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

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

Tempting, but I think I need to do at least one Dark Urge playthrough first.

 

[AwesomeButton]

The problem with Pillars wasn't just a thing of tech, it was it lacked something that BG and DOS kinda share, and that it's kinda difficult to grasp, but it's summed up by this:

D:OS is silly and probably downright stupid, but it wasn't the number crunching or the build potential that kept people interested in Baldur's Gate, or at least it wasn't the sole factor.

I completely subscribe to this. I've said it more than once in the neverending PoE discussions - maybe it's the quest density, maybe it's the area map sizes, but I can never "get myself lost" in PoE the way I can do it in BG.

Funny enough, Josh Sawyer has criticized BG2 specifically for having "too much content". And now developers are feeling unsettled because BG3 has "too much content". Sour grapes, huh? (Edit: Also Tim Cain has criticized his own Arcanum for being too long and feature-bloated)

You can make a masterpiece in two ways: you can either innovate, or you can execute stuff which has been done before to a level of polish and perfection which is unprecedented.

This. What we end up calling "classics" in media (written, cinematic, music) are usually not those who "did it first" but the ones who did the "textbook example of" something, and become genre defining.

BTW, I recently took notice that Deep Purple wrote "Smoke On the Water" in 1972. I was struck with how early that was yet how it fits well even among songs recorded nearly 20 years later.

Shit like that is for “m-muh immersion”-pussies - an rpg crowd so emasculated it makes storyfags look like manly heterosexuals

Immersion inclinations lead to having ingame waifus and radiant sex encounters. So, yeah, you're right. Jokes aside, there is a way for "immersion-purpose" activities to appeal to storyfags, when they allow you to create your own narrative, if the immersion activities are varied and rich enough, and all the production values are there. Ever tried setting RDR2's day/night cycle to 3 hours and spending a day in the wilderness, hunting, exploring, fishing? A lot of cool stuff can happen in an emergent way, which no one ever scripted, it's all you interacting with immersion-intended systems.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

do i go barbarian and take the frog or do i go battlemaster and take karlach?

other two spots are for the cleric and the wizard

No idea, since Karlach isn't released in Early Access, and since I almost always behead her.

I say go Wizard and execute Gale too.

 

[Yosharian]

You can select from different penises? Umm... Where do I begin with this one

 

[gurugeorge]

I've been playing through DOS2, reminding myself again of the Larian "vibe."

It's a mixture of really taking the CRPG seriously as an adventure simulator, and at the same time being so embarrassed that you're such a nerd that you nervously dot the experience with awkward college humour that sometimes lands, but mostly doesn't. I would guess that this comes from a love of tabletop gameplay. It's really perfectly encapsulated by the Larian symbol of the fighter with a toilet plunger.

I mean, I have to admit that for all its faults DOS2 does the job of making me feel the "virtual worldeyness," it does occasionally provide a strong and absorbing sense of adventuring through that virtual world - which so many games that try to be CRPGs just fail to do, even if they nominally have all the right bits. Somehow Larian consistently manage to pull it off. I think it's partly to do with the fact that all NPCs are reactive, and all on a flat plane, so to speak (no nameplates, you have to mouse hunt, and you can talk/trade with any of them, and you never know, one of them might have an adventure for you that takes you far and wide) and that so many items in the world are interactive "clutter" in the Bethesda sense. There are so many opportunities to "nose around" in the world, poke and prod, see if you get lucky with that barrel or whatever. And that aspect in itself is great adventure simulation.

They also retain old skool elements that tend, on the one hand, to slow you down a bit, but on the other hand by virtue of being slowed down, keep you engaged. Like for example the ridiculously clunky trading interface, or the inventory management. I tend to find I spend quite a bit of time with inventory tetris in Larian games, getting things just so, yet somehow it kind of works to keep me engaged. And the admirable thing is that they've stuck to their guns all this time: clearly these design features are intentional, because they've doggedly retained these clunky, slowing-down elements from DivDiv to DOS2, when everyone else around them has been streamlining all those sorts of elements away.

And when the humour lands it lands pretty well as a meta sense of humour (laughing at the genre itself) - like some of the "nod and wink" dialogue options (for example, there was one the other day that I thought was funny, where I was interacting with an NPC, and some of the options were very meta, in the sense of, "OMG this NPC is such a cliche."). But more often it's just groan-worthy humour - but then again, that's part of the charm.

So all that's well and good, it's why Larian are still a thing when so many others have fallen by the wayside over the years.

But the $64,000 question is: does that vibe fit with the traditional Infinity Engine games vibe? Can Larian continue their quirky, private CRPG tradition, while still servicing nostalgic memories of the Infinity Engine games?

 

[FreeKaner]

Divos2 is extremely garbage both mechanically and narratively, BG3 isn't going to retroactively change that.

 

[processdaemon]

I've been playing through DOS2, reminding myself again of the Larian "vibe."

It's a mixture of really taking the CRPG seriously as an adventure simulator, and at the same time being so embarrassed that you're such a nerd that you nervously dot the experience with awkward college humour that sometimes lands, but mostly doesn't. I would guess that this comes from a love of tabletop gameplay. It's really perfectly encapsulated by the Larian symbol of the fighter with a toilet plunger.

