Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Setting a darker tone

you are insulting my intelligence by insinuating that Baldurs Gate 1 and 2 were by any metri "Darker", let alone had "Horror graphics"

I literaly posted a picture of sunny beaches in BG1 so how does it not belong?
is the beginning of baldurs gate 2 the only part of baldurs gate thats actually baldurs gate?

youre not giving good hard critical advice, youre making stuff up.
how about you give a hard critical look to your own rose tinted glasses for once.


Theres a lot of very bright screenshots in this very thread and also some very dark ones from BG3, at this point you are continue lying in the face of beeing caught, you realy think this is making your criticsm more valid?
Or making the devs consider it more? Or do you think that this just makes you look spitefull?

Please keep the discussion focussed on content, speculation or whatever, not on other forum members' supposed motivation. Thank you.

The forgotten realms clearly have locations that are not all doom and gloom (i.e. sunny beaches).

BG3 will clearly have locations in many varieties, just based on what they showed on the livestream, their was a beach, a foresty hill side, a crashed alien ship, ruins, low lit dungeons, crypts etc.

I really don't get the concept of baldurs gate 3 not being 'dark' enough or not as dark as a baldurs gate game should be.

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I agree with the movement cursor and pathing indicator needing a facelift.

I agree with everything.
+ Spellcasting Sounds/latin chanting

Instead of making things simply darker for the sake of it (this is 100 years after the original two games), I would prefer a variety in tone. There should be some locations on the outskirts of civilization that are brighter and pretty with wildlife and local flora, but some locations should be gritty and dark and depressing.

I disagree with removing paths for attacks or spells as this is a standard quality of life feature that should honestly be present in any isometric style game.

Spells should feel different though and there should be more of a separation between characters and classes. Death animations would be a positive, especially if there is feedback in it (a fire spell burning a corpse, while sword slashing bodies).

Weapons should have different feels as well. A two-handed sword/axe should cleave enemies on death and it should sound meaty, while daggers obviously shouldn't. There needs to be impact though. This isn't necessary to make it "darker or more BG", but because it adds something to combat.

Combos should stay as well since it also adds tactics and something to gameplay. It also makes a bit of sense. Someone covered in gasoline will logically go up in an instant compared to someone who isn't, while someone being shocked while covered in water will take more damage than someone who isn't (look at electric chairs).

There is a difference between sunny beaches looking goofy cartoony, and just having a beautiful beach setting.

Larian does not know how to create a nice looking setting, everything has to be cartoony and over the top.

Just look at the number of colors in screen in BG3 demo - open areas. There are literary at least +20 colors on the screen the whole time, with high contrasts.

Original BG was much more toned down in its color palete.

Baldurs gate... Sucked....GET OUT... Just go. Lol



And yet you could still choose how you reacted to it. You were not pigeon holed into evil. Larian studios games have always had crap stories. If you think otherwise... honestly id feel bad for you and whatever happened to you in child hood. Did your parents read you the tabloids at night as your only experience to story telling? Dos had viruallyy no story at all, dos2 was pretty much the same game with identical stories for each origin with different paint. Baldurs gate story was.. epic.. dangerous, and you were wrapped up in it regardless of who you were as a person... And it was up to you to deal with it as best you could.

I dunno what beaches look like where you're from, but on the East coast they can be quite vibrant with contrasting colors.

As to BG having a toned down color palate or even just being darker in general: That's because it's a product of the time and engine it was released. You're talking about a game released in 1998 (the same time as Fallout 1 and 2).

I don't mind the game being dark and gritty in some portions, in fact, in battle torn areas it should be, but the game shouldn't be held back by engine and technological limitations of the 1990s. Is there some in universe, lore reason as to why the games were dark? If not, then there's literally nothing stopping the scenery from looking different.

Wouldn't it be dark tinted glasses? ...I guess that means sunglasses.

OKAY, DON'T BEAT ME.

Jokes aside, there is no darkness without light. There is no horror without wonder. All gloom for the sake of it has no meaning, and no emotional impact if it does not have a counterpart to create contrast.

Actually, in forums 'fanboy' almost always means 'likes something I don't like'.


