I drove through a snow storm, a mini-blizzard, when my nearest Best Buy got copies in and I called and asked them to hold a copy for me. Ran outside, shoveled my driveway, but we lived off a half-moon circle, which hadn't been plowed, so I turned my Honda civic around in the driveway, backed up into the garage, reeved the engine, and shot down the driveway picking up enough speed to plow through the snow until reaching the street that had been plowed. Got stuck twice coming and going, but I got back home with that box and its six CDs.
Dude I feel you, I used to plow through snow with my EG3 '94 Civic, the wee bugger actually managed that without any major damage, was my first car as well and I loved it!
I extended my college by 2 years playing these & also Warcraft 3..Still playing BG1 & 2 and also actual pen & paper DND. Thank you BG for introducing me to DND!
Currently about halfway through baldur's gate, my first experience with crpgs and the d&d ruleset as a whole, and I just can't stop playing, can't wait to start bg2 and 3 eventually
This was literally a game changer when I played it in the late 90's, no one had seen anything like it - a real time fully animated high quality open world rpg. It blew me away at the time and I was super impressed by it as it was everything I had dreamed about as far as video games went. For all the graphical wonder of today's games none of them excite me or impress like this game did back in the day.
I bought it day and date. Other than Panzer General II, this is the greatest game ever made. All the clunky stuff he describes is intuitive to me, I played d&d in the 80s, even hung out with Gygax one time, so yeah, the UI and rules fit me like a glove
Playing this as 9 year old in the 90s was beyond amazing. I had Pentium 100 mhz 16 ram so that game barely run with like 17 fps but still loved every second. I don't think I ever felt magic of gaming so strongly again, Mass Effect was close but that was many years later. Good times, great game.
Honestly the thing I missed most in the sequel was the blocked mapping, where you HAD to cross the region and get to the other side to get to the next region. It really lent a real feel to exploration and journeying across the wilds.
I totally understand the frustration with BG1 & 2 lack of explanations and tutorials. However, this is what made them feel like playing D&D for real. When I got "stuck", I would "cheat" by breaking out my D&D books (especially the Monster Manual), and figure things out from there.
The box copy game with massive manuals that had all the rules, spells, class professions as well as hints on where to invest proficiency points based on which class.
Games had manuals. Now they don't. Is that somehow better or intrinsically a good thing? That you don't have a manual to read and everything is crammed into in-game tutorials or hover over menus or something? If I watch a movie set in a historical period that I know nothing about and fail to grasp many points due to that ignorance, is it the movies fault? In my opinion it isn't. Not all media need to be baby food level of pre-digested to be well designed. I would argue the opposite. If the base concepts of a game are too complex to be apprehended just through emerging gameplay, they should not be crammed tutorial style into it.
Personally I liked those open, almost empty areas. It feels natural and balanced. Not every area needs to be packed to the max with stuff. I also like those "long walks" giving you the feeling of actually going somewhere. I missed that a bit in BG2.
Back in the day with the original, I remember wandering and exploring areas looking for secrets. There were a good number of them, they just weren't EVERYWHERE. I also wandered into WAY over-leveled areas without warning and got caught by several winter wolves and a vampiric wolf I had no chance of winning against. I ran, the entire way across the map, with them chasing me, and finally got away. It was awesome.
Also they weren't empty. I think every square of the map had something to it. An NPC, a little quest, some scenery elements, a tough enemy, maybe a dungeon even if it's a tiny one. Sure, nothing of that is some great adventure with tons of loot. But it's small touches that make the world alive and believable.
The Enhanced Edition was a blessing to preserve this series for modern hardware. Been playing through the saga for my girlfriend who never played it and got into D&D
I never played D&D prior to Baldur's Gate so I didn't have the knowledge of what a round, a turn was. You can imagine my frustration when I saw things like "Last for 10 rounds + 3 rounds/level", "Last for 2 turns". It also took me a very very long time to figure out why my fighters just stood there not attacking even when their portraits showed that they were engaging combat. Also, to this day, I can't estimate whether my web will hit myself or my enemies. I blame Edwin, he must have done this on purpose.
Playing thru BG1 again, no idea how many times I’ve played this. I love the wide open empty spaces. I have adult children younger than this game, mind blowing.
bwahahaha. that is awesome. glad to see I am not the only one who does that stuff. Having just finished Icewind Dale, their names were: Fightergurl, mage/thief, thief/cleric, and so on. :P
Perhaps someone else mentions this in the comments, but 1gp for a night at the inn is actually a crazy price, unless it's a very nice inn. The game, because it's a CRPG, does have you accumulate a rather large amount of gold, but this is not the norm in the setting. In D&D a night at an Inn may actually be around 1sp (silver piece), which generally will include a meal if it's a good spot. A ratty inn may even just be 5cp or 7cp (copper piece), expect no meal and perhaps an STD in that Inn. This is why you see some equipment cost 10gp, like a sword, which is an amount a peasant cannot hope to afford. Great video and a true classic of CRPGs.
Exactly..people often don't realise that, the way items are portayed in games often, a +2 longsword would probably be able to buy a house all for yourself in regular DnD
I think one thing missed but worth mentioning regarding companions, besides time, is that alignment matters for whether companions stick around. Like Edwin is the strongest wizard in the game, but if you cross 18 alignment, he leaves you. Also, some companions flat out cannot be placed with other companions. Regarding the achievements for starting area, my theory is that a lot of players bought baldur's gate on steam for nostalgia sake, since they probably own the CD that no longer works with most modern computers.
This is my first time watching a video on your channel. I really like that you make these reviews after "100%" completion. I can hear the differences in comparison to other peoples' reviews which often stop after understanding the core. Your understanding and views of the games are so much better and it truly give your reviews extra quality which is worth it! Keep up your good work!
The top character doesn't always do the talking. Sometimes dialogue happens when your party is walking up to an npc, and the character who is closest to that npc will be the one doing the talking. You can also select individual characters in your party to initiate dialogue and that character will be talking, or using their charisma stat if you're talking to a merchant to get higher prices for your sales.
I've always preferred the "openness" of Baldur's Gate 1 versus Baldur's Gate 2. Reminds me why I love the Pillars of Eternity series because they embrace the same structure of BG1 while telling a (mostly) linear storyline with great villains.
The villian in Pillars 1 genuinely made me want to defeat him. He was so sure of his goal and of the ultimate fruitlesness of our fight against him! Such a good villian.
I love this game. Had to laugh at the basilisk encounter at around 11:30. That map was always a pain when I was a kid and never used the protection scrolls or spells.
I was almost one of those people that never left the starting area. It wasn't until watching some guides on RUclips (yours included) that I truly understood how to navigate playing this game.
I grew up on action RPGs, with my favorites being modern Bethesda/Bioware/Obsidian RPGs. I felt like I was stretching myself to play Pillars of Eternity 1 & 2 because of the CRPG gameplay, but ended up loving them for the story & the strategy in combat. I may never get around to playing BG1&2, but I loved this vid and I'm excited for your story series to learn more about the games!
You could work your way back. Starting with Pillars of Eternity and then trying increasingly older and less accessible titles as your cRPG experience grows. You won't even need guides by the time you hit Baldur's gate. Baldur's gate is actually pretty accessible compared to the 25 years of cRPG surrounding it. When it released in 1998 it was definitely among one of the easiest cRPGs to pick up (unless you want to count hack'n slash games like Diablo. Not nearly as rough as Wizardry 8(2001) let alone the lower budget games that were releasing at that time. Baldur's gate had come a LONG way from Ultima 6(1990), wasteland(1988) and dark sun(1993).
This one video earned you a sub. Very well done and structured. I literally already own the game but I'm trying to buckle down and play the damn thing, I hate abandoning games.
I just found this from random. As someone who has beaten the game many, MANY times, I will say this is an outstanding review. Kudos to you, friend. You've gained a subscriber.
Very good commentary. I played the original (multiple CDs and paperback-sized manual) when it was a new release, so the EE was more of an enjoyable nostalgia trip than it would be for a lot of other players. It was a great game for its time, but it has not aged well and it takes a lot more patience than most games out there now.
Here's the thing about Dragonspear. It has to be a mostly self-contained story so as not to interfere with bg2. It's a tangent,a side story. That said,I love me some Argent.
