Tag: baldursgate3

Reviews

Baldur’s Gate III – Act II Thoughts

Thread of Souls

We recently completed Act II of Baldur’s Gate 3, the immersive game based around Dungeons & Dragons. Following up on our thoughts for Act I, here is a spoiler-free overview of Act II.

The Story

The second act of Baldur’s Gate 3 is heavily story-based. From early on you begin to pick up on lore about the largest enemy (or ally, depending on if you are playing a good or evil game), Ketheric Thorm. Through exploring, talking to NPC’s, talking to your own party, and reading documents around the map, you begin to piece together the story of what took place in this shadow-ravaged area.

The storyline is compelling, with complicated characters and fully realized histories. Each step you take leads you to another, and everything logically falls into place. The only thing that stood apart was what felt like a sidequest in the Gauntlet of Shar, but actually was part of the main questline.

The stories you discover here can be depressing. This act is centered on death and destruction on a large scale, with innocent lives caught in the middle. But if you choose a heroic game, it does feel nice to restore goodness to the area once again.

The Gameplay

The fights are a lot of fun, and there are truly some spectacular dungeons. Grymforge was one of our favorites to go through. Aside from one small puzzle in the Gauntlet of Shar, every challenge felt logical, every puzzle made sense, and you were never left wondering what you to do next.

There is a good balance here between peaceful interactions and violence. That is to say, there are areas where you can explore and socialize without fear, and other areas where dangers and horrors are aplenty. The Last Light Inn was a standout location, offering more and more areas of intrigue the further we delved.

The Locations

Beautifully realized locations are across the map with this act in Baldur’s Gate 3. From the soaring peaks of the monastery, to the dark and dangerous shadow lands, the environments invited more and more exploration.

That being said, there were a few areas we chose not to fully explore because they were too disturbing and too gory. Balthazar’s experiments and Reithwin were our top two that we sped through, only hitting the highlights, because of the body horror and grotesque elements. So fair content warning for those curious about the second act.

Overview

All in all, the second act of Baldur’s Gate 3 is deep, story-driven, and offers some truly spectacular locations and dungeons to explore. It’s good fun all around.

Pros: Well-written, fun dungeons, detailed locations, good characters

Cons: Depressing, too gory

Reviews

Baldur’s Gate 3: Act I Impressions

Thread of Souls

Our spoiler-free thoughts after playing the first act of Baldur’s Gate 3.

We’ve been eagerly awaiting the release of Baldur’s Gate 3 since we played early access three years ago. The thing that appealed to us most was that we could create our own characters within a TTRPG setting, allowing us to create Taliesin and Ruuda. We always play them, and other characters from our game/book series when allowed to create an entire party. We’ve done it for Pillars of Eternity II, Neverwinter, WWE 2K23, and Solasta. As soon as the game was officially out, we jumped at the opportunity to begin this new adventure.

Character Creation

The character creation is decent. Since we tried to recreate our characters exactly, it was disappointing. When games with less development time like 2K23 allow you to enter your character height by inches and weight by pounds to adjust their physique, we expected to see a game with this much detail allow sliders at the very least. We were super happy you could play a duergar, however. That race always gets overlooked and it is a joy to finally have that option.

The graphics are certainly very pretty; the hair looks soft enough to touch. And the ability to dye your clothes to further customize your look is a wonderful addition. We wish you could preview the dye look before committing to it, though.

Gameplay

The gameplay is extremely user-friendly. You can toggle the camera between characters and swivel it around, giving you much more flexibility than the typical top-down perspective of similar games. You point and click where you want your character to move instead of having to fuss with directing yourself through the keyboard. It is easy to target enemies, and the hot bar has simple navigations to find what you are looking for.

Combat flows really well. You are allowed to scale the difficulty based on if you want to focus more on the story and less on fighting the same boss over and over. The three-dimensional environments allow for some really fun fighting locations.

Story

The story is the heart and soul of Baldur’s Gate 3. The characters have depth, are complicated, and have interesting backstories that influence your quests. You are allowed to make moral decisions, and it isn’t always clear on who to trust. You care about NPC’s, you are driven to explore, and the absolute vast amount of dialogue options allows you to feel like you are truly part of the story.

