So, Baldurs Gate

[Glyphwright]

Yep. And? It's still a halfway decent game with a decent story that isn't about saving the world, decent (if not too fleshed out) characters, and a combat system that isn't a dumbed down, no-perma-kill-having, consolized piece of garbage. Is it the best game evah omg!!! Nope. But it's hardly the worst.

Thanks, I hadn't known any of that before you told me.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Lib, you better post the other screens as well. Because after that screen, where you will meet a hunter if you stay on the road, there's Beregost. Then there's the two areas between Beregost and Nashkel. In the first one, you'll encounter a corpse and a pair of Ogrillons. In the second one, there's the hobgoblin ambush and ... a messenger. That is, if you stay on the road.

So yes, it's entirely possible to get to the end of Ch.3 without doing ANY exploration whatsoever, not even in the areas that you must go through.

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

BG is much smaller than Morrowind. This means that while in Morrowind you have to decide what to explore, in BG you can, and will 'explore' everything.

There's no decision of what to explore or not explore in Morrowind; the player has as much time as they wish to systematically search every square area of land. Time or resource constraints are non-existent in the gameworld. Only the player's time/patience serves as a limiting factor.

This leads into what I feel is the most salient critique of BG1's exploration, which also applies strongly to Morrowind (as well as many other open world games). Both force the player to gamble away their time on the Content-Roulette, with some wins and a lot of harsh losses.

In BG1, there are some areas that are, simply put, total shit. They contain nothing unique nor interesting and serve only as filler that wastes the player's time. Take for instance the locale in the extreme southeast. Gibberlings abound and not much else besides a lousy Fed-Ex quest. But the unknowing player will still go to clear it and likely leave underwhelmed, at least in the back of their mind. There's definitely more areas like that. Not every place has a real hook or hooks.

Exploring places, especially dungeons, in Morrowind is a not too dissimilar affair. For every rare occasion that the player is rewarded with an object of interest, be it a piece of equipment or some lore pellet, they are inundated with meaningless, bland dungeons or empty terrain. Rooting around indoors will yield a couple thousand finds of lesser soul gems (or similar trash items) to every one time a Daedric Killmaster 3000 is wedged in between a couple of boxes. It's a bad distribution of goodies; 99% of the time stuff is crap, while 1% of the time it's outstanding. The observant player realizes that meticulous exploration is important, but will only be rewarding a scant minority of the time. Terrible incentive structuring, terrible design for a game. Compare to something like Risen or Dark Souls, which have a lot more meaningful finds delivered more often. This makes their respective Content-Roulettes have a much better expected value, encouraging scouring the gameworld.

And neither world is very good at flagging areas as crap/not-crap.

BG1 names some of it's areas, but everything else is just guesswork. Can any information about an area be gleaned from 40x40 pixel sketches representing areas? Does a cottage under a tree adequately convey, "Here be Basilisks, mad mages, and a party of rival adventurers"? Even named areas aren't a flag for good content. The Gnoll Stronghold, while having plenty of in-game reasons to visit, is a tad underwhelming in gameplay. A bunch of high AC/THAC0 meleed00ds does not make for a compelling gameplay session, even if picking up Gauntlets of Dexterity, a charisma tome, and/or Dynaheir justifies the trip. Now if it was filled with casters, archers, and maybe some domesticated critters acting as guards...well,now we're talking.

Morrowind is pretty bad in this regard as well. Any given dungeon could be naught but a bunch of trash mobs and crap loot; in fact, many are nothing but. Even "unique" dungeons lack interesting gameplay content, mostly a fault of Elder Scrolls shoddy core mechanics. Loot and lore are basically pellets that keep the player on a (very boring) hamster wheel.

Basically, it's the inconsistency of content quality (usually with lots of mediocre/bad) that make "exploration" bad, not being restricted to a 2d environment.

 

[Abelian]

Missing implies you tried to hit, after all, while in BG, unless you specifically aim to avoid the content you're pretty much guaranteed to exhaust it.

