@ Big_T_UK and all those hardcore RPG gamers: if you never finished the game, if you only played it for like 2 meagre hours, you just don't have a right to speak. I'm sorry, but I don't put my nose into threads I don't know anything about either.
If a n00b visits this forum after playing FO2 for 2 lousy hours and claims that FO2 is shit, than what would you do? Flame the n00b. And I'd help you doing so.
Hell: we should ban Big_T_UK for desperately wanting to be a smart alec!
Look: Arcanum is not perfect. True. But the character creation screen only becomes really mind-dazzling when you've played the game at least once. The backgrounds are poor? No, they're not. Saying they are, is just showing you know zilch about how Arcanum works. Lotsa people start "whinging" (eh, Kharn) about those backgrounds, but to me that only shows they don't "get" the game. The backgrounds give you the possibility to play an infinite amount of characters, but no Jack-of-all-trades like in Fallout. In Arcanum you need to specialize or you die. You want to be a thief. Well, be a thief. Choose the appropriate background and stop complaining about how that fucked up your Willpower or whatever. You can be anyone you want in Arcanum, but you can't be all people at the same time, which is just logic to me. Fallout is a lot poorer in those decisions. Tag Small Guns, Speech and Lockpick (in both games, for crying out loud) and you're set. You'll survive. Always. Try to play a game of Fallout with tagged Throwing skills, Science skills and Speech. It'll work if you know how Fallout works (and if you finished it at least once), but you won't be satisfied (Throwing! Ha!). In Arcanum, the possibilities are nearly endless and what's more: they deliver a really new gaming experience every time you try another character. But you will have to sacrifice certain stats or skills to become really good (which is only normal imo).
The way I see it is this: if you can't appreciate the character creation of Arcanum, you must be one boring RPG player (a Jack-of-all-trades, imo, and pretty colourless).
Combat sucks? Well, imo, that's the melee player talking. Ever tried throwing weapons for a change, like the chakram and the boomerang? Grenades? Magick? Poisons? Backstab + invisibility? Guns? NO? Then shut up. No really, if you only tried your hands at Arcanum for a lousy two hours (which is about the same time I spent playing that Pingu game, for crying out loud), then you have no right to speak whatsoever.
Combat isn't as good as in FO games, agreed, but that's primarily because the manual (or the interface for that matter) does not give you any details about how many action points you need to wield this or that sword or axe or cast this or that spell or whatever. For the rest, the difference with Fallout games is really minimal.
Arcanum is great. Arcanum is pretty fokking close to what I would call a perfect game. Saying that there are too many quests is crap: if you think so and you find it annoying, than just don't do those "boring" quests. Simple, right? There's other quests waiting for you out there, trust me.
I personally think that one of the major problems gamers have with Arcanum is that you need to make difficult choices. More difficult choices than in any Fallout game. You just won't be able to finish all quests the way you wanted to finish them (they'll get botched, eh), much more quests are mutually exclusive, but the reward for that is excellent roleplaying and often in a better way than in Fallout.
Arcanum is also the only RPG that ever gave me a satisfying EVIL PATH. Playing an evil character really gives you a completely different game (something which gamers who tried it for like... yeah, two hours, don't know anything about) and the path of a magician and a technologist is so different, that again, you think you're playing another game. Was Stealing fun in Fallout? Was it really? Well, it is in Arcanum, it offers you a multitude of quests that will not be available to other characters. And so on, and so on.
Look, it's pretty simple: don't attack Troika's first masterpiece if you never played and finished it. If the only things you can say are "it's too brown and grey" or "the 54 backgrounds suck" or whatever, than just , you know, don't even bother. How many of Fallout's traits have you ever used, eh? Always going for "Gifted" and then maybe "Finesse" or "Small frame" or "Fast shot"? Wow, that's just really... wow! Doing it Per's way, because all in all, Per's way is the most satisfying way too play the game.
Try to write an ultimate Arcanum guide. Just try it. I'm laughing already.
Now stop throwing dirt at a game that is, all in all, superior to the Fallout franchise in more than one way.
Hm. I really had to get that of my chest, sorry people, but Arcanum is my kind of game, it just is.
