THQ Nordic released a playable teaser for a potential remake of the classic Piranha Bytes RPG, Gothic last December. A full remake from THQ Nordic Barcelona would be in the cards if the prototype is received well and if enough players showed interest. Since a vast majority of the players voted to have the 2001 game remade, THQ Nordic has now greenlit the production of the remake.
According to the developers, over 180.000 players have played the playable teaser so far. On the evening (CET) of February 16 2020, THQ Nordic took the survey offline, and have released the raw data of the survey, as well as highlight graphs. With more than 43.000 answered surveys and over 9.000 reviews on Steam and various discussions on all social media platforms, there is enough data to check.
Linked below are the results of their survey in a neat PDF file or – for the people who really want to dig into the raw data – the entire dataset with all 43.111 participants included.
Download the PDF: http://n.thq.com/sQC130qiBae
Download the raw data (.csv and .xlsx in a zip): http://n.thq.com/vIF030qippZ
Even though fans were up for a Gothic remake, the general reception has been mixed across the board, with criticisms aimed at the For Honor-like combat system, changes to the opening, the presence of immersion-breaking elements etc. Do note that the prototype is in no ways a final representation of the finished product.
Next Steps for the Gothic Remake
THQ Nordic will establish a new studio based in Barcelona, Spain, and will then assess what players liked and what they want to be different than in the playable teaser. One of the most common mentions was, for example, the demand for a grittier and less colourful world.
Here is an example of how this could be tweaked:
“We are up for the challenge to develop a full Gothic Remake which will stay as faithfully as possible to the original experience and transport the atmospheric world of Gothic into a high quality look and carefully modernizing certain gameplay mechanics,” says Reinhard Pollice Business and Product Development Director at THQ Nordic.
Since Gothic is one of my favorite RPGs of all time, I hereby wish the team all the very best and hope that they treat the original with the respect it deserves.