Compared to Arcanum...

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I guess it's not trying to be like Arcanum -- relying on a brilliant old setting rather than a brilliant fresh setting, and concentrating on the fun of h'n'slash instead of plot and character.

The fighting in Arcanum was fun a lot of the time, but sometimes it clunked. I would assume the ToEE has excellent combat, really letting you get into the strategies of how best to use your spells and warriors.

Can anyone who has played both compare the two titles for me?

 

Depends whether you're into turn-based combat or not. I'm not. I find it a pain in the backside in a game like this and it often makes combat long drawn out and ultimately tedious.

I haven't really played much of Arcanum but the combat looks amazingly basic in what bit I've seen so far. Run up, hit someone then keep on hitting them till they die. TOEE has more variation but the turn-based approach has really put me off. You'd have thought game designers would have realised after the farce that was POR that it's something people don't like, but clearly they didn't.

 

The Arcanum storyline was better than ToEE's. ToEE's combat is 'far' better than Arcanum's. They are both buggy as hell. Arcanum is a larger world with character development quests (i.e. prove your ability to pickpocket before you can claim the title of 'master' and get incredible pick-pocketing abilities).

 

Arcanum is a really good role-playing game, with emphasis on "role-playing". The NPCs have personalities and you can develop your own character's personality through the skills you choose. I enjoyed the combat, which reminded me of Fallout, but it's not the game's strong suit. I find it tons of fun, and though it's a bit buggy, it's not too bad. No game-stoppers. There are some questionable design and plot decisions, and there's no real reason the graphics should be as bland and washed-out as they are, but it's a good game over all.

ToEE is totally unlike Arcanum, except in the bug department. It's absolutely beautiful, the combat (so far) is fun, and there's basically no plot. It almost seems like different companies made them.

I, along with many others who played the gold box games, really enjoy the turn-based combat. It's not slow at all; tell a character what to do, they do it, and the enemies make their decisions and act quickly. PoR sucked because it implemented everything wrong - it wouldn't have been better in BG/IWD pseudo real-time. Actually, you pretty much have to set the combat in Arcanum to turn-based if you want to control it as well.

 

Never played Arcanum, but so far I have been enjoying TOEE alot after playing NWN.

I like the turn-based fighting in this game, especially in the area of tactics and strategy.

There's times when how you move around, how your party members are arranged, even use of walls and narrow hallways as a strategy (so a huge monster can't hit you directly) come into play.

There's not much of a linear storyline, but I have been having fun with the choices you have regarding various mini-quests. There are many scenarios where you can pretend to be helpful to someone only to end up blackmailing them for your own personal gain.

So if you like turn-based fighting (I may be one of only a few who do apparently), and the ability to not have to be a goody 2 shoes all the time, then I'd say it's worth it...

I was mainly excited about this game because of the fact that you could make a full party instead of it only being a single main character like NWN....