Baldur's Gate 3

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PhantomLord

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  • #3
    I posted in the general thoughts thread, but for me, the ideal BG3 game would used a turn based battle systems like in Larian's Divinity series. I always found the pseudo-real time battles in the Infinity Engine games cumbersome at harder difficulties. Not that they weren't great games, but just slightly flawed.

    Now sure how their license works, but it would also be awesome if they brought back the Dark Alliance series. Those games were so great back in the PS2 era.
     
    kenada

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  • #5
    If this is true, I really hope they use the 5e ruleset. It’s been a long time since we had an actual D&D game using actual D&D rules.

    Also, given the events of Murder in Baldur’s Gate, I wonder whether this will be a fresh start with a new protagonist.

    Murder in Baldur’s Gate starts off with Abdel Adrian’s being killed by another bhaalspawn at the start of the adventure. Abdel Adrian is the canonical protagonist of the Baldur’s Gate series. Actually, starting off the game with Murder in Baldur’s Gate would be pretty cool. It’s one of the more unique adventures released for 5e and would serve a fitting segue from the old games to the new one(s).
     
    krimhorn

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  • #7
    kenada said:
    If this is true, I really hope they use the 5e ruleset. It’s been a long time since we had an actual D&D game using actual D&D rules.
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    This is my biggest question. I played Sword Coast Legends since it was advertised as using the 5e rulesets but the actual character development is pure skill tree and not an interesting implementation of 5e classes via skill tree either. Most of the classes are identical except for one or two trees that give them some semi unique class abilities and all abilities are cooldown based instead of per rest.

    I've read that WotC/Hasbro has been hesitant to allow developers to delve into using 5e proper in video games thinking that it might dilute interest in their tabletop properties. Hopefully, if this is true, the rise of D&D streaming has provided enough new blood into the tabletop arena that they realize that anything D&D adjacent simply brings in more players rather than fewer.

    Also, given the events of Murder in Baldur’s Gate, I wonder whether this will be a fresh start with a new protagonist.
    Click to expand...
    Regardless of what any books might have done, the story of the BG avatar was finished in Throne of Bhaal. Sure, you could restart at level 1 (IIRC, the plot has you either becoming a good or evil god or becoming mortal again) but that character's story is finished. Pick it up with a new character who's been adjacent to the events of the Bhaalspawn crisis and tell their story. Maybe have their story lead up to the Spellplague (which would be interesting from a meta perspective as the story there was written, in part, to explain some of the mechanical changes in 4e) in 1385DR making them children during the Bhaalspawn crisis.
     
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    Hat Monster

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  • #9
    kenada said:
    Also, given the events of Murder in Baldur’s Gate, I wonder whether this will be a fresh start with a new protagonist.
    Click to expand...
    Well, the protagonist's story ended in Throne of Bhaal. It's wrapped up. It's done. There's nothing dangling. There are some adventure scenarios and books which go on, like Murder in Baldur's Gate, and they're really ill-advised.

    What I'd like to see is the game opening at the docks of Gray Harbor, with Balduran sailing off to Anchorome. You play the warlord-in-chief of the budding settlement and, over time, you defend and build it. Balduran's legacy goes on the walls, which is canon, but they're as yet incomplete and the stone has to come from somewhere, so you need to secure shipments or a quarry. The farmers want it to protect them, but this will delay completion, and mercenary gangs are harassing commerce, which you rely on. Bootstrap adventuring, similar to Crossroad Keep in NWN2 (which I really enjoyed, and could have been fleshed out much more than it was). Meanwhile, the Big Bad is plotting your demise in true Forgotten Realms fashion.

    The story of the earliest days of Baldur's Gate get told, the Tax Revolt, the founding of Amn, etc.
     
    krimhorn

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  • #12
    Cabusha said:
    The Baldur's Gate series are probably my favorite c-rpgs. They're very much of their time though...I'm not really sure how they could do a new Baldur's Gate in today's world. I wasn't at all impressed with siege of Dragonspear, it was like really bad fan fiction.
    Click to expand...
    I don't know about SoD as I haven't played it but it was the only narrative game that Beamdog had ever produced. I'm not surprised it doesn't live up to the heyday of Bioware. Larian has solid storytelling chops even if their worldbuilding is sometimes lacking. Luckily, seeing as this is a Forgotten Realms story, they don't have to worry about worldbuilding too much.
     
