Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura



Arcanum is an expansive and very open-ended Role Playing Game where Tolkienian High Fantasy meets Vernian Steampunk, courtesy of the designers behind the first two Fallout games.

Much of Arcanum deals with Item Crafting and character building -- almost everything the player finds can be customized, and The Dev Team Thinks of Everything. It contains a very detailed setting and a well-designed scenario, as well as vast amounts of political backstory in the game's libraries, newspapers and legends. The game retains a cult following similar to its cousin Fallout, and is additionally often very favorably compared to Baldurs Gate II and Planescape: Torment, although Arcanum's detail focuses more on its setting's history and mechanisms than on its playable characters.

The IFS Zephyr has just begun her maiden voyage, a marvelous, high-society venture through the clouds. Aboard, the cream of high society enjoys the flight, playing chess, sipping fine wine, etc. Sadly, nothing gold can last forever -- and, out of the blue, the airship is attacked by a group of ogres on fighter planes. Within moments, the vessel goes down in flames.

There's only one survivor, the player character -- and, as they crawl out of the wreckage, a dying gnome begs them to take his ring to "the boy". The player character soon meets a man named Virgil, who claims to have found the reincarnation of a long lost prophet... and that's where the story properly takes off.

The player can join up with a large amount of playable characters. Although their personalities are often not as well-defined as those of some non-playable characters in the game, many of them are (very nicely) voiced, and they all contribute to the plot and interact with each other. Many of them are hidden, and many of them require very specific aligment, charisma stats and dialogue from the player before they even suggest joining the party. Similarly, the player often needs to meet very specific aptitude requirements before certain quests are even mentioned, meaning that no two playthroughs are the same and that each new player character will have a unique experience.

Arcanum has a level cap of 50, which encourages players to specialize in very specific types of magic or technology. (However, a no-CD-patch combined with a level cap remover patch can quickly fix that.) Uniquely, knowledge of technology in Arcanum disables magical aptitude, and vice versa, so that the player will always have to choose between the two (or find a very, very careful balance) and (eventually) be shunned by the other branch.

Remarkably, the game is still being tested and patched by a squadron of devoted fans today. A new release by Good Old Games is now available, with the notorious bugs fixed and the game adapted to modern systems.

A sequel -- titled Journey to the Centre of Arcanum and using Half Life's Source engine -- was in its initial planning stages, but Sierra and Valve had disagreements, and Troika's dissolution sealed the game's fate.

This game provides examples of the following:

 * Absurdly Low Level Cap: The level cap of 50 can be reached before you've even finished half the game, quite easily at that.
 * A God Am I: The player character may become this at the end of the patched game if.
 * Adventurer Archaeologist: Franklin Payne combines this with Gentleman Adventurer.
 * Alternative Calendar: Averted, oddly enough--the game begins on January 1, 1885, despite this being another world.
 * An Aesop: Near endgame summarizes the moral of the story to Virgil: "Blind faith is bad, question everything". This holds true with the, and , and even.
 * Though as with most RPGs, the aesop could just as easily be "no scheme is safe from a band of adventurers and their dog".
 * The other Aesop is "even when life is suffering, it's still worth living".
 * And I Must Scream:
 * Torian Kel's fellow Gray Legionnaires; undead warriors whose bodies have rotted away.
 * "Nothing will ever raise my comrades from the dust. They will live on... without voice, without dreams, without vision..."
 * And Man Grew Proud
 * And Your Reward Is Clothes: See Shout-Out below. The clothes happen to be the ones the mage was wearing.
 * Anti-Villain: For most of the game,  kills, tortures, and generally acts in an indisputably evil way. But when you are told his motivations for doing so, , you can easily understand his point of view.
 * Antiquated Linguistics: The manual is written like this. Mostly in an in-universe style.
 * Apocalyptic Log: In Vendigroth you can find newspapers reporting about an elven wizard who threatened them and how they told him to screw himself. Vendigroth is now a giant lifeless wasteland -- guess who's responsible for that.
 * Arbitrary Gun Power
 * Artifact of Doom: The Bangellian Scourge, at least story-wise (in game terms, it just slashes your alignment a bit).
 * Artificial Brilliance: The AI's capable of some pretty complex interactions. If you kill a man in the street while no guards are watching, you might think you're off scot free -- but you'd better drag the body into an alley, because if a guard on patrol spots you standing next to a corpse he'll figure out you're the killer. Also, unlike in most RPGs, if you take off your clothes and go running through the streets NPCs will actually react to your obscene behaviour.
 * Artificial Stupidity: You can use the AI's proactive behavior against it, though. If an NPC spots a piece of equipment sitting around unattended, they might pick it up for themselves... and if it looks better than what they're currently using, they might equip it. Even if it's actually a cursed chainmail shirt that continually poisons its wearer. There is also a guard captain whose patrol route occasionally takes him right through a campfire. Left to his own devices, he'll walk through that fire until his platemail melts right off his back.
 * There is still no justification for picking up large, massive objects that greatly encumber the character. Like big boulders.
 * Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence:
 * St. Mannox was believed to have done this.
 * The Atoner:
 * A bigger one is
 * Awesome but Impractical: Being a Technologist is often seen as this. While it's actually more of a Magikarp Power due to the sheer number of points required, there's plenty of easier ways to break Arcanum before you even hit the midpoint.
 * Awesome but Practical: The game features a bullet deflecting top-hat, a modified rifle that fires spears, and a staff that harnesses the power of SCIENCE! to shoot lightning. In fact, pretty much anything made by a technologist after the first couple of levels that isn't a gun.
 * Badass Normal: You can eschew super science and high magic in favor of good old fashioned stabbing things in the face (or in the back in case of thieves). Very effective.
 * Badass Bookworm: The player character can be one of these.
 * Baleful Polymorph: Turning opponents into sheep is one option for mages with spells from the Morph college.
 * Ballistic Discount: It's quite easy to buy something that's ridiculously expensive, then promptly kill the guy you bought it from and get your money back. This applies to weapons, but also to (for example) a ship.