The first time I played BG1 in 2000 I missed a lot of content and even entire areas. Why did I not exhaustively search all the areas? Because no one told me to and I wasn't as obsessive-compulsive about exploring the entire map. I was used to playing strategy games where at all points you could see a mission briefing or objective list. When traveling from the Friendly Arm to Nashkel, I kept mostly to the road and missed half the surface of those wilderness maps. Why? Because I had no expectation of finding anything other than monster groups in the unexplored area. Even the journal seemed confusing to me, since it didn't tell me what to do; it only gave general hints. For example, in conversations, I would choose the most direct questions, that needed to be asked anyway, and missed some of the additional background info, or I would choose the option that lead to combat, even if there was a peaceful resolution.

Here's some stuff that I missed in my first play-through: the captain with the cursed two-handed sword, the druids near that Stonehenge-like structure, Bassillus, the Ragefast and nymph side-quest, the sirine cave, Mellicamp the chicken, the Xvart village, the Xvart caves near the Gnoll Stronghold (including one of the books of skill), the half-ogres that injured the paladin in the Jovial Juggler, the thieves' guild quests, Aldeth and the druids, the Amnish hunting party, the dead halfling messenger (found him on the road but didn't know what to do with the note), Gullykin and the Firebrandy Bridge Ruins, Ulcaster's school, the characters Kivan, Shar Teel and Alora and even the Drizzt encounter (not that it matters since I hadn't ever heard of him).

Sometimes I would start a sidequest but had no idea how to finish it and forgot about it to focus on the main plot. I encountered the kid who lost his dog, but didn't find the dog. I found the sphene gem on the basilisk in the warehouse, but didn't realize I could show it to a character for extra experience. I heard about Perdue's short sword and Gurke's cloak but didn't realize I actually had to fetch items for them.

Yeah, one could argue that I missed all that stuff because I was a kid and knew no better, but I was only a couple of years below the target audience. None of the missed content was essential, but my point is that unless the maps were explored methodically and with some knowledge of genre conventions, there was quite a lot of content that could be missed.

 

[a cut of domestic sheep prime]

Yep. And? It's still a halfway decent game with a decent story that isn't about saving the world, decent (if not too fleshed out) characters, and a combat system that isn't a dumbed down, no-perma-kill-having, consolized piece of garbage. Is it the best game evah omg!!! Nope. But it's hardly the worst.

Thanks, I hadn't known any of that before you told me.

Glad I could help.

 

[Glyphwright]

So yes, it's entirely possible to get to the end of Ch.3 without doing ANY exploration whatsoever, not even in the areas that you must go through.

What difference does it make whether it's possible or not? The quality of level design and storytelling is what determines the quality of the game, not whether or not it has optional areas.

 

[GarfunkeL]

You and Draq seemed to both be arguing that there is no exploration in BG1, or that it sucks donkey-balls, because everything is right there AND that you're forced to encounter it all. Which is not true.

 

[octavius]

The quality of level design and storytelling is what determines the quality of the game,

No wonder you are confused, if those two are your only criteria.

 

[Glyphwright]

You and Draq seemed to both be arguing that there is no exploration in BG1, or that it sucks donkey-balls, because everything is right there AND that you're forced to encounter it all

Which is true, you are required to put almost no effort into finding stuff because of how easy it is to traverse the flat landscape, and as soon as you come across something different, it either walks up to you and engaging in dialogue, or because it visibly stands out like a sore. The only way you could possibly miss stuff in BG was either by deliberately trying to avoid it (and even then I guarantee at least a dozen unwanted encounters along the road), or by being a completely inept dumbfuck who never played an RPG in his life (as described by Abelian).

Lib, you better post the other screens as well. Because after that screen, where you will meet a hunter if you stay on the road, there's Beregost. Then there's the two areas between Beregost and Nashkel. In the first one, you'll encounter a corpse and a pair of Ogrillons. In the second one, there's the hobgoblin ambush and ... a messenger. That is, if you stay on the road.

