TemplarGR
Dumbfuck!
Back in the 90s i was a teenager who owned a PSX and a PC. Having experienced stuff like Suikoden, Final Fantasy VII, and Vandal Hearts, back in 1997, i wanted to play RPGs on my PC as well, so i was starved for any RPG. I played most RPGs at the day of their release since then. I played and enjoyed all infinity engine games except Planescape torment (which i plan to play soon) for some odd reason, mainly because i couldn't find it anywhere to buy it in my country and i lost interest after a while.
Recently i began an Enhanced Edition BG1 to Throne of Bhaal playthrough, including Siege of Dragonspear, in order to experience the story again. Now that i have completed it, i have to say that the original BG was miles ahead of the sequel in most things that matter. WARNING: This is going to be long.
1) Graphics/Art/Music. BG1 had a good semi-realistic aesthetic. Most areas whether indoors or outdoors seemed believable. Characters and the bestiary looked decent. You could identify what an item was by its icon because it was mostly accurate. Fast forward BG2, and the design was trash. Item icons are retarded and often you keep smashing your head. Many new npc models like the arm soldiers are retarded. Try comparing wood areas in BGEE with BGIIEE. BgII artists tried to convey a desert-like aesthetic to BGII for some odd reason, despite the fact that in AMN there was no desert area... BGII graphics were better because of the newer engine and higher resolution, but playing BG1 with BG2's engine proves that BG1 had better art assets and direction. And this includes music, since music was better in BG1 as well. Again, in BG2, they tried to create kind-of-arabic music, that does not fit the theme in my opinion. BG1 music was more memorable and better.
2) Story/Writting. BG1 had a simple but well-written story. SPOILERS! Sarevok, a bhaalspawn, has made an elaborate plan in order to take over the Iron Throne and create a bloody chaos in Sword Coast. He taints the iron produced in the only known mine in the region, he uses mercenaries to stop iron/weapon caravans, and uses an ancient dwarven mine in order to mine his own uncorrupted ore. He plans on blaming the iron crisis on AMN in order to provoke a war and then sell weapons to baldur's gate and become a saviour, all the while reveling in destruction. This destruction will fuel his advancement to Godhood. This Sarevok knows you are bhaalspawn, so he comes to kill you. Your foster father tries to protect you but fails. You end up on your own and manage to uncover stuff about your past and about Sarevok as you battle the region's troubles. In the end you kill Sarevok and destroy his plans. GREAT story, believable.
Fast Forward to BG2 and the writters went on meth. A superman, nay, someone who would be superman to residents of Crypton according to his powers, manages to capture your whole party without a fight. Then does some experiments on you and Imoen, your "sister" bhaalspawn that inexplicably Sarevok didn't look to kill and you never knew she was Bhaalspawn till then, but Irenicus knew, because he is not only superman but all-knowing as well. Apparently this Irenicus was deprived of his soul and his connection to the elves, but somehow didn't lose his magical powers. The elves knew Irenicus was dangerous and wanted to become God himself even at the cost of the whole elven race, and instead of sentencing him to death or at least restraining him, they removed his soul without removing his godlike powers and unleashed him to wreak havok to the rest of the world... Believable story-writting right there. A fight erupts while Irenicus is torturing you because apparently the thieves guild has too many idle thieves and wants them to die at the hands of this superman. Irenicus goes to single handendly destroy whole legions of assassins while you wonder in his dungeon and find your way out. As you find your way out, you find Irenicus and Imoen after having witnessed his immense power decides to cast puny magic missiles on him. A bunch of lvl 1 wizards appear and want to arrest both and lock them in a lunatics assylum that no one escapes from, ever. Irenicus instead of just killing the whole mage population of Atkathla decides to go with them. Believable story writting again, right there. Oh and by the way, on your way out you meet Yoshimo, a bounty hunter that Irenicus hired to spy on your group, despite the fact that the attack on his place was surprising and he didn't know beforehand that you would escape, in order to arrange for someone to follow you... Or did he know? Well, Irenicus is for all intends and purposes a God, so he already knew, which begs the question why did he do all these if he knew you were going to slain him anyway, but i digress...
