Larian have definitively sold-out and turned into a hack developer

[Turbo Nozomix]

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2020-02-27-baldurs-gate-3-interview

The choices that we made are ours. Why did we go for turn-based instead of real-time with pause? Because D&D to us is a turn-based game and we're really good - or we have become really good - with turn-based combat. So that, I think, is one of our strengths, and trying out real-time with pause for now, just because the originals were that? It's a big risk. Because the team would have to think completely differently, our combat would be completely different. And we didn't really feel good about that. Normally we do try out a lot. Normally we try out a lot before we make a decision, but with real-time with pause and turn-based we didn't, we just said "Okay it's just gonna be turn-based."

So, Larian is really just using the "Baldur's Gate" name as a husk to fill with a D&D D:OS2 clone, exclusively for the purpose of sales (that's what the "it's a big risk" remark refers to). It's a cash-grab.

BTW, TB games have on average been performing worse than RTwP games. And Larian's D:OS2 didn't come close to the amount of sales RTwP legend Dragon Age: Origins did. So, really, there is only a single big hit TB game while RTwP games are on average performing better.

Wasteland Remastered and Torment: Numenera tanked in sales and are unpopular. More people own Pillars of Eternity on Steam than own Wasteland 2 on Steam. When PoE 2 had TB added to it, its sales didn't improve at all and its Steam user rating didn't increase by even a single percentage-point. Pathfinder: Kingmaker is currently more popular than any TB game outside of Divinity: Original Sin 2. And Dragon Age: Origins (3.2 million copies sold in 3 months) greatly outsold Divinity: Original Sin 2 (1 million copies sold in 2.5 months).

So, TB games are not particularly popular and they have a higher failure-rate than RTwP games. It is only D:OS2 which has been a big hit in the TB genre.

Larian have become superstitious slaves in the wake of the success of D:OS2 and traded their integrity for the comfort and sales of an echo chamber of D:OS2 fans. So, there is literally no justification to using the "Baldur's Gate" name, when Larian's upcoming D&D RPG has as much in common with the Baldur's Gate series as


The definition of a Hack[www.dictionary.com]:

1. a person, as an artist or writer, who exploits, for money, his or her creative ability or training in the production of dull, unimaginative, and trite work; one who produces banal and mediocre work in the hope of gaining commercial success in the arts:
As a painter, he was little more than a hack.

2. a professional who renounces or surrenders individual independence, integrity, belief, etc., in return for money or other reward in the performance of a task normally thought of as involving a strong personal commitment:

Larian's "Baldur's Gate 3" has not even the faintest tiniest shred of relation to the Baldur's Gate series in character, experience, or gameplay and yet they're exploiting the name with a D:OS2 clone set in D&D for the purpose of the money doing so can make them. Larian have sold-out and literally become a hack developer for the sake of monetary gain.



At 3:35 in this video, Swen says that they chose to put the DOS formula in a game with the Baldur's Gate name because the BG name will increase their reach and hopefully result in Baldur's Gate fans playing Larian's DOS games:

https://youtu.be/kGnGOnzlC4s?t=214

... so, the chance to do that, and to bring what basically is our RPG identity to Baldur's Gate as a franchise was an opportunity too good to resist. And so, what it will do for us... uh, what we think it will do for us is it's going to show a larger segment of people, because I think Baldur's Gate 3 will reach more people than Divinity will have done... it will show a larger segment of the population what our RPGs feel like and hopefully bring them to play our other games also.

Larian's goal is to just make a DOS game under a more popular brand to boost the popularity of the DOS brand. Their next game after "BG3" is probably going to be "DOS3" (DOS4).

It is a cash-grab.

[Midnight]

Originally posted by qhristoff:

Originally posted by zero:

so i guess book 2 of HP isn't a sequel cause it didn't contiune the sorc stone story?

obviously that isn't the case, but i'd love to know your reasoning for that argument, if your willing to give it.

strawman

No further elaboration required. The fallacy police will come collect zero shortly, case closed.

[zero]

Originally posted by Midnight:

Originally posted by qhristoff:

strawman

No further elaboration required. The fallacy police will come collect zero shortly, case closed.

cant wait, i hope i get a medal

[Beardpick]

Originally posted by Turbo Nozomix:

Originally posted by Beardpick:

Keeping Turbo contained in this thread is the only thing keeping him from spawning 10+ more threads each one complaining about about an aspect of the game the he has erroneously decided is not "BG" enough to be in BG3.

