In a surprising move, THQ Nordic dropped a playable teaser version of their in-progress remake of Gothic. And to even call it "in-progress" feels like a bit of stretch. Instead, the developer is using this teaser to gauge interest in a potential remake. They're giving anyone who already owns either a game in the Gothic saga or a game developed by Piranha Bytes access to the playable teaser on Steam. It's a marketing tactic that I can't remember anyone else using. Give the announcement trailer a watch below.

Again, this doesn't sound like anything we've ever seen before. Sure, companies like Capcom are constantly saying "if more people buy more Resident Evil games, then we'll make them". But I don't remember anyone putting out a playable demo purely to see if anyone is interested in a potential game. This is a two-long version of the classic Gothic RPG. That should give players enough time to know whether this is something they want or not.

As of this writing, the game has mixed reviews on reviews Steam. Obviously, that could change as more people get access to the game. However, things don't appear to be going the way THQ Nordic was likely hoping. Importantly, this isn't being made by Piranha Bytes. Instead, a small team at THQ Nordic Barcelona put this teaser together. If THQ decides to go forward with development, they will, of course, grow the team to rebuild Gothic from scratch.

Regardless of how all this turns out, it's certainly a story worth paying attention to. The original Gothic was relatively well-received critically and spawned two sequels and three expansions. If this playable teaser can garner enough interest, this could be a cool, new way for developers to try out new products.