Baldur's Gate 3 | A Newcomer's Review

[Music] balers Gate 3 may be one of the most unexpected and absolutely astounding games released in the overwhelmingly stacked list of 2023 titles released on August 1st on PC and a month later on PS5 balers gate thrust players into an expansive world of D and and one of the most complex experiences I have ever engaged with awoken in the clutches of a t faed mine flare your avatar is implanted with the brain consuming athid tadpole aboard the world Crossing nautiloid ship the flares wreak havoc consuming Souls as it travels with a magnificent entry Red Dragon Riders burst through the sky and engage with the ship causing massive damage freeing you and the horde of beings inside the ship a fierce battle ensues between dragon and nautiloid as you fight to gain control of the ship from the inside when you finally reach the master control controls you're able to warp the ship back to the land of fyon but not before critical damage sends you and the ship crashing to the ground in the final second a mysterious energy catches you saving you from imminent Peril distraught upon waking you begin the hunt to remove the Elitha tadpool from your brain at its hard bers Gate 3 is a sci-fi fantasy third person RPG Adventure game up front and at its core bg3 looks to Dungeons and Dragons the infamous tabletop role playing experience and its current 5e rule book world and lore for much of the source material and systems in the game right off the Jump bg3 defines itself as a serious RPG with one of the most extensive and detailed character creators I have ever used the options are incredibly Dynamic making your character look as unique Sinister or downright goofy as you like it is here that you also choose your class and race balers Gate 3 has a wide variation of class types and races that offer unique spell options cantrip Transformations and more if you're like me you came expecting your Basic Spell cters and barbarians but were met with a colorful array of options like the Druid Monk and the bar many of the choices that you make in the character creation will offer story world and dialogue options throughout the game which make your choices feel a bit weighted here it was also here that I learned that having some DND history will serve you well as you understand the variations between sorcerers warlocks and wizards and also kind of understanding the social impacts of selecting a Dr or a tling as I learned it also helps give you an idea of what to expect in the leveling structure and what your character would ultimately play like having that background being a d andd Noob I had a lot to learn what felt like very quickly alers Gate 3 supports both mouse and keyboard with point and click movement or full controller support in this review I never used a controller what the is this piece of I've seen from secondhand experience the radio menus and personally it seemed like way too much in a game with a myriad of goods to pick up and menus I'll say outright if dialog in story through communication and reading is a negative for you this game is going to be incredibly hard to digest the core gameplay Loop to balers gate is pretty simple but its complexity lies in the choices that you make in the sometimes overwhelming world world as you travel and uncover the mysteries of fyon you will meet a horde of potential friend and foe alike as you can expect or you're learning to your utter disappointment conversation is at the backbone of balers Gate 3 and a tool that can more often than not ease tension and build bonds versus engaging in violence but honestly that's kind of the beauty you can just wildly attack whoever you want really nine times out of 10 the game will certainly punish you for this but it's an option in engaging with people you start to piece together rather quick that the most important people and NPCs in the world all resonate with the tadpole in your brain creating this telepathic link of sorts when you engage with them but that's not gospel so make sure you're talking to everybody you'd be surprised what people have to say the core companions you meet along the way will not only be important for filling out your party but for expanding the story as you go along not everyone can join you but you'll meet folks along the way that will join your Camp if your party is full balers Gate 3 takes a big page from the DND Source material in the form of long and short rest short rests are chances to regenerate quick HP and can be done on the Fly however long rests are useful mechanically but also fundamental to character relationships individual quests and romance long rest utilizes camp supplies that you loot from around the world to regenerate all spell slots and health of the party the game offers no consequence to Long rest and it often times rewards in cutscenes and dialogue options the camp itself is also very dynamic as laran has created a plethora of unique camp locations for you to explore that freshens up the core function of the game and are overall just really nice to look at it's important to note how important dice rolles are to D and and subsequently balers Gate 3 with the system players are offered a glimpse into the workings of the backend RNG that takes place in most games with mostly fun but sometimes incredibly stressful dice roll it often often times feels like the fate of your decisionmaking is at the hands of this sometimes unforgiving system but I found myself positively shocked at the