Yep, old games look better on older equipment. I have heard about how emulator stuff these days try to replicate those CRT effects, and for good reason. You see all the jaggies if you run it on modern equipment instead of the equipment it was designed to work with. (as the above comparison shows)
Anyways, yeah. Larian has a couple of plates spinning here at the same time. By their own admission they are chasing the name recognition and nostalgia that the association the original saga evokes, but that's from an era of the Forgotten Realms that neither 5e nor Larian, really seems to want to....if they even can....bring back (and WOTC seems to actively shun). Same with the gameplay. the Pathfinder games are much closer in style and prove that there's still life in the modern world for old-style isometric crpgs, but Larian very clearly wants to make DOS3, which admittedly they are doing an amazing job at. I love the DOS series but that's not necessarily the same thing I'm looking for in the Forgotten Realms, or indeed-in Baldur's Gate. How much of that translates into something I'll enjoy remains to be seen, but it does feel a lot like 'square pegd, round hole'.
The development hasn't been without hurdles either-and while this is true of the Original Saga too (the end of SoA and basically the entirety of ToB feel very rushed, railroady and generally unfinished IMO), there is a *lot* of jank in EA, weird little choices, odd narrative paths and design quirks. I honestly do not know how the game is going to turn out at this point.
