Baldurs Gate 3

[procne]

Not supposed to explain and go into detail here. It should be cheaper because third world countries do not have the buypower of first world countries, thus regional pricing exists. It's that simple. If you still do not understand, just read about it on google. The game is already cheaper, but not enough.

That's skipping some points in the thought process.
Maybe it will be easier to explain if you take a look from another point of view. It's not about someone deserving cheaper games because they're poor (I know it's not your point, but it kinda may sound like it)

With video games cost of creating a single copy of the game is almost non-existent, especially with digital distribution.
Devs/publishers want to maximise their profits, which practically is (cost of the game x price of the game).
So they pick a price where, in their opinion, this value will be maximum. If they choose it too high then too few people will buy making the value lower. If they set it too low then additional copies bought won't make up for the lower price.

Now, in some markets 60$ (converted to local currency) might be a lot bigger part of one's budget than in most countries. Which means far fewer people would buy the game at this price. For this market the price for maximum of (cost of the game x price of the game) would be lower than in other countries. Thus, often publishers decide to lower the price in specific market to maximise profits from it.

But it also comes at a cost - they need to do market research to know the good price, set up separate distribution channel for that market, or add region blockades (so that other countries don't start "leeching" cheaper game from it), deal with currency conversions etc. Sometimes those other markets are simply not worth the hassle and developers just skip it. Especially smaller studios which don't have the know-how and which do not expect to make large number of sales.

[Pogacsa]

Oh my, you are taking me back. When they were speaking on an interview for the first Divinity game (think ti was the first) they spoke about one of their influences when making the game was on the BG series (and I remembered them mentioning Ultima too) and how they wanted to expand on it or something. This is like trying to remember an interview from 7 years ago though, I could just be having the Mandela Effect but I am pretty sure they mentioned they were inspired by aspects of BG.

Let me take you back properly then: The Man mentions only ultima. In fact he considers all the other rpgs made after them inferior. Le me quote him: " I consider Ultima VII: The black gate and Ultima VII: Serpent Isle to be among the best RPGs ever made, and in my mind there’s not been a single RPG since 1992 that surpassed them, including those now considered to be the industry benchmarks(which obviously means the bg series aswell)."

If you want to read his full blogpost its here (project E is DoS itself): http://www.lar.net/2012/05/17/the-gr...ind-project-e/

They didn't really Baldur's Gate around till the grand idea of making one. Don't get me wrong i love Larian games as well as the BG series but it' somehow so wrong that after BG3's announcement everyone wants to make it a fact that they always had this admiration and connection.

[MakeMeLaugh]

That's skipping some points in the thought process.
Maybe it will be easier to explain if you take a look from another point of view. It's not about someone deserving cheaper games because they're poor (I know it's not your point, but it kinda may sound like it)

With video games cost of creating a single copy of the game is almost non-existent, especially with digital distribution.
Devs/publishers want to maximise their profits, which practically is (cost of the game x price of the game).
So they pick a price where, in their opinion, this value will be maximum. If they choose it too high then too few people will buy making the value lower. If they set it too low then additional copies bought won't make up for the lower price.

Now, in some markets 60$ (converted to local currency) might be a lot bigger part of one's budget than in most countries. Which means far fewer people would buy the game at this price. For this market the price for maximum of (cost of the game x price of the game) would be lower than in other countries. Thus, often publishers decide to lower the price in specific market to maximise profits from it.

But it also comes at a cost - they need to do market research to know the good price, set up separate distribution channel for that market, or add region blockades (so that other countries don't start "leeching" cheaper game from it), deal with currency conversions etc. Sometimes those other markets are simply not worth the hassle and developers just skip it. Especially smaller studios which don't have the know-how and which do not expect to make large number of sales.

Nope, it's the other way around, it's the smaller studios that does regional pricing better. Steam already suggests regional pricing. I really doubt anyone spends a dime doing a lot of market research, otherwise prices would be standardized.

[procne]

Then it sounds Steam handles the market research, and offers regional blockades already.
If that's what it really does, it could be just suggesting simple currency conversion.
Still, I haven't seen any regional pricing for the indie titles I played, only for AAA titles I bought (and even then, the regional prices were in non-Steam editions of the games)

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Am just curious but in what way was DoS heavily inspired by the BG series? I understand that after Larian making BG3 obviously people need to make connections but they never have taken any inspiration from BG. The only inspiration they ever took was from Ultima 7. They said it so many times.