So yes, it's entirely possible to get to the end of Ch.3 without doing ANY exploration whatsoever, not even in the areas that you must go through.

In other words, what you're saying is, you have to put a lot of effort and do a lot of counter-intuitive and unreasonable stuff in order NOT to find encounters in BG, as well as artificially limit and impoverish your gaming style by completely ignoring the world around yourself, which you never have any incentive to do - obviously, if you bought a game and are at least somewhat interested in it, you're going to want to see as much as possible, rather than as little as possible.

So... good job proving that encounters in BG are difficult to find and require you to invest effort in exploration?

 

[ZagorTeNej]

BG1 hasn't aged well at all, in terms of roleplaying and storytelling quality, as well as level design. You could take the entirety of BG2 and release it exactly as it is today, and no one would realize the game is almost 15 years old. In fact, it would be ahead of the curb. BG1 however would be instantly noticeable as a relic from ages long past.

It doesn't have to age particulary well to shit all over the giants of the genre we have in modern gaming era today, or have you been sleeping under a fucking rock for the last 10 years or so? Before Kickstarter craze isometric party based RPGs were on life support at best if not outright dead (there's Vogel's later Avernum sequels and Dragon Age 1), there's no competition out there to make BG look outdated if it came out today.

Oh and I can guarantee BG2 would also look like an ancient relic to today's RPG gamers who're used to Mass Effect and Skyrim. Afterall, it doesn't have shiny 3D graphics with great facial animation, full voice acting, health regeneration or quest compass and to make matters even worse your party members can actually fucking die.

 

[Abelian]

The only way you could possibly miss stuff in BG was [. . .] by being a completely inept dumbfuck who never played an RPG in his life (as described by Abelian).

I take mild offense at that the first part, since it was uncalled for. Sure, I might have never played an RPG before (with the exception of RPG-lite Diablo), but I think I can claim credit for figuring out the sometimes unintuitive D&D system and managing to make enough sense of the game to actually finish it, in a foreign language to top it (not that I deserve a medal or anything).

It's not like I was saying I missed ALL side quests; I did complete a fair amount of the optional quests in Beregost and Baldur's Gate, as well as stuff like Prism the sculptor, the ogre's belts, rescue Dynaheir, fight the wolves at the lighthouse, Joia's ring, the Ankheg lair, the three fishermen's quest, Coran's hunt, Spider's Bane, white wolf pelts, helping Viconia, finding and returning Jacob's ring and Kylie's dagger and many others. You will be happy to know that I was able to successfully complete all the Candlekeep fetch quests.

I was merely showing from personal experience how it is possible to overlook a non-trivial amount of optional content when starting with the mentality that MAIN_QUEST == GAME. Sorry for not being born with a monocle.

 

[Glyphwright]

It doesn't have to age particulary well to shit all over the giants of the genre we have in modern gaming era today, or have you been sleeping under a fucking rock for the last 10 years or so? Before Kickstarter craze isometric party based RPGs were on life support at best if not outright dead (there's Vogel's later Avernum sequels and Dragon Age 1), there's no competition out there to make BG look outdated if it came out today.

Oh and I can guarantee BG2 would also look like an ancient relic to today's RPG gamers who're used to Mass Effect and Skyrim. Afterall, it doesn't have shiny 3D graphics with great facial animation, full voice acting, health regeneration or quest compass and to make matters even worse your party members can actually fucking die.

No! I love Ass Defect and Faggot AIDS - much better than Baldur's Gate!! LEAVE FAGGOT AIDS ALONE I LIKED LOOKING AT PRETTY MAPS. STRAWMAN STRAWMAN YOU'RE A STRAWMAN STRAWMAAAAAAAAHAHAHAAAAAANNN!! I don't know what strawman really means, but you're definitely one!

