Quick Look: Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition

As much as I don't want to be that guy, I'm totally being that guy; this hurts my soul to watch.

EDIT: And Xzar is not a lady!

EDIT EDIT: And they're going north! They haven't even met Minsc!

Man, they should have given this Quick Look to me.

God damnit Ryan.

I consider RPGs my favorite genre in general but the style of infinity engine games was never much fun to me. I despised the way you move around in BG and at this point I don't think I'll ever commit the time to give the game another chance. Too many new things to play and frankly I think the art doesn't hold up at all.

This quick look made me remember that @Rorie isn't around to help in situations of RPGness

The difficulty in early game Baldur's Gate is brutal. Winning that first battle when you are ambushed outside the Inn is a big challenge, especially if you rolled a mage, since you'll at best only have 2 mages and two thieves at that point, with not many hit points to go around, and at best 2 spells to cast for the whole fight. If you make it through that it really only gets easier once you realize the first rule of Baldur's Gate: everyone needs a ranged weapon. That means bows and slings all around. You're too fragile to go toe to toe with many enemies, so it's important to be able to chip away while they close the distance, and it give your mages a way to contribute beyond soaking a bandit's shoes with their blood.

To be fair, from what I remember, the original boxed retail releases of the BG games had enormous manuals which were several hundred pages long

Oh, Cam Clarke... you are the voice of vidjagames.

@Eljay said:

@stryker1121: @stryker1121 said:

I've never played BG. Were the guys making it harder and more clumsy looking than it actually is?

No, it is pretty much that difficult especially in the beginning when you're level 1 or 2 and only have 3-6 hit points and can die instantly. Mages early on are next to worthless and Ryan had two in his party plus only one warrior to soak hits. There's also limited initial direction and as Ryan discovered the bugs with the journal still persist which sometimes means you aren't sure where to go.

The game is tough, but Ryan is making it look way harder than it is. He has Khalid, Jaheira, Xzar and Montaron in his party, all of whom will have told him to travel south. In fact they repeatedly bitch at you to do so and eventually leave your party if you don't - it's the closest the game gets to a HUD symbol saying 'FOLLOW'. The fact that Nashkel, to the south, is worth investigating is mentioned by many NPCs and should be in the journal also (although from the looks of it the journal has been redesiged and maybe some detail has been lost).

Ignoring this, Ryan goes east, then north, into maps that would be very tough for him even if he was well-prepared and putting a lot of thought into his decisions. He clearly isn't well-prepared or thinking very hard; anyone who cares enough about the game to guess the difference between 'mages', 'thieves' and 'fighters' will know that it's probably not a good idea to have mages and thieves charge in with melee weapons at the head of your party. Ryan also has three fighters in his party capable of tanking decently, not just one - since Jaheira and Montaron are multiclass fighters - but that doesn't matter since he has them in horrible armour, using weapons they are no good with.

Anyone who thinks this game looks ridiculously tough should at least realise all the basic stuff Ryan is screwing up without appearing to give a shit. Also as someone has already mentioned, equipment comparison is barely even a factor in these games. If your guy is good with longswords, you give him a longsword. Then you forget about it until you find a longsword +1. Then +2. If you find the 5 types of armour confusing, check their price values in a shop. Splint mail is like 100gp, plate mail is 600gp, and full plate is like 2000gp - or something along those lines, anyway. That should tell you literally everything you need to know.

@Griffinmills said:

@Crysack said:

To be fair, from what I remember, the original boxed retail releases of the BG games had enormous manuals which were several hundred pages long

Whoa, I remembered them being long but not that long. A quick Google search turned up a PDF indicating it was 83 pages for BG1 including front and back cover. Still pretty durned long, especially in the nigh manual-less future we live in!

83 pages was a long manual, but if I recall right, a significant chunk of that was simply flavour text designed to enhance your enjoyment and serve as a companion to the game lore. Half the manual consists of in-character reviews of every significant tavern and shop in every town in the game. It's not as if it's full of dense flight-sim mechanics, cover to cover.

I've played only a little bit of this game maybe about a year ago. It was interesting and not at all what I expected, but I felt like I didn't have enough affinity for the D&D style or enough time or patience to stay with it.

@Karkarov said:

@clush: @clush said:

Anyone interested in playing this on PC would do well to play BGTutu instead. It basicly allows you to play BG1 as a mod to BG2, so you get the way superior graphics of BG2 which should make the the game a bit more approachable at least in that department.

Planescape Torment never did anything for me, weirdly enough.

This version of the game already does everything BGTutu does.