I already wasn't posting in other threads. Heck, if not for this thread's activity, I wouldn't even be on Steam right now. But maybe I should post on other threads.

BTW, your idea works on you just the same, so you just testified that you're owning yourself. There's a trend here - one of you not thinking through what you say.

Feel free to try to find a thread in this forum that I've started. Let me get some coffee, I'll wait.

[Turbo Nozomix]

Originally posted by Beardpick:

Originally posted by Turbo Nozomix:

]

Uh, you're going to want to think about that some more. So, where's the goalpost moving, the hypocrisy, and the double-standard there?

You're showing once again that you are a dishonest person and not attentive to what you read.

I didn't say that Larian's game isn't a Baldur's Gate exclusively because it doesn't continue the story of the Baldur's Gate series. You argued that it could be continuing an over-arching narrative, and I pointed out that it's a completely separate story. I didn't say that's specifically what makes it not a Baldur's Gate series game. In fact, I said something very different, that it's the fact that no aspect of Larian's D&D game bears semblance to the Baldur's Gate series that it's not actually a Baldur's Gate series game.

I don't know what Black Isle's BG3 was going to be like, other than that it was to carry on the gameplay style of BG1 and BG2.

So, are you simply being dishonest in that post, or are you really just unable to understand the things you read - in which case, why do you keep posting your ignorant assertions about things you haven't understood?

Did you actually forget what you posted, or are you just trying to backpedal out at this point?

You can read all about what Black Hound was going to be here.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baldur%27s_Gate_III:_The_Black_Hound

New game engine
New story
New rules
New characters
New location
No callbacks to BG, but callbacks to Icewind Dale

But that would be fine to call "Baldur's Gate" because they were leaving in the RTwP combat, which of course is your true issue with Larian creating Baldur's Gate 3.

The question is, are you completely oblivious to what you and I both wrote? Or are you trying to bluff your way out of being caught in the latest hole you dug yourself into?

I've browsed BI's BG3 information enough to know it was to continue the style of BG 1 and BG 2 with another story. The game engine in particular doesn't mean anything - any style of RPG game could be made in a game engine that handles an isometric style of RPG.

Icewind Dale is a Baldur's Gate clone with less focus on story and a heavier focus on combat. Icewind Dale takes place in the same world as Baldur's Gate. BI's BG3 would carry on a plot point of the Icewind Dale games and continue the gameplay of Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale.

Since BI's BG3 didn't release, we can't see entirely what it would have been. But it was to carry on the format of the Baldur's Gate series. Larian's game isn't carrying on the format of the Baldur's Gate series and has no other shared design style with the Baldur's Gate series.

[Dixon Sider]

Originally posted by marv:

I am going to buy Baldur's Gate 3 made by Larian Studios.

You will be waiting a while. They are working on a different project for probably the next few years.

[Midnight]

Originally posted by Dixon Sider:

Originally posted by marv:

I am going to buy Baldur's Gate 3 made by Larian Studios.

You will be waiting a while. They are working on a different project for probably the next few years.

BG3 is to enter EA in a couple of months.

[Turbo Nozomix]

Originally posted by Beardpick:

Originally posted by Turbo Nozomix:

I already wasn't posting in other threads. Heck, if not for this thread's activity, I wouldn't even be on Steam right now. But maybe I should post on other threads.

BTW, your idea works on you just the same, so you just testified that you're owning yourself. There's a trend here - one of you not thinking through what you say.

Feel free to try to find a thread in this forum that I've started. Let me get some coffee, I'll wait.

What does you creating threads have to do with your business here preventing you from posting other dumb comments in other threads? Either way, your trolling here ties your hands in the very same way you think you're trolling here would tie somebody else's hands.

BTW, which other threads was I posting before this? Oh, you mean you didn't know that I wasn't busy posting other threads? I've only made 1 other thread in the BG3 forum in the past month or few months. That was made yesterday.

So... this post of yours:

Keeping Turbo contained in this thread is the only thing keeping him from spawning 10+ more threads each one complaining about about an aspect of the game the he has erroneously decided is not "BG" enough to be in BG3.

... was simply a stupid thing to say. All you've done is ensure that I posted a whole lot more than I otherwise would have.

[Hobocop]

Originally posted by zero:

not really much of a divinity clone when they have talked about how closely they are working with wizzy coast to help design the game, which is shown during the reveal, they follow the 5e rules closely (aside from init? not sure what that's about), and that shows a true attempt to make a great BG game by working with its owners that closely.