After Irenicus and Imoen get captured, you try to find a way to free Imoen. For no reason at all, because who gives a fuck about her, but apparently you do because reasons. You can enlist the help of Shadow Thieves or the vampire sister of Irenicus, Bodhi. After you do a few miniquests to get some money, like helping a young lass liberate her castle from trolls and then lose it for no reason to someone she has not married, or get lured by a red dragon who hates you because your foster father battled him once, but when he has the opportunity to eat you alive he decides to let you live despite you having butchered his whole army of servants. Again, quality writting 101.
You finally arrive at Spellhold, Irenicus steals the souls of you and imoen, but you don't die because apparently who needs a soul in order to live, amirite? Bodhi gets the order to kill you but decides to let you escape because it is more fun that way, and you end up destroying their plans and forcing them to leave. You discover you have the power to become Slayer, Bhaal's form, but you only acquired it because Irenicus stole Bhaal's essence from you. Yeah i know, makes sense. And the fact that you lose 2 reputation everytime you transform even if no one left alive sees you, makes sense too. You follow them to the underdark, you return to Athkatla, you kill Bodhi and get Imoen's soul back. Then you go to face Irenicus, who has drained the super-power of the elven life tree, and has your soul inside him as well, in addition to his immense spell power that never needs memorization and has unlimited spellcasts. You have to destroy 3 insect thingies which drain the tree's power and transfer it to Irenicus, before you can kill him. You can walk past Irenicus and he doesn't lift a finger to stop you. You can even move just behind his back for a quickie and he won't say a thing. After you kill the 3rd instect thingie you teleport to Irenicus and you dispatch him EZPZ, then for some reason you die with him, despite this not happening for imoen, and your whole party comes with you in bhaal's realm. then you have to face 5 tests in order to escape death. If you fail even 1, the game changes your alignment but doesn't notify you about it. I only knew i became lawful evil after i couldn't hold carsomyr anymore. Apparently i lost 1 out of 5 and the the game devs decided to troll me by forcing me to reload a save 30 minutes ago. Punks. You re-defeat Irenicus in hell, you win. the end. Superior writting, give the guys a trophy!
3) Apparently BGII was the beginning of turning Bioware games into bad romance simulators. In an effort to make party members more believable, they allowed some romances to occur. I had experienced 2 in my playthroughs, and they both sucked huge black cock. My original playthrough i had Jaheira, a recently-made widow who took the death of Khalid very badly initially, to want to jump my bones after 2 hours. I realize my cock is sweet and all, but bitch, please, show some restraint. On my recent playthrough i prefered a virgin over the hot MILF i desired in my younger years, so i went with Aerie. After a whole history of tiresome dialogue by a mentally 3 year old, she offered herself to me for some hot sex. She really wanted it. And the next morning, she decided to abandon me. Did the writers want to imply that the Bhaalspawn has a small cock? Wasn't Aerie satisfied? But Jaheira was, and she supposedly had years of experience, so her hole must have been bigger. Perhaps Bhaalspawn had a big cock and Aerie was hurt? Don't know. All i know is that since in real life i had experiences with BPD girlfriends, i let her have her time and leave the party, thinking she would return after a while. Little did i know that this option would remove her from the game entirely. With the whole spellbook i taught her. Devs, fuck you! And please don't let virgins write romances, thanks.
4) Enough with the crappy writting, lets talk gameplay, the worst part of BGII. In BGI, loot felt special. Magical weapons were rare and really helped you against enemies. And since you were low-leveled, every level you got counted. You could really feel the advancement in power. But while you became better, you were never overpowered. With BGII, and seeing the success of Diablo and the competition from Diablo II, Bioware devs decided that they needed to have tons of loot in their game. So they filled the whole area of AMN with +1 and +2 weapons like they were candies, and you could easily acquire +3 +4 and +5 weapons. And i won't mention the travesty of Throne of Bhaal where even the trashmobs were equiped to the teeth... And i have to ask, who created all those weapons since magic is apparently banned in Amn? And now that i think of it, this whole situation retkons Baldur's gate 1 plot. How come the southern neighbour of AMN has so many magic weapons and Baldur's gate not? Couldn't they buy some? And if AMN had that much military tech superiority, why didn't they conquer Baldur's gate already? Who cared about the iron shortage in BG1 when you could get tons and tons of +3 weapons from Amn? Why Nashkel had such a poor selection to buy? Why the tavern owner in a sieged city at the beginning of ToB has every +3 weapon and ammunition in the game to sell? If that tavern owner had moved to Baldur's Gate during the iron crisis he could have been rich. LOL.