 * Beef Gate: The first town has a very literal Beef Gate; that is, a gate guarded by three Beef Gate characters. All but a very few character builds can get by them without abusing the system to make them incapable of fighting at full strength. Trying to go to the various cities out of order can potentially land you in random encounters well above your ability to handle, but this is hit and miss.
 * Even extremely weak character builds can generally eliminate the initial Beef Gate gang with careful exploration - the town is full of various items ripe for the taking, including at least one bundle of dynamite and two stun grenades.
 * Better Than It Sounds Video Games
 * BFG: Several, including the terrifyingly powerful Elephant Gun, the armor-defeating Rifled Cannon, and the enormous Hand Cannon.
 * Bomb Throwing Anarchist: Subverted. Donn Throgg's resistance movement resembles some of the more militant socialist movements from the mid-to-late 19th century, but Throgg isn't really a bad guy, and he saw violence as the only way to change the hideous working conditions in the factories of Tarant. He can be persuaded to pursue his goals in a peaceful manner.
 * Bonus Boss: Stringy Pete and his crew are significantly harder to beat than the final boss. You can, however, give yourself an advantage by using your accumulated Fate Points to Critical Success Pickpocket all his gear before the fight.
 * Book Ends:
 * The very first side quest that can be found involves a spirit stuck on the mortal plain, in pain every moment.
 * And another variation. Plot of the game starts when someone escapes Void (although you are not involved in it). It ends when you do the same thing.
 * Boring but Practical:
 * The first spell of the Black Necromancy college, Harm, does decent damage with little Fatigue consumption.
 * There's also the humble Balanced Sword and Featherweight Axe, a pair of simple and easily-obtainable melee weapons that are easy to use, extremely powerful, light, and fast, and so will usually be a technological melee fighter's primary armament for most of the game.
 * Bow and Sword In Accord: Characters can be built who switch between guns or bows and melee weapons, but carrying multiple weapons of your chosen type is also common because Breakable Weapons is in effect and swords are no good for breaking open stubborn chests.
 * Breakable Weapons: A sword is not a proper tool for opening stubborn doors and chests. Neither are your fists, and it will hurt like hell to boot. Bring an ax. Or an elephant gun.
 * Certain monsters and objects are hard (metal doors, machines, golems) or hot (fire elementals, normal fires) enough to destroy most melee weapons on contact, even axes. The exception to this is similarly damaging or extremely powerful weapons (the pyrotechnic axe and arcane weapon variants, for example, can smash anything).
 * The dog becomes extremely strong in the course of time. He can just bite open all doors and chests with minor hitpoint damage (that is easily healed with a magic healer in the party). You do not need to worry about keys or unlocking magic/skills anymore.
 * Cast From Hit Points: A variation. Using magic doesn't decrease your HP, but runs out your Fatigue meter. An unwise mage can exhaust themselves into unconsciousness.
 * Clap Your Hands If You Believe: Part of the reason why magic and technology are in opposition of each other.
 * The Chosen One: Almost from the moment the game begins you're told that you're the reincarnation of Nasrudin, a messianic figure. Later subverted when . Or possibly played straight, since
 * Subverted in some of the ending choices.
 * The Chosen Zero: If you happen to be, say, a dumb ogre, upon first meeting Virgil, he will make an awkward "the gods move in mysterious ways" excuse while trying (and hilariously failing) not to be offensive.
 * Chronic Backstabbing Disorder:  will stab you in the back, figuratively and literally.
 * Cowboy Cop: Doc Roberts. Even though he isn't an actual cop.
 * Crutch Character: Virgil allows a non-combat character (and even a pure combat character may have difficulty with this at level one and no real gear) to fight the random wolfs in the starting area (even if one at a time) and provides free healing. While Virgil never becomes a bad party member, it's almost impossible for some character builds to survive the early game otherwise.
 * Cryptic Conversation: Virtually everything the Silver Lady has to say. It takes at least a second playthrough to fully decipher her visions, which include not only advice on where to go next but also tidbits of backstory as well as hints to the true nature of the villain.
 * Cutting Off the Branches: One of the more impressive things about this game is the strength of how this trope is averted. Aside from the fact that nearly every problem has multiple solutions, there is indeed the possibility that you could kill someone with quest-relevant information. If you don't find any items on their person with the information you need, you can even cast a Black Necromancy spell to conjure up their spirit and interrogate them that way. Party members with voices even have dialogue for this!
 * Cutscene Power to the Max: Well, Backstory power to the max, anyway, overlapping with Informed Ability. Arronax . In-game, he can't even use Disintegrate (which he actually does use in a cutscene). It mostly amounts to a game engine limitation. Since all characters run on the same type of build (that is to say, they function as you do), it's impossible for him to be as powerful as advertised. Still not a sufficient excuse, though, because there are other characters in the game who are legitimately more powerful than he is, so someone overlooked something with him.
 * Da Chief: The Police Chief in Caladon.
 * Damage Discrimination: Averted. One stray bullet or misaimed boomerang is all it takes for two townsfolk to start laying into each other.
 * The Dark Arts: Averted. Black Necromancy and even demon-summoning are morally neutral, though in point of fact Black Necromancers tend to be jerks.
 * Death by Irony:
 * Deconstruction: The game see-saws randomly back and forth between deconstructing and reconstructing Heroic Fantasy tropes.
 * Deconstructor Fleet: For the Steampunk genre. The game takes pains to point out the more unpleasant side of the Victorian era, including hideously unsafe factory working conditions, strikers being gunned down, classism, racism (try playing the game as an half-orc), eugenics -- there's a ''very' uncomfortable book that talks about a way of solving the Orcish Question via use of a breeding program and removal of a 'malignant gland'. Not to mention the Half-Ogre breeding project, which has some distinctly unnerving parallels with antisemitic conspiracy theories of the time.