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    NavyGothic

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  • #13
    Interesting. I'm not entirely sure what the draw will be here; the classic IE gameplay has already been brought into the modern era by the likes of Pillars of Eternity (and to some degree Larian itself with D:OS), and Throne of Bhaal was a pretty conclusive ending to the story. I'm not sure the D&D / Forgotten Realms IP has anywhere near the value that it did back in the day.

    Still, D:OS and especially D:OS2 were fantastic, so I'm certainly looking forward to more info.
     
    BenN

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  • #14
    I will definitely get this. Still a fan of ye olde CRPG (currently replaying BG2: ToB, and NWN2: MoTB), but I hope it doesn't feature fucking Drizzt D'oh!urden.

    Accordng to this corner of internet D&D nerd-dom, there is speculation that it is going to be somehow linked with the forthcoming Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus.

    Apart from no Drizzt, I hope it features other areas of the Realms - Sea of Falling Stars, etc.
     
    krimhorn

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  • #15
    BenN said:
    Accordng to this corner of internet D&D nerd-dom, there is speculation that it is going to be somehow linked with the forthcoming Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus.
    Click to expand...
    Well, that would be consistent with the way Wizards is doing things. The Neverwinter MMO tends to feature new content that ties into new modules when they come out. Can't say I'm thrilled about it being an adaptation or loose tie-in but seeing as I neither have a tabletop group and have no real desire to do the Adventurer's League I have no risk of already having played parts (or all depending on how it's done) of it.
     
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    Moller

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  • #17
    BenN said:
    I will definitely get this. Still a fan of ye olde CRPG (currently replaying BG2: ToB, and NWN2: MoTB), but I hope it doesn't feature fucking Drizzt D'oh!urden.

    Accordng to this corner of internet D&D nerd-dom, there is speculation that it is going to be somehow linked with the forthcoming Baldur's Gate: Descent into Avernus.

    Apart from no Drizzt, I hope it features other areas of the Realms - Sea of Falling Stars, etc.
    Click to expand...

    I'm also currently replaying BG2 (enhanced edition, with...a lot of mods). So I'm...cautiously optimistic about this. Baldur's Gate was the game that basically got me posting on internet forums back in the day.
     
    krimhorn

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  • #20
    Mister E. Meat said:
    Thorvard said:
    Drizzt D'oh!urden
    Click to expand...

    Don't kill me, but I wouldn't mind a CRPG focused on his early years. He's been run into the ground, but I really enjoyed the early books.
    Click to expand...
    Do you mean the years he was named R. A. Salvatore before he made his way to Icewind Dale?
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    The history of D&D is literally the creator's characters being amazing and powerful and basically gods. Don't see why people get so up in arms about Drizzt being that for Salvatore and not characters like Mordenkainen, Tenser and other first-gen player characters turned lore characters. Is it just the amount of content that he's in that led to an overwhelming popularity compared to his predecessors*?

    *Who, admittedly, by the time of 3rd Edition were essentially just background lore for the spells and items carrying their names but that's mostly on TSR (and later WotC) deciding not to use them much in narrative content.
     
    BenN

    BenN

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  • #21
    krimhorn said:
    Mister E. Meat said:
    Thorvard said:
    Drizzt D'oh!urden
    Click to expand...

    Don't kill me, but I wouldn't mind a CRPG focused on his early years. He's been run into the ground, but I really enjoyed the early books.
    Click to expand...
    Do you mean the years he was named R. A. Salvatore before he made his way to Icewind Dale?
    Click to expand...
    The history of D&D is literally the creator's characters being amazing and powerful and basically gods. Don't see why people get so up in arms about Drizzt being that for Salvatore and not characters like Mordenkainen, Tenser and other first-gen player characters turned lore characters. Is it just the amount of content that he's in that led to an overwhelming popularity compared to his predecessors*?
    Click to expand...
    For me, its a combination of:

    * Drizzt = Gary Stu. His only flaw is that he's too perfect.

    * Self-righteous EMO whining. He's just no fun. I mean come on - he's a drow FFS. It is possible to make drow 'hero' characters that are quite a good laugh & cheerfully amoral.

    * There's too much of him. Fair enough, he has legions of fans so he's a money tree for RAS.
     
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    NavyGothic

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  • #24
    Anvilfang said:
    Larian doing BG3 seems interesting. I truly hope they stay true to the real time with pause, it was one of the functions of IE that made the series so popular. Why mess with that?
    Click to expand...
    I'm not sure it translates well to more complex mechanics. In 2E your fighters and thieves would spend most of the entire battle autoattacking, and your mages and clerics had pretty severe restrictions on spell availability. Modern game design (including more recent D&D rulesets) tends to make fighter-type characters more engaging while giving casters more at-will spells. If you're pausing too often to issue commands, it hurts the fluidity of a real-time battle system.

    Even Pillars of Eternity recently introduced a turn-based mode. I haven't tried it yet, but I can see why they would make that decision.
     
    Diabolical

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  • #25
    BenN said:
    krimhorn said:
    Mister E. Meat said:
    Thorvard said:
    Drizzt D'oh!urden
    Click to expand...

    Don't kill me, but I wouldn't mind a CRPG focused on his early years. He's been run into the ground, but I really enjoyed the early books.
    Click to expand...
    Do you mean the years he was named R. A. Salvatore before he made his way to Icewind Dale?
    Click to expand...
    The history of D&D is literally the creator's characters being amazing and powerful and basically gods. Don't see why people get so up in arms about Drizzt being that for Salvatore and not characters like Mordenkainen, Tenser and other first-gen player characters turned lore characters. Is it just the amount of content that he's in that led to an overwhelming popularity compared to his predecessors*?
    Click to expand...
    For me, its a combination of:

    * Drizzt = Gary Stu. His only flaw is that he's too perfect.

    * Self-righteous EMO whining. He's just no fun. I mean come on - he's a drow FFS. It is possible to make drow 'hero' characters that are quite a good laugh & cheerfully amoral.

    * There's too much of him. Fair enough, he has legions of fans so he's a money tree for RAS.
    Click to expand...

    I deeply enjoyed kiting him to a specific lake in BG1, shooting arrows at him for two hours, killing him, and taking all of his gear. I sacrificed a character to do it, but SO worth it.
     
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    PhantomLord

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  • #26
    NavyGothic said:
    Anvilfang said:
    Larian doing BG3 seems interesting. I truly hope they stay true to the real time with pause, it was one of the functions of IE that made the series so popular. Why mess with that?
    Click to expand...
    I'm not sure it translates well to more complex mechanics. In 2E your fighters and thieves would spend most of the entire battle autoattacking, and your mages and clerics had pretty severe restrictions on spell availability. Modern game design (including more recent D&D rulesets) tends to make fighter-type characters more engaging while giving casters more at-will spells. If you're pausing too often to issue commands, it hurts the fluidity of a real-time battle system.

    Even Pillars of Eternity recently introduced a turn-based mode. I haven't tried it yet, but I can see why they would make that decision.
    Click to expand...

    I would actually prefer a turn based system, but an optimal design would be to give the choice for those who want it or to switch for easier battles. For BG1, I was able to make it through, but in BG2 I found many of the battles were a real struggle even with pausing because of the amount of abilities and spells available. Because casting and action times vary, it can also be confusing when and if something is happening. Basically BG2 could get overwhelming very quickly and become trial and error for larger battles.

    One thing I hope is that they can bring back the awesome dialogue and descriptions. So few games have really been able to match what those Infinity engine games had. Full voice acting has actually reduced the amount of dialogue and descriptive text since time and money are a limiting factor. I don't mind at all the partial or no voice acting.
     
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    Moller

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  • #27
    PhantomLord said:
    One thing I hope is that they can bring back the awesome dialogue and descriptions. So few games have really been able to match what those Infinity engine games had. Full voice acting has actually reduced the amount of dialogue and descriptive text since time and money are a limiting factor. I don't mind at all the partial or no voice acting.
    Click to expand...

    I'm super behind on certain types of games thanks to MMO addictions, and this hit me really hard playing through Dragon Age: Origins. Everything is voiced! BG2 feels like...maybe 10-20% voiced? Even for characters that are voiced, if it's a long conversation often only the first section (or sometimes just the first sentence) will be voiced. That feels a lot smoother. Dragon Age feels a bit slow sometimes because of all of the dialogue.
     
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    PhantomLord

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  • #28
    I do find that even though RPG's have less dialogue now because everything is voiced, conversations can still feel really long and dull. I would have loved an option in games like Fallout 3 and Skyrim to mute the dialogue and just have click through text. Even with faster well acted dialogue, these large games always re-use voice actors which can really take you out of the moment. Plus the really descriptive dialogue and fluffy text is completely gone.

    Imagine listening to a fully voiced Planescape: Torment? Yikes.
     
    krimhorn

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  • #29
    PhantomLord said:
    I do find that even though RPG's have less dialogue now because everything is voiced, conversations can still feel really long and dull. I would have loved an option in games like Fallout 3 and Skyrim to mute the dialogue and just have click through text. Even with faster well acted dialogue, these large games always re-use voice actors which can really take you out of the moment. Plus the really descriptive dialogue and fluffy text is completely gone.

    Imagine listening to a fully voiced Planescape: Torment? Yikes.
    Click to expand...
    Per this site PST had 75k lines in the script whereas the next closest of the classic games was Icewind Dale II with 63k and BGII with 57k. Dragon Age Origins beats both of those out with 68k and Fallout 4 (the "least" RPG of the Bethesda Fallouts according to some) has more than all of them with 111k lines. The Mass Effect series has 20k, 25k and 30k in each of their respective entries and the Metal Gear Solid series (except for 3) has more lines of text than all but ME3.

    Script length really doesn't indicate quality, IMO. While two of the most well-regarded titles of yesteryear are near the top of the distribution of script length, most of the titles that people look to as "how a CRPG should be done" fall well into the distribution right around the mean. The main difference that I've noticed when it comes to modern RPGs trying to ape those older ones is the tendency to words for the sake of wordsing because "that's how it used to be done". Things like 3 long boxes of text in a dialogue when the useful information was communicated in the first two sentences and everything else was either restatement of those two sentences or meaningless tripe to lengthen the script of the interaction for no reason other than to lengthen it. That's led me to having a tendency to skip most non-dialogue because most of it is irrelevant.

    D :OS and D :OSII are two examples of modern games that I think get the amount of dialogue and description mostly right and, personally, Mass Effect's use of cutscene advancements instead of text descriptions makes its rather paltry 20k lines feel like so much more. If BGIII follows the D :OS series in terms of text use (or ME in terms of text combined with cutscene) then I think it'll be just fine.
     
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  • #30
    Hat Monster said:
    kenada said:
    Also, given the events of Murder in Baldur’s Gate, I wonder whether this will be a fresh start with a new protagonist.
    Click to expand...
    Well, the protagonist's story ended in Throne of Bhaal. It's wrapped up. It's done. There's nothing dangling. There are some adventure scenarios and books which go on, like Murder in Baldur's Gate, and they're really ill-advised.

    What I'd like to see is the game opening at the docks of Gray Harbor, with Balduran sailing off to Anchorome. You play the warlord-in-chief of the budding settlement and, over time, you defend and build it. Balduran's legacy goes on the walls, which is canon, but they're as yet incomplete and the stone has to come from somewhere, so you need to secure shipments or a quarry. The farmers want it to protect them, but this will delay completion, and mercenary gangs are harassing commerce, which you rely on. Bootstrap adventuring, similar to Crossroad Keep in NWN2 (which I really enjoyed, and could have been fleshed out much more than it was). Meanwhile, the Big Bad is plotting your demise in true Forgotten Realms fashion.

    The story of the earliest days of Baldur's Gate get told, the Tax Revolt, the founding of Amn, etc.
    Click to expand...
    The simplest explanation is, Baldur's Gate has brand value. If they called it something else, I might not have clicked the link in this forum, because I don't know much D&D lore, but I DO know and love BG.

