Agreed, it does look great. Perhaps a little too sunny though?
There were also some lovely instances in-game, I forget what exactly but I know they happened! Probably finding little unexpected things, stuff like that.
It makes me sad that currently there is little else I can praise about the game from a personal point of view.
I agree with you OP. To be honest, I think that Larian is trying to attract new players to the genre, such as your friend, and not to please the old ones.
I've seen posts here that say, "I wish they'd spent this money on mechanics, not cinematic inserts" like if BG3 looked like a normal traditional CRPG u know.
I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but then they wouldn't be able to attract new people.
And you are absolutely right when you say that 'cRPGs were largely a niche genre'. I think Larian is trying to change that.
It's always good to bring in new players, that is a given, but if all it takes to attract them is fancy cinematics then I can only assume that they will, for the most part, have their head turned by the next pretty thing that comes along (obviously there will be exceptions here, such as Saito's friend, who has clearly fallen for the lore, etc.).
It just feels like a fine line between trying too hard to attract a wider audience and neglecting what created a game people are playing 20 years later. Cinematics can be great but alone a great game they do not make.
I don't think cRPGs have been a niche genre for many, many years now so there's no need for Larian to try and reinvent the wheel.
