Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General What makes bg3 so popular? What gave bg3 this mass appeal?

Every other rpg I played only gathered the audience of either from RPG fans, RPG veterans, old-school gamers, etc.

But baldurs gate 3 managed to interested not only rpg players but also people who normally do not play RPGs.

Same as World of Warcraft who managed to garner interest from people who are not MMO players.

I played wow with people who are into video whatsoever. They only played wow because their kid played wow. I met girls in wow who only played wow because their boyfriend played it. And so on.

BG3 is kinda similar, it somehow managed to convince casual gamers to try this game and stick with it. RPGs and casual gamers usually do not work well usually.

One time I saw a Twitch streamer who bought bg3 and refunded it just because she learned it is turn-based game. The inclination to buy it was there.

What caused this game to go mainstream?

I cannot categorize myself since I am kinda mix of everything. I am filthy casual because I do not care about score, achievements, etc. I am rpg gamer since I love those types of games. I played RPGs because they usually offer the best price to time spent investment. The same goes for MMOs, I enjoy them because I create a character who is always evolving.

As a rpg player bg3 doesn't tick the right boxes. The kingmaker: wrath of the righteous does.

Bg3 offers dumbed down dnd ruleset aka dnd 5e combat dnd 3e or 3.5e.

It is turn-based compared to rtwp. I tried D:OS 2, solasta, wasteland 2&3, XCOM enemy unknown, XCOM2. Neither of them grabbed me. I tried giving these games a shot. I own all of them.

People who love nwn and dnd 3.0 are playing nwn ee or nwn diamond and their multiplayer servers. People who love rtwp are playing Wotr, tyranny. People who love wh40k are playing rogue trader.

Those games never garner large appeal that this game have, I spend countless hours watching youtube videos, reading twitter, etc., to find THE thing that gave it mainstream appeal but I cannot find it.

Maybe I am missing something. I really want to discover the thing gave it mass market appeal.

Thanks for the info,

Cheers

Simple Larian prioritized making it fun and entertaining, and they were brilliant at marketing those aspects. They also created characters and storylines that people cared about.

Marketing and sexy companions.

It's a similar thing how Dragon Age: Origins made waves, Morrigan being sexy (Also apparently Alistair) draws in the general population.

Add a dash of simplicity (DA:O did this via Warrior and Rogue classes being 90% "I auto attack the bad guy") through watered down 5e ruleset and you don't drive off the players who aren't interested in hardcore RPG's.


Personally, that's a benefit for me. I abhor RTWP as it often feels like it just combines all the worst aspects of TB and RT into one awful system.

Fun and entertainment is rather a broad term. It means different things to different people. Characters, storylines, etc., yes they are important but mostly RPGs audience, mostly.

A lot of people play world of warcraft do not know anything about the lore and characters involved in it.

I learned about bg3 from a channel that makes info about general gaming news.

I am more interested why people who are not normally interested in playing RPGs decided to pick this game.


DAO was far more simpler when it comes to games mechanics then bg3 or any dnd is.

I doubt it matters to general populous if the game has turn-based or rtwp system. You not liking rtwp is your prerogative, same as me not liking turn-based combat.

Something about this game caused to appeal to non-rpg minded gamer. At the start you hinted that the popularity of dao was Morrigan and Allister.

When I look on bg3 companions none of them provoke the same feeling as allister or Morrigan from dao. Maybe I just loved Claudia Black performance in Stargate.

Ooh. Interesting question. Certainly hype is a major factor. It just snowballs. When everyone is talking about a thing, more people want to see what the fuss is all about.

The resurgence of D&D popularity probably helped a lot. (Thank you, Stranger Things).

You call 5E “dumbed down”, and maybe it is by tabletop standards. But by video game standards, incorporating all they did (with a little tweaking) and the way they did it is very far from dumb.

Other games might have pulled off similar levels of complexity, but not usually with all the high quality voiced cinematic dialogue and cut scenes.

The trend for AAA games has been making everything more and more accessible for ages. Larian didn’t strip it down to the bare minimum, they included as much as they could. The game doesn’t hold your hand much by telling you where to go and what to do. It rewards you for finding clever ways to approach things, and sometimes it rewards you for trying something really stupid just to see what happens.

It’s not a perfect game. I can think of some things I think they could have done better, but it’s a game that respects the player for figuring out how it works. And they’ve shown that there is actually a big market for that. I hope other developers will get the message.

Or maybe that’s all bollox, and it’s just because there’s sex.

I don't dispute that.

But being simple tends to help non-RPG fans stick with a game. So, once they get into the game for whatever reason (Such as, because of sexy characters) they stay around because it's not overwhelmingly complex to actually play the game.


For the most part, no (Though TB can help some people because it gives you more time to think through your actions which provides a buffer for learning RPG mechanics)

My comment about that was more interjecting my opinion about that particular facet than it being a reasoning for BG3's popularity.


Companions generally seem to be a key factor in an RPG's popularity with the masses. In DAO it was Morrigan and Alistair. In ME it was Miranda (With Tali and Garrus coming in big once people played ME2). In BG3 it's Shadowheart, Karlach and Astarion.

It's interesting to note that DA2 and DAI which featured less sexy companions also had less mass appeal (Also, the upcoming Veilguard is not getting much love and its characters are being memed about for how awful they look)

There is definitely a trend with modern RPG's that have more detailed character models and thus sexy characters being more mass marketable than CRPG's that usually have less detailed character models and PNG portraits.

On a side note, if you liked Claudia Black's performance in Stargate, you should definitely check out Farscape if you haven't already. Her performance in that was amazing (Also, Ben Browder's performance was also top notch there too)

Sigh.

Honestly I dont get why theres always these D&D players around that dizz the latest iteration of D&D.

Thats was already the case when AD&D was the previous system and D&D3 came around.

And now people act as if D&D3 is the good system and D&D5 is somehow "bad".

(D&D4 was really bad, as in it wasnt actually D&D, but thats another topic; and by the way 3.5 was basically 3.0 with only very minor changes and not even good changes)

No D&D5 is still not perfect. But it solved a lot of problems that D&D3 had.


Just an example, D&D had from version 1 to 3 always the problem that attack rates would get up and up, while armor improved much less.

In BG2 you would in the end absolutely not care anymore what your AC is. Unless you would manage to build very special characters, opponents would hit you all the time anyway. Only countermeasure was to have Improved Speed so you would kill opponents quickly, and to have Regeneration so you would heal enormously every round.

Or in "Star Wars: Knights in the Old Republic", which was based on d20, which was a simplified version of D&D3 that didnt require to pay Wizards of the Coast to use, I just gave up trying to build up defenses - even if you went all in on defenses, you still would get hit all the time anyway. Instead I went for maximum offense, combined with crowd control where that was possible, and found this much stronger.

D&D5 finally fixed that. Now you only improve your attacks with the proficiency bonus, which starts at 2 and increases by 1 every four level after the first.

All in all D&D5 is easier and more elegant, just like D&D3 was easier and more elegant than AD&D. Except the step from AD&D to D&D3 was a lot bigger.



So yeah, D&D5 is great. Its also the most successful version of D&D ever. They did something right there.



