Malraz Alizar
Novice
- Joined
- Jul 2, 2003
- Messages
- 36
Baldur's Gate was the most popular and critically-acclaimed CRPG of 1998. The most popular and critically-acclaimed CRPGs of 1997 were Diablo and Final Fantasy VII. Seen in that context, and not the revisionist fantasy in which everyone and his dog played Fallout and immediately recognized it as the next logical step in CRPG design, Baldur's Gate was viewed simultaneously as a return to form and a much-needed modernizing of the genre.
To wit, Baldur's Gate combined all the essential elements of a traditional role-playing game...
1. Math
2. Reading
3. An official AD&D license
...with all the desirable elements of a modern multi-media experience...
1. Luscious presentation (including CGI cutscenes and limited voice acting)
2. An intuitive, mouse-driven graphical user interface
3. Real-time strategizing
4. Six-player co-op over LAN or internet (the importance of which, at least among those gamers with the means to take advantage of it - ie games journalists - CANNOT BE OVERSTATED)
...to create a "perfect storm" of interest in what was at that time still seen as a moribund genre, about equal in importance and future prospects with that other staple of the '80s and early-'90s, the graphic adventure game. (Of course, no one actually referred to it as a "perfect storm" at the time, as the film that popularized that now-ubiquitous expression wouldn't be released for another two years, but you get my drift.) If anything, Planescape: Torment only served to cement Baldur's Gate's reputation as a harbinger of the future of computer roleplaying, and it wasn't until Baldur's Gate II utterly failed to build on the concepts introduced (or, more accurately, re-introduced) by that game that the critical backlash against BioWare really started to pick up steam.
To wit, Baldur's Gate combined all the essential elements of a traditional role-playing game...
1. Math
2. Reading
3. An official AD&D license
...with all the desirable elements of a modern multi-media experience...
1. Luscious presentation (including CGI cutscenes and limited voice acting)
2. An intuitive, mouse-driven graphical user interface
3. Real-time strategizing
4. Six-player co-op over LAN or internet (the importance of which, at least among those gamers with the means to take advantage of it - ie games journalists - CANNOT BE OVERSTATED)
...to create a "perfect storm" of interest in what was at that time still seen as a moribund genre, about equal in importance and future prospects with that other staple of the '80s and early-'90s, the graphic adventure game. (Of course, no one actually referred to it as a "perfect storm" at the time, as the film that popularized that now-ubiquitous expression wouldn't be released for another two years, but you get my drift.) If anything, Planescape: Torment only served to cement Baldur's Gate's reputation as a harbinger of the future of computer roleplaying, and it wasn't until Baldur's Gate II utterly failed to build on the concepts introduced (or, more accurately, re-introduced) by that game that the critical backlash against BioWare really started to pick up steam.