Larian wanted to make balders hate after OS1 and asked wizards if they could, wizards said come back when you have more rpgs under there belt. So they made OS2 to show what they could do for baldersgate which lead to wizards contacting them.

So pretty much OS2 was a demo for them to show to wizards for baldergate.

[Fencers]

I didn't like part one, i loved part 2 so i'm interested.
But why would anyone buy a early access singleplayer game, particularly for a full AAA price.
So i pay 60 euros, have to deal with bugs and can only play less than 1/3 of the content. Or i could wait for the release and play the whole game bugfree for the same price.
Thats really mind-boggeling.

Well, not everyone views video games as a value proposition strictly. Many were going to buy it anyway too.

I buy most new majorly released games because I am interested in how video games are made and implemented. The major interest and enjoyment I get from games is not in playing them expressly; so much as I enjoy looking at how they are designed and how the gameplay is implemented.

There is likely not a lot of difference in playing BG3 in EA and looking at the aspects of game design and gameplay now versus 3 years from now. Larian has a great track record of making interesting games and this franchise, Baldur's Gate, is likewise well regarded.

Lastly, not everyone is buying or playing games singularly. My husband and I share the same games accounts. He might want to check out the game at some point, my children might want to play, my sister, my brother-in-law, et cetera.

[MakeMeLaugh]

Then it sounds Steam handles the market research, and offers regional blockades already.
If that's what it really does, it could be just suggesting simple currency conversion.
Still, I haven't seen any regional pricing for the indie titles I played, only for AAA titles I bought (and even then, the regional prices were in non-Steam editions of the games)

Gonna give you a few examples.

Crusader's King 3 did amazing on regional pricing, it's actually way too generous to be honest. As you can see, they use the exact value Valve suggests.
https://steamdb.info/sub/452686/

Then you have abominations like Fifa 21.
https://steamdb.info/sub/458627/

Some games where regional pricing is only applies to some countries for some unknown reason, while others got absolutely fucked.
https://steamdb.info/sub/407114/

And then BG3.
https://steamdb.info/sub/365345/

I'm not saying Valve suggested price is 100% correct(it isn't) but it serves as a starting point for publishers. Prices outside the US and EU are chaotic.

[Makabreska]

With this good graphics the sex scenes will be interesting, if they are as explicit as shown in the one youtube video. I'm sure all us coomers will love it

Eh, expect W3 level of nudity.

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In between Pillars of Eternity 3 and D:OS3 I'm down with D:OS3, it's simply whole next level when it comes to looks. Infinity style games have their appeal, but this one is just so much better.

PoE 3 highly unlikely, with how abysmally second game sold. Also, Obsidian under Microsoft is busy with more popular genres.

[Mendzia]

It literally blows my mind that people are whinning about bugs and problems with graphics in early access...
Holy shit people... of course it will be that way... you are testing the game for them and many things will change for better.
If you want great working game... buy it after 1-2 months since release after x patches.
I bet 90% of the people whinnig about slow combat have never even tried D&D before, lol.
Larian is literally last studio that i trust (maybe Nintendo too) and hopefully it will stay that way.

[Orby]

Let me take you back properly then: The Man mentions only ultima. In fact he considers all the other rpgs made after them inferior. Le me quote him: " I consider Ultima VII: The black gate and Ultima VII: Serpent Isle to be among the best RPGs ever made, and in my mind there’s not been a single RPG since 1992 that surpassed them, including those now considered to be the industry benchmarks(which obviously means the bg series aswell)."

If you want to read his full blogpost its here (project E is DoS itself): http://www.lar.net/2012/05/17/the-gr...ind-project-e/

They didn't really Baldur's Gate around till the grand idea of making one. Don't get me wrong i love Larian games as well as the BG series but it' somehow so wrong that after BG3's announcement everyone wants to make it a fact that they always had this admiration and connection.

I'll have to take your word for it. I been trying to find the interview since you replied and I have given up lol. So I surrender :P

[Makabreska]

Welp, first reviews are very favourable. Main issues I saw were lengthy combat when many enemies at once, and very limited set of abilities on some classes at low level.

