Unable to apply Gothic 3 cheats via console

When I activate the console in G3 by pressing ~tilda key, the console's
graphics are all messed up looking - kind of weird blotchy black lump
at top of screen, and so when I type, I don't see anything appear, and
basically I can't get any cheat codes to work.

Can anyone think of a workaround please?

Thanks, regards, dnw.

PS ~ assuming I get it to work, I'd like to have a lot of gold
(wouldn't we all!) Would it be something like -

give gold 1000000

?