History Videogame / Gothic

** The Eye of Innos is depicted as an extremely powerful mystical artifact of the gods which will give the Hero the edge he needs to defeat the dragons. That's true FromACertainPointOfView. All it does is force dragons to talk to you and take away their PlotArmor, though it's unclear whether the latter is an in-story thing or just a game mechanic. The amulet ''does'' provide a sizeable defense boost when worn... but it loses its power after talking with a dragon until you power it back up again with a dragon heart, meaning in the fights where you'd really want that boost, it's unavailable.

In the third game, ''Gothic III'', the Nameless Hero travels to the mainland of Myrtana, only to find out that the land has mostly been conquered by the Orcs, though several factions are still struggling. Finding himself in the middle of a political struggle which also represents a war of dominance between gods, the Nameless Hero has to choose a side. ''Gothic III'' was the first game in the series to feature MultipleEndings, and was something of an ObviousBeta at release. An ExpansionPack called ''Forsaken Gods'' was also released, which took the ObviousBeta status up to eleven and wasn't made by Piranha Bytes. Most fans consider it SoBadItsGood at best. This time, the Nameless Hero returns from exile because he is majorly pissed off at the people of Myrtana not enjoying the peace he has brought them with hard work, but rather warring each other in various factions once again. In the end, the Hero becomes the new King of Myrtana to unite them once and for all.

* ObviousBeta:
** Gothic 1 has such unstable game coding that it was even prone to crashing on systems available at time of release. Gothic 3 was this to some extent, but JoWood / Pirahna Bytes approved [[GameMod Community Patches]] have largely fixed this.
** ''Forsaken Gods'' was a very obvious version of this, but the same team that fixed Gothic 3 has managed to turn this game into something, while somewhat weak story wise, is playable and fully functional in a gameplay sense.

* SpiritualSequel: ''VideoGame/{{Risen}}''.
** In particular, the Jharkendar section of ''Night of the Raven'' can seem almost like a bit of a proto-Risen in hindsight, what with its pirates, swamp-dwelling bandits and vaguely Carribean setting.
%%* SpiritualSuccessor: To ''VideoGame/{{Ultima}}''.

%%* PenalColony

* ALighterShadeOfGray: The New Camp and its successor organizations (like the Mercenaries) generally come across this way. They're highly violent, criminal and unpredictable, but the alternatives tend to be ruthlessly authoritarian or mindlessly fanatical. Thus, the New Camp bunch gains a bit of a TheEveryman feel, being the only faction that is down-to-earth, non-judgmental and straightforward and honest in what they want, not to mention free-spirited. Even characters from other camps, most notably TheMentor Diego, are implied to have New Camp sympathies, and they later without hesitation [[spoiler: take in an Old Camp Nameless Hero, as well as his pal Milten, as refugees of sorts]]. Plus, the Hero unavoidably during story scenes mocks the Brotherhood's fanaticism (even if he joined them) and canonically stood up to the Old Camp's systems by refusing to pay Bloodwyn and giving Ian's list to the New Camp, but he doesn't really have anything bad to say about the New Camp. The Water Mages, who are aligned with the New Camp, also function as a BigGood to varying extents in every game, arguably moreso than the "officially good" Fire Mages. This goes doubly for the third game, which firmly establishes that [[spoiler: Adanos, not Innos, is the BigGood among the gods]].

** Justified pretty well in ''Gothic II'': The loss of status from ''I'' to ''II'' makes sense. The Colony had a society all its own, and no one in the greater world is going to care if you were a mercenary or a templar in the Colony. The Fire Mages in Khorinis wouldn't know about you if you went that route in Gothic 1 because [[spoiler: the ones in the Colony all got killed.]] The only faction this doesn't make total sense for is Lee's mercenaries, but that can be justified because the new ones wouldn't just accept the Nameless Hero, and he's quite a bit weaker since he signed on with them in 1.

%%* BatmanGambit: [[spoiler: Your player character's progression [[TakeALevelInBadass from nobody to badass]] was part of one on the part of King Rhobar II]].

* TheChosenOne: Defied. The Nameless Hero is treated as the Chosen of Innos, God of Fire, Light and Justice, even by Innos himself, but considers himself no one's champion but his own and is perfectly capable in the third game to join Innos's mortal enemy instead, or just screw them both over and end divine rule over the world for good. Likewise, [[spoiler: Xardas becomes the Chosen of Beliar by the end of ''Gothic II''... but he uses his newfound powers to find a way to stop the war of gods instead of supporting God of Darkness]]

* CuttingOffTheBranches: Downplayed. The second game does canonize some things the Hero did in the first game, but they're all fairly minor things which do not decisively lock in his choice of camp or build, or major story decisions. He completed the Grim ambush quest, meaning he refused to pay Bloodwyn protection money. Cavalorn also says he would constantly come by to buy arrows from him, which suggests an archer or ranger build for the Hero, but arrows were also handy for trading in the first game, so it's ambiguous. He probably learned at least the first level of one-handed fighting, since the flavor text points out a beginner's mistake in his stance which he does not repeat in the second game. And of course, the Hero is shown wearing the Ore Armor and Uriziel in the opening, but not really fighting with the sword, so having been a mage build remains possible too. The one borderline case is that, if a particular dialogue option is chosen, Lares will state the Hero brought him Ian's list, which is technically a betrayal of the Old Camp in favor of the New Camp, but it was still possible in the game to join the Old Camp after doing this, so it would only mean the Hero was not canonically a fanatic Old Camp loyalist, unsurprising considering [[spoiler: you later have to work against them anyway]].

** Ask and look around a bit early on in the first game and you'll learn that the Old Camp originally had two major mines, but one (now known as the Abandoned Mine) eventually collapsed during an accident. [[spoiler: Guess what happens to their other mine later in the game at the worst possible moment...]]
** Wondering who this ominous dark master commanding everything is that all the wise characters keep warning you about in the second game? It's actually a case of HiddenInPlainSight, just take a close look at the banners of his orc underlings. [[spoiler: They depict a {{Dracolich}}]]...

%% * GettingCrapPastThe Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.

** Ironically brought back in III [[spoiler: with the same guy who put your character in one erecting the same thing around himself willingly!]]

* OddFriendship: The Hero can in the first and second game be friends with Ur-Shak, a DefectorFromDecadence orc shaman. Orcs in the first two games are basically AlwaysChaoticEvil and according to their prophecies, the Hero is meant to be the "holy scourge" which destroys them. Depending on your choices in the second game [[spoiler: this friendship may end in blood and tears, however]].

* SchmuckBait: In the mining canyon area in the first game's New Camp, there's a mercenary who suavely promises to get you an InfinityPlusOneSword for only the price of a medium-sized banquet worth of foodstuffs. If you haven't been clued in that this is a bad idea by the fact that you can do it at level one, and that even your questlog expresses skepticism, maybe the deliberate [[invoked]] FridgeLogic concerning why he's only using standard mercenary equipment when he has access to that kind of hardware will do the job. Actually get him his things anyway and [[spoiler: it turns out he just wanted to party with his friends. There is no InfinityPlusOneSword and he mocks you for being gullible to the point of deserving it]].

** In the first game, joining the Old Camp is unique because it later allows you to [[spoiler: become a DefectorFromDecadence]] and switch to being a member of the New Camp, which means experiencing a bit more content in one run than a pure New Camp or Swamp Camp playthrough, adds a bit of ItsPersonal drama to the story and, when playing a mage, leads to the otherwise inaccessible and settingwise BeyondTheImpossible scenario of having sworn an oath to and obtained the magic of ''[[YinYangBomb all three of the mutually exclusive gods at the same time]]''!