[The Butt Witch]

Welp, first reviews are very favourable. Main issues I saw were lengthy combat when many enemies at once, and very limited set of abilities on some classes at low level.

That was always a problem Larian's turn-based combat. I remember trivial enemies in DoS 1 and 2 taking whole minutes to deal with.

[Makabreska]

That was always a problem Larian's turn-based combat. I remember trivial enemies in DoS 1 and 2 taking whole minutes to deal with.

Low hit chance at low lvl doesn't help here, but this can be adjusted.

[Jastall]

I did not say they were the same, but had a lot of similarities and that was fine, same engine, same devs.

Larian are the new big guys in RPG's. While Obsidian is good, I think they got surpassed.

Larian makes better gameplay, but when it comes to writing and quest design Obsidian absolutely destroys them and that's the aspect I value the most in RPGs. OS2 has a better combat system than Pillars of Eternity for example, but the former's story put me to sleep where the former drew me in. Sybille was the only OS2 character I liked while there's like, two I didn't like in the entire cast of Pillars. Rivellon, as a world, is incredibly boring even after, what, 6 or 7 games set in it while Eora needed less than one game to feel immersive and fleshed out. Plus the encounter design in OS2 got really cheesy at times in a very bad way which undermined its tight gameplay, with only PoE's bonus boss approaching it.

I'm a gameplay over story guy usually... except for RPGs. I can still replay Fallout New Vegas or Planescape Torment today even if they play like dogshit just because the writing and RPG systems are so good. Larian games I've literally never been able to finish one because I can never for the life of me get invested in anything that happens on screen. No matter how good its systems and combat might be, if BG3 is the same I'll be dissapointed.

[Endus]

Larian makes better gameplay, but when it comes to writing and quest design Obsidian absolutely destroys them and that's the aspect I value the most in RPGs.

You need to be real careful with assertions like this.

The latest game that Obsidian developed was The Outer Worlds. It was pitched as a "Fallout Killer", and people made all the same condescensions towards Bethesda that you'd expect. The game's a first-person action-rpg like the modern Fallouts, has a similar nostalgia stylization in the sci-fi, etc.

And the result? The game was very shallow, exploration is unrewarding at best, the stories are trite where they aren't pretty damned internally nonsensical, and the whole grounding theme is so wildly hypocritical it's impossible to take it as satire; it's more like a satire of satire, but in the laziest damned way possible. You can basically sum up the story theme of nearly every quest thusly; "CORPORATIONS BAD." That's as deep as the game gets. Not because of anything complex, but because "CORPORATIONS STUPID." The story basically plays out like Idiocracy, but the reason everyone's so fucking stupid about literally everything is literally just "CORPORATIONS, AUGH". Like, seriously, there's a big questline on the first planet about how everyone's getting sick, and you might be thinking "there's a weird plague that we'll have to solve, is it bioengineered? Alien disease from the local alien wildlife? Who knows!" Nope. Corporation is forcing everyone to only eat their canned fish. Which they've been mixing with everything from alien meat to sawdust, because fuck you. The solution is, like in Idiocracy, to suggest "maybe don't just eat crap? Grow fresh food." Ta-da, that's how dumb literally everyone is.

As much as there's annoying bugs and stuff in the various Fallouts, I've played them all more than once, and some I've racked up hundreds of hours. The world's just fun to experience. The Outer Worlds, by Obsidian, I played through to completion, and by halfway it had gotten to be a bit of a chore. I kept hoping it was going to kick off, but it never did. It's an incredibly shallow game and the writing is one of its weakest points, and it's not just in execution; the fundamental building blocks of the setting just do not make sense.

That's Obsidian, today. Don't get blindsided by stuff they produced in the past; you have to take the company based on the product they're producing right now. I was a big fan of Obsidian. The Outer Worlds changed that. It's been a long time since I was that disappointed by a game. No Man's Sky was less of a letdown, at launch.

[Jastall]

You need to be real careful with assertions like this.

The latest game that Obsidian developed was The Outer Worlds. It was pitched as a "Fallout Killer", and people made all the same condescensions towards Bethesda that you'd expect. The game's a first-person action-rpg like the modern Fallouts, has a similar nostalgia stylization in the sci-fi, etc.