Why BG3 was so successful well I'll have to list a lot to fully explain but bottom line, its a passion project. For example I saw a statistic that only 3% of Steam players actually finished the ironman mode. And yet the game has one. The game is full of details, great storylines, etc. And they are only expanding on this now.

I think it is less about “the thing” BG3 or Larian did, but variety of smaller bits that made the game attractive to a variety of potential players. Mass appeal titles have less to do with being exceptional, and more with offering something to more demographics.

Using well respected IP
D&D game
Making a big budget RPG during an AAA RPG drought
Characters (with them I take issues as far as long term storytelling) but are very evocative and compelling on surface level
Game mechanics and story situations fitting nicely for social media
A lot of good will from EA, good buzz.
Game that can be played solo, and in multiplayer, promising scone magic story driven experience and interactive sandbox.

In Kotor you can solve every problem with lightning. Even if you are light side.

IMO the most important thing that BG3 did was high quality motion capture and very good voice acting. Larian did other things well too, but its the unprecedented scale of the fully voice acted script and the acting that really sells it. I say this even though I actually prefer games that are not voice acted.

Bear sex.

The hype for the game only really started with the presentation of that scene floodes tiktok. Before that only rpg gamer were really interested because of the ip.

And Larian kept the hype going by focusing on the sexual content in marketing, making it seem more explicit than it was, and designing the companion to be thirst traps, more like characters in a visual novel, than a rpg. And Larian then reworked the game so that you can experience everything in one playthrough.

And the simplicity and full voiceover also helped. You could read a lot of variations of "After BG3 I tried out <other rpg>, but its so much reading/math/complicated so I stopped playing."

Its quite interesting how full vo made PoE2 into a failure but helped BG3 immensely because of the different target groups.

Strange that you mention that shadowheart, Karlach and Astarion since on most bg3 videos Lae'zel is the thumbnail.

I tried listening to the Karlach on youtube, didn't enjoy her voice maybe it is just me.

In dao I loved leliana and Loghain ; I love Simon Templeman performance especially for his voice in Legacy of kain series. Not to mention his performance as Doctor Doom in 90's version of Fantastic Four.



I loved da2 because of Jo Wyatt performance as female hawke.



Mass effect it was jennifer hale as female shepard ; Jennifer hale is a legend since she voiced bastilla shan in kotor 1; teasing bastila was the best part of kotor 1. Kaiden was voiced by the same actor who voiced Carth onasi in kotor 1.



Mass effect 2 has awesome voice actors roster: Claudia Black, Tricia Helfer (Number Six in battlestar reboot, kerrigan in starcraft 2), Michael Hogan, Jennifer Hale, Carrie-Anne Moss, Martin Sheen.

I never heard of Farscape, I will check it out.

the bear sex helps... i mean it got people talking about the game and the 'think of the kids' nutjobs had their two mins on socal media

Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on your point of view, sex and how attractive characters are matter to the average gamer. Things like waifus in games are a big deal. People complain that Aloy in the Horizon games is ugly.

Which is sadly, why we didn't got small race companions, because obviously people don't think, they are waifu material enough.
Aloy is s very pretty btw, I never understood the complaints.

Even though the shorty models turned out really nice, Helsik and Korilla easily make it into the prettiest NPC lists for me. Anyway, came for the immersive sim elements, stayed for the wizard - you are nice too Lae'zel.

I think it's a first game Aloy versus second game Aloy debate.

KotOR wasnt a hard game to begin with.

Going all out on offense though meant battles would be over much quicker.

Especially the ones when you have to fight alone.

Don't agree on Helsik, but Korrilla is so beautiful! That head is fantastic.

Marketing and lack of serious bad press, rival franchises going downhill, video games becoming mainstream as a whole. It helps that almost everything is voiced. A video game these days doesn't need to be perfect, it needs to fail to be off-putting. Most non-RPG fans find reading too much massively off putting, for example, so you need to work around that. Bg3 became popular for most of the same reasons the Witcher 3 did. All around competence > being exceptional in one or two aspects, and downright bad in others.

If you're going to go the extra mile, make the world "alive"... something both games also committed to. Truthfully, a lot of people want to play. The fewer you scare away, the bigger your success. It's as simple as that.

Dwarf females have the most beautiful heads in the game and I die on that hill. Hope is very pretty too. I love gnomes too - I think, I might have a crush on Philomeen. And of course our fauvourite Barcus.

It's still a shame, we don't have shorty companions.

I preferred Nettie. Would she followed us instead of Halsin.

There are many reason why dnd 3e is better than 5e. It changes depending on who you ask.

As for me the main reason is ECL (LA + RHD) and prestige classes.

Level adjustment and Racial Hit Die allows to play stronger races like brelani eladrin, Fey'ri, Hound Archon, Rakshasa or Gloura with keeping their unique feats and abilities.

Getting damage reduction as brelani or gloura up to level +3 weapon is awesome; you get the feeling that you are playing this all-powerful races. Choosing them was awesome but everyone of them had handicap; slower leveling; at level 20 or 40 you get easily defeated by level 20 or 40 human mostly because of level difference aka hp difference. Was it worth playing race that had those big bonuses but kinda was weak at the endgame or play as human who was weak in the beginning but would shine at endgame or should pick a race as yuan-ti pureblood or drow/githyanki to gain spell-resistance who wouldn't matter at lower level but play big role at level 40 since they gain +1 to spell resistance at every level.

Presitge classes allows for every playthrough to be unique like being as bladesinger, hellfire warlock or become a lich.
Prestige classes opened so much possibilities no only because of roleplay but also of gameplay possibilities.
That what makes 3e better then AD&D or 5e.



I wish game like kingmaker, tyranny or wrath of the righteous had similar budget like bg3.
Other RPGs also had fine characters.
People like to say sandbox are awesome but real life disproves this. Nearly all sandbox MMO had failed - only eve online is there as a shining beacon of sandbox success.
All other sandbox games failed.
Other games tried doing gimmicky things and they failed so I wouldn't count it as a sign for a game to succeed.
Despite bethesda games being named as sandbox, they are not, they are theme park games. In those games you cannot create your own cities, etc.
So you are saying that this game is combination of theme park game and sandbox? Interesting.



That definitely was a cause of its success. Not sure about motion capture but voice acting is important to bring larger audience.
I remember the amount of backlash fallout 4 received when it was discovered that protagonist will be voiced.



Yes, Bethesda got backslash for having voiced protagonist and Voiced main character was the main reason I played mass effect series.

Only blizzard managed to pull this well so far aka the formula "easy to learn, hard to master".

There are tons of 18+ games that offer sex scenes and yet, it didn't make them popular. So i really do not get why that scene caused the game to go viral.

I do not like the word simplicity; it sounds like boredom. I remember when planescape: torment pride itself for having more than 100 000 lines of dialogue.
Thing change i do not know if it is for the better.
Reading is a byproduct of low budget. Owlcat or Obsidian didn't even had the third of budget that larian had to make bg3.
Not wanting to make a big game does mean it would mostly cater to hardcore audience rather casual audience.
It is hard, i would even say impossible to cater to both hardcore and casual audiences.

WOR doesn’t have that budget because the game isn’t as fun and thus not as popular.

