Baldur's Gate Are BG1 and BG2 too dated today?

[Joseph Stalin]

They aren't dated - except the mechanics. Take off your nostalgia goggles, comrades - 2nd Edition aged TERRIBLY. It's bare-bones and barren, more similar to ARPG mechanics than a fully-fleshed RPG system. One needs only to realise that there are no skills and, more importantly, the entirety of your character's social abilities are tied to ONE SCORE, which is additionally completely and utterly useless outside the first game.

Not to mention that non-spellcasting and/or non-thief classes have very few gameplay options, other than "click and attack."

 

[Cleric of Asmodeus]

Any cool mods out there for Adventure? Game was hype AF back in 1980 and I'm thinkin another playthrough would be litty

 

[rusty_shackleford]

NWN is looking compared to titles from other big name studios of the time.

Year 2002.


NWN:

Dungeon Siege :

What is this supposed to prove? NWN was ugly as hell.
Compare it to other 2002 games like Mafia, Bloodrayne, Morrowind, Wind waker, no one lives forever 2, ...
And it's not just ugly graphics, it's ugly art direction.

 

[Cleric of Asmodeus]

Freedom Force came out in 2002 and I think it looks pretty decent. Mostly due to art direction. The characters certainly look more distinct than IE characters, which was one of my major pet peeves with the art of those games.

 

[Sarathiour]

Well, i should have give some context and explanation when posting. Dungeon Siege is an interesting comparison, because it's roughly the same genre, at least on technical level ( isometric rtwp). I also perhaps should have show screenshot of my own rather than some shitty from the web, because they both get remastered and it's now rather annoying to find screenshot from 2002.

Point is, NW look like shit compared to DS character asset are terrible, a playmobil shield look more realistic than the one in NWN. The depth of field is non-existent, you got shitty fog if you dare look farther than 10 feet away from character. And don't get me started on decorative shit like tree or sculpture.
Also, DS load the whole map from the beginning to end, contrary to nwn.

I mean we can just look at Aribeth's sword, how the fuck something like this got approved ?

 

[Lyric Suite]

only thing dated are the blurry sprites of the npcs.

The sprites are not blurry are you using the EE?

 

[Darkzone]

When you train martial arts with weapons then you then the first thing that you discover is that it is very difficult to pass / get behind a defending enemy.

Then the game's systems need to reflect that, rather than just gimping the AI to behave as if this were the case without actually making it the case.

Here lies the buried dog. Ok now i know why you think this way. But first: Sorry for the late answer since i had a lot to do this weekend.
There are many roads that lead to nowhere or to rome. You can have an explicit handler that handles the players position and possible enemies positions and gives values to the agents or you do it from the agent side. Dependent on the implementation of Agents and etc one solution is more or less efficient (costs more computing power by computing time and computing space). In Unreal engine it is usus to make it on the agent side. The agents checks the positions of the player figures or sees them with sensing (AI sensing) function and reacts corresponding from behavior trees (used by the AI Controller) and the Agent BP script handles also his movement (its kind and speed). Therefore it is optimal in a RT Game to handle it all by the Enemy NPC Agent. My answer to you comes from this knowledge and therefore i stated that the Enemy has to reduce or even stop himself in his movement if a player figure is at a certain range, because all the function will be in his BP (Blueprint) script. The thing goes even deeper and therefore dividing the system and the Enemy behavior trees is not so ... since the behavior trees handle very specific actions, like roaming or moving to specific points in proximity or towards the spotted player characters and to attack them. But the kind of attack (like the animation and its duration (playback speed)) is (mostly-making it quite varible) handled by the Enemy BP and the BP also is connected with that Animation BP for the Enemy NPC, likewise it is with the AI Controller.
But it will be clear to you, if Kris has made the BM video for Steam EA and when you come to his Discord then he can show it to you directly without me as a medium. Naturally only if you want to and yes this is just one model for such a thing.