There is one thing a low reputation will do for you: grant different special abilities. As you begin and/or finish each chapter, your character will dream when resting and get special abilities. The dreams are slightly different depending on whether your reputation is =10. Higher reputation gives defensive abilities such as cure wounds, neutralize poison, and draw upon holy might. If you have lower than average reputation you will instead get Larloch's minor drain, ghoul touch, and vampiric touch.
Can’t stress how much I love these videos. Excellent job! You inspired me to give Pillars of Eternity 1 a try and I’m about 1/3 done with it. I don’t have much time to game so it will take me awhile. Loving the story and world so far even if combat is a little easy on normal. Will give this game a chance sometime next year most likely. Thank you for posting such great content!
If they would modernize the actual UI of these games, they would hold up against games like Pillars of Eternity and Pathfinder just as well as any game made today. What makes them really archaic and hard to understand is the extremely clunky, extremely un-optimized UI where you could do something in 1 click, you're doing it in like 4 clicks and 3 menu screens when it comes to BG.
They did modernize the UI with the enhanced editions and you'd need a lot more than a UI change to make Baldur's gate as accessible as POE or Owlcat's pathfinder games. It isn't that you need to make '4 clicks' in baldur's gate, most tasks are simple enough to perform. What's hard is understanding the game. How to build your character, the rules, how to explore, how to overcome encounters.
2+ e of BG games is miles more accessible and easy to learn than Pathfinder for instance (basicallly 3.5e) when it comes to building a char. No feats, no skills, no misleadingly bad options and easy ways to mess up . Encounter design in earlier fights is better than Pathfinder too imo (I shudder at that 30 str 5th level Bear-treant against a 2 lvl party and the Owlbear)
@@user-gn3cq6jw4w Was also surprised by that statement. Owlcats Pathfinder video game was really hard to get into without a guide for me and I played pen and paper 3.5 for years.
You've said before how CRPGs need to do better about explaining their own mechanics, but man, this game gives me hope because they were MUCH worse about it back then.
Yeah they really seemed to expect you to read the books and learn all the systems inside out before playing lol. That still helps these days but it seems less necessary at least.
This game came with a physical manual. But obviously they're trying to improve and they're making the games simpler, sharper and more accessible as well.
dog I'm 110 hours into the trilogy first full playthrough working on baldur's gate 2, ran into the "nauseated" debuff for the first time no clue what it meant
I didn't have too much issue with BG1, generally any problem is solved by getting better equipment. But BG2 I really struggled with. The text always went by so fast, I never knew if I should case Ruby Ray of Reversal, Keldon's Warding Whip, or Breach. Or even dispel magic. It's still a mystery to me to this day. :-)
It's a shame Enhanced Edition didn't add a way to examine enemies' resistances and immunities / conditions like Pathfinder. I love how free-form the start of the game is.
I really tried to love the game because of the many classes.....but I quit after I got to the first Inn. If they do a remake, it would be wonderful, till then most people will never fully play it
@@FatBunny168 "Most people will never fully play it" is a hell of a claim. Most zoomers, perhaps, but a whole hell of a lot of us played its original release and regard it as the best Western RPG to come along.
@@ahoyforsenchou7288 It's largely unplayable today due to the existing knowledge you need to even attempt to play it. The game tells you nothing and requires way too much outside research for most people to ever play.
@@FatBunny168maybe try jrpgs If you've played most of the Western rpgs. I recommend starting with xenoblade chronicles definitive edition. It does have some tropes at the start but gets much much better very quickly and it uses the tropes on purpose to subvert expectations. Play on casual mode if it gets difficult since if you don't do the boring fetch quests you'll be underlevelled.
I purchased the enhanced version back in 2016 and loved it. I own the original's but could never get them to run properly on a modern PC. Brings back good memories. What I like best about the combat in bg 1 and 2 is that they are a thinking person's game. You can't muscle your way thru some of the encounters. As it should be mages are tough opponents that require you to get past their shields.
The game was my first RPG ever. I did not even know what RPG is. I played the original and my English was bad at that time. However, I never had any of the problems that players are complaining about. The game rules are easy to grasp ever if you haven't heard anything about AD&D. Unless you are too lazy to read. Those who complain are either too dumb of too spoiled by the new generation games. It is still one of the best games I have played ever.
Was it really hard to believe that Irenicus, an epic leveled mage, captured Gorion's ward and his team? He could solo all the BG1 companions and your created hero at the same time and it's not even a hyperbole. What was even the point of "Siege of Dragonspear" narratively?
Forcing Minsc, Dynaheir, Jaheira, Khalid and Imoen into your party to avoid continuity snarls with the beginning of BG 2. That's the only thing I can think of.
honestly i would reccomend that people get this on mobile/tablet and not on steam. the mobile port for 1 & 2 are amazing. and this is a perfect poop game.
Modern gamers often dislike old school games like BG1 & 2, Fallout 1 & 2, ect because those older games didn't do nearly as much hand-holding, or easy mode follow-the-sparkly-line game play. You actually have to talk to NPC to figure out the weakness of the werewolf-like monster (loup-garou) is weak to gold not silver, and they find a powerful gold sword. As for the other monsters, why would you just assume your character would, or should know why their attacks don't work? Would the monsters tell them? "Ha ha, I'm immune to cold, but I sure hope you don't have fire-based spells, that would be bad for me." TLDR: games that don't lead you around by the nose, are often disliked by modern gamers.
Thats true and more than often I do agree, however one must understand that modern gamer have been brought into an industry of hand holding. If everything you played had holded your hand, you will feel horrible the moment you try a game from the MS-DOS era. So in the end the new batches of people coming in dont know anything outside lootboxes, dlcs, pre orders (of digital games *facepalm*) and so on. Now... the people who came from the Baldurs Gate era or prior, who morphed into supporting the casualization of the games.... those are the ones one to be blamed.
Glad I found your channel . Binge watched a lot of your previous videos during this heatwave in Scotland. Nice measured reviews and a mellow voice in the background make it also a nice podcast while I make builds for characters in games I will never the leave the starting area with. Thank you
I just have to express regarding companions in this game, that although they aren’t very fleshed out, Minsk is one of, if not THE, most beloved companion in a Bioware game and maybe in CRPGs. Do I care that he is just a 2-dimensional ultra chivalrous do-gooder)? No, I don’t because he’s so funny about being a good guy. His hilarious comments and interactions with the party is great. And that Minsc either has a miniaturized giant space hamster which only he understands or that Minsc is maybe a little insane is part of his charm. That there are hints that Minsc isn’t insane and Boo may actually be a miniaturized giant space hamster is *chef’s kiss*.
I picked this up out of curiosity in 2016. Played through the first game and got partially through the second game before I got completely stuck. Shelved it until 2023, and picked it up again as I'd heard about BG3 being released. I picked up right where I left off, determined to get through the part I was stuck at. Once I did, the whole game opened up for me and I've now become completely obsessed to the point that I couldn't give a crap about BG3. By the way, the modding community is still very active for this series. Modding is much more complicated given it's an old game, but it's injected completely new life with updated combat AI, more characters and kits, and endless banter and dialog mods to bring the characters to life. You owe it to yourself to muster up the patience to learn this game. It's well worth the effort.
Imoen, Khalid, Minsc, Jaheira, Dynaheir I was never able to play with other companions, never and this was also the only game / trilogy I played multiple times. My childhood
To be perfectly fair to siege of dragonspear, it offers a bit more of a connection between bg1 and bg2 in the form of conversations with the "hooded man". It's not the biggest focus of the expansion but somewhat appreciated. In doing that, it lays the groundwork for the major question of the series what it /means/ to be a child of bhaal. That's still not much when compared to the entire expansions runtime, but the main story in bg1 was pretty incidental to a lot of the main game's content as well.
Right but those conversations could've been happening alongside just about anything else. Mostly he's just goading you and telling you how cool Caelar is compared to you.
I would not recommend playing vanilla BG1, but there is a mod out there called "Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition Trilogy" which is combining BG1, BG2 + Add-ons in the BG2 engine/mechanics. It improved vanilla BG1 so much that it feels like a brand new and way better game.
THACO is one of those things that always confused me when playing BG1, all explanations I've found online have been rather convoluted and made little sense. Your explanation has made it much clearer! Y'never know, I may even finish the game this time!
All I know is that the lower your THAC0 is the better and that it stands for "To Hit Armor Class 0," but how you actually calculate your attack rolls is completely beyond me.