And the situation with the abundance of high level equipment created a big problem since if you were to gain high levels and tons of magical equipment, the game would become a cakewalk. But no worries, Bioware devs to the rescue: They filled the world with tons of high level spellcasters that spam lvl9 magicks as soon as they see you! It is so much fun having a spellcaster time stop and destroy your party. It is so much fun in every battle having half your party held and the other half charmed or confused. Not to mention level drain. And mind flayers are awesome. It is so much fun having a paladin with -20 saving throws and -10 armor class and still die in 2 hits because intelligence drain, and having to reload again. And that is how BGII battles go, at least if you are not using easy mode like most fags. You quicksave every 30 seconds, you get a battle, if the RNG is bad you lose, savescum until you win! Even if you win, most likely you are going to have 1-2 members killed, so raise dead and slog through the process of re-equiping them again, only to have them die a minute later and repeat. I have lost count how many times Minsk died and has been risen. Minsk, even Boo can take more than you, moron.
In BG1, i only had to savescum vs Sarevok because he is the final boss and he is retarded, and when a basilisk petrified me. In BG2 i had to savescum every 10 meters of gamemap. I even encountered fucking kobold mages with high level magicks! I once went through a beholder dungeon and in the southeast corner 15 beholders expected me in the same room. FUCK! I mean, even the sprites of the fat bastards don't fit in there. Balanced gameplay Bioware, balanced gameplay...
I have seen many idiots claiming that BGII had the best combat of infinity engine games. All i have to say is that the braindamage is strong with those people.
In conclusion: All in all, BGII was still a good game, but in my opinion BG1 was the more focused and well-designed game. In my opinion BGII was rushed to cash on the success of the original, they tried to go bigger-larger-better in every way but didn't stop to think if all things they added were good. BGII has more of everything, higher levels, higher items, higher spells, higher resolution, more party banter, and people are condition to think that more is better. But while BG1 had a touch of genius, BGII was an overbloated mass-market successor. Playing both with their enhanced editions, without the poorer resolution and UI obstructing you, you realize BG1 was a better game. Plus it was openworld and non-linear, instead of the trashy railroad of the sequel. BG1 was the better game out of the BG saga, and Icewind Dale was better than both, but that would be best analyzed in another post.
TL DR: If you think BGII is better than the original, your opinion is bad, you are bad, and you should feel bad.
Recently i began an Enhanced Edition BG1 to Throne of Bhaal playthrough, including Siege of Dragonspear, in order to experience the story again. Now that i have completed it, i have to say that the original BG was miles ahead of the sequel in most things that matter. WARNING: This is going to be long.
1) Graphics/Art/Music. BG1 had a good semi-realistic aesthetic. Most areas whether indoors or outdoors seemed believable. Characters and the bestiary looked decent. You could identify what an item was by its icon because it was mostly accurate. Fast forward BG2, and the design was trash. Item icons are retarded and often you keep smashing your head. Many new npc models like the arm soldiers are retarded. Try comparing wood areas in BGEE with BGIIEE. BgII artists tried to convey a desert-like aesthetic to BGII for some odd reason, despite the fact that in AMN there was no desert area... BGII graphics were better because of the newer engine and higher resolution, but playing BG1 with BG2's engine proves that BG1 had better art assets and direction. And this includes music, since music was better in BG1 as well. Again, in BG2, they tried to create kind-of-arabic music, that does not fit the theme in my opinion. BG1 music was more memorable and better.
2) Story/Writting. BG1 had a simple but well-written story. SPOILERS! Sarevok, a bhaalspawn, has made an elaborate plan in order to take over the Iron Throne and create a bloody chaos in Sword Coast. He taints the iron produced in the only known mine in the region, he uses mercenaries to stop iron/weapon caravans, and uses an ancient dwarven mine in order to mine his own uncorrupted ore. He plans on blaming the iron crisis on AMN in order to provoke a war and then sell weapons to baldur's gate and become a saviour, all the while reveling in destruction. This destruction will fuel his advancement to Godhood. This Sarevok knows you are bhaalspawn, so he comes to kill you. Your foster father tries to protect you but fails. You end up on your own and manage to uncover stuff about your past and about Sarevok as you battle the region's troubles. In the end you kill Sarevok and destroy his plans. GREAT story, believable.
