Thank you for the Gothic rec -- that's actually the one I tried to read! And it was very interesting in some ways, but unfortunately I didn't get very far. It's in illustrious company, at least: Frankenstein and The Count of Monte Cristo have met the same fate. Maybe someday I'll have better luck.

I meant to read that Rock Paper Shotgun article after it was mentioned in hbomberguy's video review, but then holidays happened and it completely slipped my mind, so thank you for linking it! There are some things I love reading about even if I'll never experience them directly, and this game definitely seems to be one.