Also that's because Planescape: Torment is an okay to reasonably good story wrapped around a terrible game.

Nah, the difference in graphics between this and BGTutu is day and night. Mainly the character models are superior. The maps/scenery will scale pretty well by just increasing the resolution. BG1 hasn't aged well, BG2 still looks decent and at least very playable.

Well this is a new release that is supposed to show people that never played the original how fantastic this game was way-back-when. And yes it was but way-back-when CRPGs weren't particularly good and this game showed everyone that yes you can make a decent CRPG and sell it too!

But the thing is AD&D was never a good system for a CRPG and no amount of remaking sprites or tutorials or whatever is going to correct that. Even the manual was a very brief explanation of mechanics like THAC0 and descriptions of spells. The game sort of assumed that you knew AD&D.

What you see here is basically the reaction of pretty much anyone who isn't familiar with this kind of old school game compounded by the fact that a quicklook needs to be an entertaining show where you sort of show as much as you can as fast as you can while people are looking at you.

Still as someone who still has BG and BG2 (and Torment and IWD) on a shelf right in front of me i really would love to get a quicklook by someone who knows and understand the game. I really want an idea if this is work picking up.

Thanks for screwing this up Davis!

I'd like to see some enhanced editions of the BG:DA games show up somewhere. Lots of memories with those games.

@Black_Cat said:

Well this is a new release that is supposed to show people that never played the original how fantastic this game was way-back-when. And yes it was but way-back-when CRPGs weren't particularly good and this game showed everyone that yes you can make a decent CRPG and sell it too!

But the thing is AD&D was never a good system for a CRPG and no amount of remaking sprites or tutorials or whatever is going to correct that. Even the manual was a very brief explanation of mechanics like THAC0 and descriptions of spells. The game sort of assumed that you knew AD&D.

What you see here is basically the reaction of pretty much anyone who isn't familiar with this kind of old school game compounded by the fact that a quicklook needs to be an entertaining show where you sort of show as much as you can as fast as you can while people are looking at you.

Still as someone who still has BG and BG2 (and Torment and IWD) on a shelf right in front of me i really would love to get a quicklook by someone who knows and understand the game. I really want an idea if this is work picking up.

I bought it, and it's not really worth it. The mods you can pick up for the old GOG version, like Tutu, etc., are way more worthwhile than paying anything for this.

So, uh... the "positives:"

• So far I've noticed some (not many; some) nice UI tweaks and makeovers
• two new voices to chose at character creation
• replacements (hasty replacements, at that) for the old pre-rendered cutscenes
• the option to change the language of the game to French, Spanish, Dutch, and a few others (with more apparently being worked on and to-be-released)
• there's two or three new recruitable npcs (good news! you have to buy them with real money!), but they are really bland "Bioware" characters; by that, I mean one is a runaway "wild mage" who's "really powerful," but "equally dangerous" (...just like Morrigan and Jack...), and the other I've found is just an evil half-orc that nets you -2 reputation when he joins your party and has a unique weapon that only he can use (just an axe or sword or something that gets a temporary buff when you kill something with it). Let's face it, though; people aren't buying this because they want new characters.
• Also it looks like BG2 rather than BG1 and lets you create a player-character out of any of the BG2 creation options, half-orcs and all.

The negatives, at least as of its current state, are much more significant.

• I can't play in full-screen mode (Vista 32-bit), 'cause every time I click an item my cursor permanently disappears and I have to force-close. And playing in windowed mode is a problem because scrolling to the borders to attempt a simple "pan" of the camera becomes a horrible tedious chore where if I move my mouse too far it goes out-of-window and has no effect, and I'm left to awkwardly cross my hand over and use the arrow keys to pan around.
• The pathfinding is "improved," but in actuality is way worse, being more cumbersome, snaggy, and time-consuming than it ever was before. I can't remember characters getting lost and caught on random geometry this much. One character will just chose to stop completely while everyone else successfully navigates to your waypoint. I know this happened before, but it seems much more common now, and it seems to happen in a different way.
• other miscellaneous bugs. Others have reported crashes (I've been lucky, though), same ol' typos and same ol' unclear spell descriptions.
• The "graphics" options are a frickin' joke. Seriously. There's ONE option with a checkbox next to it: fullscreen or windowed, and of course for me I don't have a choice in the matter anyway. But it's ridiculous, it seems like they kept the whole old 'graphics' menu, stripped it clean, added ONE item, and then figured they'd just leave it there. I assume they'll patch in more options... hopefully.

So... in my opinion: download the old pc version and mod it.

