I would be disappointed if there aren’t also some great BG1/2 and general Forgotten Realms lore-related items, but then I’d expect those to be in the base game rather than something someone would need to buy a deluxe edition or join early access for.
This is my feeling exactly. If they reserved BG1/2 stuff for the deluxe edition, I'd find that to be kinda cheap and not great as a choice. That stuff should without question just be available in the base game as things you can find. Either as environmental storytelling alluding to the events of past games or as epic loot you get that's tied into the story. And as for wider D&D/Forgotten Realms stuff? I think that as a setting, there isn't as much iconic stuff that the wider audience will just immediately feel grabbed by. Stuff that's outside of the original BG games that is. The Forgotten Realms just doesn't seem like a setting that gets a lot of love and D:OS2 has the benefit of having been a relatively recent, very popular game. The fun of these sorts of easter egg items is that they're iconic, the audience is probably going to know where they're from. If most of the audience is just gonna go 'huh?' then that spoils the point, and I just don't think there's any forgotten realms stuff outside of the Baldur's Gate games that's going to be as well-known as D:OS2. Which in my mind is a failure on WotC's part.
As an aside, I recently got into Pathfinder 2e thanks to a humble bundle they've got going and that book did such a better job getting me invested in the setting than the 5e Player's Handbook. And there's so many books just about LORE, and 2e has only been out for a couple years. That's a big part of what hooked me in, the world lore that D&D 5e really seems to lack.
