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Originally Posted by Madscientist
BG1+2: Those games had several dark places, but also many places that were not so dark.
Many characters were completely over the top cartoony crazy: Minsc talks with his hamster, Jan Jansen talks nonsense all the time, Xzar and Montaron are paranoid psycho killers, Xan is whining all the time, and so on.
Most of these characters are so memorable because they are nuts.

Lots look at Larian:
In D:OS1 your main quest is to investigate a cult that sacrifices people to bring the end of the world. There are several areas with piles of corpses and blood all over the place.
In D:OS2 you start in a prison were they turn prisoners to mindless zombies. Later you come to many places that are destroyed, overrun by void monsters or demons or different groups of people are busy killing each other. Your ability to talk with ghosts is useful because there are so many corpses, even if you do not kill them yourself.
Sure, both games had also some over the top funny things.
The Preview of BG3 showed a soldier being turned into a tentacle monster and the intro movie shows the destruction of a town and people being kidnapped and infected with a parasite by such a tentacle beast. very funny and cartoony, right?

my opinion: BG1+2 and and D:OS 1+2 are actually quite similar. both have some dark places, some not so dark places and some over the top crazy characters.
I think the main difference is, that BG1+2 had painted 2D backgrounds while BG3 has a detailed 3D graphic where you can look at everything from all directions and move every object.It makes a difference if you walk through a idealized picture of a place or if you walk through such a place looking from the perspective of your character.

PS:
I think PoE1 was too dark for me. In the first town the main attraction is a tree full of corpses, the main topic are children without soul, and there are several cults who sacrifice people, while the game had almost no funny stuff except some comments from Eder and Kana.
The game is good, but sometimes it felt almost depressive.

I think a game needs both dark and funny things. This is an RPG, not a splatter horror survival game.


Another good post MadScientist you and I think alike! +1 to everything you said.

One other thing I wonder about is why the use of Lighting (Torches, Lamps, Light Spells etc...) gets completely ignored in video games. Some of the fun I think is exploring a dark dungeon and having to manage\use your light sources like a torch where you can only see about 30 feet in front of you and if you have to fight holding it you cannot hold a shield. Maybe video games have more casuals who just feel thats more a pain than it is worth? I have found mods in the games like Oblivion and Skyrim to make dungeons darker where light sources are a must. I know this isn't what the thread meant by darker tone:)

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Originally Posted by Saxon1974
One other thing I wonder about is why the use of Lighting (Torches, Lamps, Light Spells etc...) gets completely ignored in video games. Some of the fun I think is exploring a dark dungeon and having to manage\use your light sources like a torch where you can only see about 30 feet in front of you and if you have to fight holding it you cannot hold a shield. Maybe video games have more casuals who just feel thats more a pain than it is worth? I have found mods in the games like Oblivion and Skyrim to make dungeons darker where light sources are a must. I know this isn't what the thread meant by darker tone:)


Man, I could not agree more. I just don't get it ... at all .. ever.

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Thats a great idea.

I never used the light spell or a torch in any DnD computer game.

The Witcher 1 had some very dark areas where you had to drink a potion of darkvision to find the way.

It would be very nice and immersive if the darkvision feat would finally have any meaning.
So with darkvision everything looks black and white while characters without it and without some other light source would always have disadvantage with their action while enemies have advantage over them. You will likely be surprized by enemies or traps in the darkness.
Maybe some creatures flee from your torch while others are attracted by it.

I liked the thief games: stay in the darkness, avoid sounds, knock out enemies from behind and hide their bodies.


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Originally Posted by Emrikol
Originally Posted by Saxon1974
One other thing I wonder about is why the use of Lighting (Torches, Lamps, Light Spells etc...) gets completely ignored in video games. Some of the fun I think is exploring a dark dungeon and having to manage\use your light sources like a torch where you can only see about 30 feet in front of you and if you have to fight holding it you cannot hold a shield. Maybe video games have more casuals who just feel thats more a pain than it is worth? I have found mods in the games like Oblivion and Skyrim to make dungeons darker where light sources are a must. I know this isn't what the thread meant by darker tone:)


Man, I could not agree more. I just don't get it ... at all .. ever.



Hey I started asking for dynamic lighting since DOS days!

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Are you really demanding a game made in the year 2020 look like a game made in 2000?

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Solasta is a game in the works that has the right idea on lighting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aUMt5xemeI

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Agreed by me.
When I saw the presentation, that was my first point.
And I wrote to Larian almost immediately on FB and twitter :)

The game needs to have some kind of filter or something applied, so it could distinguish itself graphically from DoS.
I'm OK with sunny beach .. if it fits the area.
Also please, less "shinny" armors. Especially it it is leather armor and is shinny because of.. .. ???

Also I agree on "Larian humor".
Throwing a shoe is funny, but only once... the first time.
It'a good if you have some jokes from time to time, but please, not non stop.
For me, this is killing fantasy.
I finished DoS2 only once (took 120h), yesterday I've reinstalled and deleted after 2h. The narrator is killing it for me.
I also reinstalled BG2 .. and the feeling, the voices, the environment, the settings. It's completely different.
Torture rooms, hookers, drunks, slavery, powerty.
As mentioned somewhere in the discussions BG is based on medieval setting. I would expect same from BG3.

