Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

Baldur's Gate Baldur's Gate 3 Early Access Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

Grauken

Arcane
Joined
Mar 22, 2013
Messages
13,329
Let's be real, gaming journos don't actually play the game before writing the review. :smug:
This, especially for long massive RPGs their reviews are pointless
 

whydoibother

Arcane
Patron
Joined
May 2, 2018
Messages
17,701
Location
bulgaristan
Codex Year of the Donut
Let's be real, gaming journos don't actually play the game before writing the review. :smug:
I'm sure they play. They just play, and replay, and replay, and replay, with different settings on different systems, only the first part of the game. They will just review Act I anyways.
 

Zeriel

Arcane
Joined
Jun 17, 2012
Messages
14,020
Except that the original DOS1 version is better than the Enhanced edition which is ironic when you think about it.
The only reason to think this is if your particular playstyle got hit by balance nerfs. Pretty much everything else improved.
They added voice acting which broke the roleplay and nerfed the bosses into Oblivion. Decline.

Did they nerf it across the board, or move the difficulty to the hard mode? I only played the hard mode + iron-man, and I honestly don't recall.
 

whydoibother

Arcane
Patron
Joined
May 2, 2018
Messages
17,701
Location
bulgaristan
Codex Year of the Donut
Except that the original DOS1 version is better than the Enhanced edition which is ironic when you think about it.
The only reason to think this is if your particular playstyle got hit by balance nerfs. Pretty much everything else improved.
They added voice acting which broke the roleplay and nerfed the bosses into Oblivion. Decline.

Did they nerf it across the board, or move the difficulty to the hard mode? I only played the hard mode + iron-man, and I honestly don't recall.
I think they added an additional difficulty setting, which may have reshuffled the others. If you played on the hardest mode, it was the same in both versions. Or at least I didn't notice any difference.
 

processdaemon

Scholar
Patron
Joined
Jul 14, 2023
Messages
630
It sounds like they got quite a few more in person beta testers this time around so I'm hoping that they've gotten more comprehensive feedback on the later acts than they did for the D:OSs. That said I am still expecting a lot of bugs on launch, I can't think of a single really big RPG that hasn't had them (some even have them 20 years later if you don't install fan patches). It's not exactly good practice but it seems to be inevitable with games with an ambitious scope, if they put out the fires quickly and do so in a way that doesn't brick people's saves between patches I think it'll be fine.
 

Darth Valer

Literate
Joined
Jul 5, 2023
Messages
44
About killing NPCs and quests, most of the time important NPCs have either diaries or key items that you can pickpocket, loot or steal from them that can help you progress through objectives or gather the relevant information they held.

At least in EA, moreover, the main quest simply requires you to find a cure for the tadpole and there is no prescribed solution. There are many potential people that can help you, both good and bad and in-between, and you can also skip all of them and gtfo the Act 1 area through simple exploration.

It'll probably bottleneck later on, but Act 1 is extremely free in terms of approach
 

Readher

Savant
Joined
Nov 11, 2018
Messages
710
Location
Poland
Larian games always have seriously flawed content after the first act due to very little testing of it compared to the EA. So yeah, probably no big upside to letting reviewers see it ahead of time, if they know people will already buy.
Given how they let journalists have keys only a few days ago, not like they would've made it past Act I.
By the sound of the article, the fact they got keys on Sunday actually doesn't matter, since they have no means of getting the final game. They'll only be able to download it on Thursday, same time as everyone else. That's why they say they'll have at best an in-progress review on Friday morning (after evening/night of playing).
 

whydoibother

Arcane
Patron
Joined
May 2, 2018
Messages
17,701
Location
bulgaristan
Codex Year of the Donut
Larian games always have seriously flawed content after the first act due to very little testing of it compared to the EA. So yeah, probably no big upside to letting reviewers see it ahead of time, if they know people will already buy.
Given how they let journalists have keys only a few days ago, not like they would've made it past Act I.
By the sound of the article, the fact they got keys on Sunday actually doesn't matter, since they have no means of getting the final game. They'll only be able to download it on Thursday, same time as everyone else. That's why they say they'll have at best an in-progress review on Friday morning (after evening/night of playing).
That's not how I understood the article.
I understood it as the review embargo, as in the earliest date you can release your review, conicides with the public release.
Actual journalists could've downloaded the game on sunday, but they couldn't preload it, and therefore were stuck with a 10 hour download or whatever their internet situation is.
One of the YouTube channels that is posted here, Wolf-something, has said he plays 10 hours per day of the full game, therefore he does have it.
 