 * The Dev Team Thinks of Everything: Every voice-acted NPC has extra dialogue depending on your status. This isn't merely limited to whether your character is retarded or talking to the NPC's ghost, but also includes invisible, transformed, shrunken, and whether they're dressed as a Barbarian or completely naked.
 * This also extends to the numerous ways you can solve any problem. For example, early on, you need to get a local merchant to identify who made a ring you're trying to identify. You can simply roll with his request for an item from the nearby haunted mine, hand over a rare camera in trade, butter him up with social skills, or steal his key and look through his documents in the back. If all else fails, you can even use Black Necromancy to interrogate him (or any other quest-giver related to the main plot) after he's dead. Even Virgil can be questioned this way. Talk about Video Game Cruelty Potential.
 * Merchants have chests which are tightly locked. Only a master mage or master lockpick can open them. Of course, they're always the simple way of beating the chests open... but then the merchants never restock because you've destroyed their inventory.
 * Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Defeating, who's more or less a Physical God at this point.
 * But then again, so is the player, especially if you use the patch to remove the level cap. The game even lampshades this: . And of course, earlier in the game an evil character can do a quest to depopulate the entire town of Stillwater by him/herself...
 * Disadvantageous Disintegration: The Disintegrate spell handily destroys your enemy's loot, as well.
 * Does This Remind You of Anything?:
 * An in-game character called Gil Bates. Considered the inventor of MS-DOS steam engines, . Reminds you of any old, debunked conspiracy theories? He even has a pissed-off, borderline incompetent competitor named Cedric Appleby.
 * Also, the first NPC character that can join your party and act as your early guide to the world of Arcanum is a man called Virgil. Possibly doubles as a nice Shout-Out.
 * The Dog Bites Back
 * Dummied Out: Characters in-game frequently mention the island of Cattan, a tropical touristic island. You can see it on the map, but you can't actually go there in-game without using glitches or cheats and it's completely empty anyways.
 * Dump Stat: Beauty. It only really helps to keep people from being hostile on sight and resolving a small few situations without combat. You can get by with a 2 (and even maximize your Charisma).
 * Elves Versus Dwarves: Played with.
 * Elves and dwarves have traditionally gotten along fairly well -- the recent industrial revolution has, in fact, caused both civilizations to dislike humans far more than each other, though elves are still a bit bitter about the dwarves letting Gilbert Bates get his hands on the steam engine.
 * King Thunderstone points out that the two races don't get along (but are civil about it) because their moral and ethical philosophies differ too much for them to understand each other properly. Ironically, if you consider the philosophies, they are actually very similar.
 * Even Evil Has Standards:
 * Trellian, known as The First Assassin, severs an alliance between the assassins' guild he leads, The Molochean Hand, and the Derian-Ka, a cult of necromancers, when he learns of the atrocities committed by the cult's founder, Kerghan, and leads the Hand in a war to purge the Derian-Ka from existence.
 * Fake Balance: Of the "everything is cheap" type, with most builds having access to abilities that can destroy everything in their path. The exception is guns, most of which are woefully underpowered; on the other hand, the Elephant Gun is one of the most damaging weapons in the game.
 * Archery is another exception. Archers lack any high-end weapon and the skill has no particularly special use.
 * Fantastic Racism:
 * Everyone looks down on orcs. Elves and dwarves simply hate them; humans and gnomes use them for slave labor in a direct allegory of black slavery. The book series "The Orcish Question", found in the Tarant library, goes into a lot of detail about both sides of the debate, including some contributions by Orcs themselves. There are many almost-explicit comparisons to Africans and to Jews in the discourse, which neatly lampshades the trope: unlike in real world racism, Orcs actually tend to have lower intelligence and a more violent nature than the authors. Odd thing, though -- if you play a half-orc they have the same base intelligence stat, and a lot of the orcs you can talk to don't really seem stupid or violent at all, just uneducated and underprivileged. As for the manual entry...
 * Elves and dwarves don't especially like humans, though this is justified by the fact that humans have been making a mess of things recently. Gnomes, for some reason, are not nearly as disliked by either. Everyone likes halflings, more or less, and racism towards half-ogres is limited by the fact that it's a bad idea to tick off something that big and strong.
 * Racism against half-ogres is usually too subtle for them to notice. The one you meet on the Island of Despair (who was unusually intelligent, as well) didn't realize he was a factory slave until years afterwards, when he'd gotten an education and time to think about it.
 * Subverted by the half-elves who are almost universally liked and admired (and tend to become diplomats, merchants and... trophy wives because of it), except for the almost universally disliked half-orcs, who loathe them.
 * Fantasy Counterpart Culture:
 * The Unified Kingdom, which actually has no monarch and is run by a cabal of gnomish capitalists, is obviously modelled on late Victorian Britain. The fantasy races are mostly Tolkienian stereotypes.
 * Before the release of the game, the official site carried several front pages for a fictional newspaper from the gameworld. One article had an amusing account of a fantasy version of the historical controversy concerning Darwinism. The gist of it was that the Elves consider themselves the oldest race on Arcanum, and are rather irritated at recent discoveries that seem to indicate that the humans and dwarves evolved first and that elves and some other races branched off from them the due to the influence of magic.
 * Talking about that, one of the in-game texts was a journal of local Archaeological Society. It turns out they are very unhappy about "heroes" raiding ancient tombs and ruined temples for magical treasures and ancient lore, without any reverence for scientific methodology. It could be a Shout-Out to Heinrich Schliemann's methods -- but it's a fantasy role-playing game, and we all know what the characters in every fantasy role-playing game ever excel at.
 * Fantasy Gun Control: Averted in a big way--and arguably played straight at the same time. Guns are considered technology, and therefore magic interferes with them. Thus, the archetypal mage cannot use a gun without it exploding in his hands.
 * Final Boss Preview:
 * After you visit the Isle of Despair, but before you reach the Wheel Clan, Arronax appears before you as a phantom, taunts you and uses a spell which knocks you and all your followers unconscious.