Fast Forward to BG2 and the writters went on meth. A superman, nay, someone who would be superman to residents of Crypton according to his powers, manages to capture your whole party without a fight. Then does some experiments on you and Imoen, your "sister" bhaalspawn that inexplicably Sarevok didn't look to kill and you never knew she was Bhaalspawn till then, but Irenicus knew, because he is not only superman but all-knowing as well. Apparently this Irenicus was deprived of his soul and his connection to the elves, but somehow didn't lose his magical powers. The elves knew Irenicus was dangerous and wanted to become God himself even at the cost of the whole elven race, and instead of sentencing him to death or at least restraining him, they removed his soul without removing his godlike powers and unleashed him to wreak havok to the rest of the world... Believable story-writting right there. A fight erupts while Irenicus is torturing you because apparently the thieves guild has too many idle thieves and wants them to die at the hands of this superman. Irenicus goes to single handendly destroy whole legions of assassins while you wonder in his dungeon and find your way out. As you find your way out, you find Irenicus and Imoen after having witnessed his immense power decides to cast puny magic missiles on him. A bunch of lvl 1 wizards appear and want to arrest both and lock them in a lunatics assylum that no one escapes from, ever. Irenicus instead of just killing the whole mage population of Atkathla decides to go with them. Believable story writting again, right there. Oh and by the way, on your way out you meet Yoshimo, a bounty hunter that Irenicus hired to spy on your group, despite the fact that the attack on his place was surprising and he didn't know beforehand that you would escape, in order to arrange for someone to follow you... Or did he know? Well, Irenicus is for all intends and purposes a God, so he already knew, which begs the question why did he do all these if he knew you were going to slain him anyway, but i digress...
After Irenicus and Imoen get captured, you try to find a way to free Imoen. For no reason at all, because who gives a fuck about her, but apparently you do because reasons. You can enlist the help of Shadow Thieves or the vampire sister of Irenicus, Bodhi. After you do a few miniquests to get some money, like helping a young lass liberate her castle from trolls and then lose it for no reason to someone she has not married, or get lured by a red dragon who hates you because your foster father battled him once, but when he has the opportunity to eat you alive he decides to let you live despite you having butchered his whole army of servants. Again, quality writting 101.
You finally arrive at Spellhold, Irenicus steals the souls of you and imoen, but you don't die because apparently who needs a soul in order to live, amirite? Bodhi gets the order to kill you but decides to let you escape because it is more fun that way, and you end up destroying their plans and forcing them to leave. You discover you have the power to become Slayer, Bhaal's form, but you only acquired it because Irenicus stole Bhaal's essence from you. Yeah i know, makes sense. And the fact that you lose 2 reputation everytime you transform even if no one left alive sees you, makes sense too. You follow them to the underdark, you return to Athkatla, you kill Bodhi and get Imoen's soul back. Then you go to face Irenicus, who has drained the super-power of the elven life tree, and has your soul inside him as well, in addition to his immense spell power that never needs memorization and has unlimited spellcasts. You have to destroy 3 insect thingies which drain the tree's power and transfer it to Irenicus, before you can kill him. You can walk past Irenicus and he doesn't lift a finger to stop you. You can even move just behind his back for a quickie and he won't say a thing. After you kill the 3rd instect thingie you teleport to Irenicus and you dispatch him EZPZ, then for some reason you die with him, despite this not happening for imoen, and your whole party comes with you in bhaal's realm. then you have to face 5 tests in order to escape death. If you fail even 1, the game changes your alignment but doesn't notify you about it. I only knew i became lawful evil after i couldn't hold carsomyr anymore. Apparently i lost 1 out of 5 and the the game devs decided to troll me by forcing me to reload a save 30 minutes ago. Punks. You re-defeat Irenicus in hell, you win. the end. Superior writting, give the guys a trophy!
