I really think Gothics controls would work much much better on a game pad. Really. The left stick for movement , left shoulder button for locking onto a target in combat, right stick for attacks. Small difference to the keyboard controls but would work much better.
Having said that the controls once you have practiced a bit and actually understand what they where trying to do with them are mostly very good. having to hold the ctrl key for more or less every bloody action was, for the most part, unnecesary though.

The game was actually developped with consoles primarily in mind, if I am not mistaken.

Neither in this case. :P

I know History will prove me right at some point.