Stop preaching to the choir, hombre, I had the audience of at least minimally intelligent/invested CRPG gamers in mind when I said BG2 wouldn't seem outdated whereas BG1 definitely would due to its near-total lack of party member interaction, tons of monologue instead of dialogue, and lack of functional sexploration.

I take mild offense at that the first part, since it was uncalled for. Sure, I might have never played an RPG before (with the exception of RPG-lite Diablo), but I think I can claim credit for figuring out the sometimes unintuitive D&D system and managing to make enough sense of the game to actually finish it, in a foreign language to top it (not that I deserve a medal or anything).

It's not like I was saying I missed ALL side quests; I did complete a fair amount of the optional quests in Beregost and Baldur's Gate, as well as stuff like Prism the sculptor, the ogre's belts, rescue Dynaheir, fight the wolves at the lighthouse, Joia's ring, the Ankheg lair, the three fishermen's quest, Coran's hunt, Spider's Bane, white wolf pelts, helping Viconia, finding and returning Jacob's ring and Kylie's dagger and many others. You will be happy to know that I was able to successfully complete all the Candlekeep fetch quests.

I was merely showing from personal experience how it is possible to overlook a non-trivial amount of optional content when starting with the mentality that MAIN_QUEST == GAME. Sorry for not being born with a monocle.

Look, basing your position on the experience of a completely fresh-out-of-the-water player who never played an RPG in his life (I'll pretend you didn't just use RPG and Diablo in the same sentence back there) is probably the thinnest argument I've heard ever since Dorky the Pigeon wrote his brainless cop-out bullshit. As is the hypothetical style of play that involves rushing through optional areas along the main road with your eyes firmly shut to avoid noticing that you're being chased by armies of paladins begging you to kill a gibberling and girls crying out for their lost cats, in order to beat the main quest ASAP. I'm not even sure if it's technically possible to beat any of the boss battle without enough experience points, but I digress.

The point is, this isn't the style of play expected of at least a minimally intelligent and invested player. An intelligent player will strive to explore as much of the game as possible, because there's never any incentive to do otherwise - it's not as though there's a time limit, or a need to choose between Area A and Area B - all the areas are out there, and the fact that you're going to visit all (or almost all) of them is a natural consequence of being at least a minimally seasoned RPG player - it is not to the game's credit.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

Stop preaching to the choir, hombre, I had the audience of at least minimally intelligent/invested CRPG gamers in mind when I said BG2 wouldn't seem outdated whereas BG1 definitely would due to its near-total lack of party member interaction, tons of monologue instead of dialogue, and lack of functional sexploration.

Outdated compared to what? You give examples of those modern RPGs that put BG to shame but with which BG2 can stand shoulder to shoulder (the fucking privilege), so you don't accuse me of strawman.

 

[Glyphwright]

Outdated compared to what? You give examples of those modern RPGs that put BG to shame but with which BG2 can stand shoulder to shoulder (the fucking privilege), so you don't accuse me of strawman.

Some of my favorite RPGs that came out after Baldur's Gate and put it to shame in terms of story, plot, characters, level design, sexploration, and atmosphere - some of these terms, if not necessarily all in each game.

Anachronox
Arcanum
Planescape
The Sith Lords
Vampire Bloodlines
Icewind Dale
The Witcher
Gothic
Gothic 2
Morrowind
Final Fantasy VIII
Final Fantasy IX
Final Fantasy X
Arx Fatalis

 

[TedNugent]

I'm just going to leave this here.

 

[Johannes]

So wtf is that thing on the left

 

[Exar Kun]

As someone who recently played BG1 for the first time, I would have to agree with Glyphwright.

The game does show its age and it certainly doesn't compare to the timelessness of playing PS:T (which I also recently played). The lack of party interaction, so-so/bad writing, and monotomous exploration makes it age worse then other games.

I still really enjoyed the game and its still one of the best RPG's out there. Im looking forward to my first BG2 playthrough because of it.

 

[a cut of domestic sheep prime]

So wtf is that thing on the left

its a game that has shit exploration and didnt age well mkay. its clearly a relic from ages long past.

