Absolutely and deservedly so.
PoE? Very unlikely. Codex doesn't like it that much. Original Sin, yeah, maybe. Gothic 2 was 9th place, btw.
I'm about two hours in and I'm really liking it so far. I absolutely hate the exposition, the duuuuumb names and the UI/Inventory is a real bummer but other than that, yeah, it seems pretty good and reminds me of classic Gothic.
The amount of hidden places I found between the starting point and the first city is really impressive. They don't reuse locations either, everything feels hand-crafted and unique, lots of verticality, too.
If they can keep the quality of the world throughout the entire game, then this just might be the best world PB ever created. At least when it comes to exploration.
Everything else really feels like a Gothic game. The dialogs (I'm playing the German version), the settlement and its NPCs, the way the player organically receives quests and directions (I don't think there are quest markers in this game), faction armors, etc.
I had a feeling Elex would turn out better than Risen 2 and 3 but so far it exceeds my expectations.