Alpha Story

Author: Flosha
Written: 02.09.2023 - 27.08.2025

In order to analyse the original story concept of Gothic we have to differentiate between different phases of development. In course of time there were several iterations of the story that in the beginning evolved organically until the point of no return, where it had to be scrapped and was redone in the last couple of months in order to finish the game under the pressure of the publisher and time. The story was changed and reduced to such a degree, that the former story authors were confused and wondered what happened to the story when playing the final game. By summarising and comparing the narrative as it evolved until it was cut down to a fraction of it’s original scope, we will be able to (1) point out the most comprehensive and profound iteration of the story and (2) clearly see whatever valuable is to be found in other iterations, (3) in order to harmonise the best of all in Phoenix; which is summarised in Phoenix Story.

We distinguish between the following versions or iterations of the Story.

1. Initial Orpheus Plot (1996)              | Plot V1
2. Early Phoenix Plot (1997-1999)           | Plot V2-3
3. Late Phoenix Plot (first half of 2000)   | Plot V3-4
4. First Cuts (second half of 2000)         | Plot V5
5. Release (2001)                           | Plot V6

Orpheus (1996)

What was there from the very first concept:

• Earthquakes and visions happen that are thought to be related with the Magical Barrier.
• A Psi drug related with Minecrawler secretion is essential and widespread both among humans and orcs to resist the madness.
• There are escape plans, only supposed to be revealed to the player in course of the story.
• The player experiences horrific visions of the Sleeper throughout the game and has a vision in a dream.
• He is lured into the camp of the psionics early on in the story to be involved in their plans (later “PrepareRitual” event).
• The Psi Mages cause a madness wave in a mass ritual to awaken the Sleeper; earthquakes accompany the madness waves, resulting in the Old Mine being flooded (later “OmFull” event).
• A vision in the fire during the ritual: A dead paladin is seen in the ancient temple behind a door, that was besieged by the Undead, he has a weapon with him that can harm the Sleeper (later Uriziel).
• In consequence of the ritual the Old Mine cannot deliver Ore anymore; thus at some point the Old Camp raids the Free Camp. New Camp and Old Camp turn hostile (later “FmTaken” event).
• The Magic Barrier is in disorder; according to the Demon Evocator everyone is in danger.
• There is a magic amulet that has to be acquired to help against Madness, to come closer than ten meters to the (psychic) Barrier without becoming mad (not defined why; perhaps to research the Barrier and what is going on).
• At some point in the story there was supposed to be a mass event in form of a revolt against the Barons, summarised in the sentence “Down with the Orebarons”.
• The Sleeper was supposed to sleep at the foot of the Barrier on a platform from stone.
• At some point, the Sleeper awakens.
• Upon the threat of the awakening Sleeper, the Orcs flee to the Surface through the Free Mine; the New Camp is tarnished (later “OrcAssault” event).
• The surface is unsafe and the orcs “use” the marketplace (exchange place) for some reason.
• Open fights between the camps; the relationships go down resulting in chaos and overarching mutual killing sprees, secretly driven by the progressively more intense psi waves of the Sleeper that drives the whole Colony insane (later “Nemesis” event).
• In some way the player enters the temple and tries to reach the deepest levels.
• There is a Hood of a High Priest (undefined whether orcish or human, but most likely orcish) to protect from the wrath of the Sleeper, which would be given as a reward (undefined by whom, but apparently by the Priest himself as a reward for killing a specific powerful undead creature, such as the dragon below).
• But an Undead Dragon or a dragon-like creature (it was not decided) blocks the way in a defile on the path to the Sleeper.
• Thus a weapon has to be found that enables to destroy the Undead.
• The player acquires the weapon from the vision in the Paladin’s Cave in the Temple, kills the dragon and somehow banishes the Sleeper.

This was all part of the earliest iteration of the story. What was not yet included at this point or at least not yet mentioned in the documents available to us are the Minecrawler Queen (MCQ); the specifics of the player’s involvement in the plans of the Sect and their internal struggle for power; the specifics of the player’s involvement in the plan of the Watermages; the specifics of the involvement with the Demon Evocator and his role (it is also not clear if he was supposed to be part of the battlemages at the start (as was the case in a later iteration) or if he was living in his Demontower right from the beginning of the game, which is more likely); the specifics of how the player would get into the Orc Caves and the temple and what he would do there; and diverse connections of these different threads.

