I've been playing Baldur's Gate...2. I just beat Baldur's Gate 1 and moved right on to 2. Immediately there was a major noticeable change in the scenario design in a very good way when I got to BG2. Dungeons are now puzzles to be solved rather than just marching through mobs of enemies. Chapter 2 lets you go nuts and achieve an explicit objective by any means you like, and it makes at least three of those options pretty obvious. I'm now in Chapter 3 and hope to have finished the game and moved on to BG3 before the PS5 port of BG3 comes out. I'm really enjoying it overall, but sometimes, even on easy mode, it just feels like bullshit. I just took on a boss of a dungeon who was impervious to basically everything I could throw at him, and I just had to reload a previous save and try different spells until I could finally break through his defenses, which I don't think is the greatest game design in the world, given that there was no foreshadowing that I should be prepared for that. Likewise, in that same dungeon, there were vampires and wraiths that can energy drain me and de-level my characters; there's one specific way out of this situation as well, and I once again had to reload an earlier save and just have those spells ready to go to solve that problem after knowing via save scumming what's around the corner. Not only that, but a negative for this game compared to its predecessor is that it respawns enemies in dungeons. So when your only option for forward progress is to rest so that you can equip or cast absolutely critically necessary spells and then you get bombarded by another mob of enemies, it can be super tedious.
Because of scheduling conflicts, I wasn’t able to continue my coop playthrough with a friend until today, so I started a solo campaign, and put in about 40 hours last week.
Because I’ve only seen people falling over themselves, talking about how this game is the second coming of Christ, here a few relatively minor issues I have with it.
The camera is terrible. There’s constantly something in the way and the game isn’t smart enough to know that I don’t really want to move to the stalactite thirty meters above me, just because it was in my way in the middle of the screen. Cramped spaces are probably the worst, walls everywhere, and you have to do constant 180s with the camera to see every corner.
I usually don’t mind inventory management, but I hate it in this game. I’m definitely to blame as well, since I just pick up everything, but it’s always such a pain to organize through everything. The sorting options aren’t that good, and sometimes stuff feels completely random. Also, (unless I’m missing something) why can’t you access the inventory of your companions, that aren’t in your party?
Why is the pathing still ass in this game, it’s the third one Larian made in this style. My characters just love walking into traps (that I’ve discovered) or shit on the ground. It’s just really fun to micromanage four characters, just so they can get safely through a few mines or don’t take a 50 cm shortcut through a patch of fire. I think Divinity had at least an option to pause the game, when you found a trap, so you might have a chance to change the course, but this is missing in this game.
Lastly, I wish your companions were more involved, when you have a conversation with someone. I could be deciding the fate of the world with my choices, but Astarion is just T-posing behind me (not literally, but you get what I mean). At least an occasional line when the “X character approves / disapproves” notification pops up would be nice.
I still have a great time and enjoy the game, but some of these things have existed since the D:OS games, so it’s a shame they still aren’t improved.
I definitely agree about your companions chiming in on conversations. Maybe I've just been spoiled by games like Mass Effect and the like, but the lack of input seems like an obvious problem to me.
Even BG2 had more interjections from your party members than BG3 I think, and I get that it was mostly text but still, that was 23 years ago. In BG3 someone sometimes adds a comment at the beginning or end of a conversation, but it seems like they rarely if ever butt in in the middle.
The whole “X Approves/Y Disapproves” definitely feels a little telling, not showing and I wish they would comment on what’s going on instead, even if it was only recycling a handful of general comments from a pool.
Playing through BG2 now, the interjections are rare and don't really budge the flow of the conversation in any direction. It's a very small amount of color to inform you of their personalities.
Oh it was definitely rare that an interjection would actually change the outcome of the dialogues, but that color and flavor you mentioned does a lot to make characters feel more alive. Same goes for the way party members just randomly start conversations when walking around in BG2.
Worth noting I always play with the Gibberlings Fixpack installed. IIRC the vanilla game is really sensitive about party members having to be physically close to the talking NPC to interject into dialogues.
I’ve been playing a shitload of Valorant. It hits the sweet spot for me between FPS and MOBA. I hadn’t played a tactical shooter before but I’m warning up to it. I still prefer Halo-style battle arena games but this is fun.
Speaking of Halo-like games: I am still playing splitgate even though the game is dead. It’s some of the most fun I have ever had while playing a game with friends.