Watching this quicklook was a trip down memory lane to the first time I played BG. Everything was fucked within not too long.

Only for me that got me to learn about D&D, which frankly I prefer to almost any videogame native system, and to really dig in to the strategy of the game. I don't know why people hate so much on die based systems, i find the number manipulation in them to be quite a bit more rewarding than other approaches to combat in RPGs.

I understand how difficult it may be to transition a table top ruleset into ones fashioned for gaming. The one problem I had was how much the experience seems compressed when a traditional turn based system is converted into real time. Yes, it does have this pause component that even kicks in via event triggers, but I couldn't get over it entirely as a lot of it often seemed to devolve into barely contained chaos. I'm playing Icewind Dale I right now with some graphical mods and it took me an hour or two to get accustomed to the rules, and even at normal difficulty found myself wandering into exploits afforded by real time and 'gaming' the system.

@KoolAid said:

@gladspooky said:

You can't make art without risk. It's just not gonna happen. You're basically talking about the t-shirts at Walmart as if they're Raphael paintings.

We are talking about minimizing risk, not eliminating risk. Every product has risk. Minimizing risk is just another way of saying making games people want to play. If you are making a game no one wants to play, and saying "well, no one gets it. It's art." I mean, what is that? Is that quality? That's what art is?

And Raphael is pretty damn good at painting. But someone has to draw those walmart shirts. And that person is probably pretty good at what they do. I dunno, maybe we have different opinions of what art is.

Nah. The problem is that you have no idea what art is. Take a class. Then get back to me.

Man that was hard to watch. I am disappointed in the "enhancements" they've done to this game. I'd like to see some improved UI and a modernized equipment/character system.

I suppose what could you expect for $10? I hope maybe this just represents the beginning for what they intend to do with the infinity engine.

This reminds me of how bad Dragon Age 2 was. Might pick this up on iPad.

Pantaloons sighting!

Ryan is always way off when it comes to release dates. Taxi Driver 1976, Silence of The Lambs 1991, Baldur's Gate 1998.

I'm just a fan and have been following this for a while. I'm also kind of bummed @snide or @LtSquigs couldn't do this QL. Or even better with the iOS version which is now available: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id515114051?mt=8

For those asking why it's not a graphics update, it was originally planned to make this EE an HD version but Bioware didn't have the original assets anymore for BG1. [source]

MAC: How did the deal to work on an Enhanced Edition of Baldur's Gate even come about in the first place?

TO: War, Bloody war. We talked about making an HD version of BGand I went to work, digging through the ownership and spending the next 14 months getting a contract together. Late in the negotiations, we got a drop of all the BG content and we couldn't find the art source. After a number of trips to BioWare HQ, we came to the understanding all the art source was lost and we would have to back down on the HD plans. This sidelined the deal for a while, while we re-thought and came up with some ways to use technology to use art we had and make the game look great. In the end I think we've made the game look great and we've got plans to improve it even further in the future.

@gladspooky said:

@KoolAid said:

@gladspooky said:

You can't make art without risk. It's just not gonna happen. You're basically talking about the t-shirts at Walmart as if they're Raphael paintings.

We are talking about minimizing risk, not eliminating risk. Every product has risk. Minimizing risk is just another way of saying making games people want to play. If you are making a game no one wants to play, and saying "well, no one gets it. It's art." I mean, what is that? Is that quality? That's what art is?

And Raphael is pretty damn good at painting. But someone has to draw those walmart shirts. And that person is probably pretty good at what they do. I dunno, maybe we have different opinions of what art is.

Nah. The problem is that you have no idea what art is. Take a class. Then get back to me.

Wow, I'm sure glad we have you to tell us what art is. The last couple centuries of scholars who pondered that problem must have just been too lazy to figure it out, not to mention the last 50-100 years in the art world.

@Max_Cherry said:

Ryan is always way off when it comes to release dates. Taxi Driver 1976, Silence of The Lambs 1991, Baldur's Gate 1998.

He was pretty close to the dates for silence of the lambs and baldur's gate (off by a couple years but who cares its close enough). Also, he was definitely joking about taxi driver being a film of the 80s.

Man the AI in this game is something to behold

What is up with this quick look? I remember playing through BG 1 and 2 in my early teens and having a fantastic time. At the start I had no idea what the DnD rules were (or even what DnD was), but it quickly fell into place after playing the game a little. And I have never played a real DnD game or read anything DnD-rules related in my life. So I'm having a hard time understanding people complaining over this "complex" game (It's not that complex).

