Why Baldur's Gate 3 Is GameSpot's Game Of The Year 2023

[Music] [Music] [Music] I can point to the exact moment moment I knew balers Gate 3 would be a banger last year Kurt indovina wrote hosted and produced a video aptly named the box that broke balers Gate 3 in which Kurt spoke with laran studios in great detail about how everything short of Witchcraft was utilized to program balers Gate 3 to twist and turn on itself to ensure that regardless of the choices a player wanted to make they'd always end up with an artifact in their inventory necessary to progress The Game's plot in that video I witnessed the desperation any game master has dealt with the mixture of adaptability and exasperation necessary to plan a rewarding story and simultaneously agonized over contingencies for every chaotic thought the players at your table might have at that moment I knew that laran Studios understood the assignment the developers knew that first and foremost the most crucial aspect of Dungeons and Dragons is encouraging and rewarding Choice the result of honoring that ideal is the best game of [Music] 2023 balers Gate 3 works so well because larion cleverly uses every aspect of the game to lead your creativity back to the established narrative curating this feeling that all options are viable and the quote unquote Right Way Forward clever writing and frankly the best all-around voice acting of any game this year bring balers gate 3's characters and memorable narrator to life incentivizing you to pursue their respective storylines and follow their objectives intelligent enemy AI response to your action so even repeated combat encounters against the same enemy type feel distinct with your different choices shaping fights to play out in a myriad of ways humorous discoveries seem to dot every corner of the multitude of locations some of which can only be fully uncovered by having certain items or access to specific spells so even after you reach the limits of the map there's often still a sense of Mystique and Discovery to the world as if you've barely scratched the surface of it all and the random nature of dice rolls ensures you can't always succeed at what you want to do and sometimes have to re-evaluate pushing you down a path that seems inspired even though laran carefully authored it with the same care as all the other ways forward it's brilliant laran Studios has set a new Benchmark for what developers can accomplish in a single player RPG and I won't be surprised if we see more Studios attempt to emulate Boulders gate 3's success when it comes to designing choice-driven narratives Jake Decker wordss it perfectly in gamespot's Boulders Gate 3 review so I won't even attempt to do better that Freedom it offers is unprecedented and it takes a little while to really see the scope of what that means for the game at times the sheer number of choices and consequences can be overwhelming but before long it becomes apparent that balers Gate 3 allows players to be the authors of their own Destinies in a way no other game has before the story of balers Gate 3 most benefits from the sheer amount of choice you have even character creation is rewarding as your chosen race class and background can have huge effects and what dialogue choices you'll have access to there aren't many RPGs that you can point to where the consequences of character creation can still be felt dozens of hours into the main plot but even beyond the main story every aspect of the game celebrates player Freedom practically every companion is down to sleep with you if you put in the effort coloring your playthrough with unique and emotionally gratifying romantic arcs and combat mechanics are flexible enough to fit even the most absurd and unpredictable of strategies if you think I wonder if I can do this there's a strong chance Boulders gate 3's response is yes yes you can it's a testament to Boulders Gate 3 success that players myself included are taking inspiration from it for their DND tables to improve the experience of playing the original tabletop game the way balers Gate 3 handles the guidance can trip short rests healing potions and a whole host of other aspects of DnD helps the game maintain the momentum of play far better than its tabletop counterpart in the end everything is in service of getting you to that next choice and encouraging you to author your own adventure and have the best time while doing so and sure balers Gate 3 can't possibly be as reactive as a real life person directing the action but damn if it doesn't emulate the sensation of playing DND better than any other roleplaying game out there culminating in one of the most memorable stories in video games in years and hey you don't even have to deal with the frustration of bringing a group of friends together every week for 3 hours just to experience it [Music]

Channel: GameSpot

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Length: 6min 33sec (393 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 06 2023