Jermu

Arbiter
Patron
Joined
Aug 13, 2017
Messages
1,681
7d6fus40hofb1.png


soon my beloved
 

Readher

Savant
Joined
Nov 11, 2018
Messages
710
Location
Poland
Larian games always have seriously flawed content after the first act due to very little testing of it compared to the EA. So yeah, probably no big upside to letting reviewers see it ahead of time, if they know people will already buy.
Given how they let journalists have keys only a few days ago, not like they would've made it past Act I.
By the sound of the article, the fact they got keys on Sunday actually doesn't matter, since they have no means of getting the final game. They'll only be able to download it on Thursday, same time as everyone else. That's why they say they'll have at best an in-progress review on Friday morning (after evening/night of playing).
That's not how I understood the article.
I understood it as the review embargo, as in the earliest date you can release your review, conicides with the public release.
Actual journalists could've downloaded the game on sunday, but they couldn't preload it, and therefore were stuck with a 10 hour download or whatever their internet situation is.
One of the YouTube channels that is posted here, Wolf-something, has said he plays 10 hours per day of the full game, therefore he does have it.
Not only that but the review embargo is Thursday evening, at the exact same time the game is released, so we can’t even talk about it properly until after many people have bought it.

Although they probably won’t have had a chance to play it by the time the embargo is up, because for some reason pre-loads are not allowed.

We’ve asked developer Larian Studios for an explanation of the review situation and hopefully we’ll be able to update you on Thursday, as to what the reasons are.

The best we can probably hope for though is a review in progress for Friday morning, once we can take stock of where we are so far – although the fact that the game has been in early access for over a year does help a bit.
If they can play since Sunday, then why wouldn't they just post the review in progress right when review embargo ends, on Thursday evening? Why wait until Friday morning? Does one more evening make such a difference? I guess they could think that, but it seems weird to me.
 

Non-Edgy Gamer

Grand Dragon
Patron
Glory to Ukraine
Joined
Nov 6, 2020
Messages
17,656
Strap Yourselves In
Is this D:OS level humor or did they tone it down some?
Dialog in the Early Access was fine, apart from the ogre sex gag a few people got mad about.

But in the past year, they've taken a giant LGBT shit on the rest of the game. I don't know if it's supposed to be humor or not though.
 

processdaemon

Scholar
Patron
Joined
Jul 14, 2023
Messages
630
I wouldn't put too much stock in the metro article, they claim there's 'no explanation' for the preload issue despite the fact there very much is and the metro is known in the UK for lazy clickbait articles. They probably looked at 3 tweets about the situation and wrote it up in 5 minutes.

EDIT: example of the kind of quality journalism that the metro engages in

1690976085140.png
 
Last edited:

Kem0sabe

Arcane
Joined
Mar 7, 2011
Messages
13,231
Location
Azores Islands
I wouldn't put too much stock in the metro article, they claim there's 'no explanation' for the preload issue despite the fact there very much is and the metro is known in the UK for lazy clickbait articles. They probably looked at 3 tweets about the situation and wrote it up in 5 minutes.

The explanation is bullshit. Larian could very well remove the EA a few days early and allow preload.
 

Readher

Savant
Joined
Nov 11, 2018
Messages
710
Location
Poland
I wouldn't put too much stock in the metro article, they claim there's 'no explanation' for the preload issue despite the fact there very much is and the metro is known in the UK for lazy clickbait articles. They probably looked at 3 tweets about the situation and wrote it up in 5 minutes.

The explanation is bullshit. Larian could very well remove the EA a few days early and allow preload.
Yeah, but has there been a precedent where people get locked out of access to a game they bought? Because that's what would happen in this case. I don't think any other game did that.
 

processdaemon

Scholar
Patron
Joined
Jul 14, 2023
Messages
630
It doesn't seem like bullshit to me, arguably poor planning because they it could have been resolved by having the EA on a separate page to the main release but this isn't the first time the issue has cropped up on Steam so I don't think Larian invented it out of the blue. I think it's unreasonable for the article to imply that it's because Larian 'is worried about technical problems' (I bet they are because Swen has openly admitted that they're doing last minute troubleshooting, but I don't think this is to cover it up).
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom