There comes a time when a game releases that is not only massive in its respective genre but redefines what that genre can be as well as shining a spotlight on that genre for the masses to dive into for the first time. That was exactly the case when Larian Studios officially released Baldur’s Gate 3 late last year. I fall into that category as someone who has never really dabbled in the CRPG genre until this game. Now, after nearly 150 hours during my first playthrough, I can attest that Baldur’s Gate 3 is truly a special game. Thus, let’s delve into what makes Baldur’s Gate 3 such an incredible experience for longtime fans of CRPGs and newcomers alike.
Baldur’s Gate 3 is basically Dungeons & Dragons the video game. From the lore, classes, and world being pulled directly from the tabletop game to the literal dice rolls you do constantly throughout the game when conversing with characters or in battle trying to land an attack, all the DnD aspects are implemented phenomenally. Like a campaign of DnD with your friends, Larian gives you the freedom to tackle the world and quests in any way you’d like. You want to do every quest and interacting with every NPC and reap the rewards, you can. If you want to just go around killing all your party members and brute forcing your way through everything alone, that’s fine too. You’re given mostly free reign to do what you wish unless there are specific things that must happen during the story.
There are plenty of random quests given by characters or found throughout the world. Sometimes you just wander into them. At one point, I was walking through an early area of the game and found some vines that went down a hole. Next thing I know, I’m in a new area with a load of fish people and trying to talk my way out of having to fight them all. The sheer amount of variety of how quests could go or that you might not see gives the game the craziest amount of replayability so you can try to see as much as you can as it’s near impossible to see everything in one go.
The best part of Baldur’s Gate 3 are the characters. While you can choose one of the preset characters at the start of the game, it’s highly recommended that you create your own character as the preset characters can become your party members throughout the game. Also choosing a character, technically removes that character’s personality as you are playing that blank slate character as the main character. You do get a wide assortment of party members throughout the game, and they are all endearing in their own way. However, some things you can do will cause some members to leave your party or just completely not join up with you. Or you could kill them or they could kill each other, anything can happen.
However, if you do manage to add a party member, they each have unique quests that play out over the course of the game that can have an impact on the main story. These quests are some of the best things Baldur’s Gate 3 has to offer. While most quests are great throughout the game, these companion quests are the highlight of the game. They endear you to the characters and their struggles with what’s going on. You want to help them achieve their goals throughout their personal stories. These quests are so good that they give you a major incentive to switch of your party of four all throughout the game so you can explore each party member’s questline without issue. Plus, the game will auto level your unused party members when they join you so you never have to worry about bringing an underleveled member in your party just to do their quest.
While the companion quests are absolutely some of the best quests you could find in an RPG, the overall story of the game is a bit lackluster in comparison. The main story can be tackled in a variety of ways with plenty of different quests that have impact on the direction of the overall story. However, the pacing of the main story is is the weakest part of it. It takes a bit too long for the story to really get going; especially when you look back on earlier parts of the game feeling like you’re just doing random quests that don’t feel like they are tied to the main story. Luckily, the story really picks up towards the back third of the game and entrenches you with so much that all ties everything together.
The combat in Baldur’s Gate 3 is adequate and the turn based nature of it allows for a lot of variety in how you approach enemy encounters. There’s an absurd number of spells and abilities that become available as you progress and level up the characters. However, as the game takes it’s DnD roots seriously combat still involves things like initiative to determine turn order and dice rolls to determine if an attack lands and how much damage it does. Even the highest level spells and abilities can do the most abysmal of damage depending on a roll which can be detrimental in harder fights you may be unprepared for. You could also be out of spell slots and thus unable to accomplish your goal of even winning a fight if you don’t rest enough throughout. Thus, some may find the combat lacking especially when compare to the dialogue aspects of the game.
Overall, Baldur’s Gate 3 is a magnificent experience. The sheer variety of things to do and discover as well as the twists and turns the story can take through the course of the game is on another level when compared to most games. The Dungeons & Dragons aspects are phenomenal and feel like you’re actually playing with a group of friends. Baldur’s Gate 3 not only sets the bar for what CRPGs can be, but now raises the standard for the entirety of all RPGs. This game will be something many developers look at for inspiration for years to come, and could easily be considered Larian Studios’ magnum opus.
Score: 10 out of 10
Reviewed on PlayStation 5