While the most important story arcs were defined (and some of these most important story arcs were either not realised at all (to the regret of the developers, not because they rejected them) or heavily condensed), it was not yet sure what would lead to what and for which reason. Chapters were not yet introduced.

Phoenix (1997-1999)

The next iteration of the story that we will describe below is based on the earliest available story document, described as “Story 3.3”, given to us in 2022. The Orpheus story outlined before can roughly be described as the “Story Version 1”. That said, there was a story version 2 inbetween and we don’t know anything about it, other than that it was a transitional stage between the two, probably without much or any additional information. But there is at least one difference we know of. In V2 the story was divided into chapters and at first there were supposed to be five. Thus we assume that the Story V2 can be identified with the story hinted at in the Phoenix Pitch, which mentions five chapters, while Story 3.3 has already six.

The document is internally described as “Zusammenfassung Story-Meeting 27” (summary of the 27th story meeting). The document was created in November 21th of 1995(!) and was updated last in May 24th of 1999[*].

[] People keep saying that Gothic was in development for about 3 or so years, because it was 1998 that the ZenGin was started to be developed and the actual production, in a technical sense, went from 1998 (or the end of 1997, to be precise) to 2001. But this only refers to the stage of development under the working title *Phoenix. If the whole conception phase and the Orpheus stage is taken into account, then the development has started as early as 1995 and in this sense Gothic was in development for at least 5 years.

It is a document that was updated and evolved in the course of many years. Earlier iterations are most likely lost (unless some dev may still have an older backup), because the document was just constantly overwritten for years. A version control system was not yet in use.

We cannot say for sure whether or not the addition of a sixth chapter was accompanied by the addition of any actual story content or if - and we assume so - it was mostly a structural change. As seen above, we can find all the important story arcs in the Orpheus concept already (and even more - like the rebellion against the Barons which was either discarded, neglected or forgotten in later iterations); thus we do not think that there were any major changes in the story between Story V2 and Story V3. It seems that it was not that much about what would happen, but why. It was about motivations, pacing and so on.

Story 3.3 consists of the following chapters (the English translation is from us):

The different chapter names compared to the release version of the story are not a mere stylistic difference, but a reflection of the different story with that was developed at the time. It may seem like a more elaborated version of the same story, but there are major differences in focus and themes.

Alongside the chapters and the story progression, the player character progresses through six corresponding levels of his character automatically, which we may summarise as the “(character) level progression”. That means the player is always on level 2 in chapter 2, on level 4 in chapter 4 and so on, with a maximum level of either 6 or 7, based on the earliest documents. This sort of character progression was not linked to the experience he gains, but simply to the story progress, due to the story-driven approach.

Another crucial aspects of the story, by which we can roughly structure it, is by which parts of the world are going to be explored in which chapter, which we may summarise as the “(world) exploration progression”. The progression through the game world goes along the progression through the story. The player has to access specific levels (world parts) in order to progress in the story and has to progress in the story in order to access specific levels, as we have described them in /world/levelstructure. This version of the story corresponds exactly to the early Phoenix levelstructure with the four temple levels, as described in said document.

In v3.3 of the story, the exploration progression correlates with the chapters in the following way:

The main story writers consisted of Mike Hoge (who at that point, as far as we know, after outlining the essence of the main story, focused more on general game design and let others work on the development of that story, giving feedback on what they came up with), Stefan Nyul (who was main responsible for the specifics of all the chapters after Chapter 1, on which Mike focused most) and Matthias Filler. Additional story writers were Carsten Kißlat, Steffen Rühl, Jörg Bütow (he focused on the development of the New Camp; almost nothing of his work ended up in the game), Florian Jacobi and Navid Vahdat. No one else in the team was involved in the development of the Story.

We consider it necessary to point out once again, that Björn Pankratz, so often associated with the creation of Gothic or even as one of the “fathers” of Gothic by mistake, had nothing to do neither with the creation of the setting, nor the story, nor the world of the original Gothic.

In story version 3 (and perhaps in V2 already) they introduced a system of dividing missions into Priority 1 and Priority 2 missions.

• Priority 1 are main missions, that bring the story forward.
• Priority 2 are guild related missions that relate to the main missions either directly or indirectly.

