Originally Posted by robertthebard
Originally Posted by Sozz
you shouldn't really compare BG3 to BG2 yet. But as far as introductions go, the introduction of Irenicus and Imoen and dungeon crawl to the Promenade are head in shoulders above our brief jaunt through hell and all the vague Absolute stuff.
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At this stage, I'm not sure a "fair" comparison can be made. Even with potential plot holes of "but you were dead in BG 1", we still knew who these companions were. We had all the background information we needed, in the intro, to fall right back in "where we left off", even if it wasn't really where we left off. In this case, we're closer to what we had in BG 1 instead. We're learning who we are, and who the companions are, as we go. Gameplay mechanics aside, this is exactly the same situation we were in during the intro to BG 1. Sarevok wants to kill us, but why? Who is Sarevok? What's up with Naskell? All things that have parallels here, to one extent or another. The problem being, since this is EA, we're not going to get any satisfying answers. We are, after all, not getting enough of the game to have any chance at getting them. I'm not "blown away" by the current iteration, but, I didn't expect to be. I expected to get something along the lines of what we got, since it's literally for testing out things, and seeing what does and doesn't work. My interest is piqued, but that's about it, so far. I've made a conscious decision to avoid playing overmuch, because I don't want to burn out on it before release, and considering my history with the franchise, I really want to love it, but it's too early to tell, right now.

I agree with you, but it's also true that Baldur's Gate II was created to be accessible as a first game more than as a sequel, a short coming of a lot of multipart games (for people in for the long haul anyway). So for comparison I do think we can look at the intros of Baldur's Gate 1, 2 and 3 and how they do a few things, such as setting up your character, the world and your reason for adventure.
I think Baldur's Gate II's intro has the most distinct setting of the three, and does the best at tying your adventure with your narrative, Baldur's Gate 1 is the least linear when it starts out so it does the least to push you into its main story, which depending on how much of a sandbox player you are might make it the best of the three.

I too am happy with Baldur's Gate 3 but I find that the introduction does a lot to undercut the tension it starts to build up from its start being experimented on by Mind-Flayers, that ticking clock I was talking about. Something I think Baldur's Gate 3 does better in its first act than any of the other games is subtly cluing you in that all your companions have distinct pasts and are probably tied to the main story more than they know, or are letting on.

But the evolution of the NPC since the 90s has been pretty big.

Last edited by Sozz; 10/04/21 09:42 PM.
dumb, pseudo-intellectual and polite homophobe