@@MrQwertysystem . Here is simple explanation. Roll is done using d20. If your THAC0 is 15 and you roll 16, you would hit -1 AC. If you roll 18, you would hit AC of -3 (18 is 3 more than 15). If you would roll 14, you'd hit AC of 1. Normal human without dexterity bonuses or dense skin traits etc usually had AC of 10. What is often confusing with THAC0 is that the lower it is, the better. AD&D second edition was tremendously good ruleset back in the day, but it did things the other way around than modern games do.. AC, THAC0 and saving throws all get better the lower they get.
@@MrQwertysystem You count the difference between the AC and THAC0 to determine the roll required to hit(minus the AC from the attacker's THAC0 to determine the roll). Works the same way as AC really. No 'tables' needed if you can count. What's the difference between 20 THAC0 and -5 AC? 25. What's the difference between 6 THAC0 and 5 AC? 1. Count the difference. You can literally do it on your fingers.
Just finished ToB, and have to let Mortym know I wouldn't have gotten through the original saga without him. Besides that, I prefer BG 1 way more over the 2nd mostly because of the map setup. It's also nice to start nowhere and then work your way up to this big city after figuring everything out. Thanks again Mortym.
As a 20 year old who has been blessed with Dos2, deadfire, tyranny etc. I just can’t play these old school games, I give them a fair go but it’s like trying to read og Stan lee comics they just don’t cut it by todays standards.. Great review as always I look forward to trying BG3 one day.
Understandable. I played Baldur's Gate back when it was released in '98, and it was the most amazing thing ever. Now, after having been spoiled by Owlcat, Obsidian and Inexile, these games do seem terribly clunky. The Infinity Engine has not aged well. I think it's only really the nostalgia that keeps us coming back for one more run-through.
I’ve been playing baldurs gate trilogy recently and I installed no class restrictions for any race mod It’s so much more fun to mix and match races. I would recommend it if you want something different.
Yeah my first ever CRPG experience was baldur's gate It was the reason I actually really didn't like the genre. Eventually when tyranny came out I changed my mind ended up going back and really loving the experience, but as a new player at the time and fairly young it was just an overwhelming experience and I can see why a lot of people would be turned off.
I played BG1 & 2 for the first time last year, so no nostalgia: big agree on SoD being a mixed bag. It feels weirdly anachronistic, like a 2016 crpg story sandwiched between 2 1990s fantasy stories. It might be fine on its own, but it’s a strange bridge between BG1 and BG2.
Literally my all time favorite video game series... Pillars of Eternity and The Witcher has come close, but just doesn't quite get there... the character creation will never be beat in my opinion
Minor complaint with the review of Dragonspear: the ending is not the only thing tying it to BG2. The "hooded man," who hounds and interacts with you quite a lot, is the real connection. You see how and why he began taking an interest in your character, and this is very important in the context of "why/how did we get captured" in BG2's opening. Mind you, it's still a very slim piece of the whole expansion, but it does link the games. All that said, Dragonspear is an absolutely fantastic and fun expansion and whenever I do a full trilogy playthrough, I never skip it.
Great video watched the whole way through Really looking forward to your story series as I'm trying to get caught up to BG3, and so I bought the first two games but after hours I'm only in the town of Beregost after recruiting Neera lol (not used to games like these)so I think I'd prefer watching a series from someone that really knows what they're doing though I'm still stumbling my own way through BG1 and eventually 2 to say I did lol
Hey. I’m sure you are already swamped with titles to play. I would love to see some videos on the old gold box or silver box games. Specifically Pool of Radiance but others in the series would be great too. Or if you are in to sci-fi, the AD&D Buck Rogers games would be fun to watch also.
I'm here to see the Origins of Baldurs Gate 3 and holy moly. I see the similarities which is cool. BG3 brought a whole new fan base and it makes these games interesting to more modern gamers. A brand new universe (to me) that I haven't heard of aside from D&D, I only thought it was a board game. I'm amazed how complex the old games were.
yeah I started Baldurs Gate 3 but was a bit confused by being throw into situations with all the lore not known to me. So stopped after clearing the Underdark and decided to go back to Baldurs Gate 1 and was very surprised. Combat is dated but the rpg mechanics of the combat are still great. I love the exploration aspect of the game with questing and different areas and also how lived in the world feels. you meet many a character, some just going on about their lives, some in trouble and it's all done with a wide variety of characters. much bigger range than in the first area of BG3 with the grove etc.. a lot of roleplay is also very good. reputation and alignment etc.. is a big thing and you have to play accordingly otherwise your chosen party members might not like the changes (be it good or evil depending on the character) and they leave if you reach extremes on either side. also some quests, sometimes the best way is to not brute force and use items/potions to get a result for the quest without it breaking your character rp.
The fact that only 46% of players who own the game actually left candlekeep has another explanation - a lot of people buy this game due to nostalgia and never actually sit down to play it.
@@MortismalGaming This is me. I had to get the mobile version since I just could not power through with those graphics on pc but I want to be familiar with the setting before 3 releases
Baldur's Gate 1 and Fallout 1 were the first games I got really into back in the day. Still love and play 'em both. For anyone on the fence about playing BG1, another plus is the MUSIC and SOUND. You really feel "in the world" all the time. Also, games back then came with quality manuals! So, part of the experience was reading up on the spells and so on. Buying the game now should come with a PDF, although I'm not sure if it's the same document as the original manual.
Great review! I know that's nitpicking, but calling ToSC DLC sounded so weird for me, because at the time of its premiere additional content for games was called expansion packs, in particular as large as ToSC. Although DLCs already existed at that time, they were mostly minor things and not so widespread as today. Also, it seems that YT shows wrong game as it links to BGIIEE to this video, not sure if it is something that YT does automatically or you choose it.
Late 90s and early 2000s was a great time for crpgs. I kinda like how underpowered you are in BG1 and can easily get killed by a wolf in the beginning. In BG2 you already start at a much higher level.
I actually appreciate the fact that this game doesn’t explain every facet of enemy strengths/weakness to the nth degree. It certainly frustrated me back in the day tho! The boss Wolfwere on that island is, however, RIDICULOUS lmao. There’s only 3/4 weapons in the entire game that can harm him. It was one of the very rare occasions I just gave up and looked online for a solution in a game. Talk about throwing you in the deep end with no idea what to do about it lol
Honestly I just bought the enchanted edition because I loved the game back then. I wonder how many others like me there are out there who influence the steam statistics xP
Good vid, I actually like the lack of info feedback on certain enemies as it encourages you to read the in game info and would be more realistic in questing role play wise
I think the difficulty level was ridiculously hard. Imagine a group playing tabletop D&D, and the dungeon master is so incompetent and cruel that there are multiple party wipes every play session! You would spend all your time creating new character sheets, and hardly any time adventuring. Ideally, the DM adjusts the difficulty level to match his play group, so that encounters are challenging, but survivable if the players have their head in the game and work together.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but another thing with combat is that it has friendly fire. Casting Web is great, except for your fighter, who's up there with the mobs. I loved BG when it came out, but now, if I never hear, "You must gather your party before setting forth," again, I'll die a happy man.
There is very few things i liked about BG1 but those few things are actually something that still stands out til this day. the biggest one is probably the story and the morality behind the question it poses to you as a player, and i can't really say more without spoiling the story. the other being so many companions and they all seemingly like to come with some form of baggage and their own goals and own morality, they aren't just people you pick up along the road to come fight for you, if you bring good natured companions and evil natured companions in the same party there will be conflict. the quest text is interesting because it's not exactly like the usual quest text, it reads more like a diary where the character isn't always sure what is awaiting them or what to do exactly or where to go. the rest of the things i don't feel important to mention or something i think was objectively bad. for example the power of certain spells that completely makes you overpowered or how you can absolutly get stomped on by RNG even though you did every possible move right so you are forced to more or less save in every room, before entering anywhere or doing anything because it could just be game over around every corner potentially if you don't know the game well enough. your standard fair of saving constantly in older games, but more so in this game than most others, there's a reason why you have a quick save button in a game as old as this.
I started playing it recently, it's so fun and am looking forward to going deep, started with a crusader and moved to a kensei and am having a great time
I tried BG:EE some years ago, but stopped playin after a few hours. As you said it is clunky, but there are many mods for this game. Especially the ui mods make it look and feel more like a modern crpg.
