Solastra the BG3 killer, well not really

[Mr. Darcion]

So I went and bought Solastra to see why it was constantly been thrown over BG3. Here is what I found and please remember that these are my personal feels over both games and iäm not a professional reviewer nor do I even speak english as my first language. So mercy plz kthxbai!

Character creation:

Solastra: The character creation is very deep and you get to design 4 custom characters with their own origin stories. You also get a chance to somewhat influence your starting equipment. You have 2+1 different ways to distrivyte stats. Rolls, 27/27 point system or totally broken cheat mode where you can raise all stats to 18. You also can get double profiencies to certain skills with rogue and manipulator feat. (Somewhat cheaty)

BG3: "The chosen one"-start. You get to only design your one main character, but still the creation process feels solid. BG3 uses only distributed stats method.

Personally I feel that less is more, but I can not deny that I used stupidly many hours on Solastras character creation testing different party compositions, skills, feats, etc. Feels odd, but I think this might be a slight win for Solastra.

Winner: Slightly to Solastra

Resting:

Both have similar systems, except in Solastra you need rations and there might be night ambushes during long rest. BG3 has some major things happen during long rests.

Winner: Uncertain/Shared. I do like night ambushes, but so do I like to have a certain safe spot. :/

Story:

Solastra: In the early cutscenes I got interested that what was going on, but I quickly lost interest when I actually got to play the game. For some reason my lvl 1 characters are made deputies for the princes or some crap like that. Than I needed to go investigate and outpost that seemed to be overrun.

BG3: Story feels far more refined and I'm well invested to see what the heck is going to happen with my brainslug buddy. Also the companions seem to be more interesting with their own secrets. Sidequests are also drawing me in like a freaking whirlpool.

Winner: Straight win for BG3... I was partially falling asleep when playing Solastra.

Combat:

Solastara: Enter sarcasm, "Hell yeah it's back to the early 2000 turn based tactical rpgs!" End sarcasm mode. Yeahhhh. I find myself NOT liking Solastras combat. It feels so... Ahem... Ancient.... In a bad way. Also an additional issue is that it's faaaaar more easier than in BG3.

BG3: Combat feels stressing, painful and powerful. It feels damn good to actually have to use some grey matter between my ears to actually come on top of tough fight. What's even better is to see all of my insane plans to come into fruition.

Winner: Sol... Fudge no. BG3 all the way!

Overall Difficulty:

Solastra: If there ever was easymode, than you love this game.

BG3: If you find yourself enjoying challenge and beating the odds than you'll love this game.

Winner: I think I will have more fun with BG3

Graphical style:

Solastra: Well I guess this is more DnD style, but for some reason everything seems very bland or the coloration is very lame. There seems to be usage of different shades of same colors which make seeing thins bit more difficult. For example I had a suddenly got into a fight with a group of goblins that were close to or standing at some ramparts. Problem was that the sand was light brown, ramparts were medium/dark brown wood and goblins were wearing brown gear and their own shade was also brownish. (Damn you stealth enemies!)

BG3: I get lots of DOS/DO2 vibes, but the colors are far more vivid and you can separate things more easily. For example you can see seashells at the shore, grass that is not just 2D-color, but grown graas, multipple different forms of rocks, mountains, rivers, trees, etc.

Winner: BG3:s art style seems to be more "eyecandy" and it is drawing me in, while Solastras "Minecrafty" bland style wants me to go zzzZZZzzz.... So BG3 wins in my books. :D

Graphics:

Solastra: Ugly, plain, early 2000, missing oomph, not impressive, repetative... And I could keep on going on.

BG3: Beautiful, vivid, engaging, multicolored, multishaped, godrays, etc.

Winner: BG3 is just more pleasant to the eye.

Animations:

Solastra: All around animations are bland, booring and at times oddly synchronous. Especially when talking to people. My group does the same iddle animation in sync and it loks like a weird dance. Oh! The eyes. The horrible dead soulless fish eyes.... Go AWAYYYY!

BG3: Animations in all around are far more natural (Except when they bug causing stretching bodies), physics also feel far more fun, spells have far more illustrious or "magical" feeling on them.

Winner: Yep, BG3 is more beautiful.

Facial animation:

Solastra: Do you guys remember the controversy in Mass Effect Andromeda facial animations? No worries we decided to make your faces tired too with our brand new year 2000 style face open-close-random-words-come-out modelling! Enjoy!

BG3: Facial muscle movement, full body movement while talking, using hands while talking, and the other face animations that seem just more normal. At least in BG3 people are not staring right in to you soul trying to suck it out constantly.... Minus the Mind Flayers lol :D

Winner: BG3 knows how to avoid soul stealing fish eyes... Unless they are a story element. ^^

UI:

Solastra: Primitive, plain and frankly boring coloration.

BG3: Somewhat confusing inventory, character and other sheets, but more defined colors.

Winner: A win to BG3, but a mark on the fact that I hope that all the different tabs could be redesigned into a single or 2 sheets at most. I had trouble finding my XP bar lol.

Areamap:

Solastra: Bland, booring.... I think i'm starting to repeat myself. Well one interesting feature is the quick travel system that makes your group move inside of the map quickly to you designated location.

BG3: Looks interesting, you can see shapes, green forest zones, possible secret areas, etc. Fast travel happens instantly.

