This game tales a few steps back from Gothic 3, in a good way, and brings a small, hand-crafted open world akin to the ones seen in Gothic 1 and 2. This time around, Piranha Bytes shake things up by introducing a legitimately great combat system into the game, and populating the game world with dungeons to fight your way through. Most of these dungeons, except the story-important endgame ones, are open to the player from Chapter 1, leading to the new Nameless Hero being able to get rich and powerful before even joining a faction.

Personal opinion: I like the combat system, and I enjoy dungeon crawlers such as the King's Field series and the last quarter of Arx Fatalis, and get bored by long dialogues such as what is seen in The Witcher 3 or in the first chapters of any Gothic game. As such, I definitely like this game, probably more than Gothic II, but if you think you would not enjoy an easier, more combat-oriented game (though, I have to say, this may be my favourite combat system in an RPG) then you might want to give this one a pass.

All in all, if you've enjoyed any of Piranha Bytes' games, I would recommend you to at least try this one out, as it retains the spirit of what makes the games great whilst providing a more focused experience, even if it is focused on dungeon crawling and combat, rather than character stories and dialogue.

(Copied from Steam)