It’s been over twenty years since the release of Baldur’s Gate II: Shadows of Amn. There’s been spin offs and enhanced remasters, but it’s been nearly a quarter century with no follow up. Given that both original Baldur’s Gate games were adored by critics and fans alike, creating a worthy follow up after this amount of time would be a daunting task, especially for a studio different from the original developers. After their success with Divinity, Larian Studios decided to role the dice with creating a sequel. After six years in the making with almost three in Early Access, Baldur’s Gate III is now complete and ready to be experienced in full.
Before getting too far into Baldur’s Gate III, it might help to understand exactly what type of game it is. Baldur’s Gate III is a turn-based role-playing game, but is using the rules from Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition. More specifically, it tries to recreate the experience of playing tabletop D&D. This places a great deal of emphasis on exploring the game world and interacting with its numerous inhabitants. There are set objectives, but how the player chooses to achieve them, or not achieve them, isn’t set in stone. There are multiple ways to accomplish the same goal, and like its tabletop origins most outcomes are left to chance with the roll of the dice. This isn’t the first game to attempt to recreate the tabletop experience, but it’s arguably the one that executes that goal the best.
Like Divinity Original Sin 2, there are several ready-made Origin characters that the player can choose to play as or create their own custom character. Origin characters will appear during the game so the player can potentially have them join their party. Or kill them. It’s really up to what the player wants to do. Creating a unique character can be a daunting task as there’s no shortage of player choice. There are 11 races, 12 classes and 46 subclasses. Additionally, the player can also multiclass their character. The drawback to doing so is it will prevent that character from getting the highest level abilities for a given class, but they would have the advantage of having great skills from a variety of classes. The progressive nature of Baldur’s Gate III allows the character in choosing their gender with a non-binary option. And also like Cyberpunk 2077 the player has the option where they can customize certain parts of the anatomy that are not customizable in most games.
Tabletop role-playing games rely heavily on dialogue and this isn’t any less true in Baldur’s Gate 3. The voice acting is excellent across the board, from background conversations among minor NPCs to the narrator that fills a similar role to Dungeon Master. The conversations between major characters and events is as well written and dynamic as would be expected, but what’s most impressive is the same attention to detail was also given characters who serve minor background roles. Some of the most entertaining dialogue actually comes from animals, so it’s encouraged to have at least one character have access to an ability to converse with wildlife. Dialogue trees are plentiful, and the choices in how a player can respond are expanded based on what type of character they are playing. Typical options for discussion are present as is the option to resort to violence as a way to handle things. Beyond those options character abilities based on either race or class present themselves, such as intimidation, smooth talking or even mind control. Those skill-based attempts are based on a role of the dice, but even failure can result in worthwhile interactions which adds excitement to most encounters.
Well-written NPCs help make the world feel more alive, but one area where the writing shines is in the interactions between party members. As is the case with many RPGs, the party members have banded together because they share a common goal. Their companionship is based on a need for one another to reach said goal and not because they like each other. The player’s actions can gain approval or disapproval from party members, but rarely will anything gain approval from everyone. But getting beyond interpersonal relationships within the adventuring party each character is nuanced and highly developed. Intraparty conflict is a common theme, at least during my playthrough, but as the adventure progressed certain characters warmed up to my character more than others and their motives for their journey became more apparent. Certain characters had rather unusual needs that required addressing (Gale immediately springs to mind), but some of the particulars of those will not be spoiled here.
When a studio takes several years between releases, it’s difficult not to draw comparisons to their earlier work. Divinity: Original Sin 2 is the game that most often sprung to mind during the review period. Partly because they’re both Larian games and partly because there are a lot of similarities in their gameplay. Baldur’s Gate 3 allows players virtually free reign over how they want to progress through it. If a player doesn’t like a party member there are actions they can take where they don’t have to deal with them anymore. NPC encounters aren’t scripted in a manner where there’s a right course of action; any action can be taken so long as the player can live with the outcome. This world of Baldur’s Gate III lends itself well to such moral freedom because most characters aren’t presented as simply good or evil, but merely acted in their own best interest. The player can choose to be a paragon of virtue or a cutthroat oath breaker; it simply matters what play style suits their interest. Does a player wish to act diplomatically in area to protect it from goblin invaders or do they wish to sympathize with the goblins and raze it to the ground?