Spoiler

mass effect

FAR worse exploration than bg1 actually...

edit:

The only way you could possibly miss stuff in BG was [. . .] by being a completely inept dumbfuck who never played an RPG in his life (as described by Abelian).

in Glyphwrite's world, everyone who buys a game should be a total aspy and explore every square inch of its butthole in one playthrough.

Seriously, bro, play NWN2's Original Campaign. You have 99% of the sidequests, areas, companions etc shoved in front of you and they really are the most banal and uninteresting things ever. THAT is "putting no effort into finding stuff". BG1's sidequests and exploration are perfect by comparison.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

Some of my favorite RPGs that came out after Baldur's Gate and put it to shame in terms of story, plot, characters, level design, sexploration, and atmosphere - some of these terms, if not necessarily all in each game.

Anachronox
Arcanum
Planescape
The Sith Lords
Vampire Bloodlines
Icewind Dale
The Witcher
Gothic
Gothic 2
Morrowind
Final Fantasy VIII
Final Fantasy IX
Final Fantasy X
Arx Fatalis

I don't see how Arcanum, PST and IWD are supposed to be representative of supposed modern gaming evolution, they're all games which came out around same time BG did (well Arcanum did 3 years later but still, that's nearly 13 years ago) which were better than BG in some areas (and better overall games IMO regarding PST and Arcanum).

Kotor 2 is a great storyfag/atmospheric experience and has some similarities with IE games but is limited to 2 party members (+PC), isn't isometric, has lesser scope etc. not sure I'd call it the same type of RPG.

The Witcher (not sure I'd even call it an RPG to be honest but still a very good game), Gothic games, Morrowind and Arx Fatalis are all action RPGs which might as well be a different genre and one that we're still getting in steady supply (they aren't nearly extinct like isometric party based RPGs are). I mean I can understand comparing Arx Fatalis to Ultima Underworld for example but BG is too different as far as I'm concerned.

Anachronox I tried out a few years back but the game kept crashing, really liked what little I saw though(especially the setting which seemed like a mix of sci-fi and film noir) despite JRPG like combat, will definitely dive into it again at some point.

Final Fantasy XXX - I don't play JRPGs, never owned a console.

 

[Glyphwright]

I don't see how Arcanum, PST and IWD are supposed to be representative of supposed modern gaming evolution, they're all games which came out around same time BG did (well Arcanum did 3 years later but still, that's nearly 13 years ago) which were better than BG in some areas (and better overall games IMO regarding PST and Arcanum).

Nobody cares. I wasn't talking about modern RPGs, I was talking about modern standards of CRPGs which were codified by games like PST and Fallout, which, despite being released at the same time as BG1, remain paragons of storytelling and roleplaying, whereas BG1 despite being enjoyable on a completely different level, just looks aged and silly. The fact that RPGs that came after 2005 stopped adhering to these standards and fell to the level of glorified Diablo with quest compass is not my problem - standards of quality are defined by the best of the stock, not the worst.

Kotor 2 is a great storyfag/atmospheric experience and has some similarities with IE games but is limited to 2 party members (+PC), isn't isometric, has lesser scope etc. not sure I'd call it the same type of RPG.

Nobody cares, we're not comparing game mechanics.

The Witcher (not sure I'd even call it an RPG to be honest but still a very good game), Gothic games, Morrowind and Arx Fatalis are all action RPGs which might as well be a different genre and one that we're still getting in steady supply (they aren't nearly extinct like isometric party based RPGs are). I mean I can understand comparing Arx Fatalis to Ultima Underworld for example but BG is too different as far as I'm concerned.

Nobody cares.

Anachronox I tried out a few years back but the game kept crashing, really liked what little I saw though(especially the setting which seemed like a mix of sci-fi and film noir) despite JRPG like combat, will definitely dive into it again at some point.

Nobody ca... well, yes, it's a great game and you should get past the bugs and enjoy the game world and story.