    I'd imagine the new game won't be more than loosely tied to the original games - you'll visit the city, maybe meet some NPCs as a fan-service, and other than that it will go in a different direction. Is my prediction.

    As for hopes and dreams, I would really love if they were able to keep the style from the original. I don't expect a 2.5D engine to cut it these days, but the hand-painted background of the originals were beyond beautiful, with detail and character that would be very time-consuming and difficult to manage in full 3D. Still, a game that isn't gorgeous and immersive, is not a Baldur's Gate CRPG.

    I would also prefer to keep the turn-based combat - it was an interesting concept, and while you could do a lot to better visualize things like timing and spell-queues to better show what will happen and when, to whom, the basic gameplay was solid.

    The story, of course, also needs to be engaging, with quests that make you want to complete them, to find out what's going on. BGII in particular had some great ones, where you weren't quite sure who was good or evil, and were kept guessing until the resolution.

    L.
     
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    PhantomLord

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  • #31
    I'm shocked that Fallout 4 had so many lines, but on the other hand that is probably why that is the first Fallout that bored me so quickly. The forced 4 choice dialogue trees really hurt that game. I agree that the amount of text doesn't make a game better, but I do miss the descriptive text in between the dialogue from those old games.

    Torment: Tides of Numenera is a good example of words for words sake. I only played for about two hours and was enjoying how the game played, but the dialogue and text was stretched out way too far.

    I also agree that Mass Effect is a good example of hitting that almost perfect medium where the dialogue really felt just right and the conversations were fun to work through.

    Speaking of all this, how does Divinity Original Sin 1 and 2 fit in with dialogue balance?
     
    krimhorn

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  • #32
    Lestat said:
    As for hopes and dreams, I would really love if they were able to keep the style from the original. I don't expect a 2.5D engine to cut it these days, but the hand-painted background of the originals were beyond beautiful, with detail and character that would be very time-consuming and difficult to manage in full 3D. Still, a game that isn't gorgeous and immersive, is not a Baldur's Gate CRPG.
    Click to expand...
    2.5D-like does pretty well within the crowd that is the audience for this game. Though I don't expect Larian would roll a totally new engine for this instead of incrementing the Divinity Engine and adding a D&D rules implementation (if applicable).
     
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    PhantomLord

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  • #33
    Eurogamer article with a lot of details and a cinematic trailer for Baldur's Gate 3: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2019 ... urs-gate-3

    Been in development since 2017 and follows the events of BG1 and BG2. This is going to be a really high production value game and there are over 300 people working on it. No specific details about the gameplay, but they are using Divinity Original Sin as a base. It sounds like it just might be similar to Original Sin, but with D&D rules.

    Steam page is up. So how long until Epic puts out the cash to get this exclusive for a year?
     
    wireframed

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  • #35
    krimhorn said:
    Lestat said:
    As for hopes and dreams, I would really love if they were able to keep the style from the original. I don't expect a 2.5D engine to cut it these days, but the hand-painted background of the originals were beyond beautiful, with detail and character that would be very time-consuming and difficult to manage in full 3D. Still, a game that isn't gorgeous and immersive, is not a Baldur's Gate CRPG.
    Click to expand...
    2.5D-like does pretty well within the crowd that is the audience for this game. Though I don't expect Larian would roll a totally new engine for this instead of incrementing the Divinity Engine and adding a D&D rules implementation (if applicable).
    Click to expand...
    I expect it will be full 3D, but might use the same isometric view we know and love from the hey-days of CRPGs. I just don’t expect them to do 2 or 3D sprites on a 2D background (which is what I meant with “2,5D”). I do foresee issues hitting the same visuals in full 3D, they did with BGII. But if they really have 300 people on the project, it’s possible. :)

    L.
     
    Hound of Cullen

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  • #37
    Thorvard said:
    * There's too much of him. Fair enough, he has legions of fans so he's a money tree for RAS.
    Click to expand...

    That's my biggest issue. There is just *so much* Drizzt. The early stuff is still my favorite. I mean, even Elminster(unless I'm forgetting) doesn't have anywhere near the amount of books that Drizzt does.
    Click to expand...
    Drizzt is just Forgotten Realms Wolverine. :eng101:
     
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