Larian built their success on making the games enjoyable for the players, I don’t like a lot of the Larian homebrew etc but I admit it is fun to exploit it on occasion.

DOS 2 was a lot of fun to play and BG3 is even more fun. They are committed to doing things to make the player’s enjoyment their first priority.

Give the people what they want and they will beat a path to your door.

Like I said before fun is subjective. It may not be fun for you but maybe be fun for other people.

For example, I am not into competitive play or into getting achievements but I know a lot of people enjoy gaining them. For me games main purpose is to relax and not to feel like a second job.

You must define the budget before even starting game development otherwise your funds are squandered.
Plus if I recall correctly owlcat gathered 2 millions on Kickstarter for wotr there was certainly a market for it.
Pathfinder 1e is based on 3e dnd so it is more spreadsheet than anything else. Some people enjoy it, some do not.

DOS 2 was not fun. Countless battle that drag for ages, I tried 5 times to get into that game.

But lets get back to the topic. What do you think that bg3 did exceptionally well that brought a ton of people to it?

I think someone else really gave the reason. It's not that BG3 did any one thing exceptionally well. Success in these kinds of things are alchemy, not science. There's no set of ingredients that you can put in that will guarantee results. There's just some tried and true aspects mixed in with luck, creativity and even more luck. If you ask me, I don't think there's any part of what BG3 did that a different game hasn't done better. But maybe it's just that they did enough things good enough.


Simplicity and boredom are two entirely different things. Simplicity means that things are easy to wrap your head around and you can launch into it straight away. It means there's minimal extaneous elements to worry about. Simple can be boring, but so can complexity. Just look at any board game with a huge booklet of rules that are super complex and intricate and lead to people just zoning out or getting frustrated. there's a sweet spot of simplicity vs complexity, which is different for everyone and also varies depending on what you're trying to do. As I said, making games is a process of alchemy.

It's a game in a genre that always had a certain appeal and a very dedicated fanbase, and this is one of the titles in the entire genre that ranks the highest in terms of overall budget/production value, so it caught out outside of its usual "niche".

It's not a big mystery, I would argue.

I do not. If they had a higher budget they would need to be "more accessible" and "streamlined" to sell enough to turn a profit which would destroy everything that made them far superior to BG3.

Thats why nowadays actual innovation and masterpieces are created in the indy sector while AAA gaming are bland and souless sequels to existing IPs, spiced up with a combination of engineered "awesome" moments, pop culture references and sex.

And Larian has joined the AAA club, the video game version of fast food chains.

I thought we already did this discussion in another thread some time ago?

My views on this are quite well known, I think. I do need to add, though, that I haven't seen any evidence that the game was able to "bring in non-rpg gamers." That's a notion that's bandied about but I haven't seen any hard evidence to support such a claim. For me it is more that the rpg gamers group is in itself quite large. But it is an internally divided group, consisting of cRPG, ARPG, JRPG, MMORPG, and other such subgroups, who don't necessarily like games from their respective out-groups. But BG3 had appeal across all the subgroups within the RPG fans group.

Anyway, here's what I see as the things BG3 brought that made the game attractive to people outside of the hardcorre, old-school cRPG group:

SEX (specifically, interractive sex with lots of permutaions, variations, and options)

Some 170+ hours of cinematics

Full voice acting

Couch co-op

Story and characters that resonate with and appeal to today's young people (Gen Y and Gen Z) (I won't give my specifics on this because that will surely upset/anger some people; suffice it to say I have a lot of negatives toward the character, personality, and attitudes of today's younger generations, obviously with exceptions granted)

I doubt adding full voice-over would make wotr or kingmaker "soulless".
You can clearly so improvement between kingmaker and Wotr, mostly because owlcat had more people are budget. So doubt bigger budget always means soulless games.


Theoretically, it doesn't, but practically it does; At least it is my experience.

Blizzard has been pruning people abilities for years in wow, same goes with wizard of the coast when it comes to the difference between 3e and 5e, Bethesda does it with every version of their game - they removed some features when going from daggerfall to Morrowind, same goes from morrrowind to oblivion, wasteland 3 removed it fallout like feats system which was the main reason I stopped playing the game.

I had to say I enjoyed "complexity" of Morrowind when it comes to leveling skills to advance within guilds that you joined. I love sitting 2 hours in front of wotr character creation to choose the best class to fit my tastes.
From my point of view, nearly every time a feature is removed cause of streamline or so called "boredom" is rather a detriment to a game rather than a bonus.
Despite skyrim is better looking game than oblivion I couldn't give it the same amount of love I gave oblivion despite oblivion is worse game overall. I remember constant crashes in oblivion that drove me nuts but despite all this I got immersed into oblivion and didn't into skyrim.

So you answer why bg3 was a success is caused by several factors that wouldn't meant success if other game did what larian did.
I was rather looking for more "scientific" approach like you put it.
If you toogle boxes of a, b, c it will translate to a success in form of d.
Sometimes it feels like karazhan paradox in wow. People love that raid but no one at blizzard managed to duplicate karazhan success.
Same goes with witcher 3, I have no clue why witcher 3 was a big success on western markets and witcher 1/2 didn't achieve the same success despite witcher 1 had better dialogue from my point of view.

It would have been far better had you refrained from saying anything of the sort. It's totally out of order to take a swipe at anyone, much less such a wide group. And this is coming from, based on things you've said elsewhere, someone who is older than you are. Please no more of such unpleasant comments.

I do think it's brought in non-RPG gamers to some extent. The sales numbers reflect that. They became interested due to the hype and news surrounding it. Whether they stayed interested or not is a different issue. I think a game like this attracts a different audience compared to the Final Fantasy type games.

It very much depends on how it's implemented.

Think of games like osu! or Geometry Dash. They are "Simple" in that they only use 1-2 inputs. But they're far from boring because what you do with small number of input options are very much interesting.

While in games like WoW, FFXIV and basically every MMO, they reduce the number of abilities you use... But don't' do anything special with them so you're just playing a less interesting character.

Just like there's the flip side where complexity doesn't necessarily equate to more enjoyment.

Having ability bloat so you're swimming in lots of actions that don't do anything unique is not interesting, it's simply a waste of time.

Having systems that are so complex you need a PhD in theoretical physics just to understand what's going on does not make them more engaging.

"Simplifying" a game can be just about removing redundancies that serve little tangible purpose.

For example, what was being gained from needing to get Point Blank Shot and Precise Shot feats just to be able to use ranged attacks against a target that is next to an ally without a huge -4 attack roll modifier?

What was gained from having Cantrips being utterly useless because they were just 1d3 damage spells necessitating every caster to run around with a crossbow?

These sorts of things don't add anything but unecessary "Complexity" to the game. They're not creating any meaningful decision making.


If we look at other games that managed to be more successful than their typical niche;

Witcher 3 had a smoother combat system compared to 1/2. This made it more enjoyable to actually play (I personally couldn't stomach the jank combat of W1 and W2)

Mass Effect 2 had a more streamlined, action orientated combat system which lead to less time spent faffing around in menus and more time shooting aliens and wooing sexy companions.

