A great world, a poor game. Remembering Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura

The story of Troika Games began with Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura. After releasing two more titles, the studio shut down. Playing Arcanum today in its fan-polished state, it becomes easy to understand why that happened to veterans of the legendary Black Isle Studios (Fallout 1-2, Planescape: Torment, Icewind Dale 1-2). They crafted magnificent games, yet exceptionally cumbersome ones.

Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura is an isometric role-playing game where magic and firearms coexist, and heavy plate armor sometimes loses to an ordinary trench coat. And that is exactly what makes the island of Arcanum so compelling – an unusual setting, a richly detailed world, interesting and humorous dialogues, and an elaborate role-playing system. The most frustrating thing is that the gameplay has aged terribly, and no fan modifications can save it.

Character creation and role-playing system

Arcanum begins with a well-crafted cinematic showing the player what they will have to deal with. A duel between two knights clad in heavy armor. Except one of them is holding a flintlock pistol. That characterizes the project completely.

Then character creation begins. And the editor in Arcanum is the kind of benchmark any role-playing game should strive for. The player can choose their gender, race, and background. At first glance, everything seems standard. Starting stats and bonuses depend on the selected options. But once you start looking through the combinations… A half-elf bandit who despises technology yet relies on it? Or perhaps a half-ogre barbarian with minimal intelligence but plenty of strength points to hit an offender harder? A female forest mage who gains combat bonuses in nature but loses them inside caves and buildings?

There are thousands of options, and it is entirely up to the player to decide what starting stats they will board the Zephyr zeppelin with before crashing into the ground. However, ruining your playthrough right on the starting screen is all too easy. You cannot pick one path at first and then, halfway through the journey, decide to switch course – consider yourself defeated. When creating a character, you need to know in advance who they will be and how to role-play them.

After building a half-elf bandit, you might be surprised to find that investing in technological skills yields almost nothing even five levels later. They still do not know how to handle technology properly, and putting a pistol in their hands is a bad idea – ammo will just fly into thin air. And that is one of the main problems: no one tells you that you have already failed. Once you realize this a dozen hours later, after clumsily tackling numerous quests, you won't want to keep playing Arcanum.

Fortunately, for the lazy, there is a so-called build “scheme.” Above the special Aptitude meter, which indicates whether your character leans toward magic or technology, there is an icon with a gear and a lightning bolt. Clicking one of the suggested presets makes the game distribute all character points automatically, though figuring out where they went is left up to you. 

The world and combat system

The atmosphere and style of Arcanum draw you in completely. Magic and technology cannot coexist: sorcery disrupts machinery, while mechanisms suppress magical energies. The player must choose whose side they are on – among the chosen few who master the arcane arts, or with the majority, armed with a shotgun and draped in grenades. This dilemma lingers throughout the journey, as both paths offer plenty of fascinating options.

Yet it is frustrating when well-developed characters, great dialogues, and an interesting world are overshadowed by drawbacks like clumsy conventions and flawed internal logic. Starting out near the wreckage of the zeppelin, clearing the area, and searching for an exit, the player discovers they can travel across the world map to Shrouded Hills. The player clicks “travel,” runs off to chat with NPCs, takes on quests, and completes them. But when the time comes to tackle the main quest and leave town, the game essentially shows you the middle finger.

You can only exit via the bridge guarded by Lukan and his gang of ogres. Resolving the situation comes down to a few options: killing them, paying a bribe, or running an errand for the rogue. But a logical question arises: how did the character enter the town in the first place?! If they crossed that very bridge, why is Lukan seeing them for the first time and introducing himself? Using the global map for travel is no longer an option either – it gets locked.

And Arcanum is full of such little annoyances that ruin the impression! Take the trading system: an inventor merchant refuses to buy filaments, and a herbalist won't take roots gathered by the player. Want to purchase armor? No one will tell you whether your character can equip it – save the game, buy it, try it on, and reload if something goes wrong to avoid wasting gold. Hardcore? Yes. But exceedingly inconvenient.

And here we come to the combat system. Suppose you decide to kill Lukan to save money and avoid spoiling relations with the locals. Prepare for an hour-long ordeal of reloading saves. Even with a companion healer at your side, winning comes down to pure luck. My companion and I were level 5. My character wielded a revolver packed with ammo and wore decent armor, but none of it mattered – Lukan’s level 3 half-ogres, and their boss himself, simply bypassed any armor and resistances, beating my two-man party to death with their bare fists in mere moments. Switching to turn-based mode and back made no difference – constant defeat. In the end, I gave up and went to destroy materials for the new bridge, just as Lukan requested.

Fans can cite a thousand reasons why I failed to punch my way through the bridge. But the flaw of Arcanum is that people have to explain this to me, not the game itself. How are you supposed to decipher obscure abbreviations on armor pieces? Guess for yourself. Why can’t I use the global map? The game is under no obligation to explain. Where do I find the steam engines I was tasked with destroying in a quest? No comment.

Certain classic games, like Gothic, also refrain from pointing out exactly what and where to search. Yet they give you landmarks, context, and aren't afraid to share engaging lore related to a mine or the New Camp. From those scattered clues, a rough path forms in your mind. Arcanum has none of this whatsoever. The constable asks you to deal with Lukan and his gang, saying: “They are near the bridge leading to our town, and we are building another bridge to the south, but progress is stalled.” The dialogue is flavor-rich, but practically useless.

And that is how the whole game goes. A few quests offer comprehensive journal entries or at least point you straight to your destination. Most resemble “go somewhere, do something, and break a steam engine.” The player ends up dashing across the entire city, trespassing on every private property to track down the machine that needs destroying.

Diagnosis

Above all, the work of the modding community deserves praise. The Multiverse Edition bundles countless fixes, improves localizations, and restores cut content along with unused graphics. Now one can comfortably play on widescreen monitors, complete with scaled fonts and user interface.

Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura itself remains a good game, boasting one of the most compelling role-playing systems to date: the pull between magic and technology, dependencies on race and innate traits. It features solid quests, the ability to talk your way through situations, and memorable characters with sharp dialogue. Its primary issue is the core gameplay, which has aged terribly – and no fan compilation can fix that.

Pro

• richly crafted setting and lore
• interesting quests and dialogues
• the Multiverse Edition mod eliminates heaps of bugs and flaws
• one of the finest role-playing systems

Contra 

• outdated gameplay mechanics
• inconsistent game world logic
• clunky trading system
• cumbersome controls