Final Fantasy XXX - I don't play JRPGs, never owned a console.

Nobody cares. FFVII and FFVIII were released for Windows.

 

[Metatron]

Outdated compared to what? You give examples of those modern RPGs that put BG to shame but with which BG2 can stand shoulder to shoulder (the fucking privilege), so you don't accuse me of strawman.

Some of my favorite RPGs that came out after Baldur's Gate and put it to shame in terms of story, plot, characters, level design, sexploration, and atmosphere - some of these terms, if not necessarily all in each game.

Anachronox
Arcanum
Planescape
The Sith Lords
Vampire Bloodlines
Icewind Dale
The Witcher
Gothic
Gothic 2
Morrowind
Final Fantasy VIII
Final Fantasy IX
Final Fantasy X
Arx Fatalis

Add Icewind Dale 2 to that list.

Baldurs Gate was an interesting infinity engine testcase and good for what it was at the time of its release cause fantasy rpgs could use something new and exciting back then (and at least the engine made things look quite good) but I honestly prefer everything else inifinity engine (including the expansions) to BG1. I guess it excels in the exploration department if exploration equals compulsively clearing fog of war but in terms of storyline, setting, reactivity, encounter design, dungeon design, coherence, atmosphere whitout dumb 4th wall breaking jokes etc. it's usually the 4th or 5th best IE-game. I does deserve some praise because it came first but if they released it after BG2 or IWD2 everyone would've thought it was a bit shitty.

 

[Telengard]

You and Draq seemed to both be arguing that there is no exploration in BG1, or that it sucks donkey-balls, because everything is right there AND that you're forced to encounter it all. Which is not true.

I will make an attempt to distill what they are saying down into normal-people speak.

So, for most people exploration is much like sightseeing. Did I go there? Yes. Did I see something there? Yes. Check. Good, job done.

But in terms of Game Exploration, instead of just the sightseeing tour, exploration involves three steps: Search, Discovery, and Reward. (And for the real explorrfags, Discovery is its own reward, so the last of those is actually optional.) BG1 has Search covered in spades, where you uncover the fog of war across each of the maps. But it bags discovery and goes straight to giving reward. You uncover the map, and you immediately get all the rewards as soon as the fog of war is opened.

Discovery: that sense that you are right now seeing something that no one else has ever seen before few playing this game will ever see. The sense of: "I found this special place". The sense that you are gazing upon vistas that only the true explorers will ever see, because only an explorer can find them.

A small 2.5d map with a simple implementation of fog of war is something that doesn't lend itself well to Discovery. Which doesn't mean that a designer can't add Discovery to it, by doing something clever and offbeat - such as by adding in secret rooms with missable quests. But, BG1 didn't do much of that. In BG1, as soon as you decide to 'explore', you are immediately rewarded with everything the area has to offer. Thus, BG1 lacks Discovery. And without Discovery, it is missing a vital element of Game Exploration.

 

[octavius]

As someone who recently played BG1 for the first time, I would have to agree with Glyphwright.

The game does show its age and it certainly doesn't compare to the timelessness of playing PS:T (which I also recently played). The lack of party interaction, so-so/bad writing, and monotomous exploration makes it age worse then other games.

I still really enjoyed the game and its still one of the best RPG's out there. Im looking forward to my first BG2 playthrough because of it.

BG1 in its vanilla state is probably one of the CRPGs that have aged most badly, mainly due to it having such small resolution (only 640X480, I think), which looks terrible on modern monitors.
But why play vanilla BG1 when you can play with BGT and Widescreen mod? Throw in BG1 NPC Project if you want BG2 style banter and interjections, in addition to more quests. Add Sword Coast Strategems if you want more challenging combat.
Hell, even the Enhanced Edition should be much better than the vanilla version.