Dragon Age: Origins only notable things were the shift away from the "Classic" CRPG style of game (Isometric view, low res character models, PNG portraits) into the more detailed character models from a closer viewpoint (Enabling sexy character designs)

Elden Ring became more accessible. Since its open world freedom (And powerful mechanics like OP Ash summons, OP status effects and OP spells/weapon arts) enabled people to simply go elsewhere if they found content difficult which was a change of pace from their prior titles more linear paths (Also, this lack of linearity also meant less traps. Less ambushes from around corners/behind barrels, no mimics etc. Since these things don't work with freeform paths. Without traps, there's less frustration for unfamiliar players who'd get surprised and die, losing all their Souls/Runes)

So we can look at BG3 for what things it seems to do:

- It also uses the more "Modern RPG" style of character design and camerawork, enabling sexy characters just like DAO (And unlike Owlcat's offerings which still rely the classic style. Even Pillars 2 is closer to the CRPG style than the more modern style)
- It has a smoother and more accessible combat. Between the usage of 5e and Larian homebrew, it's more straightforward to do combat than many other titles, there's no unnecessary bloat of required feats and building a character is as simple as slapping in some stats and picking a class that sounds fun (While hardcore RPG fans can sink their teeth into multiclassing and min/maxing for ultra powerful builds)
- It gained a massive boost in popularity since it piggybacked off a well regarded IP. Not only hardcore RPG fans like the Baldur's Gate name, but many casuals likely have nostalgic memories about playing BG1 or BG2 when they were young.

I completely agree, DOS2’s popularity and BG3’s validate the argument that Larian knows what it is doing when it comes to making games that large numbers of people find fun. Increasing success leads to bigger budgets for the next project.

The game is very theatrical. I think by hiring all those theater peeps and leaning way into it, they were able to tap into something that I haven't really seen before in video gaming, like where the whole ensemble just elevated the material. Just about every bit player nailed it, hitting all their marks, so when even the rando NPCs are coming like it's their big breakout role, that makes the entire production just feel pretty next level. Pitstop did a lot of heavy lifting I think. I mean I fell for this game based mostly on the Strength of Lae'zel hehe, but they're all pretty great! Then you add into that mix the vibe of EA, which was sorta like checking out the band at a smaller venue, before they go launch off into the stratosphere with stadium shows in later days. I don't know, but it feels vaguely like that, or what I imagine that to be like.

The Art direction was also very solid. They gave me a lot to hold onto there. I mean there are scenes in the second act of the game that just threw me right back to stuff like this that I grew up on...



It had that vibe for sure. But I think it also worked in part because, rather than trying to be whatever a D&D thing typically is, or was, it instead drew from the things that D&D always draws from to come at it obliquely. Like a pastiche on the swords and sorcery or film fantasy genre with the broader strokes. It's more like a pop riff on the D&D cultural touchstone, blended with like netflix and chill, the inside jokes and all that, which is what BG did too, except that then it would have been more like night at the movies, or sitcom/saturday morning cartoon callbacks. BG just had a different angle than some of the other entries I can recall, which preceded it in my mind, in that it was already tapping into the recyclotron thing that would come to define the spirit of the age at the turn of the millennium. Like what if we took the B plot from Highlander 2, but with doppelgangers? Also, Newhart somehow, and then just ran with it across the board? Every random Hobgoblin barking like the best of og warcraft hehe. The new one came especially clutch with the Goblins doing something pretty similar. I also thought they did a nice job with the Gith and Tieflings, which for a novelty still in FR player species, felt pretty well executed.

The game feels simultaneously solipsistic and communal somehow. Like Arcade Game accessible, aimed at all comers, but also a total black box that's really hard to unlock or climb inside solo. It has a similar sort of paradox to it that I can remember from old arcade fighting games when those first dropped, necessarily more social, cause like you have to learn the moves by watching other people play right? Or maybe your friends tell you how to throw a blue fireball or handcuff or whatever, and then apply that on your own time and your own dime/quarter/token. BG3 takes random ass stuff from D&D mechanics/lore and applies that same sort of Street Fighter 2 special move or super combo concept to FR, which is very sticky. Like it's just sticks a different way when games take that approach, where it's a communal discovery and you feel like an insider while playing. Like 'hey maybe I'm the first to actually see this play out exactly this way? crazy!' even if some of that is funhouse mirrors. I don't know it's like if you were in the parking lot before a Dead show, waiting on a miracle, and then bam, suddenly you're in the front row. You want to share the experience, or share in it, and then the game sorta leans into that by making it fun to be pedantic about D&D stuff and teach the game while playing the game.

I don't think this one achieves anywhere near the popularity it did without D&D. People have suggested that, and Larian moving on would seem to suggest the D&D/BG legacy isn't really the special sauce here, but I still think it is. I'm only here because Larian made a Baldur's Gate game. I'd have no clue who these people were, were it not for that. Game could have been called DoS 3 like some said it should have been, or was masquerading, but I'd have slept on that for sure when it came out. I wouldn't have put in hundreds of hours on the upswing, or swooped a thing on spec just hoping it might hit the high notes. There was an expectation that, because it was Baldur's Gate, that it would have to kick ass, or die trying, and anything less would have been a real letdown.

For the Bear stuff, to me that signaled that the game would be sex positive and just generally more self aware of it's moment in time, like in the comedic way that I appreciate when the humor is timely and self deprecating and all the things. It's a send up, clearly, and a way to say something like 'See, we're not uptight. We can throw an alright party. See! Every Bear gets laid!' Whatever, it worked. The actual game isn't really like that, it's much more saccharine and way less tawdry. Like even in that very scene, to watch it vs hearing a recounting of it, pretty different takeaways. I don't think the game was particularly high octane sex driven, like is that what makes it cool? Cause I'm more into the Squirrels, and all the little 'awwww, isn't that adorable' moments with the Dog and such. They made it just sweet enough to play at being a fairy tale, while also being a psych horror slasher flick at the same time. Way to thread the needle there lol.

Hard to say though why it worked or caught on. They'll probably be trying to figure that one out for a while. Like years maybe

Pretty wild

My intent was exactly to avoid unpleasantness even while expressing my personal point of view. If that is not how it came across, then I surely apologize.

I concur with those saying it’s very largely about the characters. The companions especially, but other compelling characters too.

Getting it exactly right, enough to create a fandom around them is probably a bit of a black art. You need interesting characters, good performances, a balance between serious and emotional moments and some lighthearted humour. Basically making characters people actually care about.

For widespread appeal, it’s probably necessary to make them fully voiced and animated and for that to be done well.

Of the games mentioned, KOTOR probably had it, Mass Effect had it (and lost it with Andromeda), Dragon Age had it and it remains to be seen if they still have it. I think the Witcher 3 had it. BG3 has it too, and they’ve done it when YouTube and social media are so prominent.

It’s not the only factor of course. It still needs to be a good game that people enjoy playing.

Uuuuuuh ...

1. Karlach is the best, but she's still not a too complex person.
2. Wyll is also great, but he's clearly also stupid, the way he became Warlock.
3. Gale is intelligent, sure. But he is also super creepy. The way he talks about being in love with Mystra and then he suddenly hits on the protagonist. What a collossal jackass.
4. I am willing to tolerate a lot in the case of Astarion, after all he was tortured for 200 years straight. Still he's just utterly evil and beyond redemption.
5. Laezel is a murderer and boasts about it and talks about killing "teethlings" just because they are "weak".
6. Shadowheart literally follows a deity that wants to destroy the world.