 * More of a "Final Mook Preview," but one quest in Blackroot involves shutting down a portal . During it, you fight monsters normally not seen till the final dungeon. When you kill them, more spawn, changing to different monsters after you've dealt with enough of one type. Though they run out eventually, leveling here is pretty quick, enough to get you near the top in one go.
 * Game Breaking Bug: Several, with perhaps the most notable being the one where a party member told to wait will disappear forever.
 * Gameplay and Story Integration: The game deserves credit for the fact that the resurrection spell enables new quest options via restoring a person.
 * Gay Option: Seducing a lonely widow is harder if you're also a woman, but it's certainly doable. Then there's the female Dragon, who, when faced by a female hero, is actually more likely to be the one doing the seducing. Finally, there's an actual brothel in Tarrant, which isn't that discriminating about its clients. Or its employees. Near endgame she will have sex with the PC regardless of gender. In fact, it appears the only straight option for females are two filthy gnomes (one being a prostitution job), and the orgy in you're invited to in Stillwater for finding the cult's statue (there are some dudes lying around in the aftermath, although you're not linked to anyone specifically).
 * Genius Bruiser: Thorvald's Half-Ogre guard. Potentially the player too.
 * Global Currency: Averted in-universe (the lack of such actually comes up as a plot point a couple of times), but played straight gameplay-wise.
 * Government Conspiracy: is running one of these.
 * Great White Hunter: Franklin Payne.
 * The Guards Must Be Crazy: Notably averted. Policeman NPCs notice and react to bodies, as well as the presence of armed characters in the vicinity of those bodies, and may attack the player if they happen to walk in while you're standing over a fresh kill with your sword drawn.
 * Guide Dang It: Recruiting the dog can be quite the hassle unless you know exactly what you're doing. Then again, it's equally possible to just stumble upon the dog by accident, since recruiting him is time-sensitive upon arrival.
 * The blessing from the All-Father. You have to make blessings at the alters in a certain order, some of which have to be repeated at least once, then find the final alter buried in Vendigroth. Oh, and if you're a technologist, you better have one of your followers carry a tech-based resurrect. The All-Father kills you in the process of blessing you, then casts Resurrect to bring you back... except a 100 tech-aligned character will block the spell, thus leaving you dead if your party can't bring you back. The game does give you a book and a vague diagram which can allow you to reasonably figure it out, and trial and error allows you to realize you messed up (other gods will curse you if you do it wrong).
 * Guile Hero / Magnetic Hero: Persuasion-based characters can get anyone to do pretty much anything they want, often without charge, and get a lot of companions (around six) to do your dirty work for you. It's even possible to have a decent combat build on top of this, but you won't be using any magic or tech.
 * The Gunslinger: You can play this kind of character.
 * Gypsy Curse: Killing Madame Toussaud is a bad idea. Can also be inverted with the quest's good ending.
 * Half Human Hybrids: Now in three flavours: half-elves, half-orcs and half-ogres. Unusually for the genre, the writers have an in-game explanation for why halfbreeds are even biologically possible (Pre-release marketing material in the form of a fake newspaper suggests that humans and elves are really just distantly related races rather than separate species, half-ogres  while Orcs are suggested to be, and why only those three variants exist.
 * Hand Cannon: With a large enough bore to literally quality as a 'cannon'; in Real Life, anyone attempting to wield it as a pistol would shatter their own arm. Not that anyone cares.
 * The Hat Makes the Man: The Helm of Dark Magics, which permanently lowers your alignment every time you use it.
 * Heroic Fantasy: Melded with Steampunk.
 * Heroic Spirit / Heroic Willpower:  is the first character where the evil strategy of 1) murder 2) cast Conjure Spirit - doesn't seem to work.   ghost doesn't feel any pain from the summoning, and actively mocks the PC's attempts at interrogation.
 * He Who Fights Monsters: The Elven Council went around righting wrongs and doing hero stuff in the Age of Legends, but their heads got pretty swollen from all of the heroic carnage, until.
 * Hey, It's That Voice!:
 * Virgil is The Batman as well as Tuxedo Mask, The Silver Lady is Poison Ivy, Gilbert Bates is The Emperor's voice in all appearances outside of the movies.
 * The Silver Lady is also Adalon in Baldur's Gate 2, while Nick Jameson (the guy who voiced Gilbert Bates) has done a lot of roles, a small handful of which include Dr. Loboto, Rumar and King Raminas.
 * Loghaire is also Master Li, proving that he learned from his mistakes - just not for very long.
 * Hidden Elf Village: Two of them. And four dwarf ones . Probably more, but they're just too well hidden to be in the game. And one for super-powerful "good" wizards. And one for Lizard Folk.
 * Historical In-Joke: While the use of an engine muffler to make a silencer may look like just another example of the game's approach to item crafting, both items were invented by the same person (Hiram Maxim) on the same science.
 * Hollywood Silencer: Although, since semi-automatic pistols have yet to be invented and normal revolvers can't be silenced, it can only be used on a certain custom-built firearm.
 * Hoist by His Own Petard: exploits the unstable relationship between magick and technology to turn a mage's powers against them.
 * Humans Are Bastards: Dwarven technology in human hands has propelled Arcanum into an industrial revolution, which has led to the destruction of Morbihan Forest and rendered Tarant the world's most polluted city. Dwarves in particular invoke this trope, and attempt to justify it; humans, being so short-lived compared to the non-human races, must be motivated by the fear of impending death (in other words, they want their life to mean something), driving them to greater and greater heights of progress. They rarely live long enough to see the destructive consequences of their actions.
 * Hundred-Percent Heroism Rating: The PC gets better reaction from other characters (including shopkeepers who give them discounts) if he or she helped the inhabitants of a given settlement. Additionally, characters sometimes mention specific deeds of the PC and act accordingly. Of course, evil deeds get attention and respect of shady characters (including party members who base their decision to join the PC on his or her karma meter).
 * I'm Dying, Please Take My MacGuffin: Slightly subverted.
