Originally Posted by Etruscan
I think you should look up the definition of toxic and reassess your judgement. It seems these days any criticism or anything negative is construed as ‘toxic’.

Conversely, one could easily besmirch those who praise every aspect of this game and Larian with the phrase ‘toxic positivity’.

Anyway, back to the thread. It’s no surprise to read these quotes from Swen. I have no doubt this will be a good game, perhaps a very good one but a worthy successor to its predecessors? Not a chance. It’s trying to be too many things to too many people and suffers for the lack of concise, coherent vision.

Yeah, I don't really talk much on these forums anymore because everything that needed to be argued has already been stated. It's actually been a whole year since we've had major debates on the absence of reactions most of all, and like nothing has really happened on that front besides an assurance from about half a year ago saying that they're supposedly working on it. Meanwhile the cinematic stuff has been a focus in every patch. I've pretty much increasingly distanced myself from the community, seeing the discourse around this game distilled into its present state along with the overall messaging seemingly being so unfocused and increasingly filled with buzzwords as is. I mean I already bought the EA and don't regret it as I know full well what I was getting into, but I'd highly discourage against a day 1 purchase with the pre-release Cyberpunk level vibes that I'm sensing from everything associated with this game now. And I'm not talking about bugs and stuff being unfinished on release (which DOS2's last act clearly was on release), I'm talking about deep fundamental flaws present in the actual gameplay that would take a definitive edition to address, if they are even acknowledged at all.

They've deliberately avoided implementing the classes highly reliant on a working reaction choice-based system so far, to the point where the last couple of classes implemented have been accurately predicted months ahead of time by some of the most pessimist people on these forums. One would think reactions are a high priority to work something out to test, but one also has to wonder if the reason for this isn't so much that they need time to figure something out, but... Because the coding base for this game can't actually handle reactions, and any possible solution is being delayed because development on the actual gameplay is seemingly taking a complete back seat to this cinematic focus. A mod on these forums gave me shit a year ago for insinuating such a thing about the engine, but again, it has been a year since then and we've barely had whispers on something that's clearly a major issue for a lot of people following this game.

I don't even have a horse in the whole 'not like BG1 or BG2' race as I haven't played either game. But in the game's current direction, I'm sure it'll make for a wonderful first playthrough. But it wouldn't be something I'd bother replaying, as I discovered during each attempt to replay the EA and found that the moment to moment gameplay was... Off and feeling like an absolute slog as a consequence, somehow. The combat is heavily focused on offense since a lot of the defensive tools present in 5E such as reactions aren't in the game, and may not even be implemented at all. On the other side of the spectrum, it lacks the environmental reactivity and build variety that DOS2 had. In the months leading up to DOS2's release, you had people swearing up and down that it was the ultimate proof that turn-based combat still had a place in the gaming industry, and it would herald the beginning of that combat style being embraced by the industry once more, which it arguably did. BG3? A blip on the radar in an industry dominated by other studios far more experienced with story and cinematics. The camp that values gameplay over story/writing seems rather tepid about this game, but the story-craving camp (or well, the camp that likes this style of writing and cinematic focus) seems to be loving this.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that hedging the majority of effort into the writing and cinematics at the expense of the moment to moment gameplay is a BAD long term idea. We've seen plenty of examples of other games that had done exactly this and failed. They still sold a lot due to hype culture, but no one heralds them as masterpieces. Coincidentally, all of them are plagued by stories coming out years later of troubled development that broke the development studios in some way.

Maybe the sooner we accept that the game is meant to be this way and move on, the better off we'll all be for it. A dozen forumers arguing in circles holds little sway in development, compared to the tide of people that will judge the game upon full release. Only then will we see if we were more than people making delusional rants. Not that anyone who thought we were only here to be mean to Larian would admit to that.

Last edited by Saito Hikari; 26/03/22 11:15 AM.