I agree here with a note, that this was only a demo.

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>torture rooms, drunks, slavery, poverty
see, this is what gets me with posts like yours.
literaly all of these things happen, and played compleltey straight, within the first minutes of fort joy.

If you realy have 120 hours, how di doyu even miss that

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I have already said it in another thread, but I have to stress it again: I have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA where this delusional claim that Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 were part of some grimdark fantasy setting is even coming from.
They absolutely weren't. Not in visual style, nor in narrative tone.

The Forgotten Realms have always been basically your run-on-the-mill Saturday Morning generic high fantasy setting.
This is isn't even meant as a criticism as much as a matter of fact.
And the two games were FILLED with bright and colorful graphics, silly humor, some endearing but amateurish writing and cartoony voice performances.

We definitely aren't talking Warhammer here. Hell, it didn't even come close to Planescape: Torment, either.

It's frankly annoying when people try to bend reality to fit their narrative just to have another excuse to bitch.

Last edited by Tuco; 06/03/20 04:53 PM.

Party control in Baldur's Gate 3 is a complete mess that begs to be addressed. SAY NO TO THE TOILET CHAIN
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Originally Posted by Tuco
I have already said it in another thread, but I have to stress it again: I have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA where this delusional claim that Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 were part of some grimdark fantasy setting is even coming from.
They absolutely weren't. Not in visual style, nor in narrative tone.

The Forgotten Realms have always been basically your run-on-the-mill Saturday Morning generic high fantasy setting.
This is isn't even meant as a criticism as much as a matter of fact.
And the two games were FILLED with bright and colorful graphics, silly humor, some endearing but amateurish writing and cartoony voice performances.

We definitely aren't talking Warhammer here. Hell, it didn't even come close to Planescape: Torment, either.

It's frankly annoying when people try to bend reality to fit their narrative just to have another excuse to bitch.


Well, if you read the new community update post you will see that even Larian has admitted that BG1 and 2 were much darker then many remember.

I just hope they now understand what they have been doing wrong via visuals.

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Originally Posted by Tuco
I have already said it in another thread, but I have to stress it again: I have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA where this delusional claim that Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 were part of some grimdark fantasy setting is even coming from.
They absolutely weren't. Not in visual style, nor in narrative tone.

The Forgotten Realms have always been basically your run-on-the-mill Saturday Morning generic high fantasy setting.
This is isn't even meant as a criticism as much as a matter of fact.
And the two games were FILLED with bright and colorful graphics, silly humor, some endearing but amateurish writing and cartoony voice performances.

We definitely aren't talking Warhammer here. Hell, it didn't even come close to Planescape: Torment, either.

It's frankly annoying when people try to bend reality to fit their narrative just to have another excuse to bitch.



Such nonsense. The BG2 beginning is already super dark. BG had his own style. Sure it's not always super dark, but it's dirty and everywhere can be some maniacs or psychopaths and there are Cleary some really dark parts like the beginning.

"release master, I no longer wish to come back"

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literaly the same is in OS2, i sOS2 now grimdark and mature?

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Actually DOS II was really Dark and gruesome.
The torture Chamber of Kniles, Shriekers, Mordus Have,
telling Kids in Driftwood their Friend who was looking for
his Mom got eaten by a Shark, any dialogue with Ghosts,
the slaughter in this Village in act 2 where you fight that
White Magister, the Graveyard of that elf Dude..i could go
on and on.
Stating its just Comic and goofy is a made up point, to exagurate
your disappointmend.

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Originally Posted by Maldurin
Actually DOS II was really Dark and gruesome.
The torture Chamber of Kniles, Shriekers, Mordus Have,
telling Kids in Driftwood their Friend who was looking for
his Mom got eaten by a Shark, any dialogue with Ghosts,
the slaughter in this Village in act 2 where you fight that
White Magister, the Graveyard of that elf Dude..i could go
on and on.
Stating its just Comic and goofy is a made up point, to exagurate
your disappointmend.


Don't forget Roost Anlon the child abuser. Giving the spirits of those kids peace was really harrowing.

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Originally Posted by ThreeL

Such nonsense. The BG2 beginning is already super dark. BG had his own style. Sure it's not always super dark, but it's dirty and everywhere can be some maniacs or psychopaths and there are Cleary some really dark parts like the beginning.

"release master, I no longer wish to come back"

Bullshit.
Just because it starts in a dungeon and you throw in the words "torture" and "trauma" it doesn't give a particularly dark tone to the entire adventure.
If that was the case Divinity Original Sin 2 would already be orders of magnitude darker than BG2 ever was.


Party control in Baldur's Gate 3 is a complete mess that begs to be addressed. SAY NO TO THE TOILET CHAIN
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Yeah, both Baldur's Gates were pulpy fantasy, not really dark or mature. They were just pretty well written for being computer games. PS:T and Fallout 1 were the really dark games of that era.