He didn’t go mad until after his family was killed. The books describe how he went mad as he cut down his family and himself. He then hired the crew the make the traps and such. The demon came later due to the massed wealth.
About the information thing... the immunities of enemies, i agree, sometimes it is frustrating, cause there is no system to research them ingame. But for the petrification, you just need to read your spells... and reading is one of the things that people don't like nowdays. In my opinion, people should just stop complaining and start reading.
The method of gaining a full custom party is somewhat similar in BG3. Start a multiplayer game and then open up the game via the .exe file up to three times after you open the first one. Then join the multiplayer lobby with each of the other windows and create your characters, start the games, save it on the first window and close them all out. Then you open the game back up and load your save. You now have a custom four man party. Enough to beat that one devil on the mindflayer ship and take his flaming 2h sword. You DO need to drop the graphics to minimum and even then your PC may crash during the creation process so be quick and patient with any failures.
I'm almost definitely one of those that didn't pass the intro. I want o play these games so badly but I'm just horrible at RTwP. Something about it just doesn't gel with me in this format.
I was the same, started it twice and never got into it. What I eventually did was started in the story mode. When I got past the mines at nashkel i was hooked. I then restarted again and had the motivation to learn the game mechanics. In normal mode you can mostly just force your way through combat with some mellee based tanks, a ranger and a mage.
Have you tried pillars of eternity before? I think those games are a perfect introduction for these RTwP CRPGS as pillars uses a lot of systems used in the OG rpgs
I will say this for THAC0: It definetely helps limit player knowledge of monster AC. That one, simple step of math to subtract AC from THAC0 score throws them off completely.
This video probably has the highest like/dislike ratio I've never seen. Your channel in general has an outstandingly low number of dislikes. Godspeed man
The worst one on the channel is the video about whether BG3 is too similar too DOS2 (I don't think they are, but what do I know) that's sits around 60/40 70/30
@@MortismalGaming I think it's too similar,and felt like falling asleep during divinity combat at times. I was hoping for a whole new game, but I will be buying bg3. I think the art for items is awful in divinity and wanted something crisp and realistic. Baldurs gate had nice art for its day.
@22:30 where you discuss the reason why many players don't make it past the starting area in this game or Baldur's Gate 2 points to the reason, in my opinion, why most modern games are just garbage. These games DO NOT just hand everything to the player... they have to learn, sometimes by trial and error, how to do things and how things work. A new adventurer would not automatically know that basilisks can turn you to stone unless they had witnessed it. IF you were hitting a creature with a sword you would be able to tell that it was not having an effect, but you would not know why. Telling the players these things picks at the fabric of immersion. Nowadays games hand everything to the player because they whine that they had no way to know... these games unapologetically tell the player to just figure it out.
Absolute classic, I still have my 6 CD original white and grey-blue box on my shelf. Can't play it that way anymore, but the EE is better nowadays anyway :D
Had evil people in my party getting upset due to high reputation. I accidentally flooded a mine killing people. Reputation decreased, and got xp. 11/10 problems solved and will play again.
Baldur's Gate was my favourite game of my childhood. I loved reading books, I love the cRPG style character building, and the game was a perfect mix of both. It made me quite excited about the future of gaming with even better games that I hoped would follow.
Using Steam achievements as a metric is a REALLY bad point though. Skyrim Special Edition, has 65% on finishing the tutorial. Fallout NV has 47% on reaching Primm. Witcher 3 has 65% on completing the first area. Half Life 2 has 67% on tutorial finish. Almost every single game on Steam has metrics, that on surface show, that the vast majority bought the game, but didn't actually play for more than 5 minutes. Having low completion metrics is the norm, not the exception (even on tutorials), so it can't be used to point out anything meaningful, beyond the unreliability of the metrics themselves.
I don't pretend it's a perfect measure by any means, but even assuming a giant margin of error, let's say half, that's still an enormous amount of people who couldn't be bothered to play it, or started up and immediately went 'no thanks'
@@MortismalGaming It is true that CRPGs tend to have at best, an unintuitive nature, but this point is better made by making the points you did by presenting the issues in game, and your points were spot on. Not to mention, many of the re-leases of old games on steam get low achievements by default, when people in their late 20's and 30's just buy them out of nostalgia, but then don't ever play them. Using steam achievements to make points is imo. better used, that the first achievement is the base line of people who even played game in a way that the steam was able to get the metrics, and the difference between it, and the second, how quickly people might have been put off and so on, but it's just not a very good metric to use even then. I mean, considering who few people get the achievement for not only NOT finishing a game, but not even reaching the half way point, but still would buy the sequel? TLDR; Your points stand better on their own without steam achievement statistics, is what I am saying.
I have an interesting psychology going on. I enjoy watching review videos on games that I've already played. (Especially yours!) I just like hearing somebody talk about my favorite games. But respectfully disagreeing, I *did* like the NPC's in BG1. Their few handfuls of spoken lines (when they are selected, when they attack, when they are low on HP, etc.) and their portrait and class was juuuust enough to make them each feel unique and different. At least, that's how it was for me, allowing myself to be conned into them being more than they really are (more psychology lol).
Thanks for the review, I watched it all the way through. Not that I need anyone to convince me to play Baldur's Gate. I love these Infintiy Engine games and never get tired of them. I understand AD&D, though, so a lot of the confusing parts aren't confusing to me. Anyone who likes these games, or who feels like they would like them if they were just a bit more modern, should try Pillars of Eternity, which is also excellent.
I drove through a snow storm, a mini-blizzard, when my nearest Best Buy got copies in and I called and asked them to hold a copy for me. Ran outside, shoveled my driveway, but we lived off a half-moon circle, which hadn't been plowed, so I turned my Honda civic around in the driveway, backed up into the garage, reeved the engine, and shot down the driveway picking up enough speed to plow through the snow until reaching the street that had been plowed. Got stuck twice coming and going, but I got back home with that box and its six CDs.
The best thing about the enhanced edition is...
No CD changing 😅😂🤣
Thats awesome! Lol Clutch dumping the civic to plow ur way to best buy! Those old civics were pretty tough for their size.
Dude I feel you, I used to plow through snow with my EG3 '94 Civic, the wee bugger actually managed that without any major damage, was my first car as well and I loved it!
I extended my college by 2 years playing these & also Warcraft 3..Still playing BG1 & 2 and also actual pen & paper DND. Thank you BG for introducing me to DND!
Wasn’t that BG2? I’m sure BG1 with Sword coast was 2 discs?
Currently about halfway through baldur's gate, my first experience with crpgs and the d&d ruleset as a whole, and I just can't stop playing, can't wait to start bg2 and 3 eventually
This was literally a game changer when I played it in the late 90's, no one had seen anything like it - a real time fully animated high quality open world rpg. It blew me away at the time and I was super impressed by it as it was everything I had dreamed about as far as video games went. For all the graphical wonder of today's games none of them excite me or impress like this game did back in the day.
Replaying it now and its addictive AF thanks to nostalgia
Same here! I tested my RTX2060 OC with it with tons of laughter from my friends..I said whaatt? Its my benchmark of CRPG immersiveness! 😁
I bought it day and date. Other than Panzer General II, this is the greatest game ever made. All the clunky stuff he describes is intuitive to me, I played d&d in the 80s, even hung out with Gygax one time, so yeah, the UI and rules fit me like a glove
Playing this as 9 year old in the 90s was beyond amazing. I had Pentium 100 mhz 16 ram so that game barely run with like 17 fps but still loved every second. I don't think I ever felt magic of gaming so strongly again, Mass Effect was close but that was many years later. Good times, great game.
Honestly the thing I missed most in the sequel was the blocked mapping, where you HAD to cross the region and get to the other side to get to the next region. It really lent a real feel to exploration and journeying across the wilds.
I totally understand the frustration with BG1 & 2 lack of explanations and tutorials. However, this is what made them feel like playing D&D for real. When I got "stuck", I would "cheat" by breaking out my D&D books (especially the Monster Manual), and figure things out from there.
The box copy game with massive manuals that had all the rules, spells, class professions as well as hints on where to invest proficiency points based on which class.
@@chrisbaldwin8570 Yeah, BG 1 & 2 did a good job of condensing down the PHB.
Games had manuals. Now they don't. Is that somehow better or intrinsically a good thing? That you don't have a manual to read and everything is crammed into in-game tutorials or hover over menus or something?
