Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General BG1 & BG2 worth it while waiting ?

I don't have any experience with running Baldur's Gate in the Neverwinter Nights 2 engine (maybe its fantastic, maybe its not) but I really do not think that it is necessary. Baldur's Gate certainly has a dated UI and dated graphics, but Neverwinter Nights 2 is hardly recent... and Baldur's Gate is very playable even if you skip the Enhanced Edition.

In any case, you will need to purchase Baldur's Gate (I assume) even if you play it in NWN 2, so why not fire it up in vanilla first to see how it goes?

You know the song from Queen "I want it all" ?

I thought you will get the good story from BG1/2 and the better graphics (it seems) from NWN2, with price of complexity. Anyway, I might end up following your advise - "vanilla". thanks

BG1/2 are the best RPGs ever made.

Of course they're old. Of course it's not the same beauty as standard modern games. Of course some mechanics are tedious.

But those games are the most legendary cRPG ever created. So yes, launch them and play.

BG3 probably won't have anything to do with them but as a gamer, it's always interresting to discover the best and to try to understand what makes those games so special.

Then you could explain to Larian because I guess they didn't understand

I would 100% play them if you have not before, they remain the benchmark for RPGs, top down or otherwise. I would go against what a previous posts said and deffo play the EEs (enhanced editions) if only because as a BG1-2 noob the graphical changes, UI and zoom in and out function, and ease of installation just make them a much more pleasant experience if you are used to modern games, and the standardization of the BG2 rules into BG1 without needing to faff around with mods is good for a beginner. Sure go ahead and play the original after, if you want to see how the game has changed so much but if you've never played before I would always say go EE - there are some bugs, but the original is full of bugs too, just different ones.

I would also start out with Baldurs Gate 1:
firstly, if you are not familiar with the system, starting out with BG2 at level 7 can be daunting if you want to play a caster class while starting out at lvl 1 in BG1 allows you to learn as you go, and going through from level 1 to level 40 through the whole saga is the ultimate noob to god story - nothing has ever really come close.

secondly, the story is best experienced all the way through, and BG1 often gets a bad rap when actually it is my favorite of the two with some of the best dungeons ever designed and a really tight plot while still allowing a huge amount of exploration and dungeon crawling.

thirdly, its just a great game, different to BG2 but not any worse imo.

In regard to mods, I 100% would play without mods - you get a lot more appreciation for both the game and the mods if you are familiar with the game without mods before you start installing a bunch of stuff you don't really understand about. If you only ever play with mods you will never know what is added by a mod and what is not. banter packs and the like are an aquired taste and vary in quality and imo you want to know what is "game" and what is "mod"


I also would not discount Siege of Dragonspear offhand, because:
1. it shows how the infinity engine can really be pushed on modern hardware
2. it looks beautiful, with these really stunning environments
3. it allows you to use all those toys you picked up in BG1 to fight some huge battles.
4. It has some pretty good AI, far better than BG1 or BG2 - the developers took some notes from a popular strategy-AI-difficulty mod (sword coast stratagems) to make some enjoyably challenging battles.
5. It has some of the very best dungeons in an IE game.

It's not that it doesn't have its issues but the good parts of it are really good imo. You don't ever have to play it again if you don't like it, but I don't think opinions on the internet should deprive you of the stuff it does at god tier (see above)


imo, just pick up the EEs and give them a go as is. Play the originals and/or install mods if you find that you like them.

As an addition if you like the dungeons and combat in SoD (As well as the more interesting creatures, and the better visuals) I would suggest picking up IWD (EE). SoD basically borrows a lot from that game and while it is more combat focussed, it does this -really- well and has even better dungeons in my opinion (And the best out of all infinity engine games)

To me, complaining about the graphics is like saying you can't get into older Final Fantasy or Mario games because of the pixel art, things don't start really looking dated to me until they started making things 3D. Like Popeye-Cloud Strife

Some old games are playable with old graphics, some are not (with a heavy dose of IMO of course). I still enjoy Might and Magic 4 through 7 even with the mid-90's graphics, but I find Daggerfall (which was "new" compared to MM7) to be basically unplayable now. Baldur's Gate is definitely on the playable end of that spectrum.

I’m not particularly beholden to nostalgia, lots of games I used to love are completely unplayable to me, but I find that BG, like many pixel games, has aged quite well. The Neverwinter Nights games have not. NWN2 has the unfortunate problem of having 3 different camera options which are all equally terrible. There might be some mods that fix it, but I would say for that alone these games can be ignored.

for all the issues with BG3, at least it doesn't have NWN2s sadistic camera

What some people are reportedly doing is taking their ancient BG & BG2 CD's and crushing them down into a fine pulp, putting them into a corn-cob pipe, and smoking them using an acetylene torch while waiting on Patch #4 for the BG3 EA!

I must strenuously advise against doing this, however--I mean, only if you are up for a lung transplant should you do this!

Instead...read a book, or watch a movie, or get a job and earn some dough while you're waiting! Beats a lung transplant any day, imo.

just make sure to not get the beamdog version

aahhh, I had quite a laugh reading you - thanks for that.

The Beamdog version is probably simpler to install and use. They do add a bit (a few new NPC's and a few new quests to go with those NPC's) but the basic experience is mostly the same. The only real sin is that they changed the opening movie in BG1. That's not really forgivable, but it is at least forgettable.

