Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Suggestions & Feedback Disappointed in Larian

In any case, it does feel like the upper city should be part of the game and like certain quests would be better suited taking place there. I don't understand why so much of the 3rd act feels unfinished and poorly structured unless it was rushed. I think the reason, beyond Larian saying it themselves, that people believe the upper city and some quests were cut down and changed last minute is because it feels that way when you play it. It shouldn't be so easy for people to believe that important quests and areas were cut from the game because of how the act is structured. To me that is a significant failing on the game's part and a game like this deserves better.

Swen has said that the game's story has "a beginning, middle, and an end" so they've done their job, and while I have tremendous respect and admiration for him as a game developer, I think that is a very low bar. Every story has a beginning, middle, and an end. That doesn't mean every part of that story is good, or doesn't need work to be as good as it could be. And it's really a shame that the most built up to and anticipated part of the game is the one that has the most shortcomings. But again, I don't really see the point of getting into specifics if they're set on never rectifying it in a way that would truly make a difference.

I think what makes it so disappointing is that it seems to be driven by an eagerness to be done with BG3 so they can move onto new projects, and so they're willing to leave the game in a state that is "good enough." This isn't uncommon with media, Game of Thrones being the most egregious case that comes to mind.

Yeah the way Larian is treating the situation really just makes it feel like they stopped actually liking bg3 quite a while ago because of the limitations they had placed on them by it being an external IP. It seems like they have the most enjoyment in the development process when they can just do whatever they want and make a game that is fully theirs in terms of both story and mechanics. If we had gotten DOS 3 released instead of BG3, and it had all the problems this game does, we would absolutely be seeing an enhanced edition in the near future that addressed the community’s issues. It seems that Larian just felt way too constrained by the universe and gameplay of dungeons and dragons that they got sick of it and are now just rolling away from the game and leaving it in a state that’s “good enough” because the universal acclaim and awards has opened the floodgates for them in terms of creativity they can put towards their fully original IP. I completely understand why that makes sense from their POV as game developers, but from the POV of a consumer it feels terrible to have the game’s lifespan end in such a sour way just because it wasn’t the developers’ favorite project (even though it’s abundantly clear that BG3 is by and large the favorite larian project by the fanbase, so absolutely nobody would complain as a consumer if they kept updating this game instead of working on something else)

Arguments over cut content aside it does seem clear Act 3 was rushed. In any event Larian is at least improving in regards to “Act 3ing” because BG3’s final act was far superior to DOS2 lol.

Maybe their next release will see a more balanced approach?

That is categorically not true.

People will complain about EVERYTHING. No matter what you do, SOMEONE will complain.

Personally, I would be annoyed if Larian kept on updating BG3 instead of making a new game... Mostly because I much prefer DOS2 over BG3 (With the exception being combat - DOS2's armour system was horrendous and the AP point system was annoyingly restrictive). But also because I hate the use of DnD while diverging so much from the actual DnD ruleset (If I'm playing a DnD game, I want to play a DnD game...)

To me, it'd feel terrible for them to waste time trying to put lipstick on the pig that is BG3, where they're constantly fighting against the DnD ruleset and setting (And fixing the story would require massive rewrites...), when they instead could be working on something that jives with their style and desires (Be it Divinity or a new IP I'm not too concerned, so long as it's something they have full control over).

Well… BG3 did launch in a better state than D:OS2 did. Larian also shipped multi platform from a get go, this time around rather than working on a port for a year. That gives them less incentive to keep working on BG3, as they are not going to resell the game now. Previously Enhanced Editions aligned with the console release, which made for a nice multiplatform marketing push.

And Larian has been working on BG3. Updates might not be as advertisable as “we remade act3” but the game has been updated.

I don't think anyone would want or expect them to work on BG3 indefinitely "instead" of moving on to other projects. I just don't want them to leave the game in it's current state because I believe the last act feels more like a rough draft than a complete project.

Larian set the expectation themselves with dos2.
A definitive edition with reworked 3rd act.

And of course people are disappointed when Larian does not deliver that, despite BG3 being in a worse state than Dos2 and it being such a massive success.

Also, long term support and definitive editions for RPGs are more or less industry standard by now.

The Pathfinder games got them and still receive updates even outside of DLCs like the devil improvements last month.

Cyberpunk got massive support before the DLC.

Disco Elysium got voiceover and new content in its free Final Cut update.

Compared to that, Larian didn't do much for BG3 before abandoning it.

Well, yeah... But that's because they needed to. Since it released as a complete dumpster fire, they needed to work on the 2.0 version to make the game profitable.