There should have been no missions at all that have no kind of relation to the story and thus no kind of relevance and urgency in relation to the main missions; they are all connected to it in some kind of way. The first and second chapters for instance do not contain any Prio 1 missions. While it is clear that he wants to escape from the prison, the first chapter serves the orientation of the player in the prison world, before he can even plan the escape. The implicit goal is to join a guild, which initiates chapter 2, in which the preparation of the Psi-Ritual begins (PrepareRitual).

One shouldn’t deduce from the above that there isn’t much written about the first chapter. On the contrary, the first chapter takes up about a third of the entire story 3.3 document with its 6 chapters.

Story 3.3 Story Summary in as short terms as possible

1. “Orientation phase”: Player can explore the camps and mines, only side missions (Priority 2). Goal: JoinGuild = Player Lvl 2 & Initiation of Chapter 2.

2. “Waves of Madness”: Preparation of the Ritual. First Mass Meditations by the Enlightened leading to light eartquakes in the Colony; do not affect the Psi Camp due to Psi Protection from the Holy Stone. One Week later: Second Mass Meditation, heavier earthquakes: 3 Novices unconscious. One Week later: Third Mass Meditation, even heavier earthquakes, Madness Waves throughout the colony, 3 novices die, five novices went insane, Temple vision, OM collapses; madness affects the Psionics too (temporary), since NC has stolen the Holy Stone. Player Missions are still only side missions (priority 2), depending on his guild. As a PSI-Player he helps with the preparation of the Meditations. As a NC Player he has to free the Peasants from the tyranny of Jeremiah, the Rice Lord and steal the Holy Stone from PSI. As an OC Player he works as a PSI Spy or works with the information of the PSI Spy if he is a Merc or Mage as well as being involved in some PSI Sabotage. The Focus Stones are not yet mentioned in this version of the story. The Crawler Queen was part of the story already, but didn’t play a role in Chapter 2 and was not associated with the preperation of the ritual. The collapse of the Old Mine caused by the third ritual (OM Full) initiates Chapter 3.

3. “Orcs and Ore Pirates”: Priority 2 and at the same time the main focus at the beginning of the third chapter revolves around the assassination of the Enlightened, that the player influences in different kinds of ways, depending on his guild and preferences, either on the side of Y’Berion or against him, alongside the power struggle between Kalom and Angar, that Kalom decides for himself, upon which Angar seeks revenge. This is why he (and his followers) has been described as the “Rächer” (avenger(s)) in all of his character descriptions. This struggle leads on different ways to Priority 1, the exploration of the OrcCaves (Lvl 1) in search for the temple. Due to the former mass meditations there is an extreme drug shortage, which all the camps depend on to endure the nightmares and hallucinations caused by the psi emissions of the Sleeper. But the waves of madness occurring in the second chapter stop and only occasional earthquakes remain. There are no deliveries to other camps, due to which everyone has an interest to get the drug production flowing again. It is here that the Crawler Queen enters the picture of the story, supposed to be deep below in the Natural Caves (not in the Old Mine - the model of which was actually used as the Free Mine and vice versa till a few months before release). As a Novice (on the Guru path) the PSI player is send to the OrcCaves with a PSI expedition to find the temple. As a Templar he is send to search for the Minecrawler Queen due to the drug shortage (Prio 2). The idea of an expedition into Orc territory that goes horribly wrong and everyone dies, as it has been included later in form of the expedition to the Orc Cemetary, was originally meant to occur in this context of the search for the Crawler Queen. The OC & NC player is send to the OrcCaves for other reasons and to look for the temple while he’s on it (it is the same Prio 1 mission but disguised as a Prio 2 mission); the reasons for NC/OC characters to be send to the OrcCaves were not yet defined (with the exception of the thief characters, see below). Due to the interconnection of the underworld the player would find the OrcCaves on different paths and for different reasons, depending on his guild. As an OC thief he is send to find the leader of the OC Mercs (who later would be named Thorus) in the collapsed Old Mine to get his key to the armoury of the OC. The flood opened up a new passage to the natural caves, which also makes it plausible that the mine is only partially filled with water, as it has breaken free another way for itself. The search for the leader leads him into the OrcCaves, where he finds him close to the Orc Prison. The path of the GRD was not defined, but he could have a similar reason; instead of looking for the leader due to his key, as the Shadow does, he may look for his leader to rescue him. The NC Thief is also send to the Old Mine, to plunder the remnants of the OM; finding the OC Merc leader to get his key before the shadows find him, resulting in a similar path as the shadow, but with different reasoning. As an NC Guard he has to help the Scrapers in the Free Mine (Protection against Orc Attacks; NC Guards and Templars are already there at the narrow passage to the Orc Caves, asking him to help the Guards and Templars against the Orcs. And the KDW (and so most likely the KDF player too), is send by Saturas (or Corristo respectively) to find a member of the Masters, a member of the secret Brotherhood of Silence (that the four friends also belong to), who is working for the Demon Summoner. All the Non-Psi paths are leading the player eventually to free this character (called Craven in the Alpha story and “Benedikt” in Alex’ novel) from the prison of the Orcs and through him getting access to the Demon Summoner.