3) Apparently BGII was the beginning of turning Bioware games into bad romance simulators. In an effort to make party members more believable, they allowed some romances to occur. I had experienced 2 in my playthroughs, and they both sucked huge black cock. My original playthrough i had Jaheira, a recently-made widow who took the death of Khalid very badly initially, to want to jump my bones after 2 hours. I realize my cock is sweet and all, but bitch, please, show some restraint. On my recent playthrough i prefered a virgin over the hot MILF i desired in my younger years, so i went with Aerie. After a whole history of tiresome dialogue by a mentally 3 year old, she offered herself to me for some hot sex. She really wanted it. And the next morning, she decided to abandon me. Did the writers want to imply that the Bhaalspawn has a small cock? Wasn't Aerie satisfied? But Jaheira was, and she supposedly had years of experience, so her hole must have been bigger. Perhaps Bhaalspawn had a big cock and Aerie was hurt? Don't know. All i know is that since in real life i had experiences with BPD girlfriends, i let her have her time and leave the party, thinking she would return after a while. Little did i know that this option would remove her from the game entirely. With the whole spellbook i taught her. Devs, fuck you! And please don't let virgins write romances, thanks.
4) Enough with the crappy writting, lets talk gameplay, the worst part of BGII. In BGI, loot felt special. Magical weapons were rare and really helped you against enemies. And since you were low-leveled, every level you got counted. You could really feel the advancement in power. But while you became better, you were never overpowered. With BGII, and seeing the success of Diablo and the competition from Diablo II, Bioware devs decided that they needed to have tons of loot in their game. So they filled the whole area of AMN with +1 and +2 weapons like they were candies, and you could easily acquire +3 +4 and +5 weapons. And i won't mention the travesty of Throne of Bhaal where even the trashmobs were equiped to the teeth... And i have to ask, who created all those weapons since magic is apparently banned in Amn? And now that i think of it, this whole situation retkons Baldur's gate 1 plot. How come the southern neighbour of AMN has so many magic weapons and Baldur's gate not? Couldn't they buy some? And if AMN had that much military tech superiority, why didn't they conquer Baldur's gate already? Who cared about the iron shortage in BG1 when you could get tons and tons of +3 weapons from Amn? Why Nashkel had such a poor selection to buy? Why the tavern owner in a sieged city at the beginning of ToB has every +3 weapon and ammunition in the game to sell? If that tavern owner had moved to Baldur's Gate during the iron crisis he could have been rich. LOL.
And the situation with the abundance of high level equipment created a big problem since if you were to gain high levels and tons of magical equipment, the game would become a cakewalk. But no worries, Bioware devs to the rescue: They filled the world with tons of high level spellcasters that spam lvl9 magicks as soon as they see you! It is so much fun having a spellcaster time stop and destroy your party. It is so much fun in every battle having half your party held and the other half charmed or confused. Not to mention level drain. And mind flayers are awesome. It is so much fun having a paladin with -20 saving throws and -10 armor class and still die in 2 hits because intelligence drain, and having to reload again. And that is how BGII battles go, at least if you are not using easy mode like most fags. You quicksave every 30 seconds, you get a battle, if the RNG is bad you lose, savescum until you win! Even if you win, most likely you are going to have 1-2 members killed, so raise dead and slog through the process of re-equiping them again, only to have them die a minute later and repeat. I have lost count how many times Minsk died and has been risen. Minsk, even Boo can take more than you, moron.
In BG1, i only had to savescum vs Sarevok because he is the final boss and he is retarded, and when a basilisk petrified me. In BG2 i had to savescum every 10 meters of gamemap. I even encountered fucking kobold mages with high level magicks! I once went through a beholder dungeon and in the southeast corner 15 beholders expected me in the same room. FUCK! I mean, even the sprites of the fat bastards don't fit in there. Balanced gameplay Bioware, balanced gameplay...
I have seen many idiots claiming that BGII had the best combat of infinity engine games. All i have to say is that the braindamage is strong with those people.
In conclusion: All in all, BGII was still a good game, but in my opinion BG1 was the more focused and well-designed game. In my opinion BGII was rushed to cash on the success of the original, they tried to go bigger-larger-better in every way but didn't stop to think if all things they added were good. BGII has more of everything, higher levels, higher items, higher spells, higher resolution, more party banter, and people are condition to think that more is better. But while BG1 had a touch of genius, BGII was an overbloated mass-market successor. Playing both with their enhanced editions, without the poorer resolution and UI obstructing you, you realize BG1 was a better game. Plus it was openworld and non-linear, instead of the trashy railroad of the sequel. BG1 was the better game out of the BG saga, and Icewind Dale was better than both, but that would be best analyzed in another post.
TL DR: If you think BGII is better than the original, your opinion is bad, you are bad, and you should feel bad.
