Game News Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition

[Dexter]

So much rage xD That reverse-engineering stuff is likely in regards to their client software and not the games and you'll find large parts of the other crap in other Digital Distribution, I never used the software myself and don't really plan to if there's a way around but it is largely unlikely that it will need Streaming.

Also as I already said on last page it might not even matter, as they seem to realize the potential of this thing after the Announce-page killed their server and then their bigger server again, as well as all the media and general interest (they certainly didn't have that with MDK2 HD). And they certainly wouldn't get any funds for future projects through the way of Kickstarter if their games are bound to some stupid client, one of the biggest features is usually no DRM copies and Optional Steam Keys.

The Cameron Tofer guy definitely said this:

To clear a few things up:

Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition will not be exclusive to beamdog.com; however, it will be available there first. We will be making more announcements regarding this. stay tuned.

While we do want more people to come to beamdog.com to buy great games our goal is the best possible launch and distribution for Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition. Therefore, we will be making changes to beamdog.com to support this. The two biggest changes will be to the drm and the download client.

If you're looking for crap you're certainly going to find some, for instance just a few of those Brian Fargo Interviews in regards to Bard's Tale or Hunted are going to make you wonder how much of what he says is just pandering to get the money, but so far I choose to believe that they both mean well and actually want to do this stuff properly. In the case of Baldur's Gate we're certainly going to hear more about it soon, Screenshots and some more Announcements etc. should be coming up.
Hoping for some because god knows there's some desperate need for it. Just imagine Planescape 2 and other Obsidian stuff in Nuu-Infinity Engine.

 

[DragoFireheart]

Yeah I'm looking at the Beamdog site now and they do have some extremely shitty DRM.

DRM?

No buy. Beamdog can go fuck themselves.

 

[Licaon_Kter]

Talking about Beamdog, I just got Precursors for $5 with a local gaming magazine and they ask $29.99? And the fixes come from Wesp anyway..pffft

 

[Kitako]

Yeah I'm looking at the Beamdog site now and they do have some extremely shitty DRM.

However, it's not exactly that you have to always be online as far as I can tell from reading their forum. What happens is you have to sign online with your Beamdog account to install the game, and then it will authorize your computer to play the game. You have to always have Beamdog open to play it from then on, but it doesn't necessarily have to be online. Much worse than the original Baldur's Gate DRM (you need the disc in the drive.)

It's still a very shitty DRM and something no one should support.

That's the reply to what I wanted to ask, thanks for the info.

 

[Ivory Samoan]

It was definitely too much to ask to just get a nice re-do without all sorts of fuck-a-polooza added in for good measure..

What were we thinking?

The world is a vampire.

 

[Volourn]

" but he repeatedly calls himself a "Bioware founder" and says he was lead developer on Neverwinter - is that true? "

O RLY? That's news. I ehard their were 3 BIo fiounders. All doctors who started it as a medeical software company. The 3rd guy moved on very quickly leaving the company with the 2 ones stll around. Oster was a senior employee but founder? First I heard of it. And, he claims there were actually 6 founders? R00fles!

I wonder how BIO/EA fits into this since the IE is their engine, and Interplay learned what happens when you try to steal profitz from BIO. Hmm..

 

[Ringhausen]

Based on the screens they're going to use the BG2 engine. Doesn't look like this is going to amount to much.

 

[Aeschylus]

I'm not really sure what to make of the screens. Oster just recently said on his twitter than they're not going to be releasing any screens or trailers for a while, so it seems like those ipad things might not represent a finished product. I certainly hope not, or it would be monumentally lazy.

 

[Ringhausen]

They sure are dicks for not coming out with it already.

will include the entire Baldur’s Gate adventure, the Tales of the Sword Coast expansion pack, and never before seen content including a new adventure and new party member.

Making a new BG1 npc takes no effort at all and it's not like the game is so short that it needs another quest. Though admittedly the ones inside BG city could use some refinements, since they're so shoddily thrown together if not outright broken.

Now if they could blow up the prerendered background images and make new characters sprites (seen modders put NWN moddels in the game and it looked great) AND keep it compatible with mods, then it would be something.

 

[GarfunkeL]

So which mods they are going to steal? Widescreen mod is a certain one. BGFixes and BGTweaks are likely competitors as well. Lift the "new" quest and NPC from one of the content mods? If that screenshot is real, this is the laziest moneygrab I've seen in a long time.

 

[oldmanpaco]

You can take the man out of Bioware but you cannot take Bioware out of the man.

 

[waywardOne]

Those have to be mockups done well before the site went live. Porting to iPad is not enhancement.

 

[Stabwound]

IGN has a hands on preview of the iPad port. I don't want to link to them because I hate them and don't want to give them any more clicks, but that is a working model.

I had the opportunity to go hands-on with an early build of Baldur's Gate iPad, and my initial impressions leave me optimistic about the potential of this huge port. For now, Overhaul is primarily demonstrating that this is indeed Baldur's Gate, running on an iPad. It exists, it runs smoothly, and as a company representative put it, "the technical issues are behind us."
What hasn't yet been changed is the interface. With the PC version's tiny buttons, very small dialogue selections and incredibly complex menus displayed on an iPad, right now it's tough to effectively play with a touch interface. Overhaul has promised that revised, touch-friendly menus are in the works.

The iPad port's revised pan and zoom camera control shows the potential of a more "player friendly" Baldur's Gate iPad experience. The camera has been fully optimized for iPad and works in the way players expect. They can pinch to zoom their viewpoint in and out, and a simple drag of the finger moves the camera anywhere around the map. A button toggle locks the camera and enables drag selection boxes, making it easy to select multiple enemies in hairy combat situations.

Does anyone know if that sounds like GemRB - the pinch zoom etc?

 

[waywardOne]

I could find out, but I need to know why the hell you'd want to do so.

 

[lulurkinglurkerlurk]

I hate tablets, i am some kind of amish fuck,when i see this filthy things i want all the hell for this "innovation".
Games should be plaayed,alone with mind peace and focus on content,but portable devices, take your e-entertaiment among outside folks,so games again are cut of deepness and dumb to aim at ours very shallow nature to beat top 1 gaming score roster and nothing more.