Insomniac, Blizzard, Obsidian Devs Attack Baldur's Gate 3 Scope, Call it "Rockstar-Like Nonsense"...
Insomniac, Blizzard, Obsidian Devs Attack Baldur's Gate 3 Scope, Call it "Rockstar-Like Nonsense"...
Larian's Baldur's Gate 3 is poised to be one of the biggest cinematic role-playing games in years & many devs are criticizing the scale/scope of it!
Interesting video describing various developers' take on the game. Is it a genre-defining game or not?
Nobody really expects RPG's to be as big and deep as BG3, they just want a complete game that works without shitty microtransactions everywhere and always online for no reason. Plus, having interesting characters and storylines, quests that can be solved in more than one way, and gameplay that's actually formed by taking player feedback and listening to it is what people reacted well to, among other things. Baldur's Gate 3 doesn't even have Denuvo!
If there's one thing that I hope competitors learn from Larian and BG3, it's that respecting your players and giving them what they want leads to success. Similar to Elden Ring and from software, like that video mentioned. Now compare BG3 to Diablo 4 and Immortal, or the upcoming Starfield and you'll see why people love it. It's not about specs or scope, it's about designing a game to be actually FUN.
Wait, what's wrong with the upcoming Starfield?
Denuvo nothing. Baldurs Gate 3 doesn't have DRM. You can play online without any form of crack. The GOG installer doesn't need any form of account to play, not even a GOG one.
Nobody really expects RPG's to be as big and deep as BG3...
Just to warn you, you will now be quoted in a future video about "Social media viciously attacks Larian for games that are too big and too deep!"
It's not about specs or scope, it's about designing a game to be actually FUN.
This is the key point that these publishers and studios are trying to avoid.
- How much of most AAA budgets are spent on designing microtransaction psychologically manipulative money sinks (dark designs)?
- How much of most AAA budgets are spent on creating addiction in the player-base so that they keep playing the game (and spending money)?
- How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit DLC (not actual new content)?
- How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit to satisfy shareholders?
- How much of most AAA budgets are spent on shit the devs don't want, but executives do?
- How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit padding for marketing purposes?
- How much of most AAA budgets are spent on bullshit DRM?
And keep in mind, by budgets here, I mean both the dollar amount AND time spent by devs that could be spent elsewhere (which is part of the dollar amount since salaries, but I wanted to make it clear that time spent is also important).
Some of the absolute best games in the industry have literally none of that, and people still want to play and buy them years after release because gasp they're actually fun, but these publishers and devs don't want to compare to those, because they WANT the industry to be a bunch of "GAAS" bullshit that's basically a vacuum pushed into people's wallets, cause hey, if it worked for Candy Crush....
I mean for one the DnD mechanics are perfect, the character models are phenomenal, this game deserves the amazing descriptor. But I don't really want to see a bunch of other studios scramble to implement these features because they'll all miss the mark. Its not the futa mommies we made along the way, its not the open quests you can solve however you want, its all of it together. These studios will grab one part and be like "why didn't they like my cock n balls?" It wasn't about the cock n balls.
I doubt a lot of them will. Take Bungie for instance. One of their huge talking points is over-delivering to the player base, and they use the Forsaken expansion as the example. Bungie ponied up a lot of content for the expansion to the point where it became the player base's expectation that the studio would deliver that amount of content every single expansion. BG3 would definitely be in the category of over-delivery by Bungie's standard, however Larian doesn't seem to care. They only cared about delivering a really great product to gamers.
Quite frankly, it's refreshing to see Larian deliver a game like BG3. For years other studios have consistently shaved off content, pulled up paywalls, or locked content behind micro-transactions or sparsely laden DLCs. I find BD3 refreshing, and if it does change the industry, good.
However I don't think that will happen...especially with games published by EA, Activision, and Bungie (Sony). These studios only really care about enriching themselves, and will consistently continue to deliver products that contain the least amount of content they can get away with.
EDIT
Changed BD3 to BG3.
its not the open quests you can solve however you want
I mean...this part is certainly a lot of it. Very few RPGs allow you to combine systems the way that Larian's games do, in a way that approximates a tabletop setting's creativity.