Overview

The first act of Baldur’s Gate 3 is an epic and dark adventure sweeping you into a fully-fleshed out world. You truly lose track of time when you play this game due to how simply fun it is.

Pros: Beautiful graphics, compelling story, great characters, user-friendly gameplay

Cons: Limited character customization, too gory

Baldur's Gate 3
Storytelling

How the Baldur’s Gate 3 Panel from Hell Stream Inspires Story and Character Creation

Thread of Souls

The third Panel from Hell revealed an extensive amount of details for what’s to come in Baldur’s Gate 3. We are huge fans of the Early Access module and are excited for the future of the game. This isn’t going to be an article about all of the new things coming to Patch 5 because there’s a lot of it and you can read it all here. Instead, we’re going to be focusing on one specific aspect of the stream, the LARPG mechanic, and how it can be used to inspire story creation.

We give our top tips to creating stories and developing characters in your world to make your Dungeons & Dragons game the best it can be!

Larian Studios did something a little different than their last two Panels from Hell streams. Instead of focusing on Baldur’s Gate 3 gameplay, the studio designed an epic live-action role-playing (LARP) event involving developers acting as a Dungeons & Dragons party. Swen Vincke, founder and creative director of Larian Studios, led the party on a grand adventure taking them through the real-life castle of Gravensteen Castle.

Establishing the Party

The stream consisted of a party of four including Warlock, Fighter, Ranger, Cleric, Druid, Wizard, and Rogue. Your home game doesn’t have to include a specific class of characters nor does it need one class above all to make the party dynamic work. There is a reason skills exist and that’s why anyone is free to roll for any skill whether you’re a wizard who’s trying to pick a lock or a barbarian who’s trying to be stealthy.

Click on the picture to go to Amazon’s product page for Baldur’s Gate Enhanced Edition

Discuss Who You are

During the stream, Swen would ask party members questions about their character. Even though the dungeon master may be aware of a character’s backstory, other players may not be. It could be used as a moment to discuss more about who your character is. Or it sets up a nice scene to talk about characters and their story.

This can be done during a quest while the party is walking through the area or dungeon or during a long rest. Partch 5 for Baldur’s Gate 3 will change how the resting system works by shifting the standard location to the area where the party is exploring. It’s during this time that characters will typically talk to one another about something on their mind. One scene showed the adventuring party resting around a campfire discussing their adventure. This is a great moment to talk about your character and their background.

Backgrounds are another great way to interact with the players and their characters. If a character has the Folk Hero background the dungeon master can pull from it to encourage role-play. For instance, a Folk Hero is able to blend in in certain scenarios. A DM can have an NPC approach the character and give them a safe place to rest for a time. From there the game master can have the NPC reach out to the Folk Hero for help and then reward them with experience points or items or whatever they so choose.

You can find a place to hide, rest, or recuperate among other commoners, unless you have shown yourself to be a danger to them.

– Player’s Handbook

Questions to inspire role-play:

  • What deity do you serve?
  • Where are you from?
  • What is your background?

Dressing the Part

LARPing is all about dressing as the character you are playing as. This can also be done at the table whether it’s digital or physical. The outfit can be full-on cosplay and include homemade weapons and armor or something like casual cosplay. Casual cosplay is matching everyday clothes you may have to that of your character’s aesthetic.

Another option is to wear accessories that your character may wear. Objects like necklaces, rings, or scarves are simple yet add so much to who your character is.

Make a Mood Room

A mood room is a place that inspires creativity. It is full of all of the stuff that helps you create a story, character, or project. While you may not have access to an entire castle like the Panel from Hell 3, you can build your own where ever you live.

Setting up a Mood Room:

  • Dungeons & Dragons minis
  • Weapons and armor
  • Books
  • Accessories
  • Sit and listen to fantasy music
  • Play a fantasy video game like Baldur’s Gate

Role-play Outside of the Game

The character’s in the stream role-played their characters throughout the panel. They spoke and acted just like their character would in a Dungeons & Dragons game. Yet beforehand they practiced their part and got into character like actors would before a movie role. It’s something you can do at home outside of the game as well. By spending time thinking or acting as your character away from the game, you can help build who they are all the time. Characters are always shifting, changing, and growing and character development can even happen outside of the game. You can also use this time to talk to other players as your character or discuss them away from the table.

Baldur’s Gate 3 Patch 5 release July 13.