Originally Posted by WarBaby2
Originally Posted by Emulate
Again saying this blasphomy of a game plays like Divinity is insulting divinity, this is nothing like divinity games unfortunately.


True, it isn't, but it also doesn't play like a D&D/Baldur's Gate game, which always have been a much more grounded, classical fantasy experience... and many, many, many people coming into this project will expect that from it.

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If people want this game to feel like BG and/or BGII they are being unreasonable, and slightly irrational based on the facts below.

First the system, AD&D, that BG I & II used as their template is multiple iterations in the past.

The owner of the IP has changed hands twice since then TSR > WotC > Hasbro (Through buying WotC)

The studios that made the two games don't exist anymore - one literally doesn't exist (Black Isle) and the other doesn't have a single staff member left that made these two games (Bioware) if i have my facts correct at least not people in the top design positions of the company.

The publisher who published the games doesn't exist anymore.

So the rules don't exist anymore, the developers don't exist and the publisher doesn't exist and the original license owner doesn't exist anymore. What RATIONAL view of the facts would make anyone REASONABLY think they would get a BG III that played like the originals?

This ignores the huge technology leaps in the past 20 years and the major changes in quality of life improvements that often change how a game "feels" to play because things have improved by so much. To say nothing of cognitive biases that screw up our memories of how games actually played from that many years ago. You see this most starkly when people complain about humour in a BG III game because that isn't how I and II approached things. Yet time and time again people can point to very numerous and specific instances where humour was part and parcel to the BG experience. When this is pointed out people time and time again make excuses and try to rationalize their point. The fact is their memory is flawed and they are not "wrong" that BG feels more like a dark RPG because that is what they remember. Yet for other people they are not wrong when they say the entire series was chalked full of humourous situations. The fact is people take different things from the games so no sequel 20 years later is going to hit the right notes because people remember different notes.

If your expectations that BG III should or would play like BG I & II, then your expectations need to be adjusted. Too much time has passed, the rule set used to make BG III is multiple version removed from the original games. The publisher, developers and license owner have all disappeared for the first games and the new license owner has ZERO desire to make a BG I & II style game mechanically. This is why both Obsidian and inXile entertainment have both tried and failed to get the license for BG III for over a decade.* Hasbro's WotC wouldn't give it to them for a REASON. yet would give to Larian. Why? Think about that for a bit.

This game does NOT play like DOS or DOS II, the entire combat system is different. The game is far more similar to 5e that you give it credit for and yet plays very different from most of the D&D games in the past because most previous D&D computer games are not based on 5e rules. So again is it reasonable to expect a game based on 5e to play like a game based on 2e rules or 3e rules? I don't think so.

Now I am not going to attack the OP on their choice to refund the game or people's opinion that they don't like the game, because entertainment (all entertainment) is subjective. So liking or disliking entertainment is neither right nor wrong, it simple just is. I simply feel people's expectation for this game are wildly unreasonable given the amount of time that has past, that ALL the principle players involved have change, most of which no longer exist, and the very core IP this game is based on have gone through 4 iterations from AD&D (3.0, 3.5, 4e & 5e). The original games are simple just too far removed to use them as a..., again, reasonable benchmark to anchor current expectations for BG III.

I personally feel the only reasonable comparisons/expectations are along narrative lines, but only broadly speaking. BG I & II told a specific story that had a beginning, middle, and end. So my expectations for BG III narratively are is is dark, is it humourous, does it have meaningful relationships with companions and does the setting tie into the first games? Their seems to be all three narrative elements there and the setting is the same. so... To be clear this doesn't mean if it has all the above elements that makes the game good, or that the only reasonable position is you like the game. There are many "faithful" sequels to games and other forms of entertainment i think are crap.

TL;DR;
It is reasonable to dislike or like the game, it is unreasonable to expect BG III to play and feel like BG I & II, especially mechanically.


*[source] https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/0...t-the-rights-to-baldurs-gate-3-a-e3-2019