amount of agency and options that were available to me in the dialogue that we would ultimately roll to decide there are some Saving Grace options if you feel like the roles are consistently stacked against you which was nice but it's certainly hard to feel like the game isn't against you leveling and loot are a pillar to RPGs and balers Gate 3 is no exception a world sprawling with mountains of loot weapons to be formed and secrets to unfold bg3 has the carrot on a stick system perfected and I loved it I think larion has created one of the most player focused Inventory management systems I've ever experienced once you have your precious Goods while your character has a weight value and can become encumbered if you're a loot Goblin like me at any point you can opt to just send your loot to Camp from anywhere in the world honestly one of the coolest design choices I have ever experienced coupled this with the seamless management of your entire party's inventory The Staggering number of items in your pocket becomes manageable rather quickly in terms of leveling I wouldn't expect to blow through levels becoming super powerful off Jump Street leveling is a slow process that requires a lot of interaction exploration and questing is going to yield quite a bit of experience but I'd be lying if I didn't say that the biggest breaks for my playthroughs came through with combat balers Gate 3 uses a turnbas combat style a style that for many is an almost automatic turnoff I grew up in the world of turn-based RPGs so my love has always been there and it felt good to be back in a game that really develops the turn-based gameplay but learning to battle is complex juggling how squishy and downright weak you are in the beginning tactics and placements are taught early and established as a mus have for Success there are a ton of D andd terms to learn between status and effects but even what your basic functions and skills are you must navigate your character through the battlefield based on their speed or the distance of their movement and then determine what types of actions bonus actions and any extra class actions or skills that you want to use in a turn I feel learning this structure was the toughest for me personally I had to consistently tell myself to slow down and just be patient running in and playing like any other game often met with my demise as you develop you learn how the elements in the game interact and quite frankly how the environment can be used in your favor also that each member of your party should be viewed as an independent unit versus grouping everyone together not to say that you can't just have a group of barbs back to back wrecking everything but the more Dynamic I thought about the battlefield and my team's composition the more I found myself dividing and conquering I cannot forget about what makes balers Gate 3 such a top tier experience it's something many developers glaze over but laran heard the message and decided to do what they do best and make it the best best experience possible Animal Companions baby throughout the journey you have the potential to meet pet and play with some lovable Animal Companions while not necessary these small touches make an already highly immersive World feel Lush with experience and only slightly creepy when you have to speak with animals I would be remiss if I didn't mention the romance potentials and the unique quest lines of the main Companions of the game balers Gate 3 might be one of the most rambunctious games ever normally in other games your companions have thoughts and ideas maybe some quests here and there and seld them the chance for romance in balers Gate 3 each companion can be romanced with love and longing or for a simple one night fleeing each of the main companions also have unique dialogue reaction to world events game actions and even some scenes in the story if they're along for the ride at the right time plus their own unique story quests alers Gate 3 is one of the most complex games I've ever played but I think complexity is something that varies for everyone in this experience and a big part of that is your knowledge of d and d and of course your experience with other laran titles the rules of DnD so heavily Inspire bg3 that understanding DND rules character builds leveling and the like really gives you a leg up in the world of this game in the early game there were moments that felt completely uninviting and downright frustrating as I was playing balers gate I couldn't shake this feeling that I was learning two games at once the overall structures and systems of DnD seen through Lan's eyes while also learning the mechanical functions of this game this would of course be something I grew to love but made for a tough transition as this was my very first balers gate laran game and one of less than five of my one-off campaigns in my 32 years of life walers Gate 3 is a massive threea you could probably clear the core story in maybe 50 to 60 hours but you'd not even scratch the surface of what the world off offers each of my friends that I talk to about balers Gate 3 tell me about some of the same scenarios that we've experienced and how they have played out 100% differently and I think that's one of the greatest elements to this game player agency is at the heart of an RPG and they're just isn't a game that gives you agency like bg3 I found myself asking can I do it and 95% of the time the game met me with how do you want to do it I know I'm missing so many elements