Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Great Steam Numbers

There was an interview with Josh Sawyer where he said he would be up for doing PoE3 if he had BG3’s budget! Microsoft has lots of money, so maybe now that BG3 is a huge hit, they will let him! Just hopefully not in 1st person!

BG3's team was multiple times bigger than the entirety of Obsidian... (Well, at its peak of development, including all contractors, etc., not for six years running) Plus, back with Deadfire their assumption was that, if they would improve on the first game and included full voice overs, they'd sell even more copies than POE1. The same as Larian had done with DOS2 coming from DOS1. But Deadfire didn't do that (the game sold some in the long run, but upon release there was major disappointment at Obsidian HQ). I'd like to see a conclusion to that Watcher's story myself. But a smaller scale game seems more likely -- IIRC several staff a couple years back at also voiced interest in going back. Microsoft seems to support such too (see Pentiment).

Josh Sawyer seems rather picky about his projects in general now, and I can relate to that, as even smaller ones take several years off your life. He's already achieved all his dream projects he wanted to tackle: 1) Working on a D&D game (Icewind Dale+NWN, check). 2) Working on a Fallout Game (New Vegas, check). Plus doing a historical game (Pentiment, check). So... it sounds a bit tongue in cheek also for him to say that he'd do a POE3 -- but only on BG3's budgets. He likely knows that's just not gonna happen. Perhaps even moreso if Avowed becomes a hit. Obsidian management had always voiced the interest of using the IP for a more Skyrim-like project. The thinking on the business side seemed to be very quickly after POE1 was a success that: "Our very own successful IP + Skyrim = $$$$$$$$$$$$."

But who knows.

I wonder why PoE2 sold badly. It’s an amazing game. Not as good as PoE1, which with expansions is straight up 10/10 RPG with best lore and story I ever experienced in gaming. PoE2 continues the great story to a meaningful WTF end, but yeah - you gotta get there. Seems like people either didn’t “get” PoE1 (i know i didn’t, i understood what’s going on only on 2nd playthrough), or they dislike pirates and sunny seas theme?

Shame, both PoEs are masterful RPGs. Developers deserve the money and players deserve PoE3.

It’s sad knowing that abominations like genshin impact made 1.1 billion, and EA’s FIFA dream team micro transactions made 1.6 billion USD in 2022, while works of art “sell badly”. Fuken sad.

I think a big reason behind PoE2 initial failure was PoE1. I personally was super excited for an old school, Infinity Engine throw back until I played it and realized, meh, it’s not that great. I dint have empirical data for it, but I suspect I’m not alone.

I used to love real time with pause, but I think it is hard to pull off right, and PoE didn’t do a good job in my estimation. PoE 1 and 2’s combat had 2 flavors:

1) mindless butcher your way through trash mobs
2) the tragically rare boss that requires you to obsessively pause and unpause to hyper-micromanage your characters. Still easy, but just now more tedious and somehow less fun.
3) absolute cheese metabuilds, trap nonsense

I think there could be a good game out of the serious, but I think that Obsidian really needs to revisit the combat system from the ground up if trr get Ray do a PoE3.

I think PoE2 is beautiful in its setting and probably the best implementation of rtwp, but the theme and writing were major departures from the first game, which came across as fantasy horror at many points. The gods also seemed somewhat flanderized, but...honestly, these are minor quibbles.

I unironically think that PoE2's greatest sin was very likely simply this: Putting two of the hardest fights in the entire game, within the first half hour of gameplay. A baffling design decision. I can only imagine how many people were filtered less than an hour in, and as a result never spoke of the game or recommended it to friends.

I dont think thats true.

Good battle royales are just as hard to make as good games of any other genres.

You have to come up with an unique game concept, you have to find good mechanisms which provide challenge and variance, you have to find answers to different playstyles like sniper and camper that make sure these types of gameplay dont always succeed ...

Not many battle royales have managed longterm success. That seems to be like PUBG and Fortnite and then maybe one or two other titles.

Not to mention that many battle royales are simply just game modes for general shooter games which offer all kinds of other playstyles, too.



But the thing that really kills battle royale games are the cheaters. An unsolved problem that no game company has found a way to prevent or at least limit.

They are really the equivalence of goldsellers in MMORPGs, only much worse, and much harder to fight.

Yup. I posted this bit of news in another thread here. I don't want to get my hopes up and then have them dashed. Already went through that here with BG3. So I'm trying very hard to keep my hopes in check.

Totally agree, @ladydub!

Avowed would need to be a big success for Microsoft to even consider spending this kind of budget on PoE3. And unfortunately, I get the feeling Avowed may turn out to be the opposite of a success. Which is a shame, I really liked Obsidian, but everything they've done since FNV (except Pentiment, but it's a side project) was a lesser (PoE2) or bigger (PoE) disappointment, that led me to skip their other games (The Outer Worlds). From what I saw so far, Avowed looked like Skyrim... a game from 2011... I don't think I want to play another Skyrim in a less interesting setting.

Hey, Pillars Of Eternity was a game that looked like a game from 1999! And it was all the better for it! 2011-ish was a pretty crap era for RPGs. No wonder that the indie and crowd funding revolution was about to burst.