Riverbanks, actually.

In my opinion Forgotten Realms has never been a very dark medieval setting apart from specific places. It had loads of very exotic places, races, events all over the place. Also the general high fantasy setting does not fit to a more gritty or realistic medieval setting.

If you want a more gritty medieval setting with central and eastern European influences only Ravenloft really works for D&D and else you only get it outside of D&D.

I think peoples mainly get the impression from the more pastel colors out of the graphic style used in the old engine. I am playing RPGs and niche games plus P&P for 30 years and would not have a problem if modern fantasy would still be 1980s Sword and Sorcery and have aesthetics like the Conan Movie or D&D source books back then. Its just not realistic to expect that and new stuff still can be good. I have seen the same complaints happen about 3D graphics for decades that it looks too vibrant and comic like.

Not every game can be Kingdome Come: Deliverance. Also its honestly more fitting for Forgotten Realms to not look like Ravenloft. And hopefully we get some graphics options or modding/post filters from peoples who really need a darker palette you can use external tools for that.

So should the combat effects be MORE meaty and effective or LESS now?
See my point with you not knowing what you want?


TWENTY COLOUR SON SCREEN holy shit have you ever heard somethign so absurd TWENTY WHOLE COLOURINOS NOOOO LARIAAAAN!



THE HORROR!

How many colours are that! Qucik! better count them

Holly Moly Sordak, please stop.. XD I cry of laughter every time u post a comment.. XD

I dont have issues with BG3 for me all is OKish for the most part so if they want dark let them but form what Im seeing on the forums I have the impression that they want IDK like 70%/30% ratio dark as in something like this scene all the time, grey, bloody, the feel of hopelessness.. https://imgur.com/a/XZMJfAH
also for them probably Dos2 humor is traumatic experience so that also has to go to support the "seriousness" of the scenery also they probably want dismemberment to add to that.. what else.. IDK u get the gist.. My opinion on that is that it will probably not happen coz Larian or WOTC stated that they want to introduce d&d to younger pips right? So it will be somewhat familly friendly without Mortal combat gore..

Now my only issues are lack of punch in the hits, jumping and pushing animation seems silly but that can be improved so Im good overall..

Nice that you increased the contrast/color, that it fits to your argument. That's not how BG looks like

Beaches are stupid and goofy:

Its a duverse setting, with adult elements in plenty, but as a whole, thr Forgotten Realms is a hopeful uobeat place for a world that keeps gettimg hit by aovolypes and then repaired.

Sorry but this is a laughable comment.

Have you hear of a game called Bloodborne or Dark Souls maybe?

Those games are BRAND NEW and yet are not colored, and yet do not look like a fun park for little kids to play in.

What Larian is doing is just copy/pasting its DOS style to BG3. I think its a huge mistake and all BG fans who played DOS will notice this right away.

Well the game in the making is not called Forgotten Realms.

The game is called Baldurs Gate 3.

Baldurs Gate 1 and 2 were dark as hell.

Yes, they had some forests in them but those forests were made to look as realistic as was possible at the time.

What Larian is doing is like a new dev studio taking a game like Bloodborne (brutally dark game) and making it look like Zelda.

You think real Bloodborne fans that actually played that game a long time would like something like that?

Forgotten Realms is High Fantasy, not Dark or Grimdark. There are places magical and whimsical (Fey Wild, Suldanessellar). There are places dark and creepy (graves, crypts, the City of Baldur's Gate, the Shadowfell). There are places that are hellish and cruel (Avernus, the Underdark, the Abyss).

What I'm saying is, there is so much variety in this setting. Having a colorful beach or forest is only one slice of the world at large.

There is nothing about this screen that is goofy or cartoony.

They were trying to make the forest look as real as possible, and the monsters looked scary for graphics in 98-00.

But, if you are showing this, why don't you show to people how the Underdark looked, how Amn looked, how the dungeons looked?

I mean, in SoA, you meet a companion (Viconia) that was about to be burned at the stake alive for being Drow. You could have let her burn or save her.

Your really think Larian will give you those kind of brutal choices in this game?