Long term support and definitive editions for RPG's is still not a standard. It's just that the exceptions are notable in that they are (Or became, in the cases of things like Cyberpunk and No Man's Sky) good games so they stick in the mind.

The industry standard is that support for a game is in the form of monetized additions. Such as DLC or the rerererererelease of Skyrim (In brand new editions that you have to pay full price to get the game with like 2 changes).

Very few developers provide support for a game for free, with the usual being a few post-release bug fixes for major problems and nothing more.

BG3 is also a dumpster fire.
Which new rpgs outside of Skyrim/Starfield did not receive free long term support?
Even F76 did.

It is not. It is incredibly successful, with many awards under its belt.


F76 did because again, it needed it because it was utter garbage on launch. There's a reason it had the nickname Fallout Seventyshit...

As for new RPG's other than Skyrim/Starfield that didn't get free long term support?

Mass Effect
Dragon Age
Assassin's Creed
Monster Hunter
Dragon's Dogma
Horizon
The Outer Worlds
Persona
Zelda BotW/TotK
Octopath Traveller 1/2
Final Fantasy 15/16
Pokemon
Sekiro
Bloodborne
Dark Souls 1-3
Immortals: Fenyx Rising
Greedfall

Just off the top of my head...

Most of those aren't rpgs. And just because BG3 won many community awards doesn't mean its not a dumpster fire.
Disjointed and bad story, bad mechanics, flat characters outside of romance to name a few things. And people expected Larian to fix those things like both they and their competitors did in the past.

They literally all are. They are just different types of RPG's. Some are ARPG's, some are JRPG's. They are still all RPG's.


No, but it's highly successful. It has sold many copies. Ergo, it's not a dumpster fire. Not like CP2077, No Man's Sky and FO76 which were literally so bad on release that no-one bought the game. These games necessitated a lot of extra work to get them into a state where they COULD sell and make a profit. BG3 even on release sold very well, it won GOTY even before many of the patches.

BG3 has problems, it's not an amazing game. But it's far from a dumpster fire since not only has it sold well, people overall rate it favourably hence it being able to win so many awards and how many posts on the forums are about how great the game is and how much people love it.

I also want to voice my hope for additional content from Larian. I was sad to hear that Larian would not be doing more, mostly because they did a great job with what they did well! I came to this game in May, rather late, and a little later Larian announced there would not be additional substantial material. It left a small hope-shaped hole behind in my heart. I also have very much enjoyed this game, and admire the level of immersion it created. CRPGs will be treating the game's voice acting and expressive character personalities as a challenge to meet for years to come.

However, I do think that the bedrock of a CRPG is its story. This includes the narrative itself and the pacing. And when I hit Act 3, holy cow, did the pacing fall apart. The Act feels like it needs to be two acts, and splitting the upper and lower cities would probably have helped. Gortash and Orin need more context and discussion (especially Orin). The whole plot badly needs more structure. I think that when you kill the first of the two, time needs to advance a few days. Then you really should see panic break out in the city, see people stream out, and that all these last minute turf wars should die down. It really bothers me that Baldur's Gate is "business as usual" for most of the player's experience there. I can think of a few games that represented a city on the edge of a crisis (Majora's Mask, Dead Space 2) and in comparison, Larian really should have taken more care with the overall tone of the city--especially when the army is getting very close. (Come on, no horrible nightmares and insomnia with a giant netherbrain so close by?) There's really not a clear sense of progression through any narrative, as everything you do in the city is suspended in the same point in time.

I agree that the companions also need to be fleshed out more. I felt like I was railroaded into romancing Shadowheart, in part because the other companions barely have any scenes (except Astarion). More than half of my companions barely had a scene after after 1 and one obligatory quest in Act 3. And there's "that" companion, the Emperor, whose ending feels rather abrupt and forced. I think he deserves more scenes and a few more possible outcomes (spare his life in the battle, convince or force him to run, fight him in advance, etc). He's a great idea for a character, and his survival or not should be consequential, but the execution is really lacking. What you do with the guy should be a part of the decisions you make for (inflict on?) the world. But he gets kind of truncated as a character at the same time all the player's choices get funneled into three basic endings.

In any case, I understand that Larian has decided to make more ending scenes. I can only hope that this means they decide to stay involved. Act 3 needs substantial revision.

One more complaint: A modding kit that doesn't allow changes to text will not allow modders to fix these fundamental problems.

I will put my money where my mouth is and say I would pay for this "dlc" aka a large update that fixes these problems. I would pay Larian for my copy up front, right now. They should do what they know they're really great at and do a Kickstarter for a Definitive Edition.