Don't watch Metropolis, it doesn't even have sound. Star Wars? Made in the 70s lol.

Not just the opening movie, they replace all of the original movies. This wouldn’t be so bad except that they replace them with poorly rendered static images that somehow look even worse than 90s CG.

This mod restores the originals.

https://www.moddb.com/games/baldurs-gate-enhanced-edition/addons/bgee-classic-movies

It's not just the art, it's also the UI.

BGEE is a bit like the Star Wars Special Editions of Baldur's Gate games. Instead of just fixing the game so it wouldn't crash, or just running BG1 using BG2's engine with UI/resolution updates with some QoL features, they also substantially changed a lot of the content and the art direction.

Fortunately its mostly additive and its pretty easy to pick out the 'Enhancements', though I agree the enhanced "movies" are pretty terrible and their enhanced portraits all blow. The portraits in particular just seem amateur, even by BG standards, and I can't help but wonder if I'd like the companions they added a bit more, if they'd just hired some better digital painters? Do yourself a favor and hunt down some portraits you like so you can sub them out. Even the original standard portraits of BG2 were rather disappointing, since they all look like Thomas Kinkade paintings with those garrish pink and gold pastels everywhere. But at least they had a consistent art style.

The first thing I did after installing BGEE was to download the old Icewind Dale portraits so I could use those for some of the BG NPCs instead. When the massive black studios peeps and justin sweet did the original icewind dale portraits they basically cribbed many of the 'character' ideas from BG1/2 for those. So there is an alt for pretty much every BG1/2 NPC in the standard IWD portraits. With Icewind Dale and its sequel they made an investment to hire some stronger concept artists to make the portraits there and it really shows.

Thankfully one of the coolest things about BG was that it made custom portraits, sound barks and ai scripts a thing. So there are a lot of them floating around after 2 decades, many much better than what came with the games initially or in the EE

Ps. I also liked Siege of Dragonspear and the Black Pits, but I kind of wish they'd kept their new stuff confined to those, or in seperate area maps for added content instead inserting it into the regular games in the familiar places. I liked Dorn (not so much the portrait, but he did fit a niche that was missing.) In BG2 the original game suffered from not having an Evil thief. I dont think we had any pure class or non kitted thiefs in BG2. Even Yoshimo was a bounty hunter. So I guess they added Hexxat, but she's pretty far from a pure class thief. They basically created a whole new thief kit just for her heheh.

But all in all, even with some enhancements I didnt dig, its still pretty solid and relatively cheap to pick up. A lot more conveniant than the old CDs or setting stuff up with TuTu/weidu. I still think the BG1 NPC project had a better slate of fan created content than BGEE provides. Its worth checking out I'd think if you like older games. I also agree that the 2d sprites of BG1/2 hold up a lot better than most early 3d rpg games hold up. Its a bit like the difference between watching 20th century traditional animation, stop motion, or analogue vfx vs early 21st century cgi. The former tend to hold up better and seem more timeless, whereas the latter tend to look immediately dated by the technology of the times.

Or again, to the initial analogy, like the difference between Return of the Jedi from 1983, vs Return of the Jedi Special Edition from 1997.

Yeah, that UI they introduced later was a bad move, should have stuck with the original. But it's not horrible.

I don't think the EE changed the content much at all -- you can actually edit the ini to eliminate the EE NPCS. One line for each. Some the like <npc_name exists=0>

There were EE characters I didn't like and I'm just not interested in evil paths but the engine improvements were are substantial. I couldn't imagine going to back to the original pathfinding.

The thing you have to remember is that there was dogpile effect after the game got review bombed for (shock, horror) having a character who changed gender. Somehow that ruined some people's childhoods. So there were review-bombs by people who clearly hadn't played the game and then other jumped on the abuse train. It's just fun to get your kicks in when someone is down . . .

Which is sad because some haters ranting at computer screen ruined people's careers.

Don't get me wrong, I have my critiques of the company -- indeed I've been banned from the EE forums -- but the engine really was improved and the hand painted backgrounds have aged much better than, say, NWN1. (god that game is ugly)

Personally, I really like the Wild Mage NPC but have no use for the vampire, monk or blackguard. The bear is kinda funny.

Get it. I think I saw it for something like 7 dollars a while ago.

For what it's worth, I still have BG 1 & 2 and their expansions installed, and periodically replay. Like them, Planescape:Torment is also (I think) a super good game, if you can get past the somewhat antiquated graphics.
My two cents worth, YMMV

Yeah that was lame how peeps piled on them. Beamdog really got the worst of it from people trying to be all hater about minor characterization stuff or like a single merchant in their Dragonspear intermission. I actually like the company and don't have any beef at all over their attempts at greater inclusion in the game. All the EE VO work was pretty decent. I did a playthrough with the new companions and it was fun. I was just irked by how they obviously cheaped out on their portrait art lol

Some of the minor UI stuff I liked, such as the floating loot toggle, so you could pick up treasure from the ground without having to click each pile. Or how they approached BG1 with the NPCs having the "meet me there later" option at party reform. Some other stuff not as much. But the convenience factor of the EE won out for me, even if I still have all the old CDs. The old style installs just take too long to set up, and I like how quickly everything loads in the EEs. The difference in load times between BG2EE and BG3 makes me feel like lightning quicksilver heheh. If only BG3 could load up so quickly