 * Inventory Management Puzzle: Characters can only carry a certain amount of weight in a certain amount of space. Objects like guns and bows, though not overly heavy, can take up about a twelfth of your inventory space, while things like potions only take up a single square. Crates, chests and such can hold a much larger number of items, and have no weight penalty, but still have a space limit.
 * Item Crafting: Make a suit of plate armour with only two items and some theoretical knowledge! No tools needed! Results in literally no time at all! Or, for that matter, a sentient super dangerous attack spider from only a steam engine and a cogwheel. Oh, the marvels of modern science!
 * Killer Rabbit:
 * The summoning spell for the Nature magick college, at full power, will summon an ordinary-looking white rabbit called the "Vorpal Bunny".
 * Also, the blue rabbit that is allegedly the shapeshifted Stillwater Giant. You do find it in a cave filled with bones, after all...
 * Also, the blue rabbit that is genuinely the shapeshifting Stillwater Giant, which you meet in a random encounter later on.
 * Large Ham: Franklyn Payne, adventurer extraordinaire!
 * Lizard Folk: The Bedokaan.
 * Luck Manipulation Mechanic: The game has fate points, which may be used to force a critical success (or do something else if you prefer). This is most useful for forcing a critical pickpocket success, allowing you to steal the unique items from certain NPCs.
 * MacGyvering: You'll do this a lot if you play as a scientist.
 * Magic From Technology / Clarke's Third Law: Technology in this setting is capable of doing things so fantastic that it's essentially indistinguishable from magic in many ways (though magic itself is still a separate, distinct thing). A healing salve that closes gashes and mends broken bones in literally seconds? A staff that fries your foes with pinpoint-accurate bolts of lightning? A ring that gives you limited Super Speed when wearing it? A chemical concoction that can bring people back from the dead? All of this and more can be yours through the wonders of late 19th Century SCIENCE!
 * The Magic Goes Away / The Magic Comes Back: Its implied that, because of the Magic Versus Science rules discussed below, Arcanum goes through cycles of a period of high technology, a period when magic and technology coexist in uneasy balance, a period of high magic, another period of coexistence, and so on. Bates' manufacture and marketing of steam engines to the humans is causing a new age of technology to begin and magic to wane. Certain in-game books and conversations imply that magic was once stronger than it is now, and some of the relics from Vendigroth and The Iron Clan hint at what technology might achieve in the future. Although the Vendigrothian relics suggests that it is quite possible for the periods of uneasy coexistence to have both magic and technology be what the 'present day' of the game would consider high.
 * Magic Versus Science: One of the best justifications on record; Magick alters physics to do stuff, Technology uses physics to do stuff. Machinery operating around people using spells are performing nonsense actions - powerful spells will break weaker machines just by being used in the vicinity. Likewise, spells used around machinery are basically inserted into said machinery - powerful machines will cause weaker spells to fail just by operating in their vicinity.
 * A hilarious and quickly-tiresome conversation occurs every time you try to buy a train ticket, basically boiling down to "Are you a wizard?", "Are you sure you're not a wizard?", "You might be a wizard, if-" and quickly turns out to be completely redundant, since the conductor has a device that detects hazardous levels of magic before letting you board a train anyway. Conversely, simply being inside a train station instantly lowers your magicka stat.
 * And by "device", we mean that he holds up his watch and checks so it doesn't start running backwards when you come near.
 * Magikarp Power:
 * Most schools of magic work this way. The first level of a spell tree is some weak utility spell, the second is stronger and likely has some use in combat, the third is hefty, and the fifth (which requires a lot of dedicated status-requirements) is super-powerful. On top of that, a truly powerful mage needs a full 100 rating, which requires putting points into several spell trees.
 * Technologists as a character build are an even greater example. While they get a far worse rap than they deserve from a lot of players, there are some serious issues with using them to their full potential, most notably the extreme cost in points to fill out their disciplines. Playing an effective technologist requires you to finesse your abilities and items for the utmost advantage, but a proper build can lead to a character who is mighty enough to defeat Stringy Pete and his crew of the damned.
 * Lockpicking on either side of the fence. Any lock you can pick without maxed out skill is probably a chest you could have beat open just as easy. Maxed out skill lets you pick storekeeper chests, for infinite money and free gear.
 * The Magocracy: The Elven Council in the Age of Legends.
 * Master of Unlocking: There are two ways of becoming this. Either max out the Lockpick skill, or learn the Unlocking Cantrip spell with 100 Magicka. Being seen by guards while picking a lock will cause them to attack, so the former option is best for stealth, since all spells raise awareness levels (because they're flashy). The latter is better for repeat business (say, if you manage to unlock a shop's inventory, or plan to squat a house for storage), since a lock unlocked by magic will never be relocked.
 * More Dakka: The Repeater Rifle is a more subdued version of this; for players desirous of further Dakka, there's the fully-automatic Mechanized Gun, which can dish out an absolutely terrifying amount of damage but chews through ammo at an astonishing rate.
 * Multiple Endings: In the manner of Fallout.
 * Murder, Inc.: The Molochean Hand.
 * Highly-Visible Ninja: Played straight and averted. Unless you pickpocket every person (barring Random Encounters, who are quite open about their intentions) you talk to, you don't know who's in, but they are easily identified by the necklace once you do.
 * Murder the Hypotenuse: Inverted by, the PC can help it along if they don't explore the quest well.
 * Nice Hat: A bullet deflecting top hat.
 * Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: If you have the Bane of Kree in your party at the end of the game and gave him the Infinity+1 Sword you found in the same area, an ending sequence has him waging war upon all of Arcanum, for which you are blamed. While it would seem obvious what effect bringing him back would have, there's no real dialogue or even a hint as to how to trigger this unless you have a specific follower in your party. Contrast with the half-man, half-dragon Kraka-Tur, who will explicitly threaten to do this should you release him yet won't (no doubt being a coward dissuaded him from causing trouble with you around).
 * Noble Demon: Z'an Alurin is supposedly Alignment -30, and won't work with good PCs unless they have Master Persuasion, but nothing in her actions or dialogue besides this point backs this up;
 * No Ontological Inertia, shown early on.