If I watch a movie set in a historical period that I know nothing about and fail to grasp many points due to that ignorance, is it the movies fault? In my opinion it isn't. Not all media need to be baby food level of pre-digested to be well designed.
I would argue the opposite. If the base concepts of a game are too complex to be apprehended just through emerging gameplay, they should not be crammed tutorial style into it.
Personally I liked those open, almost empty areas. It feels natural and balanced. Not every area needs to be packed to the max with stuff. I also like those "long walks" giving you the feeling of actually going somewhere. I missed that a bit in BG2.
Back in the day with the original, I remember wandering and exploring areas looking for secrets. There were a good number of them, they just weren't EVERYWHERE. I also wandered into WAY over-leveled areas without warning and got caught by several winter wolves and a vampiric wolf I had no chance of winning against. I ran, the entire way across the map, with them chasing me, and finally got away. It was awesome.
Also they weren't empty. I think every square of the map had something to it. An NPC, a little quest, some scenery elements, a tough enemy, maybe a dungeon even if it's a tiny one. Sure, nothing of that is some great adventure with tons of loot. But it's small touches that make the world alive and believable.
@@colinsmith1495 what you remember sadly is just better than the actual game.
Glad to see Baldur's Gate being played even to this day.
The Enhanced Edition was a blessing to preserve this series for modern hardware. Been playing through the saga for my girlfriend who never played it and got into D&D
It sure is now lol
I never played D&D prior to Baldur's Gate so I didn't have the knowledge of what a round, a turn was. You can imagine my frustration when I saw things like "Last for 10 rounds + 3 rounds/level", "Last for 2 turns". It also took me a very very long time to figure out why my fighters just stood there not attacking even when their portraits showed that they were engaging combat. Also, to this day, I can't estimate whether my web will hit myself or my enemies. I blame Edwin, he must have done this on purpose.
Playing thru BG1 again, no idea how many times I’ve played this. I love the wide open empty spaces. I have adult children younger than this game, mind blowing.
How long does the story take to complete?
@@majorgear1021I’d say 50+ hrs on a first playthrough.
love how your custom characters have names like "Archer 4" very practical. I always feel bad if I don't give them an in lore name
bwahahaha. that is awesome. glad to see I am not the only one who does that stuff. Having just finished Icewind Dale, their names were: Fightergurl, mage/thief, thief/cleric, and so on. :P
@@steve_jackson9933 lol that’s when you know you’ve played a lot of isometric rpgs
Yeah, I still agonize over what would be a cool name to put on my party members :( but I think it makes for a better experience 😁
Archer the IVth is a very promising offspring of the noble house of Archers, thank you very much
Perhaps someone else mentions this in the comments, but 1gp for a night at the inn is actually a crazy price, unless it's a very nice inn. The game, because it's a CRPG, does have you accumulate a rather large amount of gold, but this is not the norm in the setting. In D&D a night at an Inn may actually be around 1sp (silver piece), which generally will include a meal if it's a good spot. A ratty inn may even just be 5cp or 7cp (copper piece), expect no meal and perhaps an STD in that Inn. This is why you see some equipment cost 10gp, like a sword, which is an amount a peasant cannot hope to afford.
Great video and a true classic of CRPGs.
How do you get an STD from a ratty inn? XD
@@nzeusman8215 They may not clean the sheets very well.
@@epyjacek haha, damn, those are some dirty sheets indeed!
Exactly..people often don't realise that, the way items are portayed in games often, a +2 longsword would probably be able to buy a house all for yourself in regular DnD
@@epyjacek you _are_ aware that people don't actually get STDs from sheets, right? Or toilet seats.
I think one thing missed but worth mentioning regarding companions, besides time, is that alignment matters for whether companions stick around. Like Edwin is the strongest wizard in the game, but if you cross 18 alignment, he leaves you. Also, some companions flat out cannot be placed with other companions. Regarding the achievements for starting area, my theory is that a lot of players bought baldur's gate on steam for nostalgia sake, since they probably own the CD that no longer works with most modern computers.
This is my first time watching a video on your channel. I really like that you make these reviews after "100%" completion. I can hear the differences in comparison to other peoples' reviews which often stop after understanding the core. Your understanding and views of the games are so much better and it truly give your reviews extra quality which is worth it! Keep up your good work!
The top character doesn't always do the talking. Sometimes dialogue happens when your party is walking up to an npc, and the character who is closest to that npc will be the one doing the talking. You can also select individual characters in your party to initiate dialogue and that character will be talking, or using their charisma stat if you're talking to a merchant to get higher prices for your sales.
Glad to see some longer form content on the channel. Found you earlier this year and have really been digging your stuff.
I've always preferred the "openness" of Baldur's Gate 1 versus Baldur's Gate 2. Reminds me why I love the Pillars of Eternity series because they embrace the same structure of BG1 while telling a (mostly) linear storyline with great villains.
The villian in Pillars 1 genuinely made me want to defeat him. He was so sure of his goal and of the ultimate fruitlesness of our fight against him! Such a good villian.
You know, when I started playing D&D in 1981 THAC0 made perfect sense to me. Now I can't even imagine why it was that complicated to begin with.
I love this game. Had to laugh at the basilisk encounter at around 11:30. That map was always a pain when I was a kid and never used the protection scrolls or spells.
I was almost one of those people that never left the starting area. It wasn't until watching some guides on RUclips (yours included) that I truly understood how to navigate playing this game.
I grew up on action RPGs, with my favorites being modern Bethesda/Bioware/Obsidian RPGs. I felt like I was stretching myself to play Pillars of Eternity 1 & 2 because of the CRPG gameplay, but ended up loving them for the story & the strategy in combat. I may never get around to playing BG1&2, but I loved this vid and I'm excited for your story series to learn more about the games!
I am actually the same. Learning to play pillars of eternity was a journey. Great story thought.
If you can, play BG2 - story is average but it's one epic adventure to hell and back.
You could work your way back. Starting with Pillars of Eternity and then trying increasingly older and less accessible titles as your cRPG experience grows. You won't even need guides by the time you hit Baldur's gate.
Baldur's gate is actually pretty accessible compared to the 25 years of cRPG surrounding it. When it released in 1998 it was definitely among one of the easiest cRPGs to pick up (unless you want to count hack'n slash games like Diablo. Not nearly as rough as Wizardry 8(2001) let alone the lower budget games that were releasing at that time. Baldur's gate had come a LONG way from Ultima 6(1990), wasteland(1988) and dark sun(1993).
Same here, but the game that really got me hooked on crpgs was pathfinder. Pathfinder kingmaker is the only crpg where I made it past act 2 😔
@@ivanesparza3589 yeah it's a great game! Can't wait for thr path of the righteous
This one video earned you a sub. Very well done and structured. I literally already own the game but I'm trying to buckle down and play the damn thing, I hate abandoning games.
I just found this from random. As someone who has beaten the game many, MANY times, I will say this is an outstanding review. Kudos to you, friend. You've gained a subscriber.
Very good commentary. I played the original (multiple CDs and paperback-sized manual) when it was a new release, so the EE was more of an enjoyable nostalgia trip than it would be for a lot of other players. It was a great game for its time, but it has not aged well and it takes a lot more patience than most games out there now.
Here's the thing about Dragonspear. It has to be a mostly self-contained story so as not to interfere with bg2. It's a tangent,a side story. That said,I love me some Argent.
This is a great series that is so needed! I have been trying to play this game for years!!!
There is one thing a low reputation will do for you: grant different special abilities. As you begin and/or finish each chapter, your character will dream when resting and get special abilities. The dreams are slightly different depending on whether your reputation is =10. Higher reputation gives defensive abilities such as cure wounds, neutralize poison, and draw upon holy might. If you have lower than average reputation you will instead get Larloch's minor drain, ghoul touch, and vampiric touch.
I can listen to you review a video of eating a ham sandwich after 100%. Keep up the good work brother man.
I don't like ham that much, so I'd have a hot take on it for sure.
I have been engrossed with this and am stoked for BG2 (which I played a little of), Planescape and Icewind.
Can’t stress how much I love these videos. Excellent job! You inspired me to give Pillars of Eternity 1 a try and I’m about 1/3 done with it. I don’t have much time to game so it will take me awhile. Loving the story and world so far even if combat is a little easy on normal. Will give this game a chance sometime next year most likely. Thank you for posting such great content!
Just finished Pillars of Eternity today! Stick it with it, it's vaulted up near the top of my all time favourite games!