Winner: Solastras interesting travel system is only a niche thing, so I find myself enjoying more BG3:s areamap.


Worldmap:

Solastra: Well Solastra seems to have a working worldmap and acctualy pretty fun travel system. You can decide to travel slowly, normal speed or fastly to your destination and this effects ofcourse how fast you reach your destination, but also how many and what kinda encounters you have. Also your toons tend to find and gather stuff automatically.

BG3 Sniff. I can see the worldmap, but it's not yet open for EA.

Winner: Solastra, but bit unfairly since BG3 does not yet have this open.


***********


Conclusion:

9/12 wins go to BG3, 2 go to Solastra and 1 is undecided.

Well now that I have both games and I've been playing both over 20+ hours I can safely say that I like BG3 more than Solastra. Solastra feels more closer to a tabletop game and I specifically mean "A TABLETOP" game and would probably make and exceptional physical tabletop game instead of a digital game.

BG3 feels to be hitting more marks right for me, but no one can or should decided for your own feelings. I think we can only share information and people need to make informed decisions with the knowledge provided, but still If you have the coin go and buy both and see what you like more

For some reason I have bit taste on the top off my tongue after reading all the "Solastara is omgzorlolzor much better than bg3 lololololo"-posts and actually going buying and playing the game.

Just give BG 3 some time and it's going to grow into an epic fantasy adventure with dark twists, turns, mysteries, cruel fates and squidy bois going splish splash!

Have fun, ya all!

[Free Luigi M.]

You must be drunk or insane to think BG3 is hard and Solasta easy.
You can literally beat the current BG3's content with a naked level 1 character.

As of now, everything outside of the purely technical aspects is better in Solasta.

[cire87]

Could of just summarized and said Solastra is unpolished D&D/pathfinder knock off no need for wall of text

[Ganrax]

BG3 has 4-player co-op while Solastra is only single player and the devs have stated that multiplayer will never work with their game. That alone is enough to keep me away from Solastra, I can't imagine playing a DnD style game without friends.

[talemore]

Opinion is like butts, everyone has one

[cire87]

props to whoever read the wall of text

[Hobocop]

Originally posted by Joe Chip:

As of now, everything outside of the purely technical aspects is better in Solasta.

Eh, debatable. I find the scenario in Solasta pretty silly, especially because some of the justifications to even send you on missions relies on your PCs being dummies.

I also really dislike how Solasta practically endorses that you cheese stat rolling since the premade characters they provide have busted stat arrays.

[cire87]

Originally posted by pandariuskairos:

I prefer Solasta's combat simply because it does not use excessive explosions, explosive barrels, and DANGER GROUND effects everywhere, and is a more 'complete' representation of 5e rules, including delayed and readied actions.

Other than that, I find BG3 to be superior in every other way.

its a larian thing ofcourse they gonna add barrels and danger ground

[Mr. Darcion]

Originally posted by cire87:

Could of just summarized and said Solastra is unpolished
D&D/pathfinder knock off no need for wall of text

I have not played Pathfinder. And yes it is a wall of text, a horrible crucible of feelings and thoughts poured into a single message.

[Mr. Darcion]

Originally posted by Ganrax:

BG3 has 4-player co-op while Solastra is only single player and the devs have stated that multiplayer will never work with their game. That alone is enough to keep me away from Solastra, I can't imagine playing a DnD style game without friends.

Wow. I didn't even know that. :S

[cire87]

Its probably not a bad game but it is lesser when compared to BG3

[cire87]

Originally posted by pandariuskairos:

Originally posted by cire87:

its a larian thing ofcourse they gonna add barrels and danger ground

We can convince them to tone it down by complaining about it.

danger ground kind makes sense D&D can have that but the barrels are a huge gimick of theres

[Bulldozer]

Danger ground? Oh Yes, I failed my perception check in the Room with sarcophagus and next thing I know there was gas everywhere and hurling fireballs and my whole team was dead. That was the first trap I encountered. After that I freaked each time a perception check was made

[Kantz]

So: Who wins the Inventory system & got the most annoying item clutter?

[Mr. Darcion]

Originally posted by Joe Chip:

You must be drunk or insane to think BG3 is hard and Solasta easy.
You can literally beat the current BG3's content with a naked level 1 character.

As of now, everything outside of the purely technical aspects is better in Solasta.

Hmm. I find your way of starting a comment with an insult against me unnecessary.

I have not tested playing through BG 3 with level 1 naked character so I can't confirm your claim. Have you played through the game in the way you mentioned and do you have some proof of it?

Also on the final phrase I find you to be somewhat intellectually dishonest when you claim that ALL other aspects in Solastra are better except the technical aspect... Just compare screenshots from both games and you'll see the difference.

[[Heretic]Rivga]

Originally posted by pandariuskairos:

I prefer Solasta's combat simply because it does not use excessive explosions, explosive barrels, and DANGER GROUND effects everywhere, and is a more 'complete' representation of 5e rules, including delayed and readied actions.

Other than that, I find BG3 to be superior in every other way.

Wait.. wait .. so you choose to uses explosive barrels and then get really upset about the over use of explosive barrels? lol come on.

I am half way through my 2nd go around and not used one explosive barrel, see the trick is if you hate a particular mechanic to ignore it. I mean if I hated the wizard class it would be strange to play a wizard then come here to cry on the forums about how bad the wizards are (or is it just me?).