Baldur’s Gate 3’s Success Puts Starfield Between a Rock and a Hard Place

It is odd, but I suspect it shifts peoples expectations slightly even if they don't think about it. Also people might not be willing to spend $60 two months in a row so Baldur's Gate could be dipping into some of Starfields potential earnings here.

I can’t though

I don’t even have enough time to play one game

As someone who enjoys RPGs, knowing I will have BG3 on my ps5 (let alone a significant backlog) makes me care less for missing out on starfield. Totally different games, but with huge RPGs and little play time, any such game can literally take up months of my gaming life. I suspect I will eventually want to play starfield, but I won’t be in a hurrry.

I started with Oblivion and hated how dumbed down Skyrim was. I later played Morrowind and bounced off once (I was too young and stupid, having mostly experienced more "modern" games), but the second time I tried it I loved it. The amount of freedom they lent you made me realize what was wrong with all the later games.

They make roller-coaster rides now, with everything trying to get you into combat as quickly as possible, and the combat encounters being carefully crafted, then you're on to the next ride. My first several hours in Morrowind my second time included no combat whatsoever and the game didn't have an issue with it. You can also skip large portions of dungeons with the right skills, and you can also change how you navigate the open world with spells. It's a wonderful experience that I hope they eventually realize is better than treating players like idiots.

I don’t think it matters if they’re different experiences.

What matters is that the game achieves what is set out to do and if that is an enjoyable and unique experience. Another thing that matters is if they can make a AAA game without scummy monetization.

By some people's standards, every game is an RPG today

I was replaying DOS2 while I waited for BG3. It is a great game. The only thing I think it was missing was cinematics. The voice acting is great but it plays out with you looking down at your characters. I believe Larian knew this was a weak spot of their games and fixed it with BG3. Now their cinematics are fun to watch. It is now very entertaining to interact with these interesting NPCs.

I was playing DOS2 dwarven Beast as a fighter with a shield.

I bounced off DOS1 and DOS2 hard but BG3 is great and I'm having a great time (once I restarted with a character that fit the party and my playstyle more).

🧠

The thing is, BG3 hasn’t redefined anything. It has shown that there’s a market for games that do have extremely strong story and character writing and don’t have microtransactions and shitty mini-DLCs like skin packs and late-game equipment early on - basically, pre-Horse Armor gaming.

It’s the same as The Witcher 3 back when that released and also “redefined RPGs”.

"Redefined" is just an industry buzzword used to describe a title that AAA publishers can't understand why it's so successful. I firmly believe they are that out of touch with their consumers.

Redefined in quality and depth of choices, maybe. It's certainly a lot better than the vast majority of RPGs that have come out lately. I keep getting surprised while playing it at what's possible.

I haven't gotten to play it yet, but from the gameplay reveal and stuff, it looks... like a traditional CRPG? Like a right proper successor to BG 1 and 2? Bigger, more polished, and not THAC0 based, but an evolution of what used to be plentiful?

Is this not just like saying "this new remastered Duran Druan greatest hits album is really redefining music!"?

One really cannot underestimate how important presentation and production values is to the vast majority of players, even those taking the hobby seriously enough to read reviews and post on serious gaming forums. If a game is all textboxes, doesn't feature decent enough graphics and isn't fully voiced people just won't be impressed with it or won't even give it the time of day.

Baldur's Gate 3 is just a CRPG with AAA production values, which we haven't really gotten since Dragon Age: Origins, which is 14 years old at this point. And there is something to it, going into some random cave and starting a questline with unique character models, voiced dialogue and cutscenes is kind of more fun than only getting textboxes, even if the actual things you do aren't any more involved or deep.

I agree this a statement from an ignorant. I love BG3 but it is just an Ultima but better. With today technology.

Yeah I'd sooner say "gone back to its roots" than "redefined". This is how I remember RPGs.

I'm with you on the hyperbole. BG3 has been a massive success, but it's not really innovative or unique. In fact it's terribly buggy and is missing several features the community has been begging for over years of early access. It suffers all of the same problems other RPGs suffer from.

It's overall very high quality (other than the bugs), it serves a niche that is perpetually starving for content, and it encourages enthusiastic fans to buy copies for their friends. It has the names of Baldur's Gate, DnD, and Faerun all going for it. It landed smoothly in between the release windows of FFXVI and Starfield so it has no major competition. That's why it's blown up the way it has.

It's really good, I'm very happy everyone's loving it, but it's just... a good game that released with providential circumstance. Why can't it just be that simple?

worse than no-name imo. the kind of name you quickly learn to scroll past in the search results. shit-name

with planets to explore

My worry here is that the majority will be procedurally generated planets.

I am thinking the same thing. I do want Starfield but do not have a PC to play it on sadly. I am buying BG3 when it drops for PS5 next month so I also wonder how much they will lose out on by not having it released on PS.

I fully expect Starfield was going to be disappointing, full stop.