Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Patch 6 is AAA title worthy already

I think I've always expected this game to have certain AAA qualities, based on the interviews and the amount of money and people hinted to be working on this game. It's almost the cost of entry to the AAA tier nowadays.

With that said, here are some things I'm impressed by Larian so far (which aren't necessarily AAA traits, just well designed traits):

1) Reactivity in the EA has been top tier so far, considering the game has cutscenes and voiced lines for almost anything (which I'd say is a cool feature of AAA titles). What I like most about BG3's reactivity so far is that it's pretty organic and very much NOT in your face. There is a tendency for CRPGs to make reactivity very structured and systematic (i.e. choices and consequences A, B, and C is very clearly laid out for you). Whereas BG3 does a better job emulating the openness of a Table Top game by being a bit more subtle about this.

2) Quest and Encounter Design - this is one area where I think Larian has done a good job going beyond the normally very rigid and hand-held branching we see in many other RPGs. While strict objectives do exist for quests, for many of them they're designed in a way where you can theoretically take multiple approaches, and interact with various different systems to accomplish your goals. A bit like the Deus Ex "All Roads lead to Rome" approach to quests, which I very much love and haven't seen as much in CRPGs. Hopefully this is kept up in the later acts of the game.

totally agree. baldurs gate 3 is the perfect storm. everything is perfect for my tastes!

<AAA worthy>...lol. For whatever thats worth in 2021.

Is this post ironic or are my missing something? Unless youve been gaming in a cave the last couple of years <AAA> nowdays is pretty negative in tone. Its a badge of bad quality and rehash game design, greedy corps, lack of content, lootboxes, season scam pass, failed promisses, marketing scam, day 1 patch bugs calore etc...
Really hope Larian doesnt aim to become a <<<AAA>>> dev.

I think the top games and most influencial of the last decades has mostly been INDIE devs, and some Mid size studio. And a very few <AAA> titles from the <BIG> boys.
Hollow knight, Undertale, Hades, Stardew Valley, Terraria, Disco Elysium, The sexy brutale, Celeste, Fez, Enter the gungeon, Isaac, Eastward, Axiom Verge, Steamworld series, Banner Saga series, Bastion, Cave story, Crosscode, Cuphead, Hotline Miami, Dead cells, Death road to canada, Dust, Katana zero, Owl boy, Rivals of the Aether, Transistor, Downwell, Factorio, Wargroove etc etc etc....

Agreed.

AAA means a whole lot of nothing these days, other they maybe some flashy graphics.

I expect AAA stuff myself, its after all their third game of this kind.