The game begins with the player being held prisoner on the Nautiloid, a tentacly airship. Held prisoner by mind flayers, the player discovers that they have been infected with an ocular parasite that will eventually transform them into an illithid. The player is able to break free and begin their escape thanks to an attack by githyanki dragon riders. During the escape the player can encounter a couple characters that can join their party, should they so desire. This is also where one of the first major choices of the game presents itself when they find a prisoner who’s body has seen better days. The player is presented with the option to try to free the prisoner, ignore it or kill it. Should they choose to free it, do they befriend or commit an act of cruelty on it? The game will progress with whatever choice the player makes, though certain choices might make the journey easier. Later in this introductory area there’s another such decision regarding a battle. Does the player wish to join in the battle and possibly acquire useful spoils of war or do they wish to take advantage of the fact the conflict doesn’t concern them and continue their escape?
It’s easy to get caught up in exploration and neglecting the main quests. Quest markers on the minimap will point the player in the general direction of where they should be headed, but great effort was put into making each area feel like its own living world. Hours were spent just in Emerald Grove learning about the ways of the druids and plight of the tieflings. The time spent there wasn’t boring, but there was such a vast world to explore outside of it with so many more interesting locations such as the Underdark and Arcane Tower. Prior to launch it was predicted that a single playthrough can take 75-100 hours, but this is a conservative estimate. It isn’t difficult to whittle away an excessive amount of time exploring the world and taking on all the side quests.
Battles are turn-based affairs and every encounter has the potential to be fatal. There aren’t random encounters and with a relatively low level cap the player can’t simply grind their way to a state of being overpowered. Learning how to use terrain along with buffs and debuffs to one’s advantage helps, but more importantly it’s best to gain an understanding of each character and what their different actions can contribute to turning the tide of battle to a favorable outcome. Battles are challenging but are engaging, which makes victory ever more so rewarding. But this is also where keeping up to date on save files comes in handy, because as any seasoned Dungeons & Dragons player knows, regardless of how good one’s equipment might be or brilliant their tactics, the role of the dice is ultimately what determines success or failure.
Baldur’s Gate III is a game that requires hundreds of hours to experience everything it has to offer. Even though a complete playthrough can be a huge time commitment, multiple playthroughs are required to experience everything it has to offer. Maybe the player took the heroic route and tried to save as many “good” settlements as they could. Perhaps they want to play again where they decide to destroy the places they saved and leave no survivors. Maybe they resisted temptation for a vast source of a power because it seemed like the virtuous thing to do or were fearful of the price they would have to pay for it. Maybe next time they want to see what happens if they give in. There are many choices the player is confronted with throughout the adventure, some of which can have drastic irrevocable consequences. But these variable outcomes are part of the charm. Progressing through the story has the level of predictability as a tabletop campaign, and with so many different ways to address every problem, a second playthrough of Baldur’s Gate III could be radically different than the first. Variety in and of itself does not make a game great, but because of how masterfully-crafted this title is, playing through each potential scenario is an absolute joy.
During the initial portion of the review process there were a few game crashes and technical issues, but these subsided after the patch that was launched on its release date. After that everything went smoothly. The framerate never stuttered or dropped even in 4K resolution. The artistic direction does an amazing job of creating the Forgotten Realms world where the creative design is matched by the technical quality of the graphics, especially during the cutscenes. The orchestral soundtrack composed by Borislav Slavov is perfectly befitting to the game events, and also is of such a remarkable quality where the music would be pleasurable to listen to outside of the context of the game. Games like this are generally thought of as being mouse and keyboard games. While that control scheme is the most intuitive and preferred method of control for this, the developers streamlined control integration in such a way where playing it on Steam Deck is just as enjoyable as on a proper PC. Note that playing on Steam Deck requires the user to run compatibility Proton Experimental and the graphic quality does take a hit due to the lower resolution. The autosave feature is not as generous as it is in many other recent games, so making frequent saves is advisable as depending on autosave can easily result in losing over an hour of progress.
Closing Comments:
Baldur’s Gate III had extremely high expectations set for it and has exceeded them. Not only is it a contender for Game of the Year in a year with many exciting titles, but it’s a continued evolution of what CRPGs are capable of achieving, building upon the legacy of the original Baldur’s Gate games mixed with some of the more contemporary gameplay elements found in Larian’s more recent games. The result is a masterpiece of a game that raises the bar for the genre. Baldur’s Gate III excels in every area, from music to graphics to story to gameplay. It’s a difficult task to recreate the open-ended possibilities of tabletop gameplay within a video game, but this is arguably the best attempt at doing so to date. Baldur’s Gate III is one of those rare games that’s nearly flawless in its execution and should be experienced by every RPG fan.