And the result? The game was very shallow, exploration is unrewarding at best, the stories are trite where they aren't pretty damned internally nonsensical, and the whole grounding theme is so wildly hypocritical it's impossible to take it as satire; it's more like a satire of satire, but in the laziest damned way possible. You can basically sum up the story theme of nearly every quest thusly; "CORPORATIONS BAD." That's as deep as the game gets. Not because of anything complex, but because "CORPORATIONS STUPID." The story basically plays out like Idiocracy, but the reason everyone's so fucking stupid about literally everything is literally just "CORPORATIONS, AUGH". Like, seriously, there's a big questline on the first planet about how everyone's getting sick, and you might be thinking "there's a weird plague that we'll have to solve, is it bioengineered? Alien disease from the local alien wildlife? Who knows!" Nope. Corporation is forcing everyone to only eat their canned fish. Which they've been mixing with everything from alien meat to sawdust, because fuck you. The solution is, like in Idiocracy, to suggest "maybe don't just eat crap? Grow fresh food." Ta-da, that's how dumb literally everyone is.

As much as there's annoying bugs and stuff in the various Fallouts, I've played them all more than once, and some I've racked up hundreds of hours. The world's just fun to experience. The Outer Worlds, by Obsidian, I played through to completion, and by halfway it had gotten to be a bit of a chore. I kept hoping it was going to kick off, but it never did. It's an incredibly shallow game and the writing is one of its weakest points, and it's not just in execution; the fundamental building blocks of the setting just do not make sense.

That's Obsidian, today. Don't get blindsided by stuff they produced in the past; you have to take the company based on the product they're producing right now. I was a big fan of Obsidian. The Outer Worlds changed that. It's been a long time since I was that disappointed by a game. No Man's Sky was less of a letdown, at launch.

That's not the most unreasonable take, but I'd argue the message was more The Board bad. Monarch Stellar Industries are shown as a much much humane corporation that works to make things better, and are generally a preferable alternative to the Iconoclasts I found. I thought everyone being dumb was fully intentional and kinda helps explain the usual RPG trope of people standing around waiting for a wandering hero to solve their problems; they're too stupid to do it themselves.

I do think the desire for somewhat clumsy anti-corporate satire muddled the message and the games comes across as too black and white for my liking, but I still laughed a good bit at some parts and thus still enjoyed it overall, and it was way better than OS2's rote main plot and largely unfunny attempts at being Monty Python and the Holy Grail writ large. Plus PoE wasn't that long ago, and I liked the sequel as well even if its overly open world nature didn't do it much favors. If nothing else I finished all these games (twice for PoE) which is more than can be said for Larian titles.

[Ghostpanther]

I didn't like part one, i loved part 2 so i'm interested.
But why would anyone buy a early access singleplayer game, particularly for a full AAA price.
So i pay 60 euros, have to deal with bugs and can only play less than 1/3 of the content. Or i could wait for the release and play the whole game bugfree for the same price.
Thats really mind-boggeling.

Because some want to experience a part of a game they have been following for a long time, sooner than later. Also help to precipitate in the development of it. Of course if you are wiling to wait long enough, all games eventually go on sale. I normally do that. And that 1/3 is a lot of content in BG3.

On a side note about bugs.....the rez scroll issue I was having using them was not a bug. But rather a lack of the player knowing when they can be used in BG3. Instead of using it on a fallen char when they seem to die, with zero hit points, you can not use them until they have actually died. If they die and are still shown as doing life save rolls, they are only mostly dead. lol!

You can use a char's ability which will remove most disabling on a down char to get them back on their feet. The rez scroll will only work if they are completely dead.

This is different than it was in OSD2 from what I remember.

So far, while not real smooth, with some freezing for a few seconds and some crashes, the game plays pretty well for early access and is a lot of fun to play. Love the attention to detail and animations.

[Gaidax]

Very good so far, but the unfortunate side effect of D&D ruleset is that almost nothing is deterministic, especially when it comes to conversations.

You can pack crazy Charisma and proficiency in Deception/Persuasion or whatever other skills and you blow up conversations right and left because of that frikkin' dice, this is especially frustrating because a lot of insight, information and more interesting developments are gated by these checks and at time multiple of them, so you are pretty much compelled to save scum, if you want a more interesting story.