 * The Other Wiki states that technology is liked by humans because the effects of machines are permanent.
 * Obfuscating Stupidity: Gar the Orc AKA Garfield Thelonius Remingtom the Third. A child of two human parents physically identical to an orc. Introduced as a sideshow act; the "World's Smartest Orc". He was forced into indentured servitude after his genuinely caring parents lost their entire fortune trying to help him. The player may negotiate his freedom and gain him as a party member if they're intelligent enough to discern Gar's true nature.
 * The Obi-Wan: Elder Joachim to Virgil.
 * Omnicidal Maniac:
 * One-Gender Race: An in-game reason was made up to explain what amounted to space limitations. Dwarf women are rare (you never see one in-game, and bringing up the issue with male dwarfs can somehow trigger homicidal rage), while gnome and halfling women apparently suffer from Stay in the Kitchen syndrome.
 * Don't forget Half-Ogres, but it is never explained why in universe.
 * It is explained.
 * One Size Fits All: Averted. Body armor comes in three sizes: medium for humans, elves, orcs, half-elves and half-orcs, small for dwarves, gnomes and halflings, and large for ogres and half-ogres. Also, ogres cannot wield pistols or other small firearms because their hands are too big.
 * One Stat to Rule Them All: Dexterity and weapon speed, in both combat options. In Arcanum, number of hits simply outweighs raw damage by a huge amount.
 * God Stat: Dexterity, and Speed in general if you're playing the game in Turn Based mode.
 * Our Elves Are Better: The major elf groups can be colossal Jerk Asses to anyone who isn't an elf...up to the Dark Elves who want to bring all non-Elves under Elven domination, or else just kill them off.
 * Can't Argue with Elves: Raven can be frustratingly unwilling to help you clean up  Yet you really have no choice but to play her games and help with her problems before she'll let you talk to the Silver Lady.
 * Screw You, Elves: Unless you are totally unwilling to put up with her shit, in which case it's time to start killing (or pickpocket her).
 * Our Dwarves Are All the Same
 * Played straight to the extent that female dwarves are simply a rumour dwarves never discuss (and your player can't be one), so all dwarves to be found are bearded males.
 * Averted with city dwarves, who eschew the old clan customs, and are more proud of their city of origin than their dwarvishness. They still don't talk about their females.
 * Attempted invocation by
 * Also subverted by
 * Pacifist Run: Possible if you have a high Persuasion skill and one of the following: High prowling skill, technological non-lethal explosives, or the invisibility spell. Unless you side with the dark elves (where you need to go Omnicidal Maniac on a town) and/or count nothing must be killed to beat the game, or at least nothing sapient.
 * Technical Pacifist Runs are a bit easier: just build up your Charisma until you can sign up a bunch of henchmen to do your fighting for you.
 * Physical God: Anyone of sufficient personal power is effectively a deity. Nasrudin and Arronax are even worshipped as such,.
 * Point Build System: Arcanum has one of the most flexible character creation systems in all of gaming.
 * Portal of Power Leveling: One early Sidequest involves the discovery and destruction of a one-way dimensional portal spawning an endless array of enemies. Destroying the portal allows you to complete the quest, but it's actually possible to just sit outside the portal and kill the not-quite-endless swarms until they simply run out. You'll jump about twenty to thirty levels for your trouble, in a game where the Level Cap is only fifty.
 * Protagonist Without a Past: Of course, if you take the trait "child of a hero", the game claims that everyone knows your father is famous, but no one will acknowledge it (although they will tend to react more positively to you).
 * Psycho for Hire: Sebastian, Vollinger, and Chukka.
 * Purely Aesthetic Gender: Averted. Females of any race (where applicable) get gain one point of Endurance and lose one point of Strength. The maximum possible value for a stat is 12 added to the starting value from race and background, and hitting 20 in a status gives you bonus (for example, doubling damage for strength) on top of normal effects for increasing stats, so females can't get that bonus without an artificial boost. Gender also affects dialog, though there's only a few times this is more then just sir/ma'am pronouns etc, such as the Gentleman's Club in Tarrant.
 * Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil:
 * Half-Orcs are subject to a lot of Fantastic Racism, partly because most people assume that at some point in their ancestry, a male orc violated an unwilling human woman.
 * "The Reason You Suck" Speech:
 * Religion Is Magic: Making offer to gods whose altars a scattered around Arcanum gives you very real stat boosts. It also gives you very real curses if you don't respect their interpersonal relationships when doing it.
 * Religion Is Right: Partly subverted and partly played straight with Panarii. Most of their myths actually happened. Their prophecies, on the other hand, need some work..
 * The Reveal: Towards the end of the game.
 * Revolvers Are Just Better: Averted; most of the upper-tier handguns are either rolling-block or semi-automatic, and the title of best firearm overall is tied between a steampunk Rocket Launcher, a bolt-action Sniper Rifle, a gigantic break-action elephant gun and a heavy machine gun. Revolvers are by far the most common type of firearm in the game, though, and will be the main armament of any gunslinger character for the majority of the game.
 * Rock Beats Laser: Averted. A few decades prior to the beginning of the game, the nations of Cumbria and Tarant went to war. The mighty army of the kingdom of Cumbria, renowned for their skill at arms, consisted mainly of mounted knights and heavily-armored swordsmen. The poorly-trained conscript military of Tarant consisted of riflemen, artillery, and machine-gun teams. The battle is exactly as one-sided as it sounds. The Cumbrians only ever won any battles through ambushes in dense terrain, and these were few and far between. By 1885 (when the game starts), Cumbria is a decaying, run-down shadow of its former self, while Tarant is thriving.
 * RP Gs Equal Combat: Technically it's possible to complete the game without fighting and it isn't even hard, but it requires you to have a very specific character build. The non-combat gameplay parts are still better than those in most RPGs anyways.
 * Scaled Up: Kraka-Tur, a human who transformed himself into a dragon using dragon's blood and a magic scroll.