These choices SUCK.

So where are my Imoen, Aerie and Keldorn ? I just cant find them here.

Frankly BG2 had quite a bit better companions than BG3. Also much better, much less creepy romances.

In BG3 I literally start a romance with Karlach ASAP just so everybody else leaves me alone. If there was a "no romances" switch, I would switch it on.

The reason I like BG3 is other factors. The way I can finally play Bard and enjoy it. The enormous complexity of the game. The good dramatic storytelling. Companions and romances ? Tolerable, but not great.

To be honest, I quite like the BG3 companions. I have some beef with some of Biowares companions, but that would derail too much.
About Wyll: he was 17, when he made the pact and he had to decide on the spot. Lae'zel comes from a culture that sees killing as a necesseity, which kind of makes sense, since they are fighting a pretty powerful foe. SHe learns throughout her journey though and can become a bitter person. Shadowheart was brainwashed and you can help her get out of it. SHe is the classical cult victim. Astarion is an evil companion for an evil playthrough mostly, same as Edwin or Viconia in the old games.
And I don't get, why Gale is creepy. He had an affair with Mystra (who btw is a relatively new incarnation), that ended a long while ago and his romance really starts in act 2 - and only, if you showed interest, otehrwise, he will never hit on you (that he did that after release was a big).

But this is what's a huge problem for me. Everyone's a "victim" (emphasis on the quotation marks). And personally I am super-tired of people playing the "victim" card.

I don't think everyone is a victim or even when they were they don't need to let that define them. True that Shadowheart and Astarion in different ways were shaped by what was done to them. But Wyll made a difficult choice at a young age, and still stands by it now and actually seems glad that it gave him the opportunity to save the city that he wouldn't have had otherwise: I wouldn't see him as a victim for that particular choice. Lae'zel is a product of her upbringing and believes in Vlaakith, but I don't think that makes her a "victim" unless someone is going out of their way to cast everything in that light in a way that yes would start robbing the concept of some of its power. As would calling Gale a victim of his ambition and insecurity (or of Mystra), rather than just seeing these as character traits that can cause him problems or that he can rise above. But for me it's one hallmark of a decent RPG character that we can interpret them in different ways and it's feasible that they can develop in different directions. And personally, I do think the BG3 companions stand up very well against BG2 ones. Like fylimar I have issues with some of the latter, and much as I love the game don't particularly rate most of the new companions introduced for BG2, but I agree that's really taking us off topic.

What feels most relevant here is not what I or you or any individual thinks of the characters - of course opinions will differ - but that some or all of them resonated with a lot of people and helped make them fans of the game, which I think is pretty undeniable.

Though I agree with folk who have said it's not any one thing that has made BG3 so popular (and, in my view, so good) but an alchemical mix of different factors.

I didn't say that, but the poster I quoted said, that Wyll is stupid and I was pointing out, that he was 17 - we were all stupid at that age and he still managed to save his city and make something of himself, so not really a victim.

The victimisation for me, seems to be much more present in the heads of the audience than in the actual story. I guess, because it is just more convenient to have a big bad to hate. Gale is his own worst enemy, but that's a story that doesn't leave much room for any righteous anger against some villainous figure on his behalf. If you reduce Astarion and Shadowheart's tales to overcoming their oppressors their tales are also much more simple than if you read them as reflections on fear & safety or on the meaning of identity in Shadowheart's case.

Not everyone.

Wyll CHOSE to enter the pact.
Gale CHOSE to be a jackass and ignore Mystra so he could get more power for himself.
Astarion CHOSE to become a Vampire spawn instead of dying.

They only have themselves to blame for the consequences of their choices.

The only people whom have legitimately been wronged by others are:

Karlach was sold by Gortash to Zariel (Leading to her being experimented on with the Infernal Engine heart and forced to be a pawn for Zariel)
Shadowheart was kidnapped and brainwashed by Sharrans (Though, how much of a "Victim" she is when she can be perfectly content continuing as a Sharran...)
Lae'zel is a Gith, brought up with Gith standards which promotes harshness and violence (Though, she's not much of a victim as she has no qualms with continuing with such things)

Besides that, making people out to be "Victims" is a common thing for companions because it gives an easy plotline for a companion story. It's much easier to write about their quest to go and get back at the person who wronged them than to write about someone who is perfectly fine and dandy just doing normal things because nothing bad happened to them (At least for good playthroughs. It's always possible for an evil character to have a personal quest of obtaining power. Like, even if Astarion was always a true vampire he could still have an arc about tracking down Cazador because of his ritual to gain more power)

I've very much not liking the implication that a mistake made in a high stakes, emotional situation justifies 2 centuries of mental abuse, physical abuse, and SA. I'm also not liking the idea that compassion and pity are uncalled for in that situation. I'm not liking that at all.

I know I've been part of it, but I think this digression has gone on long enough to count as derailing the thread.

Folk are very welcome to start another thread if they wish to discuss how far companions/origins' backgrounds excuse the choices they make (a topic that can run and run, given that it's not one that has clear answers in real life either!), but let's draw a line under it here.

Apologies if I was the straw that broke the camel's back for derailing the thread, or if I came across as too aggressive. Perhaps I was reading too much into "They only have themselves to blame."

Back on track: I particularly enjoy the side characters in this game. They're well voice acted, and some even have satisfying, multi-act arcs. I'm particularly fond of Barcus's, Rolan's, and Mayrina's arcs. I think the fact that they can all die in act 1 makes it more satisfying if the player does help them survive and undergo their character development.

As a programmer (not a gaming programmer) I think the main reason why I would probably still be attracted to this game even if I wasnt already a fan of BG1 and BG2 is simply that in this project the programmers and artists clearly have been given the freedom and room to implement a game to its fullest potential.

Not many game programmers get this freedom and I think it shows in the product.

Also Larian managed to archieve this goal without going overboard, like a certain Star Citizen.

One more point could be their good community guidelines. That allowed every streamer to celebrate the game to their fans (and make some ad-money that way) so it got a lot of free publicity.

One point may be that they had a working model to build games — DOS2 — and they translated that to a widely known IP.

I think this is one reason for the success of BG3: all the companions are obviously flawed, and in their romance arcs they can become better. It’s genuine character progression, and you don’t get that if you start out as good.

These flaws also enable Larian to draw out the romance over 150 hours of gameplay.

And they are quick to acknowledge *you* (the player).

Different for others, the delaying part of the romance for Karlach is external: it’s not her character, not some external loyalty or being alien, but just that she is cursed with that burning heart — for which she’s only responsible insofar that she trusted the wrong person.

Bear sex

My main argument was that BG3 has a lot more good elements than nothing but the companions, as it was claimed in this thread by others.

I am certain that some players indeed are exclusively attracted to the companions, but I dont think thats even a sizeable part of the gamers who play the game, let alone the majority or anything like that.

And dont fool yourself that people you meet in forums are representative for the people who play a game. For example steam statistics show that only like 3 percent have finished the game on ironman mode. The people who actually bother to read and write in the forum of this game have probably a much higher rate than that.