Powering through Tears of The Kingdom. Just finished up the last temple I had. Probably going to go hunt down a few more shrines for more hearts.
Last week my launch Switch from 2017 started to kick the bucket, displaying a blue screen. I was able to get it booted back up once randomly, which prompted me to immediately resubscribe to Nintendo Switch Online so I could get cloud back up saves for all my games. After that one session, it went back to doing the blue screen and never booted up properly again. I really hate that cloud saves are being a paid functionality and wish it was a little more gracious like with what Xbox offers.
Fast forward a few days, I picked up an OLED Switch and transferred what was available from cloud data. Thankfully TOTK was there but I was missing a number of games I thought I had back up but we’re missing. Out of all, I think I’m most bummed about missing my Smash save data. Having to unlock all of those characters again now too. Everything else I lost I either completed already or had fallen off. I get why Nintendo doesn’t allow saves on the SD card but that really would have saved me some headache.
I shipped the old Switch off to get fixed by Nintendo, received it today but in the end they did not repair and simply gave me another unit, without my old data :(
For some reason I’m on Rogue Legacy 2, cause it’s free with PS Plus Extra. Simple rogue lite, and right now life is kinds stressful so it’s nice to pick up a game that I don’t really need to think about. The mechanics are fun, and it’s been a while since I’ve enjoyed a platformer like this. Also playing Humanity from PA Plus, and it’s excellent. Almost done with it, and looking forward to trying out some of the user-made levels once I’m done with the story mode.
Still playing Baldur’s Gate 3. I really enjoyed Divinity: Original Sin 2 and I’m quite happy that this is an improvement in virtually all respects (the soundtrack being the only letdown so far). I’m especially happy that my biggest problem with D:OS2–the insanely tight level curve–is mostly gone here. It’s still a bit tight in Act 1, but I just started Act 3 and I’ve skipped a entire zone and a half now without being underleveled. I cannot overstate how important it is for roleplaying to not be required to comb the map or do nonsense like getting XP for persuasion successes and then turning around and killing to squeeze out every last point.
There are some negatives here, especially with bugs. Biggest one is Lae’zel simply vanishing from my camp. I found her wandering around a zone later but she wouldn’t join the party even with the dialogue indicating she was. Pretty sure she’s permanently gone now. A bunch of random skills and gear are either outright broken or are inconsistent. Fortunately there are workarounds for that part, but I’m honestly a little surprised to see a game lacking polish like this score as highly as it has in reviews.
I’ve finally moved on with the main story, with the plot progression essentially pausing for 50 hours while I poked around. What’s standing out to me now is that this game is a prime example of “great script writing, mediocre story writing.” The core narrative does hit on some of my personal favorite tropes, like shifting pantheons and otherwise huge stakes, but this story desperately needed more from the antagonists early on. There’s no reason one of them couldn’t have shown up in person to harass the party in Act 1. Merely dealing with underlings of varying narrative quality feels limp. That said, so many of the dialogues are absolutely fantastic, right up there with the best of Bioware’s work that the game is emulating. Better yet, they are paired with engrossing motion capture and impeccable voice acting. Still a shame not to be hearing Alix Wilton Regan in a Larian game, though.
My life has been replaced with Baldur’s Gate 3. I’m partially into Act 2 but keep having to take breaks because the spooky atmosphere and crippling decision anxiety are stressing me out too much to continue playing long stretches.
My buddies and I have been on Battlebit a whole lot. It is the first fps I have played since Halo Reach and BFBC2 that has really grabbed my interest. It is just so good. The proximity and squad speak has been so good it has actually led to me making friends via an online game, which I haven't done simce I was in middle school playing Halo 3
Since Microsoft’s parity issues, I decided to buy Divinity Original Sin 2 to support Larian. I like the stand they made (as opposed to how CDPR did with Cyberpunk), and figured they deserve the cash.
While the graphics could be better, and that it’s at times difficult to focus on such a dialogue heavy game, I noticed that I’ve already spent 20 hours with it and have barely escaped what could be called the tutorial area (fort joy).
I love it. I’m playing 4 custom characters, all necromancers, two melee oriented, two ranged, and it’s a total crap fest of a party, but I’m making it work real well.
Fort Joy is the best and largest part of the game, enjoy it! I guess Fort Joy resembles wher Larian wanted to go with the game, the last 2 acts are not even close in comparison
Add comment