Hi all, long-time Baldur's Gate fan here-- I played Baldur's Gate 1 when it first came out, and just finished my first playthrough of BG3's early access (after I happened to get a new PC a couple days before Patch 5 came out.)
I realize I'm probably a little too late to the party for my feedback to have any impact on Act 2 & 3, but I have some thoughts on "expansiveness" and how BG2 and the 2002 NWN remake fell short in that regard. Overall, I found Act 1 to be a success, but I think it leaves BG3 at a crossroads: where it could either fall victim to the "on rails" nature of so many video games today (especially MMOs) or really open up in Act 2 to being a game worthy of the legacy of BG1 and (yes) the 1991 Neverwinter Nights that helped usher in the internet era on AOL (a bit of a ridiculous claim there, I know).
I. Neverwinter Nights (1991 vs. 2002)
I'll admit that I have been a skeptic of most new video games for a long time now, so I'll start with the good. Most of the grievances other people have posted on this board aside, something that I found myself *deeply* (and pleasantly) surprised about was when I finally went back to clear Moonhaven (the Blighted Village) after negotiating with the goblins on my first pass through. Passing through the north gate, hearing the whooping and snoring of all the monsters nearby in the ruined village, I started getting flashes of how much it reminded me of the *original* Neverwinter Nights, which was an absolutely LEGENDARY experience for anyone who played it on AOL back in the early 1990's. (I missed it by a few months after my friend told me about it, and only got to experience it for the first time a few years ago as an emulator).
Essentially, the city of Neverwinter was a central hub for players to operate out of, with North, East and South gates that led to ruined sections of the city overrun by monsters. (A theme vamped on by DragonRealms, another AOL MUD which originally revolved around the Northwest and Northeast gates leading out of the Crossing toward monster territory, but I digress.) As you passed through these gates to explore the ruins of Neverwinter, you would get atmospherics in the form of text messages. ("Hmm. Strange slurping noises." "Just ahead. A tapping sound.") Further still, explore these ruined sections of Neverwinter and you will find secret passages into dungeons beneath the ruins and towns, which makes for yet another parallel to Moonhaven. I still can't figure out if the similarities between Moonhaven and NWN are intentional or (most likely) coincidental based on having the same source material, but more than anything else *this* is what made me feel like I was playing a true Baldur's Gate/Neverwinter Nights game again, and I think it's easy to overlook just how important smaller things like this are to the *experience* of the game. (Full disclosure: I got my master's degree in UX Design. Moving on...)
So this brings me to my first point related to my thesis on "expansiveness:" something that the original Neverwinter Nights got really, *really* right was that as you passed through the monster-ridden sections of Neverwinter, it eventually led you out toward the wilderness and the surrounding towns that make up the geography of Faerun. Go farther still through Neverwinter Wood, ("A sign by the road says: Traveling through Neverwinter Wood is dangerous, and only the mad even try.") and eventually you'll pop out in the towns that were only accessible through the gates that you didn't originally leave Neverwinter by, making the map into a gigantic circuit where you could get to just about anywhere from anywhere. This had an *enormous* effect on the "expansiveness" of the game, and is actually something that I think BG3 has gotten right so far (at least within Act 1).
The 2002 Neverwinter Nights, by comparison, restricts the areas that your character can access by act, making it feel more like a slog to get anywhere new. Want to leave the city of Neverwinter? Sorry, there's a derpy "plague" storyline, and you have to hack 'n' slash your way through a bunch of escaped prisoners who all make the same "blleeeaaaargghh" sound before you can go anywhere else. Eventually, as you get to Act 2, things kind of start to open up on the map, but by that point you can never go back to Neverwinter (the freakin' namesake of the game!) until the last 2 minutes of the game and the entire experience feels entirely on rails.
It's my hope that, despite BG3 being split up into Acts 1-3, we don't fall into that same trap here. I thought Act 1 did a good job of seamlessly transitioning through "areas" of the map with multiple pathways into and out of each one, and with the (as yet unopened) roads to the cursed lands it seems like we won't be railroaded into just going through one pathway once the full game is released. But this brings me to the second point of my thesis on "expansiveness" as it relates to BG1 vs. BG2.