(Personally I'm not really interested in the ironman mode ... maybe one day, I dont know, but so far I'm happy to play on hard)

Good elements =/= stand out elements.

Many RPG's have plenty of good elements. I can name many good elements for games like DoS2, PoE2, Rogue Trader, WotR, Solasta, Tyranny etc.

But simply having good elements is not the cause of BG3's massive popularity - Whereby it defied the genre niche and became mainstream. A feat that has only been achieved by select few games (Like ME2, Witcher 3, DAO, ER)

In terms of what BG3 has done that is stand out - By which I mean, is impactful enough to the average joe that they decide to pick up a game for a genre that they don't normally play. It has been the companions.

Like, not in terms of companion writing. The companions aren't groundbreakingly deep and engaging. But in terms of their sexual appeal. All across the internet, there's people lusting over Shadowheart, Karlach and Astarion. The statistics from Larian themselves show that these 3 are by far the most popular companions in the game too.

Yes, the game has other elements that are good. Which would be why actual RPG fans actually liked the game as well as why non-RPG gamers might actually stick around. But these other good elements aren't going to be attracting many non-RPG gamers to the game in the first placce.

With it also not being unique in this. Those other games that became mainstream? They also featured sexy companions/LI's. Morrigan and Alistair in DAO, Triss and Yennefer in W3, Miranda (I've also seen a fair bit of lust over Thane and Jack too) in ME2, Melina, Ranni, Marika and Malenia in ER...

Which seems to suggest that the main commonality between all these games that did the same mainstream breakthrough, is the primary reason for their larger success over other games in the genre.

I doubt that. People making fan posts on social media are not a representative group of casual players, these are usually the most dedicated (or obssesed) fans. If you engage only with them it might leave the impression this is how it is for most players. Most players are casual gamers, and don't bother obsessing over a game to this extent. I am an older player and don't even have social media where I could make 'fan posts', btw.

Larian likes to post their statistics, but that is just a count of how often players do something in the game. This tells you nothing about why the bought they game in the first place either. I've bought BG3 because I am an old fan of the original series and I like turn based combat. I have tried the romances, because why not, but it would not be (and never was) the deciding factor in buying a game for me.

I think the main reason for BG3 popularity is the one Larian named themselves, their co-op model. This gets the players to invite others, who might not even have heard about the game before. So even if someone has no social media, does not read gaming news or watch yt, or whatever is popular nowadays, they might have heard about BG3 from other people.

Most of my game purchases are made because of recommendations from others. There is just too much sponsored content on social media to follow any trends there.

Not really. Casual players use social media too, and they will post all sorts of nonsense they find interesting.

It's not indicative of playerbases at all, but it's at least something. Something that happens to line up with other factors, like other games that happened to have the same success and share a similar quality as well as the very well known fact of "Sex sells" which is why it has been a marketing strategy since time immemorial.


No, but it shows a trend. A trend that the most gushed over characters in the game are literally the most popular ones by players of the game.

There's only so many trends that line up you can pass off as mere coincidence before you have to start considering that it might actually suggest something.


And you're here on the forums. Meaning that 1) You're an RPG player and 2) You're a fan enough to engage in discussion of said game.

Thus, you are not a non-RPG gamer and thus are not representative of said group of non-RPG gamers. Meaning that just because YOU personally didn't' buy the game because of romances, doesn't mean that NO-ONE at all did.


I doubt that. Many games have co-op systems and are very good games yet have not had massive success like BG3 did.

In addition, I'm skeptical that people would suddenly pick up a game from a genre they don't normally play simply because of co-op. In addition, not all the similar breakout success games had co-op (Only ER does) meaning co-op itself isn't a defining factor of success.


But many games get recommendations. Basically all good games get recommended to others. Yet not all recommended games achieve critical success and enter mainstream playability.

Also, MANY people follow social media and trends. That's why sponsored content on social media exists, because it works. If it didn't work, they wouldn't bother with it... The average joe schmo is not all that discerning when it comes to social media and trends (I mean... Just look at all the brainrot that goes viral. Even dumb things like the tidepod challenge which was so popular that some confectionary brand even made special edition tidepod shaped chocolates to cash in on it...)

I am on these forums because they are very small and get little traffic and so you can have a normal discussion. I used to be also on reddit but that was before they got so many bots pretending to make posts there. If you look at social media, then it might seem like big numbers, because nowadays these overinflated by said bots.

I have been playing crpgs for over twenty years, and romances are not a new invention. I think people enjoy these as additions to a well made game, not the conclusion and centerpoint of one. Romance and sex games would be more popular otherwise. Imo most people play games for the gameplay itself, and being able to play with others adds to that.

Romances can indeed be fun, but so far I only liked one in all games - Aerie in BG2.

I probably would have liked Viconia in BG2, too. From what little I've seen BG2 evil parties are really funny. But I have never figured out how to play BG2 in an evil way that really worked. I really dont want to run around killing random peasants just to keep the reputation low whenever it gets too high, and thats the only way I found to make it work at all.

I already dont like the Bastila romance in Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic because its merely seven dialogues. How is that even a romance ? Its extremely subdued. Playing evil in KotOR is kind of trivial, just whenever you did something good in the regular game you would do the opposite instead in the evil game. You still get the exact same romance though, and still the exact same girl.

Not representative, but a datapoint:

I came to BG3 because I loved Divinity 2 and that one awesome Game Music Video from early access gave me the hint that BG3 was coming by Larian.

I got drawn in by playing a dragonborn, was held by a mix of strong characters, great voices, beautiful romance, sex (yes, that too), and Alfira.

My enthusiasm was stoked by the mix of hard decisions, freedom in movement (I didn’t actually travel the underdark in my first playthrough), beautiful backstories , and the storytelling for a mature audience that did not mince words.

I was completely taken in by the character progression and intense love story of Lae’zel .

There are so many points where the game could have lost me (and in part 3 it almost did), but it managed to keep my enthusiasm burning throughout the game — and that’s why I’m here now. So it was almost always good, and some parts were awesome.

Maybe one more point is that the opening scene already scared away many possible haters: those who willingly play a game where a worm claws its way into your eye won’t be taken aback by the later writing. And this was in the cinematic trailer on the store page, so you’d also not get disgruntled buyers.

I think you guys are overlooking the biggest factor of all: it is a D&D game. By multiple accounts there are now around 15 million people worldwide playing 5e D&D. For years and years after the release of the final expansion for NwN2, the legions of D&D fans were, on every single RPG gaming forum, bemoning and griping about the lack of a *quality* D&D videogame. All through much of the 3.5e years, and all of the 4e and 5e years, we got extremely few D&D videogames being greenlit by WotC, and those very few games were all universally crap. So when finally we get a D&D videogame, and it is in the highly popular 5e of D&D, and it certainly meets any D&D fan's minimal threshold for what is a *good* videogame, then those 15 million D&D fanatics are going to jump on to that bandwagon wholesale. You add in at least 1-2 million additional buyers who are *not* D&D fans, for example people who are fans of Larian and/or the D:OS games and/or RPG fans generally, then you end up with huge sales numbers. The key, though, is that you are starting out with a built-in fanbase of 15 million, a fanbase that is literally desperate for and crying out for a decent D&D videogame, and where satisfying the craving of that fanbase does not take a whole lot. That's BG3.