@@mlaine83 oh yeah. I’m not giving up. Just will take me awhile. Started the white March this morning. Great opener for that area
Don’t feel bad, I spend more time thinking about playing while doing other tasks than actually playing, lol.
If they would modernize the actual UI of these games, they would hold up against games like Pillars of Eternity and Pathfinder just as well as any game made today. What makes them really archaic and hard to understand is the extremely clunky, extremely un-optimized UI where you could do something in 1 click, you're doing it in like 4 clicks and 3 menu screens when it comes to BG.
They did modernize the UI with the enhanced editions and you'd need a lot more than a UI change to make Baldur's gate as accessible as POE or Owlcat's pathfinder games.
It isn't that you need to make '4 clicks' in baldur's gate, most tasks are simple enough to perform. What's hard is understanding the game. How to build your character, the rules, how to explore, how to overcome encounters.
It's not the UI that makes the game difficult, it's the 2e d&d rules
2+ e of BG games is miles more accessible and easy to learn than Pathfinder for instance (basicallly 3.5e) when it comes to building a char. No feats, no skills, no misleadingly bad options and easy ways to mess up . Encounter design in earlier fights is better than Pathfinder too imo (I shudder at that 30 str 5th level Bear-treant against a 2 lvl party and the Owlbear)
@@user-gn3cq6jw4w Was also surprised by that statement. Owlcats Pathfinder video game was really hard to get into without a guide for me and I played pen and paper 3.5 for years.
@@Viper3220 Let's magically convert all of the rules to 5e but change nothing else. Is the game now accessible? I doubt it.
You've said before how CRPGs need to do better about explaining their own mechanics, but man, this game gives me hope because they were MUCH worse about it back then.
Yeah they really seemed to expect you to read the books and learn all the systems inside out before playing lol. That still helps these days but it seems less necessary at least.
This game came with a physical manual. But obviously they're trying to improve and they're making the games simpler, sharper and more accessible as well.
dog I'm 110 hours into the trilogy first full playthrough working on baldur's gate 2, ran into the "nauseated" debuff for the first time no clue what it meant
@@7dayspking As a kid I remember reading those like they were bibles.
I didn't have too much issue with BG1, generally any problem is solved by getting better equipment. But BG2 I really struggled with. The text always went by so fast, I never knew if I should case Ruby Ray of Reversal, Keldon's Warding Whip, or Breach. Or even dispel magic. It's still a mystery to me to this day. :-)
I was raised playing D and D in the late 70s/early 80s. Playing this and part 2 takes me back to playing with my childhood friends. Glorious
It's a shame Enhanced Edition didn't add a way to examine enemies' resistances and immunities / conditions like Pathfinder. I love how free-form the start of the game is.
Played this duology three years ago for the first time. Best games I've ever played. They don't make them like they used to anymore :(
I really tried to love the game because of the many classes.....but I quit after I got to the first Inn. If they do a remake, it would be wonderful, till then most people will never fully play it
I played both pillar 1 and 2. Kingmaker is also great cuz I feel like a king lol, divinity 1 and 2 are amazing. .....yeah, I am out games to play....
@@FatBunny168 "Most people will never fully play it" is a hell of a claim. Most zoomers, perhaps, but a whole hell of a lot of us played its original release and regard it as the best Western RPG to come along.
@@ahoyforsenchou7288 It's largely unplayable today due to the existing knowledge you need to even attempt to play it. The game tells you nothing and requires way too much outside research for most people to ever play.
@@FatBunny168maybe try jrpgs If you've played most of the Western rpgs. I recommend starting with xenoblade chronicles definitive edition. It does have some tropes at the start but gets much much better very quickly and it uses the tropes on purpose to subvert expectations. Play on casual mode if it gets difficult since if you don't do the boring fetch quests you'll be underlevelled.
I purchased the enhanced version back in 2016 and loved it. I own the original's but could never get them to run properly on a modern PC. Brings back good memories. What I like best about the combat in bg 1 and 2 is that they are a thinking person's game. You can't muscle your way thru some of the encounters. As it should be mages are tough opponents that require you to get past their shields.
The game was my first RPG ever. I did not even know what RPG is. I played the original and my English was bad at that time. However, I never had any of the problems that players are complaining about. The game rules are easy to grasp ever if you haven't heard anything about AD&D. Unless you are too lazy to read. Those who complain are either too dumb of too spoiled by the new generation games. It is still one of the best games I have played ever.
I agree
Was it really hard to believe that Irenicus, an epic leveled mage, captured Gorion's ward and his team? He could solo all the BG1 companions and your created hero at the same time and it's not even a hyperbole.
What was even the point of "Siege of Dragonspear" narratively?
Forcing Minsc, Dynaheir, Jaheira, Khalid and Imoen into your party to avoid continuity snarls with the beginning of BG 2.
That's the only thing I can think of.
@@longjohnbaldry7360 Let us not forget the original social commentary, like giving Minsc a line about Gamergate. *eyeroll*
honestly i would reccomend that people get this on mobile/tablet and not on steam. the mobile port for 1 & 2 are amazing. and this is a perfect poop game.
Modern gamers often dislike old school games like BG1 & 2, Fallout 1 & 2, ect because those older games didn't do nearly as much hand-holding, or easy mode follow-the-sparkly-line game play. You actually have to talk to NPC to figure out the weakness of the werewolf-like monster (loup-garou) is weak to gold not silver, and they find a powerful gold sword. As for the other monsters, why would you just assume your character would, or should know why their attacks don't work? Would the monsters tell them? "Ha ha, I'm immune to cold, but I sure hope you don't have fire-based spells, that would be bad for me."
TLDR: games that don't lead you around by the nose, are often disliked by modern gamers.
Thats true and more than often I do agree, however one must understand that modern gamer have been brought into an industry of hand holding.
If everything you played had holded your hand, you will feel horrible the moment you try a game from the MS-DOS era.
So in the end the new batches of people coming in dont know anything outside lootboxes, dlcs, pre orders (of digital games *facepalm*) and so on.
Now... the people who came from the Baldurs Gate era or prior, who morphed into supporting the casualization of the games.... those are the ones one to be blamed.
Glad I found your channel . Binge watched a lot of your previous videos during this heatwave in Scotland. Nice measured reviews and a mellow voice in the background make it also a nice podcast while I make builds for characters in games I will never the leave the starting area with. Thank you
I just have to express regarding companions in this game, that although they aren’t very fleshed out, Minsk is one of, if not THE, most beloved companion in a Bioware game and maybe in CRPGs. Do I care that he is just a 2-dimensional ultra chivalrous do-gooder)? No, I don’t because he’s so funny about being a good guy. His hilarious comments and interactions with the party is great. And that Minsc either has a miniaturized giant space hamster which only he understands or that Minsc is maybe a little insane is part of his charm. That there are hints that Minsc isn’t insane and Boo may actually be a miniaturized giant space hamster is *chef’s kiss*.
I picked this up out of curiosity in 2016. Played through the first game and got partially through the second game before I got completely stuck. Shelved it until 2023, and picked it up again as I'd heard about BG3 being released. I picked up right where I left off, determined to get through the part I was stuck at. Once I did, the whole game opened up for me and I've now become completely obsessed to the point that I couldn't give a crap about BG3.
By the way, the modding community is still very active for this series. Modding is much more complicated given it's an old game, but it's injected completely new life with updated combat AI, more characters and kits, and endless banter and dialog mods to bring the characters to life. You owe it to yourself to muster up the patience to learn this game. It's well worth the effort.
Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights were a huge part of my childhood.
Imoen, Khalid, Minsc, Jaheira, Dynaheir I was never able to play with other companions, never and this was also the only game / trilogy I played multiple times. My childhood
Yeah I guess that's like the default or canon party
Dorn..Dorne?(I forget) was a must for my party.
He was the pack mule and hit like a truck😂
To be perfectly fair to siege of dragonspear, it offers a bit more of a connection between bg1 and bg2 in the form of conversations with the "hooded man". It's not the biggest focus of the expansion but somewhat appreciated. In doing that, it lays the groundwork for the major question of the series what it /means/ to be a child of bhaal.
That's still not much when compared to the entire expansions runtime, but the main story in bg1 was pretty incidental to a lot of the main game's content as well.
Right but those conversations could've been happening alongside just about anything else. Mostly he's just goading you and telling you how cool Caelar is compared to you.