4. “Mine War”: The fourth chapter begins with the attack on the Free Mine by the Old Camp. The collapse of the Old Mine caused by the ritual (“OMFull”) was independent from the attack on the Free Mine (“FMTaken”). One led to the other, but it does not occur all of a sudden, but it takes Gomez one chapter to plan and initiate the attack. Upon the attack a war between the Old Camp and the New Camp breaks out. The Psi Camp, that was formerly in alliance with the New Camp, is now changing sides under Kaloms rule and supports the Old Camp, while Angar plans an internal revolt. Either Angar or Kalom die in course of the chapter. In this chapter the player explores the second level of the Orc Caves (which is the actual underground Orc City, while the former level was another underground orc territory in front of that city) and finds the entrance to the temple, the ancient portal by which the Orcs have sealed the temple and that they guard since thousand years. The player cannot enter it yet. In this chapter the player is also confronted with the Demon Summoner for the first time, called “Necron” in this iteration. At the end of this chapter the player joins one of the higher guilds. That means, he may become a Baron as a Warrior (in either camp), a Guru as a Psionic, a Master Thief (in the brotherhood of Silence) as a Thief or a disciple of the Demon Summoner as a Mage. The New Camp / Free Camp try to get their mine back, the Psionics keep trying to find a way into the temple. The player can only find access to the temple by the help of the Demon Summoner to which he is send directly as a mage or indirectly and with the help of Craven when belonging to another guild. (there were meant to be different ways into it). When he finds access to the temple the player explores the area in front of the temple and finds a teleport that brings him to the Stonehenge at the surface, where the first of four portals open. From here the player can travel through tunnels in the demonworld back and forth from the surface to the temple. In the following two chapters he will unlock the other three temple levels and portals. The chapter ends with the return to the surface, where the player is confronted with the third plot twist (after the collapse of the Old Mine and the Attack on the Free Mine).

5. “Orc Assault”. Upon the opening of the Ancient Temple the Orcs fled from the Underground Orccity to the surface through the Free Mine (killing everyone on their way) in shock and fear of the fulfillment of the prophecies and the awakening of the Sleeper. Then they attack the Old Camp and destroy parts of the Outside Ring. To them, the humans are at fault, defilers of the temple. When leaving the stonehenge the player is confronted with this consequence of his action of opening the temple and stands in a changed and much more dangerous surface area. With the orcs at the surface the mine war ends. The humans cannot mine any ore anymore and the war between the camps is settled when being confronted by a common enemy that threatens them all. A few characters at the surface start to become insane and attack the player. All the camps are barricaded now and the player cannot access hostile camps without special effort. The goal is to open the last gate, into the innermost and deepest level of the temple, where the Sleeper resides. But at first he has to explore the first two temple levels and by doing so is confronted with enemies, traps, riddles and closed doors.

6. “Nemesis”. The awakening of the sleeper begins. The barrier turns red, the earthquakes become heavier and a large percentage of the colony population becomes insane (they get red eyes and attack each other randomly, resulting in a massacre on the surface). Only the barons, the mages, some of the Gurus/Templars and the Brotherhood of Silence can keep up their sanity (all the “higher” guilds; the lower guilds loose it). In this chapter the player activates the portals to temple level 3 and 4. Both Angar and Kalom will be dead in the end of the chapter; one of them dying already in chapter 4. In the end the player has to somehow open the dimension portal again through which the Sleeper has once been summoned and drive him back into it. In order to do so he has to get the help of the undead shamans (12 in this iteration). But they can only help him after he manages to liberate their souls from the Sleeper who captured them, for this the player needs the help of the Demon Summoner. More about the specifics of this chapter and how exactly the story would end was not decided yet.