It is not about acting suboptimally but about acting realistic. And yes millitary is limited by defence capabilities of the opposite faction, like in teams in soccer or american football (defensive line). In medieval / ancient combat this was managed by different tactics and formations like Pike- Spear Formations (famous Hoplite). When you train martial arts with weapons then you then the first thing that you discover is that it is very difficult to pass / get behind a defending enemy.

Overcoming enemy's defense is one thing - artificially imposed limitations on the offensive side are different. Football has such artificial limitations - offside rule. Real-life combat has them not.

Please look at my written answer above.

 

[tickle tipson]

De plus, les visuels BG étaient toujours jolis. C'était IWD 1 & 2 avec les jolis visuels.

Lol ne sois pas un attardé.

Les visuels BG étaient putain d'éclairés quand ils sont sortis. Pas de merde, ils ont pu s'appuyer sur ça plus tard, mais allez.

Le jeu étant une merveille technique à sa sortie est en partie la raison de son succès.

Le plus gros problème avec les deux jeux est que l'écriture est un peu merdique même si ce n'est pas tout à fait terrible, je suppose. Quoi qu'il en soit, ce n'est rien que les gaymes modernes peuvent se vanter d'avoir amélioré, donc quiconque dit que les anciens jeux ont été rendus inutiles par le nu-shit est un attardé.

Est-ce une blague élaborée que je ne comprends pas où nous prétendons que BG ne ressemble pas à quelqu'un qui a vomi à l'écran ?

I would like to nuance, the sprites are awful but the background are quite nice

 

[ADULF HITLOR FAN KLUB]

The graphics are obviously dated, but Baldur's Gate, and even Fallout for that matter, are aesthetically very pleasing to this very day.

All we really need is a Baldur's Gate HD. Too bad the original assets were lost.

 

[Wunderbar]

All we really need is a Baldur's Gate HD. Too bad the original assets were lost.

same assets but rerendered at a higher resolution would look like ass. Those games still look good precisely because of their low resolution, since it hides all imperfections and allows our brains to fill in the gaps.

 

[Comte_II]

De plus, les visuels BG étaient toujours jolis. C'était IWD 1 & 2 avec les jolis visuels.

Lol ne sois pas un attardé.

Les visuels BG étaient putain d'éclairés quand ils sont sortis. Pas de merde, ils ont pu s'appuyer sur ça plus tard, mais allez.

Le jeu étant une merveille technique à sa sortie est en partie la raison de son succès.

Le plus gros problème avec les deux jeux est que l'écriture est un peu merdique même si ce n'est pas tout à fait terrible, je suppose. Quoi qu'il en soit, ce n'est rien que les gaymes modernes peuvent se vanter d'avoir amélioré, donc quiconque dit que les anciens jeux ont été rendus inutiles par le nu-shit est un attardé.

Est-ce une blague élaborée que je ne comprends pas où nous prétendons que BG ne ressemble pas à quelqu'un qui a vomi à l'écran ?

I would like to nuance, the sprites are awful but the background are quite nice

Can you tickle my tip?

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

Especially with the (minor but significant) UI improvement introduced on BG2, I really feel like the only thing "dated" about the series is the technical obsolescence.
Even more than the visuals, one of the most grating aspects of trying to play BG1 or 2 today is the fucking awful 15 fps default framerate.

But I genuinely feel that you could take BG2 and have it ported almost 1:1 in higher resolution/higher framerate, you'd still have a surprisingly viable game by modern standards even in terms of UI, controls, etc.

Ok, maybe it could take some minor QoL improvement on the front of inventory management.
Frankly speaking while I'm typically an advocate AGAINST the allure of "convenience above all" both the Pathfinder games and PoE II handled "party inventory" a lot better, by making it an unified stash (and limiting "quick-use" items to "belt slots" equipped on individual characters).

 

[adddeed]

I wouldn't bother with Baldur's Gate 2, really disappointing game compared to Baldur's Gate 1.

 

[barricade]

I wouldn't bother with Baldur's Gate 2, really disappointing game compared to Baldur's Gate 1.

really? i've always thought that BG1 was disappointing compared to BG2. how is that even possible? could it be because it's just a matter of taste? or should i give up playing BG2 because "adddeed" said we shouldn't bother with BG2? damn, i was so wrong all this time..