This, btw, is also why someone else trying to replicate BG3 sales numbers won't work out for them, because BG3 was in a very unique position. Even those legions of D&D fans are not going to jump on to a future D&D videogame the way they did BG3, because they have now received their "good D&D videogame" fix. So another gane like BG3 won't move that needle much at all. I suspect Larian/Vincke understood this, and that was a big part of their decision to move on to something else entirely different. They have gotten all they can possibly get out of making that big D&D videogame the D&D fans have been pining after for years.

Kingmaker, WotR and Solasta are quality DnD games. Arguably even better DnD games than BG3 (Especially since they are more true to actual DnD rules compared to Larian and their excessive homebrew)

So... Why didn't they become as successful as BG3 if the main factor was simply "Being a DnD game"?


Ironically, most DnD players I've heard, are often pining for 3.5e over 5e or at the very least, bemoaning 5e due to it's "Simplicity".

This is a fairly bold prediction! I'll make a totally different one.... If Larian makes another DnD game it will (again) break sales records before it is even released.

Basically, I do not buy the market saturation argument at all. Like it or not, Larian's game was extremely popular, and I wager that if a sequel were announced that it would be met with great popular acclaim.

Larian's decision to move away from BG for their next title probably has more to do with Vinke's quirkiness than anything else, but it may also relate to issues of dealing with Hasbro.

On your first point, sorry but no, those are not D&D games, at least as seen by the vast majority of casual D&D fans. They are D&D-related, but to be true D&D the game must use an official D&D rules edition and an official D&D setting.

On the second point, again I think this sentiment is seen with older D&D gamers who may be present in forums such as this one, but who do not represent (anymore) those millions of casual 5e D&D players out there. The data are undeniable that 5e is by far the most popular D&D edition of all. 5e is what has made D&D mainstream.

I am not making a market saturation argument. I am making a novelty argument. It is about finally getting that good D&D videogame after waiting for it for so long. The first guy who does it (in this case Larian) gets all the benefit from being first. But for the second guy who does it, or the third or fourth, it will be a case of "been there, seen that. I already have BG3 for this. I don't need its clone, or even second cousin."

Furthermore, nowhere am I saying another D&D game, especially one made by the same people who made BG3, would bomb comercially. Not at all. I'm only saying it won't be BG3 big. But it could very well be "normal" big.

Then by those stipulations, BG3 isn't a D&D game. Because it uses Larian's homebrew.

Kingmaker and Wrath of the Righteous are both made based on Pathfinder. Which is more official than anything Larian made up.

While Solatsa is based on 5e (So if it was simply 5e that made BG3 successful... Why not Solasta?)

Heck, even many of the actual things that Larian hasn't made up, they've not implemented correctly according to actual 5e rules.

Hence why I'd argue that the aforementioned games are better D&D games than BG3. BG3 is so loosely based on any D&D rules due to Larian's perversion of them and excessive homebrew. While those other games are far more accurate at representing the rulesets they use.


But the sentiment exists. Thus, it's not as easy to say that all 15 million 5e players are going to be jumping at the chance to play 5e inspired games. There will be plenty of people who are simply playing 5e because their playgroups use it rather than because they actually like it.

Also, I'm not sure that D&D has gone mainstream quite yet. It's still more of a niche hobby in the grand scheme of things (Though Hasbro have been trying to push more generic uses of the IP with things like that recent movie as well as its rather lackluster attempts at lite uses of the IP such as that modern Dark Alliance game)

5e is doing work to make D&D more accessible. But it's not the favourite of many (As far as I've seen) hardcore D&D fans. You know, the ones you mention have been waiting for a good D&D game since NWN2 (Which is 3.5e the same as Kingmaker and WotR) that jumped on BG3...

So according to you nobody has ever played D&D.

Because not in P&P and even less so in computer games anyone ever plays the unmodified D&D rules.

For this stuff I tend to think of the Editions as a way to demarcate the associated eras in Dungeons & Dragons, rather than the specifics of the ruleset. So more like a fast and loose shorthand the same way people speak in generational terms. I mean also how the reference tomes can be used as a signifier, with the specific art direction there to sort of define the age (whatever it is) that's helpful. Of course it's silly to do that, the same way it's silly to split generations into cohorts and then we leave like one half of the Highschool class on a cusp, just cause they happen to born in the Fall half of the school year rather than the Spring. Like say someone born in 1980 vs 1981 a few months later. It's not all that useful outside of marketing/grifting right? Very similar with the Editions in D&D, especially when a new one comes out. I'm mildly annoyed at the new designations with a year/date - 5e 2014 compared to 2024. I think it will get awkward in the same way as generational cohorts, if they just start doing this where every decade we get a new Edition, or every 5 years or whatever. Like as if it were the Olympics? Should have just been a 6th Edition probably, cause 6e is more expansive as a term and just sounds cooler hehe.

Sorry digressing, basic point was, instead of thinking about the DMG or the PHB publication dates, I gravitate more towards the actual campaigns or games or cartoons that are floating around at the same time. So like not just the books, but the modules or the PC games that hit around the same time. BG3 as a capstone for whatever 5e was makes sense, sort of the culmination of that. Again not for the ruleset 5e specifics the way Solasta works, but for all the inuendo or pop cultural stuff or slang code switching that floats along in the aether during whatever D&D Era.

Also there's a lag time on the current moment, always, so it's really the 2020 game as much as the 2023/24 game. it just felt like BG3 tapped into that somehow as an exemplar for the era. Now it is also a shorthand. People gripe about it's meme-bility, but then look at how much heavy lifting that's done too. We have all these new ways to allude to D&D and FR using the special code that we are all now totally conversant in. You can just say Gale-like and Lae'zel-eqsue I get an immediate impression. It can be cartooned and turned into a kind of language. I think that's also why it would have broader appeal, maybe than one might have guessed. The theatrical element just adds to the collective vocabulary there, cause now it can be referenced like a popular movie or television show as much as a game. Also maybe the idea that it might be the last of it's kind, first and last I guess. I think it still has legs, and that helps as well.

If I had to choose crystal balls, I'd probably go for Dwigs. If they made it, thing would sell like hotcakes probably and peeps would tune in for sure. I think someone just missed the boat cause clearly BG3 pretty much was the 50th anniversary. Like they can talk about it now, and sell new books and all the rest, but now it's here and still the only D&D thing I care about at the moment is BG3 heheh. Go figure

But it *feels* somewhat like a pen-and-paper roleplaying game. You can’t do everything, but you can do a lot, and you see and feel the dice roll.

And while D&D reigns supreme in the USA, in Europe there is a lot more variety of RPGs.

At a meeting of mostly p&p roleplayers end of last year, almost all had played BG3, but most didn’t actually play D&D.

So there are a lot more than just the D&D players who are interested in the game due to being a well-made RPG.

Not according to me, according to so called "D&D players"

Since kanisatha said that all these other D&D games were not considered D&D games for due to similar stipulations (Despite these same people apparently liking NWN2 with the same exact situation)

Larian's homebrew makes BG3 feel less like a D&D game and more like a Divinity game. Contrasting to all these other so called "Not D&D" games that actually retain their feel of being a D&D game because they're more accurate to their rulesets.