I would not recommend playing vanilla BG1, but there is a mod out there called "Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition Trilogy" which is combining BG1, BG2 + Add-ons in the BG2 engine/mechanics. It improved vanilla BG1 so much that it feels like a brand new and way better game.
You missed mentioning mods. There is a lot of good mods that expands on NPC banter, love relations and adds new quests fixes combat and AI stuff
THACO is one of those things that always confused me when playing BG1, all explanations I've found online have been rather convoluted and made little sense. Your explanation has made it much clearer! Y'never know, I may even finish the game this time!
All I know is that the lower your THAC0 is the better and that it stands for "To Hit Armor Class 0," but how you actually calculate your attack rolls is completely beyond me.
Thats Why it doesnt exist in DnD anymore :p
@@MrQwertysystem . Here is simple explanation. Roll is done using d20. If your THAC0 is 15 and you roll 16, you would hit -1 AC. If you roll 18, you would hit AC of -3 (18 is 3 more than 15). If you would roll 14, you'd hit AC of 1. Normal human without dexterity bonuses or dense skin traits etc usually had AC of 10. What is often confusing with THAC0 is that the lower it is, the better. AD&D second edition was tremendously good ruleset back in the day, but it did things the other way around than modern games do.. AC, THAC0 and saving throws all get better the lower they get.
People who played AD&D usually just memorized or had a copy of the tables from the Player's Handbook.
@@MrQwertysystem You count the difference between the AC and THAC0 to determine the roll required to hit(minus the AC from the attacker's THAC0 to determine the roll). Works the same way as AC really. No 'tables' needed if you can count.
What's the difference between 20 THAC0 and -5 AC? 25. What's the difference between 6 THAC0 and 5 AC? 1. Count the difference. You can literally do it on your fingers.
Just finished ToB, and have to let Mortym know I wouldn't have gotten through the original saga without him. Besides that, I prefer BG 1 way more over the 2nd mostly because of the map setup. It's also nice to start nowhere and then work your way up to this big city after figuring everything out. Thanks again Mortym.
As a 20 year old who has been blessed with Dos2, deadfire, tyranny etc. I just can’t play these old school games, I give them a fair go but it’s like trying to read og Stan lee comics they just don’t cut it by todays standards.. Great review as always I look forward to trying BG3 one day.
Agreed, Ive tried like 10 times and can only make it a few hours in because it's so slow and it just doesn't grab me at all
Understandable. I played Baldur's Gate back when it was released in '98, and it was the most amazing thing ever. Now, after having been spoiled by Owlcat, Obsidian and Inexile, these games do seem terribly clunky. The Infinity Engine has not aged well. I think it's only really the nostalgia that keeps us coming back for one more run-through.
I played it on mobile version on my tablet 😅 helped me overlook how outdated the graphics are
I’ve been playing baldurs gate trilogy recently and I installed no class restrictions for any race mod
It’s so much more fun to mix and match races. I would recommend it if you want something different.
I would have liked to seen this entire engine but married to both the story and play mechanics of the Bard's Tale Trilogy.
Great review! You are really good at explaining the RPG world. I have this edition, but haven’t beat it yet. Just arrived in Baldur’s Gate…
Yeah my first ever CRPG experience was baldur's gate It was the reason I actually really didn't like the genre. Eventually when tyranny came out I changed my mind ended up going back and really loving the experience, but as a new player at the time and fairly young it was just an overwhelming experience and I can see why a lot of people would be turned off.
I played BG1 & 2 for the first time last year, so no nostalgia: big agree on SoD being a mixed bag. It feels weirdly anachronistic, like a 2016 crpg story sandwiched between 2 1990s fantasy stories. It might be fine on its own, but it’s a strange bridge between BG1 and BG2.
I loved the original BG!!!! I'm keeping my memories intact.
Literally my all time favorite video game series... Pillars of Eternity and The Witcher has come close, but just doesn't quite get there... the character creation will never be beat in my opinion
Minor complaint with the review of Dragonspear: the ending is not the only thing tying it to BG2. The "hooded man," who hounds and interacts with you quite a lot, is the real connection. You see how and why he began taking an interest in your character, and this is very important in the context of "why/how did we get captured" in BG2's opening. Mind you, it's still a very slim piece of the whole expansion, but it does link the games. All that said, Dragonspear is an absolutely fantastic and fun expansion and whenever I do a full trilogy playthrough, I never skip it.
I get excited to see a new vid of yours show up on my feed
Great video watched the whole way through
Really looking forward to your story series as I'm trying to get caught up to BG3, and so I bought the first two games but after hours I'm only in the town of Beregost after recruiting Neera lol (not used to games like these)so I think I'd prefer watching a series from someone that really knows what they're doing though I'm still stumbling my own way through BG1 and eventually 2 to say I did lol
Bg3 is set 100 years after the first two, so it's hard to say what connections there will be for sure
@@MortismalGaming I'd imagine you'll run into a certain mage in BG3, perhaps Drizzt again.
Hey. I’m sure you are already swamped with titles to play. I would love to see some videos on the old gold box or silver box games. Specifically Pool of Radiance but others in the series would be great too. Or if you are in to sci-fi, the AD&D Buck Rogers games would be fun to watch also.
Great video ;) ,saw from beginning to the end (it not usual for me for 30+ minutes videos). I subscribed 👍
I think this game deserves a run in story mode.
I'm here to see the Origins of Baldurs Gate 3 and holy moly. I see the similarities which is cool. BG3 brought a whole new fan base and it makes these games interesting to more modern gamers. A brand new universe (to me) that I haven't heard of aside from D&D, I only thought it was a board game. I'm amazed how complex the old games were.
yeah I started Baldurs Gate 3 but was a bit confused by being throw into situations with all the lore not known to me. So stopped after clearing the Underdark and decided to go back to Baldurs Gate 1 and was very surprised. Combat is dated but the rpg mechanics of the combat are still great.
I love the exploration aspect of the game with questing and different areas and also how lived in the world feels. you meet many a character, some just going on about their lives, some in trouble and it's all done with a wide variety of characters. much bigger range than in the first area of BG3 with the grove etc..
a lot of roleplay is also very good. reputation and alignment etc.. is a big thing and you have to play accordingly otherwise your chosen party members might not like the changes (be it good or evil depending on the character) and they leave if you reach extremes on either side. also some quests, sometimes the best way is to not brute force and use items/potions to get a result for the quest without it breaking your character rp.
The fact that only 46% of players who own the game actually left candlekeep has another explanation - a lot of people buy this game due to nostalgia and never actually sit down to play it.
My personal theory is a combination of that and people buying it to prep for 3 and not realizing the systems are quite dated.
@@MortismalGaming This is me.
I had to get the mobile version since I just could not power through with those graphics on pc but I want to be familiar with the setting before 3 releases
Baldur's Gate 1 and Fallout 1 were the first games I got really into back in the day. Still love and play 'em both.
For anyone on the fence about playing BG1, another plus is the MUSIC and SOUND. You really feel "in the world" all the time.
Also, games back then came with quality manuals! So, part of the experience was reading up on the spells and so on. Buying the game now should come with a PDF, although I'm not sure if it's the same document as the original manual.
Great review!
I know that's nitpicking, but calling ToSC DLC sounded so weird for me, because at the time of its premiere additional content for games was called expansion packs, in particular as large as ToSC. Although DLCs already existed at that time, they were mostly minor things and not so widespread as today.
Also, it seems that YT shows wrong game as it links to BGIIEE to this video, not sure if it is something that YT does automatically or you choose it.
RUclips does it automatically
@@MortismalGaming Stupid bot
I remember working out mustard jellies and basiliks in the base game as non-dnd playing 16yo. It was rewarding.
Late 90s and early 2000s was a great time for crpgs. I kinda like how underpowered you are in BG1 and can easily get killed by a wolf in the beginning. In BG2 you already start at a much higher level.
OGL drama brought me to your channel.. I'm here to stay. Love your content!
I actually appreciate the fact that this game doesn’t explain every facet of enemy strengths/weakness to the nth degree. It certainly frustrated me back in the day tho! The boss Wolfwere on that island is, however, RIDICULOUS lmao. There’s only 3/4 weapons in the entire game that can harm him. It was one of the very rare occasions I just gave up and looked online for a solution in a game. Talk about throwing you in the deep end with no idea what to do about it lol
Yeah, for 19 years now I play BG1 + BG2 at least once every year. It was such a prodigy when it came out.