Story 3 <> Story 1

The Orpheus fragments provided a rough framework of what was meant to happen, while it was still unclear how and why all of that would be going on. Story v2 and v3 elaborated on this framework and filled many of the gaps, but still left some open.

Some aspects, that were present in the Orpheus concept, are not mentioned in Story 3 (either not anymore or simply not yet, because it was not finished, Story 3 is a work in progress):

• The revolt against the barons did not occur or hasn’t been elaborated yet.
• The paladin cave with the ancient weapon against the Sleeper is not mentioned in Story 3, but most likely because chapter 6 in general hadn’t been developed much in this iteration, it wasn’t given up, it was just not mentioned and elaborated on.
• The hood of the high priest and the undead dragon-like creature as a boss that protects the citadell of the Sleeper were not included either.

Several aspects have been added in Story 3 that have been lacking or have been present only very rudimentary in the Orpheus concept:

• The specifics of the mass meditations
• The power struggle between Angar and Kalom, the assassination of the Enlightened and the role of the Psi Camp and their drugs (and the following drug shortage) as an import dynamics, as well as the Crawler Queen
• The role of the demon summoner has been elaborated
• The exploration through the game world with its different levels has been planned

What was still lacking in this version of the story, but was planned to be there from the start and meant to be developed later:

• The escape plan of the watermages, that was planned to exist and be a factor from the start, was not yet developed.
• The specifics of what would happen in Chapter 5 and 6, what exactly would have to be done in the Temple, how the Sleeper would be banned and how the game would end.
• Many places at the surface didn’t play any role in the story yet and were mere ambient locations: The Old Fort, the Old Temple Ruins (later Monastery), the Fogtower and Lighttower. The Stonehenge played an important, but different role and the Mountain Fort didn’t exist.

What was not yet present in this iteration and was not yet planned either (these ideas came later):

• the killing of the fire mages
• the focus stones and focus search
• the charging of Uriziel

Story Abstract as of May 1999

The next available iteration of the story is found in a table in the Phoenix Mission document that we released on the Archive during our Gothic 20th Anniversary Month in 2021. The chapters are not given particular names here.

Chapter 1 remained conceptually the same.

Chapter 2 did not change (just guild specific details changed or were added), except for two particular changes:

• A “first” crawler queen was introduced, which was meant to be found in Chapter 2 in the Old Mine (still using the model of what they would later use as the Free Mine) and be important for the ritual at the end of the chapter, as in the release story; but the other Crawler Queen was still meant to exist and play a role in the next chapter, as in Story 3.
• While developing the demon summoner further, they had the idea that he is a fire mage (this is the reason that in the release version of Gothic, Xardas is still using the KDF instance). During chapter 2 he would conduct experiments with demon summoning in the prison of the Castle. After a failed assassination attempt by a Shadow due to these experiments, the Demon Summoner leaves the Old Camp and errects the tower in which he lives from Chapter 3 onwards.

Chapter 3. In this chapter the Queen from Story 3 is found in the natural caves, it isn’t killed but “milked”. Another addition of this version is that after the collapse of the Old Mine the OC starts to work in the Abandoned Mine again. As an OC loyal guard or shadow the player was meant to be involved in the preperation of the attack on the Free Mine, but not the attack itself. At the end of the chapter Kalom dies as in one of the possible outcomes in Story 3, during the OCs attack on the New Camp (it is here that the player was rather meant potentially to be involved), in which the Psi Camp is also involved. But this frontal attack is only a distraction from the main attack on the Free Mine from behind. Other than that, the basic outline of the chapter remained the same.

