Frustrating game made back before they knew how to make games.

[ShadowDragon8685]

This game is really just a frustrating pile of crap. The autosave is useless, if your main character gets killed it's game over, it's brutally difficult to the point that the game will happily throw dire wolves at you at level 1 while you're randomly walking down the road (and they will MURDER YOU DEAD on sight,) and so forth and so on. I had to reload five times to make it to the Friendly Arms Inn and it cost the lives of two men, then not seconds after I got done having a guard give me the business about how people who start fights in the Friendly Arms Inn get swords shoved up their backsides, some jerkoff comes up and starts assassinating me with magic in broad daylight and the guards all stand around holding their guns.

And I do NOT mean the guns that are for shooting, either.

[A Distraction]

Theres a very important and mind saving strategy that ive found at the early stages, and its simply that xzar and montaran are ♥♥♥♥♥ and completely expendable : P use them as meat shields till you get characters you like/level up : D oh and if you can manage to save, lay a snare (repeatedly reloading if you have to) right around the corner to the inn, you can get your catharsis by luring him to it as he trys to talk to you : P

On a serious note, Baldur's Gate is a game of strategy, preparation and patience. The healing potions you get from Imoen and Xzar and Montaran are the best way to get out of a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ situation and the wand in Imoens possesion is a great way to interrupt the big slow spells from the MANY spellcaster assasins that get thrown at you at most new inns on the way.

And yeah Friendly Arm Inn guards have a funny way of defining trouble. They must prefer not being the target of lowbie destroying spellcasters.

[ShadowDragon8685]

A Distraction: The problem was that xzar and montaran were already expended by the time I got there. They died heroically... Well, villainously valiently, at least, in combat against a dire wolf and a wolf, respectively, tanking for my wild mage and rogue... Excuse me, thief. (Bah, I thought this game was based on 3e when I bought it. Snap decision without much time left to get the good price.)

This game is terrible, honestly. The autosave isn't worth a dog's bollock, the game throws wildly inappropriate encounters at you, and if your main died, the game is over, despite the fact that presumably if your companions win, they should be able to get you ressurected.

If this game were being GM'd by a real GM, I'd first insist he upgrade to 3.5/Pathfinder, and second sit him down and read him aloud the relevant sections from the DMG about appropriate encounters.

[Draken]

stop whining. This game is a golden classic, but since the new generation of games have dumbed down their gameplay, then old games feel terribly "broken" and inhumanly hard. there is a QUICK SAVE button just sitting there in plain sight, USE IT and stop whining about auto-save. PAUSE your game, change tactics, unpause, watch them unfold, PAUSE again, change tactics, unpause, rinse and repeat, specially if your main guy is a mage, pause for every spellcast. Also, you DONT have to fight everything thrown at you, you are adventurers not tanks, it is okay and ADVISED to run away if you encounter a hairy monster, you can return to it later for vengeance, you dont always have to fight to the last man on every encounter; and the reason if "you" die it's game over; it's "almost" explained as the story progresses, My main guy is a berzerking fighter, and even so, I try to keep him out of harm's way most of the time. I applaud the decision of the new dev team to keep the game with the 2E AD&D rules, upgrading to new rulesets (4E? ew!) is not always the best thing to do, specially if you want to keep the original game pretty much intact. I've known countless of GMs who preffer to master their games with 2E and even 1E rulesets over the 3E, and that's their desicion. Bottom line: stay calm, save, save alot, and use the pause button, if the battle is not going as you want it, run away.

[ShadowDragon8685]

Who the flying heck do you think you are to tell me to stop whining when I expect a game sold in modern times to actually be flipping playable?

This game IS broken and inhumanly hard. Save and reload and other forms of trial-and-error gameplay have no place. We play games to be entertained, not to be frustrated into wishing to put a fist through our (expensive!) computer monitors. D&D gameplay doesn't translate the best to a computer game, that's why the best D&D-based games make allowances for the fact that they're not being run by a living GM who can read the mood of his table and get things running smoothly again. It's also why modern d20 games give everybody 3x their hit dice at first level, so they can survive some shennanigans.

