Best way to play Baldur's Gate

[harhar!]

See title. I want to play it for the first time. What's the best option?

 

[Jvegi]

For the first time? It's too late. You fucked up.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Xamenos]

Tutu

 

[kangaxx]

Nintendo Switch version

 

[d1r]

Play BGEE (and BGEE2) with the "Disabled Enhanced Edition NPC's" mod, and skip the Siege of Dragonspear module, respectively import your character directly into BG2 after you're done with BG1.

EE is the fast and easy solution to start BG without almost no mods to install.

BWP is more complex and you really have to know what you're going to install, otherwise, the game can become a huge mess.

 

[Joseph Stalin]

The authoritative* version of course - the Enhanced Edition.

*From Miriam's Dictionary - having, marked by, or proceeding from authority.

Hey Lilura, guess who is the ultimate authority - the IP holder. That would be Wizards of the Coast/Ed Greenwood. Guess which version they use as the basis of canon - the Enhanced Edition. You wanna know how I know that? One - I asked. Two - Neera is referenced in official WotC work. So she's canon. So are the EE. So they're authoritative.

Have a wonderful day.

 

[Joseph Stalin]

Now a more serious answer - the EE version. They work straight out of the gate, the UI is adjusted to widescreen/high resolutions, you can skip the EE companions (JUST LIKE ANY OTHER, FOR GOD'S SAKE) if you don't like them. No need to mod them out. If you don't like the look of the UI, it can easily be modded.

Siege of Dragonspear is a good bridge between the two games, and also features an excellent dungeon in the form of Dragonspear itself. Probably the best in the series, maybe next to Durlag's Tower.

 

[valky667]

BG:EE straight out of the box.
Faster loading times (or save/reload for that matter), better distinct party control with the colored circles, that can be changed by the user (=main clothing color), no widescreen-mod needed, no other mod needed.

it just works....

Durlag's Tower for more OP stuff and then switch over and import into BG2:EE
You can get to 21 WIS in BG1 (!) - that is hell of OP, with a dualed fighter -> cleric

The only thing, I found a little bit disturbing is the pixel smoothing; while I only played BG2 and not BG1 with the widescreen mod, it looks crispier and kinda sharper and not necessary worse than the EE, but the performance impact is huge. (edit: of course I played both of them in EE - but only 2 with the mentioned mod..*weird*)
Can probably be enhanced by using ReShade....but then again, you can just zoom out ^^

 

[pomenitul]

Iggy bin all those who suggest the EEs.

 

[valky667]

Iggy bin all those who suggest the EEs.

I have both of them in proper CD boxes + addon + stuff as well, they were hard to get back then in Germany, if you wanted the English version. Not because of the blood, that is just an ini-hack, but the language. Way better atmosphere....similar to FA 1/2

 

[oldmanpaco]

Original on core difficulty with the most basic of SCS add-ons.

Also Romantic Encounters.

 

[overly excitable young man]

BGs are filled with aids. Just play Fallout instead.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

If your BG1 doesn't come with five discs then it's the wrong BG1.

 

[Lilura]

Original, unmodded. Preferably employ a Trinitron CRT for display purposes.

 

[smaug]

Use BGT, and mods to modify ruleset to the original. That way you have OG ruleset and no bonus classes and stuff from BG2 engine.

Only reason is for good pathfinding, original pathfinding is AWFUL.

 

[Tigranes]

Just play the original, it's a pretty-looking game with a well-designed UI that is easy to pick up and play. You're not going to sit there squinting or wondering which keyboard hotkeys to go forward or crashing from massive bugs.

If you like, download the Widescreen Mod.

There's no reason to bother with ruleset changes or BG2 engine stuff until your second playthrough, at which point you can pick up SCS.

 

[DalekFlay]

Pretty sure the EE is 99% fixed now and removes the annoyance of installing a bunch of mods, but I wouldn't expect many people here to say that.

 

[Generic-Giant-Spider]

I say this with no ill will DalekFlay, but you are one of the few posters I would definitely not mind watching in a tornado.

 

[Old Hans]

i like to play it on an authentic 8" monitor

 

[JDR13]

Pretty sure the EE is 99% fixed now and removes the annoyance of installing a bunch of mods, but I wouldn't expect many people here to say that.

I like the EE for the most part, but it uses the inferior character sprites from BGII. It would be damn near perfect if not for that.

 

[ghostdog]

Since it's the first time, any contact with the retarded beamdog NPCs and the embarrassing Siege of the Dragonspear can really spoil your game. As a veteran, when I recently tried the EE trilogy, I was pretty disgusted with the new NPCs (I unfortunately tried using a few of them) but I knew which of them where the new ones and from then on I simply slaughtered them all, which gave me some satisfaction at least. On the other hand SoD (which is a really, really bad fanfic mod) can only be semi-avoided through the developer's menu, but you still have to suffer through the prologue and epilogue and that was rather annoying.

If you just want to play BG1 and/or BG2 separately, either use original games with the widescreen mod (for higher resolutions convenience), or use the EE editions with the Convenient Enhanced Edition NPCs mod that can disable all the beamdog NPCs.

If you want to play the whole trilogy as one (Bg1, Bg2 and ToB) you would need to use a mod to combine all games; BWP for the originals and EET for the EE versions. I'd just go with BWP + Widescreen mod, it's not harder to setup than EET and you completely avoid SoD, while EET needs SoD to be installed.

Since it's your first time I would suggest to just play Bg1 and Bg2+ToB separately without any other mods than the ones mentioned above.

 

[Lilura]

I like the EE for the most part, but it uses the inferior character sprites from BGII. It would be damn near perfect if not for that.

Spoiler

 

[Kalin]

Original with hard times mod. EE is for faggots.

 

[DraQ]

Wait until Larian releases it.

Spoiler