 * Schizo-Tech: Showcased as early as the brief animation that plays when you first start the game, in which a traditional knight in plate armor with an enchanted sword is showcased alongside a warrior with a revolver and a suit of Steampunk Powered Armor. Things only get more ridiculous from there - the market district of Tarant, for example, has a gunsmith selling machine guns next door to a weapons shop peddling swords and maces, airplanes and commercial airship lines exist but nothing even resembling an automobile can be found, etc.
 * Science Destroys Magic: One late conversation mentions that the world goes through cycles of magic, uneasy balance, tech, etc., with the game taking place during the uneasy balance leading into an era of technology. There's an Unreliable Narrator at work, however,.
 * Science Hero
 * Shotguns Are Just Better: Averted. They're cheap, light, and compact but are still objectively one of the worst firearms in the game, with terrible range, poor damage, no armor penetration and a slow fire rate.
 * Sealed Evil in a Can: The Void fulfills this purpose. Arguably,
 * Selective Memory: Our hero was going from the second largest city on the continent to the largest one, but does not remember where these cities are located. All our hero has is a map which shows the major topographical features of the continent, but none of the settlements. The player character is supposedly from a different continent which makes their lack of geographical knowledge about Arcanum understandable.
 * Serial Killer:
 * Sheathe Your Sword: There's a side-quest where you have to get these human prospectors off of elven holy ground. The ground is cursed/blessed so that anyone who acts violently while on it is killed instantly. You have basically two options; talk/trick the humans into leaving, or goad them into attacking you thus getting them killed. If you're going for the latter option, make sure you have Automatic Combat switched to "off."
 * You can order Virgil to hold position somewhere nearby so that he can't reach the fight until everyone is already dead; the Resurrection spell, however, can be cast at long distance. If he casts it on you before combat ends, the game over screen doesn't appear. Really, who doesn't want to cheat their way out of a peaceful elven hippie curse using a combination of violent mayhem and necromancy?
 * Shout-Out:
 * Several to Fallout. You find a power-armor-wearing man outside of the secret mage city. He was sent to find a water crystal but now they won't let him back in because he's been contaminated by the outside world.
 * The entirety of Vendigroth Wastes - a huge desert littered by ruins of an ancient, technologically advanced civilization that vanished due to an unknown cataclysm.
 * There's also a two-headed cow in Parnell's museum of curiosities. Lampshaded when your character claims to have seen one somewhere else.
 * The weapon you retrieve for Throwing mastery is the Glaive in all but name.
 * The very secret Easter Egg "Aerial Decapitator", taken directly from Master of the Flying Guillotine.
 * Evil Virgil tells Joachim "Your powers are weak, old man."
 * A sidequest involves the player in an investigation around prostitutes murdered and disemboweled in a district called "Whythechurch". An obvious shout-out to Jack the Ripper, the "murderer of Whitechapel".
 * Settlers of Catan; see Dummied Out above.
 * If you can recruit the demon Gorgoth as an ally, he will sometimes scream "GET IN MY BELLY!" during fights.
 * Skippable Boss: The end boss can be talked into letting you kill him without resistance, again echoing Fallout.
 * Sliding Scale of Undead Regeneration
 * Small Name, Big Ego: Magnus, who tries too hard to be a traditional dwarf when it's apparent to all around him that he's not, and gets defensive when called on it. He does at least get better about it over the course of the game, and finally admits to it when the dwarven king himself starts prodding.
 * Sniper Pistol: One of these can be made, although the trope is played with a bit in that the resulting firearm is designed and built specifically as a sniping weapon rather than just being an ordinary pistol with a scope bolted on.
 * Sniper Rifle: One can be purchased (or built by characters exceptionally skilled in Gunsmithing). It has the longest range of any weapon, spell, or ability in the game, and can easily hit targets three or more screens away. The Elephant Gun can also serve in this role; it has slightly shorter range but deals much more damage.
 * Space Jews: The gnomes are small people with large noses and exceptional prowess at handling the money who own a large part of the industry and banking. Moreover, they've been subject to much prejudice because of these.
 * Spiritual Successor: To the first two Fallout games - which is a given, since it was created by the same team of developers, just under a different brand.
 * Spot of Tea: Debating the merits of green tea over earl grey is required to recruit a certain Cultured Badass as a follower.
 * Stealth Expert: You may play as one, which is of particular importance for pacifists and backstabbers. Why, you can hide in an open field if you're good enough!
 * Steampunk: Steampowered armour! Clockwork fighting robots! Electrified swords for that additional sting! Magnetised top hats avert bullets! Firearms are strangely weak!
 * Dwarves with Guns!
 * Take a Third Option: In the Boil, you have the option of joining one of two gangs to defeat the other. To get the good ending for that section, you have to wipe out both gangs. This is actually a quest in itself, but you could be forgiven for never actually receiving that quest since it's a bit difficult to find.
 * Most of the quests in this game have a third option that can be taken in lieu of the "correct" one. For example, one quests tasks you with retrieving a gem from a shrine, only to be told that making any noise (i.e. failing to Sneak) will summon a bunch of monsters to kill you. There's nothing to stop you from just walking up, murdering the hell out of the monsters when they appear, then taking the gem at your leisure. Quests only ever give you an objective, they never say it has to be completed a certain way. That said, quest-givers do occasionally reward you better if you do it according to their instructions.
 * Talking the Monster to Death: Diplomacy is a good solution to several of the quests. In particular, the Final Boss will agree to debate philosophy with you, and submit to an assisted suicide if you can show him enough holes in his logic.
 * Third Person Person: Ristezze in Shrouded Hills, the first town you come to.
 * Too Awesome to Use: Magic Scrolls end up being this to many players. You rarely encounter them lying around, and they cost a lot of money; even the nearly-useless ones. So they just end up sitting there, waiting for "that time" where you'll want that Scroll of Fireflash.