This part is very true and probably the thing I'm most worried about despite enjoying the EA and looking forward to release. It mostly works in the Divinity series (probably because it's their world and they set the tone) and in the EA since nothing too serious is happening but I'm concerned that they might lean into it at the wrong moments later in BG3 and it will pull the player out of the experience. Still cautiously optimistic overall though.

 

[FreeKaner]

wouldn't that be the best for us as a CRPG site?

They are objecting to good design such as reactivity, the abundant choice of character building, not against production values - cinematics and full VO.

In terms of C&C, reactivity and production values this is obviously leagues above any rpg released so far and will raise the bar. Hence the whining.

Now they are the face of the genre and they're there thanks to sticking to "old fashioned" stuff like turn based combat. So much for the progress that real time shit would've brought to the genre.

Hard to argue with these statements. Whether they have voiced it or not, I assume some devs are especially salty after in one way or another snubbing the "grognard" audience. Turns out they actually knew far better that audience than the one they were unsuccessfully trying to capture, and doing so on grognard KS money. They should be feeling... not a little silly now.

In any case it's hilarious listening to "the grapes are sour anyway", and "let's not set expectations that all grapes will be tasty" from people whose projects just couldn't do it, didn't know how to.

I'm the last person to praise D:OS/2 but it was obvious that there was a tech and a production pipeline being refined there for years.

The obvious comparison is PoE and D:OS. D:OS "won" the argument even though both games had the same fundamental philosophy, even to the point of referring to Baldur's Gate as an influence (much to Swen's chagrin, but still). The problem with Pillars wasn't just a thing of tech, it was it lacked something that BG and DOS kinda share, and that it's kinda difficult to grasp, but it's summed up by this:

D:OS is silly and probably downright stupid, but it wasn't the number crunching or the build potential that kept people interested in Baldur's Gate, or at least it wasn't the sole factor.

Issue with PoE1/2 is that to be a spiritual successor to BG1/2 it tries to be epic, but also at the same time philosophical and even theological like mask of the betrayer. Obsidian never was particularly good at making epic narratives and they also heavily failed with trying to be deep and ended up being very tryhard and ultimately confusing. Epic and "deep" doesn't mesh well, lotr isn't deep and neither is BG, frankly BG is more cheesy than anything else especially BG1.

If you want to have moral dilemmas, grey areas and philosophical questions in your game then it is best to keep the scale small, down to individuals. That's why the good parts of PoE are the DLCs and especially white march where scale is smaller and fits with the melancholic backdrop, as well as some side quests of that nature.

PoE has failed on narrative decisions, but now Sawyer and co. get the perfect excuse in scale, scope and epic narrative of BG3 to "excuse" themselves on budget or time.

Meanwhile Larian is not only playing to their strengths and not pulling punches with an epic narrative without trying too hard, the DND ruleset, setting and narrative hook tames worst of Swen's excesses in game design and "humor".

 

[Saravan]

Where's rusty_shackleford ?

Fled to rpghq.org because the Larian audience was too much even for him.

I see they have such prestigious posters like Fedora and Humbaba taking turns doing DEEP game analysis with comments like "this is shit" and "that is also shit" followed by The Mask larping as Infinitron all encapsulated within a forum design from the year 2003.

 

[Nerevar]

That website it's like an all star cast of the best posters.

Real shame good people left.

 

[Swen]

 

[AwesomeButton]

I respect Swen as a businessman, and now I respect him as a gamer.

 

[Readher]

"Why yes, I pirated games, what gave it away?"

 

[Jermu]

guess I pirate bg3 then so I can honor and follow Swen's footsteps

 

[Junmarko]

Totally torn on whether to buy this game or not.

On one hand, I hate the amount of woke-ness that has seemingly infected Larian...

...on the other hand, it pales in comparison to western developers, who are also apparently threatened by BG3's gameplay mechanics "setting a new industry standard".

As if you couldn't despise these people any more.



Lol...unbelievable

 

[Gradenmayer]

Totally torn on whether to buy this game or not.

On one hand, I hate the amount of woke-ness that has seemingly infected Larian...

...on the other hand, it pales in comparison to western developers, who are also seemingly threatened by BG3's gameplay mechanics "setting a new industry standard".

As if you couldn't despise these people any more.



Lol...unbelievable

Ok, let’s not do revisionistic bullshit here, please. Larian was always woke. Divinity 2 had a quest where you had to change gender in order to complete a stage play quest. Dragon commander had a date sim built-in and etc.

Whether game is worth- just pirate it and buy later if you like it.

 

[FreeKaner]

Rare early access game I actually bought to play in early access, I never do that even for free.

 

[Drakortha]

Cringe watching these Youtube vloggers trying desperately to stick their noses up Larian's asshole.

Flavor of the month "gaming news" is all BG3 is. None of these eceleb personalities will be talking about it 1 week after it's out unless there's drama stirring around it, like flies buzzing around a pile of shit.