 

[anvi]

They were dated on release day. But since gaming has been in constant decline ever since, they now stand as super advanced masterpieces that todays devs couldn't even comprehend.

 

[adddeed]

I wouldn't bother with Baldur's Gate 2, really disappointing game compared to Baldur's Gate 1.

really? i've always thought that BG1 was disappointing compared to BG2. how is that even possible? could it be because it's just a matter of taste? or should i give up playing BG2 because "adddeed" said we shouldn't bother with BG2? damn, i was so wrong all this time..

Its linear, bloated, quests thrown at your face all the time, mage duals all over the place, no exploration, personally dont enjoy the high level dnd, special and super weapons everywhere, no sense of adventure that was present in the BG1.
So yes BG1 in my view is the superior game.

 

[Sykar]

What a fucking retarded comment, as par for the course from our local village idiot. BG 1 is just as linear as BG 2 story wise and you HAVE to do them in order, you cannot even find the bandit camp by chance or through sheer exploration. Speaking of exploration, it mostly boils down to a few empty maps with 1 or 2 enemy groups and close to no loot, CnC, story or anything so in other words a snooze fest. Bloat is completely subjective and in fact up to your own decision making if you want to pursue them or not, so not an argument whatsoever. Same goes for high level AD&D. Mage duels are only really a thing with SCS installed. Otherwise the mages are often so ill prepared that a single breach/Spell Thrust will suffice to beat them with your average party with only very high level liches being a problem if you encounter them very early. You complain about special weapons "everywhere" which is also not true, when BG 1 has nothing special whatsoever. The overwhelming majority of items are bog standard and exceedingly boring +1 or +2 weapons. If you are lucky you get an extra +1 elemental damage or some such which is still boring to the max.
So in other words, while I got no problem people liking BG 1 over BG 2 I do get a little peeved when dumbfucks like you try to tell people to not even give BG 2 a try.

 

[Harthwain]

Its linear

And BG1 is not?

bloated, quests thrown at your face all the time

Do you like narrow corridors with one-by-one tasks to do or something? To me this was great, because there was a plenty of content, giving you stuff to do and see and the game felt very open as a result.

mage duals all over the place

Again, in a fantasy world with strong focus on magic this is great. In fact, I struggle to recall another game that had this much emphasis on mages being so powerful/impactful.

no exploration

Bullshit. There are a lot of locations to explore.

personally dont enjoy the high level dnd

I do.

special and super weapons everywhere

Eh, I get where you're coming from but I enjoyed that.

 

[barricade]

it's not like we've seen this bg1 vs bg2 debate a million times since bg2 came out.

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

a million times

At least.

 

[Nano]

Getting four new sidequests thrown at my face whenever I'm already trying to finish another one isn't the definition of fun, in my opinion. Doesn't feel very realistic, either.

 

[Mr. Magniloquent]

Getting four new sidequests thrown at my face whenever I'm already trying to finish another one isn't the definition of fun, in my opinion. Doesn't feel very realistic, either.

Yeah. Nothing worse than heaps of excellent content organically woven around a major city. That gun held to your head forcing you to talk with every NPC, pursue every quest, and not use your journal is a real burden.

 

[Nano]

organically woven

It's really not. Finding someone who needs saving with every three steps you take is not organic. BG1's mostly empty forest areas might be boring, but they're far more realistic (and thus not immersion breaking).

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

The argument that BG1 was allegedly more "non-linear" and open than BG2 only because you could walk to the borders of the map and enter the adjacent one always felt fucking bizarre to me.

First, because like it or not BG2 was factually a bigger game that covered more playable surface in the end. The fact that there was more "world map travel" in-between them wasn't exactly detrimental to the quality, either.

Second, because most of the "open areas" in BG1 could pretty much be summarized in "Here's this square mile of grassland with a bunch of bushes for shit and giggle. Now enjoy walking through it and dealing with a bunch of random ass encounters with wolves and shit".

 

[Bruma Hobo]

What about this: Both games are crap.

Groundbreaking, huh?