Group initiative seems like an interesting middle ground to address the issue of initiative being either too good on a single character (D:OS1) or useless because of the individual round robin method (D:OS2), and its a good way to encourage players to think about party synergies since you'll have all of your party members at your disposal at once on your turn much like XCOM.

[Beardpick]

Originally posted by Turbo Nozomix:

The question is, are you completely oblivious to what you and I both wrote? Or are you trying to bluff your way out of being caught in the latest hole you dug yourself into?

I've browsed BI's BG3 information enough to know it was to continue the style of BG 1 and BG 2 with another story. The game engine in particular doesn't mean anything - any style of RPG game could be made in a game engine that handles an isometric style of RPG.

Icewind Dale is a Baldur's Gate clone with less focus on story and a heavier focus on combat. Icewind Dale takes place in the same world as Baldur's Gate. BI's BG3 would carry on a plot point of the Icewind Dale games and continue the gameplay of Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale.

Since BI's BG3 didn't release, we can't see entirely what it would have been. But it was to carry on the format of the Baldur's Gate series. Larian's game isn't carrying on the format of the Baldur's Gate series and has no other shared design style with the Baldur's Gate series.

Ah, Turbo, the aurora engine was not isometric, it was full 3d and was the predecessor of the updated engine that powered NeverWinter Nights. So no, the gameplay was not going to stay the same in the same style as BG 1/2. Black Isle had abandoned the infinity engine and 2d isometric games, and moved on with a new story, new characters and a new engine.

You can try to spin it, but you're in a corner. Black Isle was going to make a version of BG3 as wholly different than BG1/2 as Larian, except they were going to keep the RTwP gameplay, which is truly all that you are actually concerned with.

[Dixon Sider]

Originally posted by Midnight:

Originally posted by Dixon Sider:

You will be waiting a while. They are working on a different project for probably the next few years.

BG3 is to enter EA in a couple of months.

No, they were talking about the project in their gameplay reveal. Not BG3

[zero]

Originally posted by Hobocop:

Originally posted by zero:

not really much of a divinity clone when they have talked about how closely they are working with wizzy coast to help design the game, which is shown during the reveal, they follow the 5e rules closely (aside from init? not sure what that's about), and that shows a true attempt to make a great BG game by working with its owners that closely.

Group initiative seems like an interesting middle ground to address the issue of initiative being either too good on a single character (D:OS1) or useless because of the individual round robin method (D:OS2), and its a good way to encourage players to think about party synergies since you'll have all of your party members at your disposal at once on your turn much like XCOM.

im just curious why they didn't just RNG it like classic D&D, its probably for balance reasons in hindsight, but it feels like a weird change to make.

[Hobocop]

Originally posted by zero:

Originally posted by Hobocop:

Group initiative seems like an interesting middle ground to address the issue of initiative being either too good on a single character (D:OS1) or useless because of the individual round robin method (D:OS2), and its a good way to encourage players to think about party synergies since you'll have all of your party members at your disposal at once on your turn much like XCOM.

im just curious why they didn't just RNG it like classic D&D, its probably for balance reasons in hindsight, but it feels like a weird change to make.

At the start of combat, it determines which side gets to go first at least, adding up the total result of all the initiative rolls for members currently engaged at that time.

[Midnight]

The one thing I'm curious about is how they will handle players choosing to spend their reaction on something (mode toggle?) and choosing to use a die for reroll.

That is the one thing that doesn't gel with video game format at all.

[Beardpick]

Originally posted by Dixon Sider:

Originally posted by Midnight:

BG3 is to enter EA in a couple of months.

No, they were talking about the project in their gameplay reveal. Not BG3

What are you on about?

Larian Studios founder Swen Vincke has put any doubt to rest – you will be able to play Baldur’s Gate 3 in early access later this year. Vincke says the announcement was meant to come as part of today’s gameplay reveal, but confirms that BG3 will hit “early access in a couple of months,” adding that “we don’t know exactly when.”
https://www.pcgamesn.com/baldurs-gate-3/early-access-launch-date

[zero]

Originally posted by Hobocop:

Originally posted by zero:

im just curious why they didn't just RNG it like classic D&D, its probably for balance reasons in hindsight, but it feels like a weird change to make.

At the start of combat, it determines which side gets to go first at least, adding up the total result of all the initiative rolls for members currently engaged at that time.

no i get that, i just don't not understand why they did that instead of the standard d20+init, place in order, unless its an engine limitation, thats just a weird method they did.