Many other checks that are not conversation allow 4 rolls for every team mate, so at least there you have a more reasonable shot at finding that secret entrance/button/lever/whatever, but conversations are a one shot chance and the check requirements are really stacked against you in vast majority of them - talking about something like 50% chance of success for your character that packs +3 Charisma modifier and +2 proficiency on conversation skills. I can't imagine what your run off the mill fighter/wizard/cleric with +0 Cha at best would look like - you'd be like missing 70% of the interesting stuff in convos, no kidding.

I really hope they will relax the required DC for those a tad, pretty ridiculous imo.

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Like this is on my level 3 warlock now:



You'd think I'd be some master silver tongue navigating my way through conversations, but nope - any moment conversation is not some basic mundane stuff and it's a huge uphill battle of minds, even with those stats, which are really as good as it gets for conversations at that level. Like, maybe I could precast "Friends" on just about every bloody NPC I meet, but that's about all I could do more there and it would just give another +2 or so.

Some places having a difficult conversation DC is as it should be, like persuading Shadowheart to spill her beans on who she is in the Blighted Village. That one you can't do without +3 Charisma with Persuasion proficiency, it's like 22 DC persuasion there. But that's OK, she's almost committing a sacrilege against her faith as a cleric there revealing that info in that fashion.

But having a bloody 17 base DC or some such on holding 2 blokes from hitting each other and having a bloody fight where you may need to kill people if you fail that check instead of letting them to just slap each other, that's just ridiculous.

[beanman12345]

From the early gameplay I figured it was just more or less a DOS2 D&D mod, which seems to be confirmed from this thread and youtube impressions. Not that that is really a bad thing, I love DOS2. Still, though, gonna wait till more origins are available, more chapters are available, and/or there is a decent sale before buying. Probably will pick it up at some point during EA though. Seems like besides some bugs looks good so far from everything I've seen, and Larian is a pretty damn good DM. Though I haven't played D&D in well over a decade now, and my last dabble with anything to do with it is neverwinter mmo which was, eh. But I'm very optimistic about this game.

[Ghostpanther]

Very good so far, but the unfortunate side effect of D&D ruleset is that almost nothing is deterministic, especially when it comes to conversations.

You can pack crazy Charisma and proficiency in Deception/Persuasion or whatever other skills and you blow up conversations right and left because of that frikkin' dice, this is especially frustrating because a lot of insight, information and more interesting developments are gated by these checks and at time multiple of them, so you are pretty much compelled to save scum, if you want a more interesting story.

Many other checks that are not conversation allow 4 rolls for every team mate, so at least there you have a more reasonable shot at finding that secret entrance/button/lever/whatever, but conversations are a one shot chance and the check requirements are really stacked against you in vast majority of them - talking about something like 50% chance of success for your character that packs +3 Charisma modifier and +2 proficiency on conversation skills. I can't imagine what your run off the mill fighter/wizard/cleric with +0 Cha at best would look like - you'd be like missing 70% of the interesting stuff in convos, no kidding.

I really hope they will relax the required DC for those a tad, pretty ridiculous imo.

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Like this is on my level 3 warlock now:



You'd think I'd be some master silver tongue navigating my way through conversations, but nope - any moment conversation is not some basic mundane stuff and it's a huge uphill battle of minds, even with those stats, which are really as good as it gets for conversations at that level. Like, maybe I could precast "Friends" on just about every bloody NPC I meet, but that's about all I could do more there and it would just give another +2 or so.

Some places having a difficult conversation DC is as it should be, like persuading Shadowheart to spill her beans on who she is in the Blighted Village. That one you can't do without +3 Charisma with Persuasion proficiency, it's like 22 DC persuasion there. But that's OK, she's almost committing a sacrilege against her faith as a cleric there revealing that info in that fashion.

But having a bloody 17 base DC or some such on holding 2 blokes from hitting each other and having a bloody fight where you may need to kill people if you fail that check instead of letting them to just slap each other, that's just ridiculous.

I agree about the dice roll. And I want a option to turn that damn dice rolling animation off. Just give me the results. Failed or successful.

But overall, very pleased with the early access condition of the game. I expected some hiccups and bugs. Not been enough to make me want to stop playing it.