 

[DraQ]

Exploring places, especially dungeons, in Morrowind is a not too dissimilar affair. For every rare occasion that the player is rewarded with an object of interest, be it a piece of equipment or some lore pellet, they are inundated with meaningless, bland dungeons or empty terrain. Rooting around indoors will yield a couple thousand finds of lesser soul gems (or similar trash items) to every one time a Daedric Killmaster 3000 is wedged in between a couple of boxes. It's a bad distribution of goodies; 99% of the time stuff is crap, while 1% of the time it's outstanding. The observant player realizes that meticulous exploration is important, but will only be rewarding a scant minority of the time. Terrible incentive structuring, terrible design for a game.

A sensible design for a world, though.

If the name of the game is soaking in the setting and atmosphere, it trumps all the game considerations.

The difference is that in Morrowind exploring is in itself an engaging activity and gameplay element, while in BG1 it's purely mechanical chore.

And neither world is very good at flagging areas as crap/not-crap.

And why should they?

Actually, Morrowind does fare much better in this regard - areas like Daedric shrines will typically contain high level stuff, while unique areas of all kinds often have all sorts of subtle breadcrumb trails leading to them.

The Gnoll Stronghold, while having plenty of in-game reasons to visit, is a tad underwhelming in gameplay. A bunch of high AC/THAC0 meleed00ds does not make for a compelling gameplay session, even if picking up Gauntlets of Dexterity, a charisma tome, and/or Dynaheir justifies the trip. Now if it was filled with casters, archers, and maybe some domesticated critters acting as guards...well,now we're talking.

You mean having differently colored skivvies is not diverse enough!?

Actually, I concur - that's the problem with BG1 encounters - other than hostile adventuring parties they are crap, and even parties are generally one trick ponies (interrupt caster, immobilize melee dewds, slaughter).

Morrowind, obviously, also has crap combat, but BG1 doesn't have lore pellets, has crap gameworld and can also bore you to tears while "exploring".

You and Draq seemed to both be arguing that there is no exploration in BG1, or that it sucks donkey-balls, because everything is right there AND that you're forced to encounter it all. Which is not true.

I will make an attempt to distill what they are saying down into normal-people speak.

So, for most people exploration is much like sightseeing. Did I go there? Yes. Did I see something there? Yes. Check. Good, job done.

But in terms of Game Exploration, instead of just the sightseeing tour, exploration involves three steps: Search, Discovery, and Reward. (And for the real explorrfags, Discovery is its own reward, so the last of those is actually optional.) BG1 has Search covered in spades, where you uncover the fog of war across each of the maps. But it bags discovery and goes straight to giving reward. You uncover the map, and you immediately get all the rewards as soon as the fog of war is opened.

Discovery: that sense that you are right now seeing something that no one else has ever seen before few playing this game will ever see. The sense of: "I found this special place". The sense that you are gazing upon vistas that only the true explorers will ever see, because only an explorer can find them.

A small 2.5d map with a simple implementation of fog of war is something that doesn't lend itself well to Discovery. Which doesn't mean that a designer can't add Discovery to it, by doing something clever and offbeat - such as by adding in secret rooms with missable quests. But, BG1 didn't do much of that. In BG1, as soon as you decide to 'explore', you are immediately rewarded with everything the area has to offer. Thus, BG1 lacks Discovery. And without Discovery, it is missing a vital element of Game Exploration.

Sorry for not being born with a monocle.

You'd better be.

 

[Metatron]

As someone who recently played BG1 for the first time, I would have to agree with Glyphwright.

The game does show its age and it certainly doesn't compare to the timelessness of playing PS:T (which I also recently played). The lack of party interaction, so-so/bad writing, and monotomous exploration makes it age worse then other games.

I still really enjoyed the game and its still one of the best RPG's out there. Im looking forward to my first BG2 playthrough because of it.

BG1 in its vanilla state is probably one of the CRPGs that have aged most badly, mainly due to it having such small resolution (only 640X480, I think), which looks terrible on modern monitors.

It aged badly because of underdeveloped design choices, not because of resolution issues. It still looks pretty good even whitout the obligatory mods.