to discussing this game play play but it honestly feels impossible to make a digestible review and touch on the Myriad of systems mechanics and nuances balers Gate 3 offers to players balers Gate 3 is a good looking game I played on alra setting through the whole experience and boy did it treat me well when panning about the Mountainside Cliff or navigating the Wisp of Dark Shadows that engulf your party or the brimming city of balers Gade this game is a visual Feast up close and from afar your character build options are prevalent in the open world and throughout all conversation in the cinematics I think one of the biggest elements to note is how smooth this game runs with a couple caveats each area is quite large and it handles a swing from an aerial combat camera to Conversation Pieces seamlessly the faces and mouth animation are truly top tier I think this game shines its brightest when in dialogue which is not surprising considering how often you're pulled into talking to another person the diversity in character models is truly amazing and in conversation you get to see Lan's character builder at work seeing the diverse amount of species and NPCs throughout the game all of this to say the game is loaded with other things to look at other than faces the environments are wonderful and filled with beauty even in the most foul places you'll find yourself pleasantly surprised when engaging the set pieces in combat most of the environment can be interacted with in and out of combat but make for some spectacles when you can attack them let's just cut to the chase blowing stuff up looks sick and it looks as good as it feels spellcasting and the horde of unique skills at your disposal all have lovely animations and effects never did I feel like a spell or interaction was just all right the particles and lighting always felt natural unless the skill is specifically meant to be unnatural or over the top Transformations are always flashy and I love that because I want the world to know when I transform into an Al bear with all that said I think it's fair to say that this is one of the most overwhelming uis I've ever seen scene to be totally honest in the opening weekend seeing menus and players bags loaded with stacks of items gave me secondhand anxiety and nerves about feeling lost when I started my playthrough learning the UI and how to organize yourself your companions and your spells feels like its own miname to be fair this feels like a criticism I have no real solution for so therefore take it with a grain of salt when you can interact with 90% of the objects in the world and have a Spellbook larger than an Applebee's menu it's bound to get a little visually hectic breaking objectivity here I think that balers Gate 3 is going to sweep Awards this season I have no doubt in my mind but if it were to only win in one category it would be the audio absolute chef's kiss balers Gate 3 has some of the best music and sound design in games I've ever heard I feel overwhelmed not knowing where to begin the overall design as you navigate the world is astounding spells traversal the environments the Ambiance the sounds of combat art to be truly marbled each new place whether a massive area dungeon Etc has its own feel and sound profile making each location feel distinct transitioning from the mud covered river banks to a wooden cabin sound Dynamic and transition flawlessly rooms also feel and sound like they have volume and depth when your character muddles to themselves empty large rooms have an echo compared to tightly packed and furnished bedrooms your characters are also aware of their surroundings when in stealth your manile party chatter creeps to a faint whisper which I just note as an awesome little touch that leads me to the voice acting the acting cast for this game is gargantuan if voice acting is something you look for with dialogue heavy games look no further I was honestly shocked with how many unique voices and identities the game is filled with each of the main Companions and the villains of the game have so much life their depth is reflected in how much you engage with them but their tone demeanor emotion that all comes through masterfully and and evolves as your relationship with them continues to expand but I feel all of this just comes together with the absolutely undeniable best soundtrack of the year and one that I think will go down to gaming history I'd be lying if I suggested I wasn't just blasting the soundrack while writing this and the fact that down by the river essentially lives in my brain my blood my body rentree for all eternity speaks volumes to the quality of the performance don't get me started on the Final Act of r holy they did not have to go so hard for that song all this fangirling aside I firmly believe that music helps Define a game balers Gate 3 will become a new standard in musical performance in games that I hope we see Rivals to in the future I'm going to skip a dedicated difficulty section because I feel I've kind of touched on that but in brief summary if you know nothing about D and D like I do and turnbas combat isn't your Forte this game is going to be tough I basically never stopped learning all the way through the game but I truly feel like learning balers Gate 3 and committing to playing even when it felt very unfun had a huge payoff as this game has slid into one of my all-time favorite games I've been doing my best to contain myself but inside I'm Tom Cruising on the couch about