Because playing for three minutes, getting in over your head, trying to fight because you're an adventurer and fighting things is what you do, and then being told GAME OVER, SUCKS TO BE YOU is no flipping fun!

[JTwarfreak]

I don't see the big deal, I got to the Friendly Arms Inn with only minor damage to one character.

[cougarshamn]

it's a legacy game, leave us old farts our painful memories. It's hard, it's even frustrating, but that's what makes it so rewarding when you do succeed

[JTwarfreak]

I wouldn't say we're all old farts, but many older gamers do love this game.

[vortex_13]

Ah yes the "It's too HARDDDDDD.." whine. Sometimes you play a game for a challenge rather than just to blast through it in a few hours.

[Amphy139]

Ah yes, that wonderful time when an older game goes on sale and all the whiners softened by newer titles come out of the woodwork to whine and complain until their butthurt is slightly slightly soothed. It's always so entertaining, please go on.

[Barnabie Illin']

Originally posted by ShadowDragon8685:

Who the flying heck do you think you are to tell me to stop whining when I expect a game sold in modern times to actually be flipping playable?

This game IS broken and inhumanly hard. Save and reload and other forms of trial-and-error gameplay have no place. We play games to be entertained, not to be frustrated into wishing to put a fist through our (expensive!) computer monitors. D&D gameplay doesn't translate the best to a computer game, that's why the best D&D-based games make allowances for the fact that they're not being run by a living GM who can read the mood of his table and get things running smoothly again. It's also why modern d20 games give everybody 3x their hit dice at first level, so they can survive some shennanigans.

Because playing for three minutes, getting in over your head, trying to fight because you're an adventurer and fighting things is what you do, and then being told GAME OVER, SUCKS TO BE YOU is no flipping fun!

Get good.

[VonCurry]

This game is not even hard....if you need to learn to build characters google is your friend.... this game is one of the greatest games ever made..I cannot believe I am reading this....

[ShadowDragon8685]

Von Curry: So, what, wizard is not an acceptable starting character, then? It cost me the lives of two men just reaching the Friendly Arms Inn the first time, then my main got panicked by a spell from the jackass who jumped me - while all the Inn's guards just did literally nothing - and Imoen couldn't bring him down with arrows (on account of him having mirror image up) before he killed my main with a good roll on a magic missile spell.

Exactly how is that supposed to be fun?

[Gel]

Originally posted by ShadowDragon8685:

Von Curry: So, what, wizard is not an acceptable starting character, then? It cost me the lives of two men just reaching the Friendly Arms Inn the first time, then my main got panicked by a spell from the jackass who jumped me - while all the Inn's guards just did literally nothing - and Imoen couldn't bring him down with arrows (on account of him having mirror image up) before he killed my main with a good roll on a magic missile spell.

Exactly how is that supposed to be fun?

I cleared this game way back with a wizard, so I think that's a load of crap. The game is pretty hard, but to be brutally honest I think you just suck at it. One thing you seem to be good at, however is whining, probably because this is what you do on a daily basis. Maybe if you put in more effort into learning the game's mechanics rather than raving on about how difficult it is, you'd actually be able to progress.

[eye81]

i dont think its terrible and ima relatively new gamer ( still hates cod tho ) yes its difficult and idk any of the rules of the game in the first place. but it is try try try again until u get lucky or improve ur strategy and many people dont like that nowaday. actualy the only game i can think of that is still like that is dark souls witch i love. the only thing about the game that really bothers me is the spell system and how u can only cast X amount everyday

[Proteus]

The game is a classic from a golden age, where they still could make challenging games without any pressure from the publishers to dumb them down in order to attract a greater audience (after all at this time it was still the nerdier part of the population who owned computers (and who loved challenging games) ... before the time where almost everyone began to own one)