Skyrim was certainly the main inspiration at one point. https://www.pcgamer.com/obsidian-ceo-id-love-to-turn-eternity-into-more-like-a-skyrim-product/ However, apparently, they've rebooted it since (probably because it didn't work out, that is the big open world). It seems to become more like an Outer Worlds in Eora. Ideally, what it still has of Skyrim will turn out to be a better version of it. As New Vegas was to the overall pretty mediocre Fallout 3.

New Vegas to me was a glimmer of hope in a pretty shallow era of RPGs in general (EVERYBODY going action-adventureish with simplified character systems, combat and a push for spectacle over depth). It was basically the actual successor to Fallout 2, just with a different engine and tech. However, it's been almost 15 years now since that was made too... Additionally, if Avowed actually becomes a huge success, the focus is more likely going to be on a sequel to that, rather than on PoE.

You can bet that the initial "spark" that (which came from Obsidian's management) was all about the money. With Pillars Of Eternity, Chris Parker, Faergus Urquhart needed to be convinced that this was the way to go. With Avowed, not so much. A more Skyrim-like product= hopefully more cash. But for as long as that means they can still keep making stuff like Pentiment, more money to them!

Devs should be really careful with Avowed and also DA:4. Starfield is proof that procedurally generated janky outdated mechanics and 2002-style combat just aren’t gonna cut it anymore.

On the other hand I don’t know how a serious dev like obsidian or bioware can make something as bad as starfield, but I won’t be surprised.

What really surprised me about both PoE games is how poorly was their setting sold. I don't say there are no good ideas behind it, or the world history is bland. Unfortunately you learn most of the lore through encyklopedia, instead doing so through quests and exploration (like eg. in Dragon Age games). PoE2 was better in that regard, but there, even if I finished the game, I don't remember a single NPC or location from it. Seriously, nothing stuck with me. None. I remember more from PoE, the game I haven't even finished.

So, unless Obsidian finds a solid way to interest me with Eora in Avowed, I feel it will be yet another Obsidian disappointment for me.

Yes, although I think that PoE lore and story is stellar, I do agree that you had to dig for it on your own, there was a lot to absorb actually, and if you as a player did not commit to it - you would just miss it all. Not a good way to present it in a game. But I do remember moments from PoE2... especially that sequence on the bridge during the godhammer bomb explosion and Waidwen. I also liked the subplot of searching for the lost city to find the "wheel". But again, I dived deeper into PoE lore than most, so it was good for me. I expect most players wouldn't care as much - and it is absolutely the game's fault.

Obsidian aren't known for making flawless combat or generally smooth gameplay... as a result I don't really expect much of Avowed, despite my personal interest in Eora, - first person open world from Obsidian screams "janky". Outer Worlds was boring.

Dragon Age 4 on the other hand... for some reason I can't help but have huge expectations for it. I think Dragon Age Inquisition was amazing, but I specifically focused only on main story, lore and quests, completely ignoring the dumb MMO checkboxes - and it turned out to be a decent RPG.

Sometimes I think the "look" of the game gets to much focus. To often we are seeing modern games that look amazing but used those incredible graphics as a crutch to hopefully make people not notice lackluster storylines, abysmal play mechanics or any other short coming.

We have seen over and over that amazing graphics do not make amazing games with many great games having CRAP for graphics. For an RPG the focus needs to be story/lore and then great game mechanics, with graphics far down the list of most important feature.

I really liked both PoE 1 and 2. Clearly there is *some* built in audience for PoE 3. So... I wonder if the correct call on this is to make it on a small budget rather than a large one.

If you make a game on BG3 budget you'd better sell it like BG3. Maybe they could do that with PoE3, but I would not bet that way. On the other hand, PoE 3 might succeed wildly as a low budget niche game. Ditch the voice acting and possibly even scale down the graphics. Tell a story without all the bells and whistles of a AAA game. I would buy it.

I think there is a much bigger casual audience of people who want to play sprawling RPGs that don’t look like ass than the dedicated, hardcore CRPG fans that only care about story and mechanics above all else.

Games are a visual medium. Presentation matters.

Sure, but the audience for video games is large enough that niche games can make money. They don't all have to be AAA games with AAA graphics.

Yeah, but I don’t think MS bought Obsidian to make niche games that are only just “making money.” They want AAA releases that will move XBoxes off of shelves, so that is the direction they will push Obsidian.

That probably means that we don't get PoE 3.

Probably, but not necessarily. Everybody in the industry took notice of BG3. It shows this model can be successful. That makes it seem less risky. If anybody can convince MS to give them the budget to make this sort of game, it’s Obsidian.

I am hoping now that BG3 was so successful it will change from lots of rpgs trying to be Skyrim to lots of rpgs trying to be BG3!

He said in the interview that he would like to design encounters around being turn-based if he did PoE3.

Another thing I would like them to take from BG3 if they did a AAA PoE3 is pacing of quests and main story. For me PoE2 had huge problems with pacing and too much emphasis on factions. BG3 lets you go where you want but still has great pacing and is story focused.