Yeah! I don't want other companies to remake Baldur's Gate 3 because it's a great game, I want other studios to put the amount of polish that BG3 has into their own games.
Sounds clickbaity as fuck.
Where are the devs criticizing the scope of it?
It seems the summary of most of the posts are "smaller studies can't create games as big as BG3" and "not every game/RPG needs to be as big and complex as BG3".
Are those responses incorrect and how is that being critical of BG3?
If anything, they are critcizing the idea that BG3 is the game all RPGs need to strive to be.
They're complaining because they make RPGs that are pathetically shallow and now people know what a AA studio can do.
I mean James Berg did though
"I would not be surprised if this was more dev effort than the next 2 or 3 games in the genre combined. It's Rockstar-level nonsense for scope.
Only a few studio groups could even try this. I cannot wait to play, but this kind of effort likely won't be replicated this decade"
Yes the original starter of the thread Xalavier Nelson Jr. has a very fair point that this can set a standard for indie games however most people have big problems when these complaints are also coming from other AAA developers. James Berg works for bloody microsoft one of the largest companies that is absorbing huge portions of the gaming industry in a monopolistic pattern. Josh Sawyer is a Design Director for Obsidian who is a company who basically follow a very similar path as Larian, its just they sort of failed with their Pillars of Eternity series especially after Deadfire. Maybe Avowed will turn out well but their recent stuff has not found much favor at least in terms of RPGs.
BG3 is what AAA development should be if it was about making good products but at the end of the day these companies are here to make as much money as possible. I mean there is nothing wrong with making money but its clear many publishers have been pushing quite hard on consumers to paying more for less. As long as gaming budgets are this expensive we should be getting things of this quality more frequently but its not likely. I doubt we will see anything close to BG3 from Bethesda with ES6 a game they have teased for nearly 5 years now with almost nothing beyond that little teaser.
Like gamers especially RPG gamers just want a complete game. Its clear the success of BG3, DOS 1 & 2, and Owlcat's pathfinder games show there is a clear market for this. It just needs to be handled with well.
I mean James Berg did though
Those aren't criticisms of Larian or Baldur's Gate 3. They are opinions that creating games at a certain scale isn't something developers can just replicate at will. Just like Rockstar games aren't something any studio can't just go out and put together.
It's like how someone would argue that not all books/novels need to be as long and complex as the Song of Ice and Fire series. Not all books need to be like those books, just like not all games need to be like BG3 (or GTA or RDR to use the other comparison).
BG3 is what AAA development should be if it was about making good products but at the end of the day these companies are here to make as much money as possible.
I think the quality of game, and lack of monetization, is certainly something that AAA games should strive for. I wouldn't agree that all AAA needs to be as big and complex as BG3 though. Just as Elden Ring being a great game doesn't mean that all similar games need to be massive and open-world in the same way.
Plenty of games are "complete" and have a similar or larger scope then BG3, and they're not getting the attention that BG3 is getting now. On the other side of the coin, people really responded to Disco Elysium, and a lot of that had to do with what they did within a small space. If all I wanted was "big" and "complete", I'd be interested in Starfield, not Baldur's Gate 3.
Setting appropriate expectations for one's own work is one thing, but I'll never understand why some people feel the need to deride others for exceeding them.
Because they don't want to be held to the new standard, obviously. They're comfortable and are preemptively taking offense at the idea of having to do more in the future. Like the normal kids who want to punch down the one overachiever who reminds the teacher to assign homework.
But this isn't a homework assignment; these are businesses competing for consumer dollars, and Larian is winning with their investment into a happy team and good product.
Because they don’t want their next rpg compared to bg3. Many of them know they’re working on titles that won’t be as good, and we’re never intended to be as large in scope and depth as bg3, but they’ll be compared to it now.
Kinda similar to how no one makes GTA-ish games anymore because no one could compete with Rockstar on open world man takes on city type games. Now studios are hesitant to stand in the same arena as BG3 because it’s just such a great product
I’ll never understand why some people feel the need to deride others for exceeding them.
Who is doing this?
The video kinda of dances around the subject, but I didn't see anything specific.
Being compared to Rockstar must be a great honor.
Love this in depth video. I agree with the videos creater, there's no way something that so many people are enjoying this much isn't going to change the industry moving forward.