To preface this, I have well over 2000 hours in BG3 alone, 5.5 runs. I've played pretty much every top tier CRPG available.
I just don't enjoy evil runs. I play video games because life is dark and challenging enough; I want to lose myself in a space where I can look forward to a happy ending, or at the very least a bittersweet one. Misery and relentless darkness just hold no joy. I like being the scrappy hero who romances Morrigan and Shadowheart, who gets a kick out of redemption arcs and not abusing the weak.
We see in forums and social media people asking all of the time for darker games or more evil play-throughs, or more misleading and anxiety ridden choices. From the proliferation of these posts, it is easy to think that it is a majority of players asking for this, but my suspicion is that it is far from the truth.
People who loved BG3 or DOS2 don't complain about the game being not dark enough, they talk about what they liked; the particular facets that made them happy, and usually those aspects are the ones that make the game fun, or rewarding, or uplifting. Indeed, most of the Embrace Durge runs I have read regret or at the very least struggled with the choices and consequences of said choices. I don't believe I have read a single person reporting they would do another Embrace Durge or evil run because their last run just wasn't dark enough, or they really enjoyed it. Most of the posts I have read are the opposite; the poster or commenters say their run was not enjoyable, with the clear implication they would not do it again.
People who post about wanting darker runs or more evil choices are complaining. People who are happy with BG3, who think Larian did an exemplary job balancing darkness and light, aren't going to tend to post complaints. They are going to post congratulatory and positive experiences, which are far less memorable *because people doing good things and enjoying doing good things is common*. We are the majority. People who want evil games are, in my suspicion, merely a very vocal minority, and I'd be willing to bet a small minority as well.
I just hope Larian uses what people actually played; the roles, the 'alignments', the romances, the alliances, as the basis for balancing Divinity, rather than listening to the squeaky wheels. BG3 is about as dark as I would want any game to get, in all honesty.
If people want more fleshed out evil run options, fine, but just don't make the entire world darker and more miserable for the majority of us who want games that let us experience joy and an aspect of being a hero in a real life where being a hero is ever more challenging and rare.
I would be willing to bet that for every player who makes more than one dark run, there are 100 who are absolutely doing Embrace Hero runs.
In short, Larian, I hope we can look forward to saving the weak, winning over the girl (or guy), and feeling like the hero for the all too short hours we are able to spend in the worlds you create for us.
Why do you think talk about wanting darker game means that players want to be more evil? Most players want to be a hero, but in a darker world. If anything that makes it feel much more heroic. Compare to something like Mass Effect Andromeda, where almost entire game was so lighthearted that it did not feel that meaningful or impactful to be a hero like it felt in previous Mass Effect games.
Think Divinity Original Sin 2, which is darker setting than BG3. Player was still a hero in it, and it actually felt less dark than BG3, but that is largely due to how it was represented and less advanced graphics and cinematics. New game will likely have little less whimsical characters like Sir Lora, and it will have more advanced graphics and cinematics making representation feel much more impactful, but story itself might only be little darker than before. Larian also does not want it to be all nihilistic and it will have their usual humor, and you can still be a hero and save it all, which i think everyone including Larian expects most players to do.
But i also hope that evil runs are done a lot better than before, they have often been lacking even in Larian games. That is also big reason why many don't do evil playtroughs, they are too often just asshole simulators rather than something interesting.