Honestly I just bought the enchanted edition because I loved the game back then. I wonder how many others like me there are out there who influence the steam statistics xP
Congrats... 100% Baldur's Gate is definately not an easy task! Great Job! Respect!
Good vid, I actually like the lack of info feedback on certain enemies as it encourages you to read the in game info and would be more realistic in questing role play wise
Thaco is kinda weird to understand but wait until you have to deal with spell protections and dispellers on BG2... great video btw!!
I think the difficulty level was ridiculously hard. Imagine a group playing tabletop D&D, and the dungeon master is so incompetent and cruel that there are multiple party wipes every play session! You would spend all your time creating new character sheets, and hardly any time adventuring. Ideally, the DM adjusts the difficulty level to match his play group, so that encounters are challenging, but survivable if the players have their head in the game and work together.
Ah, 1998. The year my view of computer roleplaying games changed forever. BG1, BG2, Dragon Age Origins, Dragon Age Inquisition, etc.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but another thing with combat is that it has friendly fire. Casting Web is great, except for your fighter, who's up there with the mobs.
I loved BG when it came out, but now, if I never hear, "You must gather your party before setting forth," again, I'll die a happy man.
There is very few things i liked about BG1 but those few things are actually something that still stands out til this day.
the biggest one is probably the story and the morality behind the question it poses to you as a player, and i can't really say more without spoiling the story.
the other being so many companions and they all seemingly like to come with some form of baggage and their own goals and own morality, they aren't just people you pick up along the road to come fight for you, if you bring good natured companions and evil natured companions in the same party there will be conflict.
the quest text is interesting because it's not exactly like the usual quest text, it reads more like a diary where the character isn't always sure what is awaiting them or what to do exactly or where to go.
the rest of the things i don't feel important to mention or something i think was objectively bad.
for example the power of certain spells that completely makes you overpowered or how you can absolutly get stomped on by RNG even though you did every possible move right so you are forced to more or less save in every room, before entering anywhere or doing anything because it could just be game over around every corner potentially if you don't know the game well enough.
your standard fair of saving constantly in older games, but more so in this game than most others, there's a reason why you have a quick save button in a game as old as this.
I started playing it recently, it's so fun and am looking forward to going deep, started with a crusader and moved to a kensei and am having a great time
I tried BG:EE some years ago, but stopped playin after a few hours. As you said it is clunky, but there are many mods for this game. Especially the ui mods make it look and feel more like a modern crpg.
He didn’t go mad until after his family was killed. The books describe how he went mad as he cut down his family and himself. He then hired the crew the make the traps and such. The demon came later due to the massed wealth.
About the information thing... the immunities of enemies, i agree, sometimes it is frustrating, cause there is no system to research them ingame. But for the petrification, you just need to read your spells... and reading is one of the things that people don't like nowdays. In my opinion, people should just stop complaining and start reading.
Nice. Excited to watch the review. Oddly never played 1 much but BG2 is my favorite game.
Replayed this classic om highest difficulty until some weeks ago. I got to Sarevok and just gave up. What a god-like headache he is.
Great review! I'm looking forward to the new player guide!
The method of gaining a full custom party is somewhat similar in BG3. Start a multiplayer game and then open up the game via the .exe file up to three times after you open the first one. Then join the multiplayer lobby with each of the other windows and create your characters, start the games, save it on the first window and close them all out. Then you open the game back up and load your save. You now have a custom four man party. Enough to beat that one devil on the mindflayer ship and take his flaming 2h sword. You DO need to drop the graphics to minimum and even then your PC may crash during the creation process so be quick and patient with any failures.
I'm almost definitely one of those that didn't pass the intro. I want o play these games so badly but I'm just horrible at RTwP. Something about it just doesn't gel with me in this format.
I was the same, started it twice and never got into it. What I eventually did was started in the story mode. When I got past the mines at nashkel i was hooked. I then restarted again and had the motivation to learn the game mechanics. In normal mode you can mostly just force your way through combat with some mellee based tanks, a ranger and a mage.
Have you tried pillars of eternity before? I think those games are a perfect introduction for these RTwP CRPGS as pillars uses a lot of systems used in the OG rpgs
I will say this for THAC0: It definetely helps limit player knowledge of monster AC. That one, simple step of math to subtract AC from THAC0 score throws them off completely.
This video probably has the highest like/dislike ratio I've never seen. Your channel in general has an outstandingly low number of dislikes. Godspeed man
The worst one on the channel is the video about whether BG3 is too similar too DOS2 (I don't think they are, but what do I know) that's sits around 60/40 70/30
@@MortismalGaming I think it's too similar,and felt like falling asleep during divinity combat at times. I was hoping for a whole new game, but I will be buying bg3. I think the art for items is awful in divinity and wanted something crisp and realistic. Baldurs gate had nice art for its day.
@22:30 where you discuss the reason why many players don't make it past the starting area in this game or Baldur's Gate 2 points to the reason, in my opinion, why most modern games are just garbage. These games DO NOT just hand everything to the player... they have to learn, sometimes by trial and error, how to do things and how things work. A new adventurer would not automatically know that basilisks can turn you to stone unless they had witnessed it. IF you were hitting a creature with a sword you would be able to tell that it was not having an effect, but you would not know why. Telling the players these things picks at the fabric of immersion. Nowadays games hand everything to the player because they whine that they had no way to know... these games unapologetically tell the player to just figure it out.
Absolute classic, I still have my 6 CD original white and grey-blue box on my shelf. Can't play it that way anymore, but the EE is better nowadays anyway :D
Great video as always!
Had evil people in my party getting upset due to high reputation. I accidentally flooded a mine killing people. Reputation decreased, and got xp. 11/10 problems solved and will play again.
Baldur's Gate was my favourite game of my childhood. I loved reading books, I love the cRPG style character building, and the game was a perfect mix of both. It made me quite excited about the future of gaming with even better games that I hoped would follow.
Using Steam achievements as a metric is a REALLY bad point though.
Skyrim Special Edition, has 65% on finishing the tutorial.
Fallout NV has 47% on reaching Primm.
Witcher 3 has 65% on completing the first area.
Half Life 2 has 67% on tutorial finish.
Almost every single game on Steam has metrics, that on surface show, that the vast majority bought the game, but didn't actually play for more than 5 minutes. Having low completion metrics is the norm, not the exception (even on tutorials), so it can't be used to point out anything meaningful, beyond the unreliability of the metrics themselves.
I don't pretend it's a perfect measure by any means, but even assuming a giant margin of error, let's say half, that's still an enormous amount of people who couldn't be bothered to play it, or started up and immediately went 'no thanks'
@@MortismalGaming It is true that CRPGs tend to have at best, an unintuitive nature, but this point is better made by making the points you did by presenting the issues in game, and your points were spot on.
Not to mention, many of the re-leases of old games on steam get low achievements by default, when people in their late 20's and 30's just buy them out of nostalgia, but then don't ever play them.
Using steam achievements to make points is imo. better used, that the first achievement is the base line of people who even played game in a way that the steam was able to get the metrics, and the difference between it, and the second, how quickly people might have been put off and so on, but it's just not a very good metric to use even then.
I mean, considering who few people get the achievement for not only NOT finishing a game, but not even reaching the half way point, but still would buy the sequel?
TLDR; Your points stand better on their own without steam achievement statistics, is what I am saying.
Very good review, and this comes from a guy that played through the original BG at least a dozen if not more times.
I have an interesting psychology going on. I enjoy watching review videos on games that I've already played. (Especially yours!) I just like hearing somebody talk about my favorite games. But respectfully disagreeing, I *did* like the NPC's in BG1. Their few handfuls of spoken lines (when they are selected, when they attack, when they are low on HP, etc.) and their portrait and class was juuuust enough to make them each feel unique and different. At least, that's how it was for me, allowing myself to be conned into them being more than they really are (more psychology lol).
Lilura's blog has a few analyzes of when it's best to switch classes when dual-classing.
Thanks for the review, I watched it all the way through.
Not that I need anyone to convince me to play Baldur's Gate. I love these Infintiy Engine games and never get tired of them. I understand AD&D, though, so a lot of the confusing parts aren't confusing to me.
Anyone who likes these games, or who feels like they would like them if they were just a bit more modern, should try Pillars of Eternity, which is also excellent.