Quite unfortunately, that ship has totally sailed as it isn’t just a matter of larian not wanting to make a dlc. They physically cannot do so at this point, as with their announcement of no dlc/sequels they explained that the IP has gone fully back into the hands of Wizards of the Coast. Larian owns the game itself and the engine it runs on, so they can continue to make tweaks and alterations to the content of the game, but any significant changes to the game’s plot at this point would directly violate them no longer having the IP. This is also why there will never be a level editor/quest builder officially supported for this game. Larian obviously knows that’s something that would make the game explode even further in popularity, but they’ve said it’s not going to happen. Theres no confirmation as to why, but the reason is absolutely because making a level editor in this game would directly invalidate the Digital Tabletop that WotC is creating, and they obviously prohibited Larian from making a level editor so they can maximize their profits from their upcoming product.

All we can really do is speculate as to why Larian decided they didn’t want to continue with licensing the IP. Their official statement is that the entire crew is burnt out from BG3 and wants to put their passion towards a new, original project. This is definitely partly true, but I don’t buy it fully because of how sudden the announcement came and how abruptly they said there would be no substantial new content after several months of post-launch support addressing major points of player feedback. Something definitely caused a dispute over the IP, and Larian decided to cut their losses and leave the game behind. I wish we could have gotten more, but it seems like all we’re getting now is mechanical changes, meaning the plot will likely forever remain kind of a mess in the third act. The only hope now is to make such a loud pushback as a community that they reconsider their decision and talk with WotC again.

How long has this project been tinkered with? If you include the first pitch, it's like a decade. Triple-A dev cycles that used to be a cause of mockery or Duke Nukem Forever jokes have become the norm as is. No wonder that everybody is jumping on those games the minute a decent one is released. People have got to justify buying those 2,000 bucks GPUs and Next Big PlayStations somehow. And still they won't change a thing: By the time TES VI et all roll out, kids made when their predecessors were released are gonna have their driver's license.

Unless Larian go fully-on Bioware now, I'm more interested in what they're up to next. And I wasn't much of a fan of DOS. However, given how much that evolved from being a comparably combat system demo and thinly veiled linear encounter parcours into a more fleshed out RPG experience, there's plenty room to grow here too still. Even if BG3 would be my favourite game ever (it's not), I'd be the same.

The most potential is still in the systemic design... With spells in particular outside of combat in RPGs being mostly woefully unexplored. That is, aside of casting "Let there be light!" in a cave. There's some that don't even let you cast spells unless you're engaged in combat. As if there were two seperate games at play: "Engaged in combat" vs. "Not engaged in combat."

That makes sense. What would you suggest in terms of continuing to complain? There's these forums, reddit, steam reviews...

A couple of points -- I'm not totally sure how IP law works in this situation, but they might have flexibility to develop the characters in the limited context in which they've already shown them in-game. That strikes me as a doable thing.

You have a GREAT point about the absence of a level editor. I was shocked when I heard that we could not edit text, but you're totally right that bg3 with a level editor is a product that would easily outcompete whatever wotc has cooking for its virtual tabletop. I know people used the Neverwinter map editor to make campaigns. You could make whole independent campaigns with the bg3 map. The player base is losing out on a lot here. There should be more outcry about the lack of in-game text editing and the absence of a level editor.

Every time they announce an update, it seems like they have a team at the company that is still enthusiastic enough to do more than initially said. I don't know what the issue is. But I've admired Baldur's Gate 1&2 for years, they were like the holy grail of gaming for me, and I can't accept their sequel being left in this sorry end state. These things matter, over time, and Larian really needs to fix the storyline and pacing mess in Act 3. They can't leave such a significant title in such a notably rushed final state. This is a question of what their legacy is going to be in five or ten years. And that's just narrative and characters, not to mention the unpolished feel of Act 3 thanks to all its glitches. It was different a year ago, when we all thought they would be fixed and that we had a complete edition to look forward to. Now it feels like I was sold a game that's still one third early access instead. And it's a MAJOR title.

Tbqh, I find Act 2's narrative to have some glaring issues too (and maybe pacing too). The whole timeline of the Nightsong doesn't make much sense and how there are three Thorms just chilling in the shadow, who are just ignored by everyone else (which also makes them a bit filler content too).

I guess that even tho they had longer to work on Act 2, and it's still abit of mess, I kinda doubt they'd bother fix the 3rd Acts issues, esp. because they see no real need to because no one seems to really care.

While in general I feel like the Act 2 pacing and narrative is the best in the game, you're right about timeline issues (and the reveal in Act 3 makes this worse). The way there are tons of Thorms running around making their own Resident Evil game and Ketheric couldn't care about anyone but Isobel had me laughing. RIP rest of the family, fr in pieces 🙏

I mean, even Ketheric's wife didn't seem to care about their son either....