II. Baldur's Gate vs. Baldur's Gate 2
Now I'm going to get controversial here: I have a deeply held conviction that Baldur's Gate 2 is an immensely flawed game in comparison to Baldur's Gate 1. Sure, they fixed some pathing issues in Baldur's Gate 2 that marred Baldur's Gate 1, I get that. Yes, there were "no dragons" in Baldur's Gate 1. But what happens when you escape Irenicus' prison and get your first, grand overarching quest for the Thieves' Guild? "Hi, go bring me 10,000 gold, byeeeeeee!!" And then what happens when you try to leave Athkatla for the first time? "Nope, you run into some rando who is poisoned, back to Athkatla with you!"
These things bely the fact that when you eventually *do* get to leave Athkatla, there is less of a world to explore than a half a dozen unrelated modules whose whole purpose seems mainly just to get you your 10,000 gold rather than advancing anything to do with a plot. None of the geography between Athkatla and d'Arnise Keep exists as areas you can walk through. Once you finish any of the modules outside Athkatla, they are essentially *over* and there is no reason to ever revisit them (unless, yes, you want to finally go slay that dragon you already talked to once). BG2, in my opinion, is ultimately only redeemed by the late-game excursion through the Underdark, but with the final reveal of Irenicus' plot being mostly a letdown (albeit MASTERFULLY performed by the great David Warner, of Time Bandits and Tron, throughout the game) having literally nothing to do with anything you ever did at any point in the early game, there is no way that I can be convinced of BG2 being a fully developed masterpiece in the same way BG1 was.
The original Baldur's Gate, by comparison, introduces you to the Friendly Arm Inn and Beregost early on in the game, and throughout the game you are opening up the unexplored areas of the map nearby. *This* is what I feel gave Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights their feeling of expansiveness-- they were essentially attempts at full simulations of their particular regions of Faerun, fully plotting both the cities of Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter *and* their surroundings-- wilderness, towns and all. And here is where I start to get a little bit worried about Act 2 and 3 of Baldur's Gate 3, but where it could also still go right and do justice to these old classics.
III. Baldur's Gate 3
I think the best way to get a sense of the directions Act 2 and 3 can go is by looking at the world map that only appears when you try to take the mountain pass route to Moonrise Towers. It was only here that I realized I had already been exploring the multiple "areas" that made up BG1/2 as icons on the map, and the transitions between them being seamless I find promising.
But will Act 2 just be another stepping stone of "completing" all of the "content" in the areas of the map outside the city of Baldur's Gate, with Act 3 taking place entirely within the city and its immediate surroundings? Will we never have any reason to revisit the areas of Act 1, and will they just be "dead" zones of expired content? Beregost continued to feel like a living city after you first passed through it on your way to Nashkel-- you were never expected to complete all its "content" before moving on to the next area. Rather, so many different things were happening in Beregost that you would continue to discover new hints about Ulcaster and High Hedge, Gullykin and Firewine, all throughout the rest of the game.
Worrisome to me is how the druid grove in BG3 is essentially *empty* after you prod the tiefling refugees along (a little bit of a tiresome plot point for me). And no matter which plot path you choose, the High Road tollbooth just becomes an empty building with a bunch of dead gnolls outside. Put simply, after you complete the content, the world dies as it stands in BG3, and I get the feeling that once we progress to Act 2, everything from Act 1 will essentially be retired content, thereby limiting the "expansiveness" of the game to whatever act you happen to be on.
This also puts a larger burden on Larian, I think-- no matter how much "content" you pack into every square meter of the game, if the world "dies" after you complete the content, in my opinion expansiveness dies with it.
At any rate, these are just my initial thoughts. I did enjoy my playthrough of early access, and the number of things that Larian *did* do right gives me hope that these are things you will be thinking about going forward. Cheers, and great work so far! Thanks for reading. (I know, it's a lot, sorry.)