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Originally Posted by Tuco
Originally Posted by ThreeL

Such nonsense. The BG2 beginning is already super dark. BG had his own style. Sure it's not always super dark, but it's dirty and everywhere can be some maniacs or psychopaths and there are Cleary some really dark parts like the beginning.

"release master, I no longer wish to come back"

Bullshit.
Just because it starts in a dungeon and you throw in the words "torture" and "trauma" it doesn't give a particularly dark tone to the entire adventure.
If that was the case Divinity Original Sin 2 would already be orders of magnitude darker than BG2 ever was.


I think "serious and coherent" are more appropriate than "dark" IMO.

There is a huge difference between a world with shimmering colors, with the joker narrator but talking about "serious" topics and a medieval/historical world talking sometimes with a funny ton.

Talking about "dark theme like rape and murder" has no impact if a talking dog, a faerie forest with magic explosive pumpkins and a witch with colorful hat and shinny design are near...

Baldur is a serious medieval world with instants of joke, DOS is a comic world with sometimes "serious topics" but Fort Joy looks more like a regular summer camp than a concentration camp.

The ambiance and artistic style are basic, that’s exactly what we’re talking about here. The "funny" throwing of shoe is unfortunately revealing of the tone, moreover I think a day/night cycle is a less waste of ressources...

Last edited by DaKatarn; 07/03/20 09:55 PM.

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Originally Posted by Tuco
Originally Posted by ThreeL

Such nonsense. The BG2 beginning is already super dark. BG had his own style. Sure it's not always super dark, but it's dirty and everywhere can be some maniacs or psychopaths and there are Cleary some really dark parts like the beginning.

"release master, I no longer wish to come back"

Bullshit.
Just because it starts in a dungeon and you throw in the words "torture" and "trauma" it doesn't give a particularly dark tone to the entire adventure.
If that was the case Divinity Original Sin 2 would already be orders of magnitude darker than BG2 ever was.


There are multiple factors here, at least for me. Yes you are right, Forgotten Realms has areas of high Fantasy, a dash of rennaisance and highbrow cosplay, lol. But what BG1 & 2 definitely had were, for the time, quite grown up concepts and stories and themes running through them. for a PC RPG. By today's standards less so, but back then it was like what we get with Witcher now. It was more mature than most RPG's of the time, at least so far as I remember. It wasn't Diablo dark, it was more varied in tone, with humour, colour and darkness.

Then there is the fact that the still old graphics and story fuelled the imagination. Of course D&D has always been cleaner than a Game of Thrones style setting, but I at least back then imagined it leaning towards that muddiness and grit, even if it didn't really. I often took Greyhawk as a setting when doing ADD back in the day and i always made it a little grittier, but that was because I wrote my own campaigns. Still, by todays standards it would still be considered high fantasy because I was at the time still heavily influenced by LOTR and LOTR is very clean, by modern fantasy standards, even the films (and they were more "realistic" visually than the books suggested).

So I don't think anyone is saying BG3 should be what Diablo 1 was back in the day by any stretch, or even the new GoT, but you can give it a dark feeling without losing the artisitc style unique to D&D. You can make the story rich and complex, with subtleties and adult enough so that you don't feel as though you're playing D&D the movie.

But no, Grimdark BG was not. Not to say I would be against as much horror (or horrible things)as the rating allows, in the areas where it makes sense. I.e. Tadpoles in eyes is a good thing (only there was a distinct lack of screaming in that trailer :-S )

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Yeah keep falling back and moving the goalposts, thats what i would expect.
No.
Baldurs gate is set in forgotten realms which is a HIGH fantasy world with magic everywhere and SOME dark moments where the writers wanted to make a point.
No matter of explaining anything of it away will change the fact.

>complaining abuot throwing the shoe
you absolute genius.
you can throw literaly anything in dnd, throwing struff isnt a story implication its something you can do. Its something profoundly stupid too, why would you throw boots at an enemy when you can throw a knife.
You CAN do silly things, and then they dont work. Just like in real life.

Get over yourself you posers. This virtue signaling about the supposed dark and gritty nature of a series known for a guy who talks to his hamster and fucking smurf coloured elves is starting to become unintentionally comical.

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Originally Posted by Sordak
Yeah keep falling back and moving the goalposts, thats what i would expect.
No.
Baldurs gate is set in forgotten realms which is a HIGH fantasy world with magic everywhere and SOME dark moments where the writers wanted to make a point.
No matter of explaining anything of it away will change the fact.

>complaining abuot throwing the shoe
you absolute genius.
you can throw literaly anything in dnd, throwing struff isnt a story implication its something you can do. Its something profoundly stupid too, why would you throw boots at an enemy when you can throw a knife.
You CAN do silly things, and then they dont work. Just like in real life.

Get over yourself you posers. This virtue signaling about the supposed dark and gritty nature of a series known for a guy who talks to his hamster and fucking smurf coloured elves is starting to become unintentionally comical.

Uh... was that aimed at my post? Because if so, I am not sure you understood what I meant. Plus as we are discussing tone, you might want to curb yours a fraction, whomever it was aimed at.

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