 * Ultimate Evil: In-universe example. Arronax is deliberately portrayed as this by the Panarii religion
 * Urban Legend of Zelda: There were rumours in various forums that you could somehow convince the Wheel Clan to invade Tarant.
 * Universal Ammunition: Pistol? Rifle? Hand Cannon? Elephant Gun? Same bullets.
 * Vagueness Is Coming: The dying gnome at the start of the game helpfully informs you that "unimaginable evil" is coming to "destroy everyone and everything".
 * Video Game Cruelty Potential:
 * Use Charm Beast to befriend a wild animal, like a wolf or bear. Walk to the nearest town. Have your animal friend enter an occupied house while you wait outside. Magelock the door shut. Then dispel Charm Beast. (You might want to magically seal the windows, too -- you don't want anyone to escape the wrath of Mr. Disoriented Grizzly.) Is also an effective means to assassinate someone without the guards finding out it was you (whereas if a cop NPC walks into a room and you're standing over a bloody corpse with a sword in your hand, they'll usually put two and two together and attack you).
 * There's also the fact that there exists only 1 NPC in the game who can't be killed . Every major character can be murdered, then have their ghost summoned and interrogated. A true villain may kill the dwarf leader of the Isle of Despair, then raise his spirit just to tell him that you're going to travel to his home clan and kill everyone - oh, and that you'll drag the corpses into the daylight just to add insult to injury (sadly, you can't actually drag the corpses outside). There's almost no limit to how much cruelty you can inflict upon the populace of Arcanum.
 * Video Game Cruelty Punishment:
 * While most things in this game can just be killed to deal with them, there are two instances where the game will punish you severely for trying. The first instance is a quest Raven sends you on. The area in question is cursed so that if you or your party harms anything there, you all die automatically. The trick is to get your targets to do this to you. The second is dealing with Stringy Pete. You have to do three quests to get his boat. You might wonder why you can't just kill him instead. After all, he's just one high-level skeleton. He is just one high-level skeleton... armed with the best magical armor available, and summons six similarly high-level skeletons to back him up. While it is technically possible to win, it's very unlikely unless you bring a huge group and prepare for it. Too bad one of his quests is impossible to complete if you pick up the Torin stone before speaking to him and the priests. Or if you lose the stone. Then killing him is the only way to get to his ship.
 * Killing the fat perverted Mr. Franklin who hires a female PC to sleep with him (while he is fast asleep from the sex) will result in the quest-giver attacking when going to pick up the payment. Can be averted by killing him after payment is received.
 * The fortune teller sidequest. To elaborate, Tarant has two fortune tellers, Madame Toussaud and a fraud in upper Tarant. Once you speak to the fraud, she'll ask you to steal Toussaud's crystal ball. Upon arrival, Toussaud will know why you've come and demand you choose a side. If you choose her side, you get the ball with no conflict and give it to the fraud, who dies upon touching it. You get a decent blessing (stat boost) for the trouble. Side against Toussaud, though, and you get hit with an equal curse (stat reduction), while the fraud rewards you with nothing worthwhile. No sane person ever sides with the fraud.
 * Wake Up Call Level: While the game can be incredibly easy with the right character, the Black Mountain Clan Mines will absolutely murder a low level party. This is made all the more frustrating since the game's narrative actively pushes you to travel there in the early stages.
 * We Buy Anything: Played with; vendors will only buy things related to their stock (smithy shops only buy armor and weapons, for example), except for the junk vendors, who will buy anything short of destroyed items. Get mastery in Haggle, though, and they will not only buy anything, they'll sell you the clothes off their backs.
 * Well-Intentioned Extremist: . Interestingly, that particular theory is somewhat confirmed in-game, since one of your party members agrees with him but still thinks that people should be allowed to choose their own fate.
 * When All You Have Is a Hammer: Virtually any problem can be solved with the right application of force. Locked door? Beat it down. Guy holding an item you like? Kill him. Interdimensional portal releasing demon hoards upon the land? Whack it closed. Note that while this method may work, it is not exactly the most subtle way of doing things. Also, some of the Golden Endings for various places require that you be skilled in Persuasion, such as taking a diplomatic solution to the matter of.
 * Wizards Live Longer: Played with; elves are both the most magically talented race in Arcanum, and have the longest lifespans (up to a millenium), and humans with a talent for magick live slightly longer than those without, according to the manual. On the other hand, dwarves and gnomes have respectable lifespans (600 years) despite having no natural affinity for magick, and orcs and halflings, thought to have been mutated by exposure to large amounts of magick, have shorter lifespans than the races they evolved from (40 years and 400 years, respectively).
 * Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds:
 * Year Outside, Hour Inside: Is the case inside The Void.
 * We Buy Anything: Played with; vendors will only buy things related to their stock (smithy shops only buy armor and weapons, for example), except for the junk vendors, who will buy anything short of destroyed items. Get mastery in Haggle, though, and they will not only buy anything, they'll sell you the clothes off their backs.
 * Well-Intentioned Extremist: . Interestingly, that particular theory is somewhat confirmed in-game, since one of your party members agrees with him but still thinks that people should be allowed to choose their own fate.
 * When All You Have Is a Hammer: Virtually any problem can be solved with the right application of force. Locked door? Beat it down. Guy holding an item you like? Kill him. Interdimensional portal releasing demon hoards upon the land? Whack it closed. Note that while this method may work, it is not exactly the most subtle way of doing things. Also, some of the Golden Endings for various places require that you be skilled in Persuasion, such as taking a diplomatic solution to the matter of.
 * Wizards Live Longer: Played with; elves are both the most magically talented race in Arcanum, and have the longest lifespans (up to a millenium), and humans with a talent for magick live slightly longer than those without, according to the manual. On the other hand, dwarves and gnomes have respectable lifespans (600 years) despite having no natural affinity for magick, and orcs and halflings, thought to have been mutated by exposure to large amounts of magick, have shorter lifespans than the races they evolved from (40 years and 400 years, respectively).
 * Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds:
 * Year Outside, Hour Inside: Is the case inside The Void.