 

[Nerevar]

Rare early access game I actually bought to play in early access, I never do that even for free.

I got BG3 and Colony Ship on EA. No other games I can think of.

 

[Zeriel]

Totally torn on whether to buy this game or not.

On one hand, I hate the amount of woke-ness that has seemingly infected Larian...

...on the other hand, it pales in comparison to western developers, who are also seemingly threatened by BG3's gameplay mechanics "setting a new industry standard".

As if you couldn't despise these people any more.



Lol...unbelievable

Ok, let’s not do revisionistic bullshit here, please. Larian was always woke. Divinity 2 had a quest where you had to change gender in order to complete a stage play quest. Dragon commander had a date sim built-in and etc.

Whether game is worth- just pirate it and buy later if you like it.

How is having a dating sim "woke"? The contents of said dating sim in Dragon Commander were almost anachronistically super-straight by current standards. If anything I remember a lot of 4channers laughing over it in a positive way. My vague recollection of the choices were basically: hot blonde elf titty girl, lifts-her-tail lizard, and the meme of a skeleton with pumpkins inserted into her ribcage to increase bust size. The social decisions in the game allowed you to be a fag, sure, but they also allowed you to ban faggotry entirely, so again, not woke.

Dragon Commander's realm decision side of the game was honestly pretty awesome, it was the gameplay in the RTS meat of the game that sucked dick.

Divinity 2 predates wokeism as a movement entirely and it was played for laughs, just like it was in BG (no, it was never meant to be a good thing back then to change genders).

 

[Swen]

Totally torn on whether to buy this game or not.

On one hand, I hate the amount of woke-ness that has seemingly infected Larian...

...on the other hand, it pales in comparison to western developers, who are also seemingly threatened by BG3's gameplay mechanics "setting a new industry standard".

As if you couldn't despise these people any more.



Lol...unbelievable

Ok, let’s not do revisionistic bullshit here, please. Larian was always woke. Divinity 2 had a quest where you had to change gender in order to complete a stage play quest. Dragon commander had a date sim built-in and etc.

Whether game is worth- just pirate it and buy later if you like it.

So bioware and Baldur's gate was woke too then?

https://baldursgate.fandom.com/wiki/Girdle_of_Masculinity/Femininity

 

[Nerevar]

Being a tranny is a curse akin to putting on a ring that gives you permanent feeblemind or a sword that makes you go insane in battle.

BG1 was based.

 

[Non-Edgy Gamer]

Issue with PoE1/2 is that to be a spiritual successor to BG1/2 it tries to be epic

IDK, I think the issue was that it wasn't a compelling narrative for the protagonist from the start.

Things just happen, you go places... and you're supposed to care about them why?

E.g., the game starts, you get the craps, everyone gets slaughtered in front of you. Some guy kills the companion you've now known for 5 minutes (who is probably the only companion that bothers trying to establish a rapport with the player, and who actually has a reason to come with you) accidentally with some weird ritual, and then everyone wanders off and you go to some village. Why care about this village? WHy care that any of that just happened? IDK? Reasons? And the story continues from there. Quests just come up and you do them just because. NPCs join you because. And then it becomes epic etc.

It's just poor writing for a game imo. You could be epic or focused, but if you don't get the player interested and involved, it's useless.

I'd say Tyranny did a much better job, even if it did use the trope of aggrandizing the player to get their attention.

 

[Junmarko]

Ok, let’s not do revisionistic bullshit here, please.

I'm not, I never played Divinity 2 or Dragon Commander.

Did not notice any woke shit in Divine Divinity, or OS1/2. Also, they could do day & night cycles in Divine Divinity, but find it too difficult now? The fuck happened?

 

[Gradenmayer]

Totally torn on whether to buy this game or not.

On one hand, I hate the amount of woke-ness that has seemingly infected Larian...

...on the other hand, it pales in comparison to western developers, who are also seemingly threatened by BG3's gameplay mechanics "setting a new industry standard".

As if you couldn't despise these people any more.



Lol...unbelievable

Ok, let’s not do revisionistic bullshit here, please. Larian was always woke. Divinity 2 had a quest where you had to change gender in order to complete a stage play quest. Dragon commander had a date sim built-in and etc.

Whether game is worth- just pirate it and buy later if you like it.

How is having a dating sim "woke"? The contents of said dating sim in Dragon Commander were almost anachronistically super-straight by current standards. If anything I remember a lot of 4channers laughing over it in a positive way. My vague recollection of the choices were basically: hot blonde elf titty girl, lifts-her-tail lizard, and the meme of a skeleton with pumpkins inserted into her ribcage to increase bust size. The social decisions in the game allowed you to be a fag, sure, but they also allowed you to ban faggotry entirely, so again, not woke.

Dragon Commander's realm decision side of the game was honestly pretty awesome, it was the gameplay in the RTS meat of the game that sucked dick.

Divinity 2 predates wokeism as a movement entirely and it was played for laughs, just like it was in BG (no, it was never meant to be a good thing back then to change genders).

Well, you can also be super straight in BG3 and kill anyone. But it is the one woke, while the rest aren’t?