this game I love balers Gade 3 it's difficult it's drawn out in the best way it's Technical and I've never been challenged by a game the way that I have with this one all of that said I'm not without complain from a general gameplay standpoint I'd have to say a consistent gripe for me is the Abundant use of seemingly hidden RNG and before you eviscerate me let me explain I know RNG exists in every game I know when I play other games I'm engaging in a lot of RNG whether the game tells me about it or not if I'm looking at loot drops damage output ranges damage received all of this is based on RNG but laran took on the challenge of making DND d a game to what sometimes feels like a fault my problem isn't necessarily RNG outright but how DND calculates it and I know I'm waiting in dangerous water criticizing DND D but for me the way balers Gate 3 looks to D and to calculate hits and damage with the different roles and checks does not feel good for a video game when I see 80% chance of hitting something that translates to me that I have a one in five chance of missing set attack but that is not how this seems to work spells and attacks account for your proficiency and level in the specific category used to cast it I'm not a game designer nor mathematician but the math don't seem to math because of the sheer number of times you miss this is an instance where learning D and and how stat proficiency affects hit chances feels necessary to cope with the amount of times that you miss balers Gate 3 does very little to explain this RNG interaction of the dice rolls happening behind your character spells attacks and cantrip again this isn't a criticism of how the game works but how staying true true to your Source can sometimes hurt the overall feel in a game those misses and inaccuracies and what feels like the hidden values of multiple pieces of RNG feel even worse when you get into the spell slot system I'm not going to go into heavy detail about spell slots but the Warlock Wizard and sorcerer fantasy just feel kind of stifled when you have a set number of spells that you can cast before you're out of the equation it's just another instance in my mind that feels like the dedication to the D and Source material makes for a less compe ing gameplay experience I understand spell slots keep casting players in check from reigning Devastation on all enemies and it kind of feels like a problem that I don't have a solution for but I just wanted to mention it as a general gripe and finally as good as balers Gate 3 looks and feels I'd be doing a disservice to players to not address what feels like a technical failure while I know not everyone experienced these issues on PC for me even as recent as patch number two in hot fix 8 I was experiencing what could only be described Des red as a memory leak I would start balers Gate 3 and the game would run flawlessly however around the 3 to 4 hour mark stutters and dragging would me my experience a quick look at my processes revealed double and triple memory values on my PC that would resolve itself instantly with a restart of the game client while hardly an issue overall in the Myriad of hours that I played in this game it's slightly annoying in a game that is otherwise a technical Marvel and a notable problem when singing The Game's Praises through through as I have been all of this to say two systems in a game that has hundreds in spans anywhere from 40 to 200 hours for a single playthrough feels like a huge win in my book balers Gate 3 is complex at every single turn it's very uninviting to newcomers it's impressive at the start and it teaches you through punishment constantly but my God does it feel good to learn the frustration that would Mount over an incredibly hard fight the dwindling of numbers down to a fin final epic moment overcoming a crushing foe brought me delight and joy in a way that I haven't felt in quite some time the player agency in balers gate is truly one of the most profound elements I've seen in gaming period with so much yes and as few NOS allowed to maintain some form of technical order balers gate never seeks to punish its players's creativity I feel like this review could be 45 minutes long and I would barely scratch the service of all the things that you can do as I'm certain I didn't even do all the things in my 100 Plus hours playthrough balers Gate 3 is an absolute 10 out of 10 in my book but I feel that I should present it as such this game unlike many 10 out of 10 games I don't feel is for everyone there is a hoorde of reading listening decision-making and tactical turn-based fighting which I know is a huge turnoff for a lot of Gamers a good story is great by many but this story is one that feels very robust as you define it your actions and your choices consistently sculpt the conclusion that quite frankly you may hate you can always save and reload but if you're like me you own every decision and every mistake which leads to sometimes hilarious albeit unfortunate consequences but if you're willing to try a game like you've never thought engage in and learn complex systems balers Gate 3 will reward you and excite you in a way I think that's unlike anything we've seen in gaming in years thanks for listening y'all your energy and time means everything to me like And subscribe for more nonsense until next time am

Channel: Skelly

Views: 7,827

Keywords: gaming, review

Id: NG-uWmxVfNY

Length: 21min 40sec (1300 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 11 2023