below. You could talk about the game, my article, the site... it's all good.