Chapter 4: The NC wants to re-conquer the Free Mine with the help of the Orcs. The New Camp secretly starts an alliance with the Orcs; guards from the New Camp wear specific helmets from now on with a mark by which the orcs recognise and respect them as allies. This version of the story introduced the so called Orcish Prophecies as an important story thread. It is by learning about and by the fulfillment of the prophecies that the player character will get access to the temple (but also drive the Orcs out to the Surface due to their fear in reaction to the prophecies being fulfilled). It was meant to be unclear whether the player character is somehow “elected” to do so or if he simply fulfills them by choice and for pragmatical reasons; depending on his choosen guild and other choices one or the other perspective seems more likely. The attack of the Orcs and the NC on the Free Mine to re-conquer the mine happens simultaneously to the opening of the Ancient Temple on behalf of the psionics. The player character is already in the area in the entry area inside of the temple at that point (the psionics, at first, only open up the gate in the Orccity that leads to the area in front of the actual temple). As the mine is being conquered, a shaman enters the stage and brings the shocking message that the temple has been opened. The alliance is over. The orcs feel betrayed and full of panic: Orc storm.

Chapter 5. The New Camp loses many men and, they seek a truce with the Old Camp now in order to survive and fight against the Orcs at the surface together. After the player character has explored the first temple level, the psionics enter the stage and explore the temple. In course of the story the player character will be the first to enter a specific temple area in some way or another and be able to explore it first, but thereby he also opens up the path for the sect to go deeper and deeper into the temple and the player has to deal with them; by opening up further areas and allowing them access to the temple he is unknowingly helping the awakening of the Sleeper.

Chapter 6. This chapter is excluded in the table and wasn’t dealt with here.

As we see, this version of the story did not bring any major changes to the story, it seemed to keep everything intact that had been developed in Story 3 so far, just summarising it in a much more condensed manner in table form. It added some aspects like…

• the demon summoner as a fire mage who goes into exile in chapter 2
• the first crawler queen in chapter 2
• the alliance between Orcs and New Camp in chapter 4
• the orcish prophecies as an essential part of the story, in course of the fulfillment of which the temple would be opened

But it does not contain anything that would conflict with the version of the story presented before.

But all the aspects mentioned in the summary of Story v3, that were still lacking, are also still lacking here.

Phoenix (1999-2000)

The “Main Mission” document was apparently created at July 17th in 2000 and last updated in September 17th 2000. They were trying to finalise the story as late as September 2000, if not for longer, but at least an important part of the document has to be of an earlier date and was most likely copied from another document (this is the table dealt with above). Therefore we can distinguish two different story approaches with a few differences within the same document.

The later story approach from 1999 to 2000 goes alongside a change in the level structure of the world and is the stage that we describe as the “first cuts”.

The underground Orccity still existed and the portal to the Ancient Temple was still meant to be found here, but the entrance to it was now put to the Surface and the separate Orc Graveyard with another separate access at the surface was introduced. The idea of an interconnected underworld with every level section being deeper and below the one before, in which the player was meant to proceed from the Surface to the Mines, from the Mines to the Natural Caves, from the Natural Caves to the Orc Caves and from the Orc Caves to the Temple, was now discarded at least to a substantial degree.

What was added here:

• The idea of the liberation party of the Old Camp in Chapter 1, in which an assassin tries to kill Gomez, but fails.
• The idea of the classes was already gone to some degree, but the player was still meant to be able to join the mages from the beginning.
• It was now clear that it was about the eggs of the minecrawler queen; they may have been part of earlier iterations already but it is here that they are specifically mentioned for the first time of all the documents we have access to.
• After the great prayer/ritual in Chapter 2, the templars would now go to the “nearby” Orc Cave just as in the release version, which turns out to be an orc graveyard. The entire story around the power struggle between Angar and Kalom, Y’Berions assassination and the drug shortage etc. were no longer part of the story. But in difference to the release story the psionics were now meant to prepare for another mass meditation in the main hall of the graveyard.
• In fear of the events following the great prayer of the Sect, the mages send the player to the demon summoner for the first time, but to no avail, as he rejects him.
• The flooded Old Mine was still meant to be accessed as in Story 3.
• In Chapter 3 the escape plan of the watermages was finally introduced; after the player was involved in the plans of the Sect in Chapter 2 he would now be involved in the plans of the watermages. The idea was that the player had to find specific items (later focus stones) and that all the mages (fire and water mages) of the colony had to be present in order to perform their ritual. This idea, later known as the focus search, was a very valuable addition as it has given reason to diverse formerly unused locations at the surface and thus incentive for their exploration. Depending on his guild the player was meant to be involved in different ways; since the Free Mine would only be attacked at the end of the chapter, the relationship between OC and NC was still stable; one of the possible guild specific missions involved visiting the fire mages and convincing them to help.
• The idea of the killing of the fire mages was introduced in this version of the story. It is is ordered by Gomez and exactly for this reason: The firemages decide to help the water mages with their ritual. Gomez and the barons do not want the barrier gone; what is a prison to most is their only protection from the royal forces and the warrantor of their power and the ore business. Now the firemages, formerly loyal to Gomez and his men, are cooperating with the enemy. Thus Gomez secretly orders to kill them. While the player is send to Xardas (he now had that name) because the mages need his help too (and Xardas agrees to it), the firemages are crucified.
• It was also decided here (if not earlier, but here we have the first mentioning of it), that the sword from the temple had to be charged, and with the very items that were first to be collected for the ritual of the mages. At that point they were speaking of twelve specific stones to be found and one of them had already to be found in chapter 2 for the Sect. The idea was that there have been twelve altars around the colony with magical stones (the “focus stones”) which have been used for the creation of the barrier.
• Chapter 4 as usual still started with the attack on the Free Mine and the war between the camps. They replaced the entire ideas based on the interconnected underworld, the alliance of the orcs and the different paths and reasons to access the Orccity, by: The player liberating an orc slave from the Free Mine, who tells him about the Ulu-Mulu and how to enter the underground Orccity with the help of it. But while getting rid of so many essential aspects, this version elaborated a lot about what exactly would be going on in the Orccity and how the player would proceed here, what has to be done and partially what the prophecies consist of. At the end of the chapter and by the fulfillment of the prophecies, the gate to the temple would open just as planned before and the orcs were still meant to flee to the surface.
• Chapter 5: Here the player starts to explore the ancient temple but cannot proceed very far. Apart from the “charging of the sword” from the temple, we find a similar, but conflicting idea in this version of the story, according to which Xardas sends the player to the ore heap of the water mages not in order to charge, but to create a sword in course of a ritual that includes the magical “explosion” of the ore.
• Chapter 6: The player was meant to come a last single time back to the surface just to notice how everything goes down, everyone goes insane, the barrier being red and so forth. There was no reason give for why he would have to return again. It is particularly stressed how the last chapter (Nemesis) was meant to confront the player with diverse consequences of his actions. The orcs hate him, because he has betrayed them. The NC hates him, because of what he did to the ore and the Orc Storm through the Free Mine, the surviving sect members are all fanatical servants of the Sleeper. Against all the guilds at the surface the player has to fight his way back into the temple a last time to ban the Sleeper with the help of the four friends that were meant to be involved in some yet undefined way. He was still supposed to first open the dimension portal in order to do so. After the Sleeper’s ban the player was meant to be able to return to the Surface again, confronted with all the insane inhabitants and demons. The game ends with the player leaving the colony.

While it added a few important aspects to the story that were lacking in former iterations (and these aspects are not in conflict with these former iterations either and would work just as well in them), this version of the story got rid of several important ideas from the first Orpheus concept and Story V3. But this version of the story from 2000, being a heavily stripped down version of the original story from 1996-1999, was ag least still containing all the five major plot twists; the release story then from the end of 2000 to 2001 was just an incomplete fracture of the already stripped-down story.

Both the Orc Assault and Nemesis couldn’t be realised. The OrcCity and all the story around the Orcs and the prophecy wasn’t included. The killing of the firemages had no good reason anymore. OMFull and FMTaken were fused into a single event, with the collapse of the mine not even linked to the psi ritual anymore and so on and so on. The cuts were legion. The release story insofar as it diverted from this last iteration of the story that still contained all the five story events added nothing new, it only removed major aspects of the story in order to finish a game that was very, very close to being cancelled.

Phoenix Story

The Phoenix story of Act I (chapter 1-6) is easily summarised. It is meant to contain everything that the Orpheus concept contained, everything of Story v3, based on the associated most complete version of the game world and interconnected underworld, while adding in the reasonable additions from the summarising table from 1999 and the early 2000 story that are not in conflict with the original level structure; thus only completing the Story 3 where it was lacking in aspects that were meant to be added anyway, such as the involvement in the plan of the watermages.

Author: Flosha
Creative Director

Written: 02.09.23 - 27.08.25