Which is kind of my point. It being a D&D game is not the main reason for the its popularity.

It being a AAA RPG likely did more than the D&D aspect (Though, much of the AAA budget went into making sexy characters - With mocap, VA, detailed models etc). With likely the Baldur's Gate name also doing more than the D&D aspect (Due to tugging at the nostalgia of anyone who had played a Baldur's Gate game before)

What made the game appealing to me was the sense of atmosphere and deep sense of immersion, it did not feel gamified but rather more simulated in this case respecting the ruleset of its own homebrewed world.
With the excessive use of mocap and talented VA's it of course heightened the sense of humanity in the game so made it that much easier to immerse, not being spoonfed also further weighted it for my brain to just dive in.

Maybe just a lot of people feel it resonated with them for same reasons?

Contrasting this: I recently got a request to run a D&D session and since I do not usually play it, I had to rely a lot on improvising based on stuff I remembered from bg3. That worked very well.

So while these are house rules, they do not make bg3 incompatible.

The best D&D CRPGs I've played since BG2 were ToEE and Solasta. Both were good in part but ultimately disappointing.

BG3 matches some of the better TT session in beats and themes. It has an adventuring day, decisive choices, camp time and party dynamics. It goes wilderness, save the town, save the city. And it had a ready made popular setting with massive lore to draw upon.

It's this last reason why I'm probably not going to buy Larian's next games. I played a lot of DOS and a little DOS2, and it's pretty weak lore wise.

And also, I don't want to learn another system. 5E is a really really good system. I don't want to downgrade. I installed WotR, and encountered systemic analysis-paralysis - that's a game design flaw from the 2000's!

Back to BG3, we've got quality VA, cinematics, better developed romances, quality model design...

Oh, and turn-based. Yes. Please. Single-player, can save anytime, and couch co-op.

There's more. BG3 is overflowing with positive game choices and features that make it very close to the TT experience. Which other game tops that?

First of all: Any term of success, your own life as well, is a mix of own doing and circumstance. Sometimes you're at the right time in the right place (and vice versa). But if this one was purely marketing and hype, it wouldn't be still as popular by now. Clearly people tried. And unlike with Starfield released at the same time, sticked around. Though Larian sure know how to sell their games. Clearly even the bear going viral wasn't a bait&switch. It seemed to have been a bait&promise fulfilled. Namely, that nothing, no matter how crazy, would be off-limits. Including playing through the game as a wheel of cheese.

And whilst the IP was meant to be a BIG part of it from the go (and it was, D&D also fitting their sandbox-y gameplay), they're now a name regardless of what they're doing next. See FromSoftware.



Full VO had been a thing in Original Sin 2 already. As that big time outsold Original Sin 1 already, Obsidian figured they'd to the same (plus ramp up their production value + game quality) and follow: big time outselling PoE1. That didn't happen, but then PoE has always been pitched on (Infinity Engine) nostalgia. Larian never did that. Even with Original Sin 1. Back then, going turn-based combat in an RPG couldn't be seen as merely "outdated", but nostalgic in itself... only the tiniest of indies had still be doing it by the mid 2000s. The notion was that: "Go TB, go bust."

But legend has it that back when conceptualizing Original Sin, it started out with something more action-based, as prior Larian games. Then Swen Vincke was in the shower one morning and supposedly went something like: "Wait a minute! Gazillions of people are playing turn-based games on their mobiles! This doesn't make sense. We always wanted to do this either way, let's do it."

I think in doing so they've aditionally cornered a market that is untapped in on their level of production (outside of maybe a few JRPGs). Whilst people who absolutely detest turn-based anything are vocal: If you think about it, it doesn't get more accessible than this. You don't need any reflexes, you're not bombarded with feedback and you have zero pressure. The market overall may not be as big (who knows). But if you're the only guy around... It also fits their cozy couch (coop) type of experience targeted like a glove. That's not to say that they're gonna make TB games exclusively.

Still, give those guys another ten years, and they may be the most popular RPG studio around -- except maybe, unlike Bioware, without going: "We want Call Of Duty's audience" and throwing it all out. It's not as if BG, in particular BG1, had ever been a game that had much to throw out to begin with. Currently replaying this. Safe for a few AD&D 2e quirks, which are not of Bioware's own making, it's almost as straight forward as Diablo meets Warcraft 2. Quests are mostly FedEx, with rarely multiple angles to take them on too. And then from Jade Empire/Kotor onwards, there was no turning back.


PS: I think Warhorse may be next in line, unless they bust their launch of KCDII. Maybe not in terms of popularity total. But certainly in gearing up a level. And it'd be probably no coincidence that all of these, FromSoft, Larian and Warhorse, started out in a niche and grew out of it over many years, rather than a big studio exec going like: "Ok, how can we double to triple our target audience as quickly as possible? By reaching out to Call Of Duty's, World Of Warcraft's, Gears Of War's audiences perhaps?" https://www.gamesindustry.biz/bioware-10-million-sales-is-a-hit

Err ... Biowares crucial fault was that they wanted to create a MMORPG - "The Old Republic" - but didnt have the necessary funding, so they sold themselves to EA.

Comparing pre-EA and post-EA Bioware with each other is invalid because post-EA isnt an independent company anymore. In fact its now nothing but a brand name. EA simply named all their development studios Bioware, to profit from the good name of pre-EA Bioware.

To make matters even worse, a storyfocused MMORPG turned out to be not such a great idea in the first place. So the success of TOR wasnt even that big.

Anyway, that and nothing else is the reason why Bioware is no more. There is only EA. Greedy, greedy EA.



I guess there is indeed a chance that BG3 will stay Larians most popular and successful game ever. Because of the added value from D&D.

People dislike the round based logic, the spells per day limitation, the simplistic armor class and hitpoints, and the other issues that are all caused by the fact that D&D is designed primarily for pen and paper, not for computer games, and thus has to keep all computations on the most simple level possible.

But despite these design constraints, D&D has a lot of depth and complexity to it, and a lot of decently developed lore in its settings, too.

Designing game rulesystems that work well isnt that easy, even if many people seem to be gloriously ignorant about this problem. On the one hand you want to give the player the flexibility to create an unique character, on the other hand you want the game to be balanced. This is not an easy problem to solve at all.

It's not such a bad idea. I mean, FFXIV is pretty successful and its biggest strength is the banger of a story that it leads you through.

The rest of that game is pretty so-so at best.

My experience of TOR was that the individual class stories were pretty decent. But after these short stories it was generic Star Wars slop where Jedi were all incompetent buffoons and all Sith were unrepentent jerkwads. Which is a complete departure from what Bioware had built up in KotoR 1/2 with their emphasis on Grey Jedi and Darth Malak's (Potential) redemption.


It's not just flexibility vs balance either.

It's being about being complex enough to allow for the flexibility. While still being accessible to people who have limited experience with the genre. (Since targeting only hardcore fans will lead to limited overall success)

Breadth, depth, and detail of the game, while making it approachable.

Plus, some people like me came from the mindless button-mashing let-down of Diablo 4, looking for something with more substance and mental stimulation/brain engagement than that