Sure it's a bit clunky, but there's nothing that you can't figure out by reading a single line of text or by spending 5 seconds trying out.

@evanbower said:

When Ryan says "he doesn't care" about the game he's playing, it really breaks the magic for me, and makes me ask why I'm even watching two dudes play a game for 50 minutes. Jeff played Funky Barn for four hours, and DAMMIT he cared about that farm.

This has been a very anticipated addition to one of the greatest PC RPGs ever made, and for fucks sake they put Ryan "I have no clue about video-games but that won't stop me from being an asshole" Davis in charge of it.

@FreedomTown said:

@evanbower said:

When Ryan says "he doesn't care" about the game he's playing, it really breaks the magic for me, and makes me ask why I'm even watching two dudes play a game for 50 minutes. Jeff played Funky Barn for four hours, and DAMMIT he cared about that farm.

This has been a very anticipated addition to one of the greatest PC RPGs ever made, and for fucks sake they put Ryan "I have no clue about video-games but that won't stop me from being an asshole" Davis in charge of it.

Yeaaaaah, I mean, you took it too far, but sure, Internet Guy.

@evanbower: *Shrug*, I just call it like I see it.

Also, props to all the commentors on this, who admittingly never played BG, yet think they are qualified to comment on this enhanced edition, saying it isn't worth the money. Keep raising that ignorance bar.

Something tells me if Greg Kasavin was there things would have gone a lot smoother!

Ryan's correct, DnD always begins when you try to get people to play the game, but no one can find the time.

@dropabombonit: The correct way to play these games has always been with the AI turned off. It does stupid shit all the time.

@FreedomTown said:

@evanbower said:

When Ryan says "he doesn't care" about the game he's playing, it really breaks the magic for me, and makes me ask why I'm even watching two dudes play a game for 50 minutes. Jeff played Funky Barn for four hours, and DAMMIT he cared about that farm.

This has been a very anticipated addition to one of the greatest PC RPGs ever made, and for fucks sake they put Ryan "I have no clue about video-games but that won't stop me from being an asshole" Davis in charge of it.

Nope, game's just bad, everybody go home.

This QL is a joke, right? They're in on it? They have to be. There's simply no other way.

The game deserved better.

I've been playing another D&D game, Temple of Elemental Evil, and watching this quick look has me stoked to play more of it! I'd recommend folks who like D&D-based games check it out, especially with the Circle of Eight mod. It's the closest I've ever felt to playing the original pens and paper game on PC.

@FreedomTown said:

@evanbower said:

When Ryan says "he doesn't care" about the game he's playing, it really breaks the magic for me, and makes me ask why I'm even watching two dudes play a game for 50 minutes. Jeff played Funky Barn for four hours, and DAMMIT he cared about that farm.

This has been a very anticipated addition to one of the greatest PC RPGs ever made, and for fucks sake they put Ryan "I have no clue about video-games but that won't stop me from being an asshole" Davis in charge of it.

Nope, game's just bad, everybody go home.

Great game back in the day, epic battles with 6 party members. What exactly has enhanced? Everything looks '98 terrible. The interface hasn't changed much and they did not cut the lame "the main character has died" crap. This could of been special but it's just the same thing you played 14 years ago.

Dave would have made a more interesting QL but having Ryan who truly didnt know what the fuck he was doing was pretty entertaining. I can understand why he wasnt enjoying the game because it takes a certain mindset to understand the logic of how past PC games work and even more so to understand the particular mechanics of AD&D.

As for my feelings on this game, well it was a solid game and the infinity engine and was home to some of the greatest games I have ever played. The original BG though doesnt really hold up to the games that would come out relatively soon after like BG2 or Planescape which pretty much set the high water mark for PC RPG games.

@atombrain said:

Great game back in the day, epic battles with 6 party members. What exactly has enhanced? Everything looks '98 terrible. The interface hasn't changed much and they did not cut the lame "the main character has died" crap. This could of been special but it's just the same thing you played 14 years ago.

"Main character has died" is there for a reason.

YES!!! Baldur's MOTHERFUCKING Gate!

I don't LIKE Baldur's gate, but it's still pretty obvious that Ryan has NO IDEA what he was doing, and this really isn't the game to play with that mindset.

My personal opinion of this game is entirely neutral, though I respect its history and all, but Quick Looks at games should not be done if the person playing the game doesn't care to at least try. There are joke QLs, and those are great, but Baldur's Gate isn't Story Hour: Adventures. This should be a strict general rule for every QL ever, and the fact that that hasn't been taken to heart after several years now, is baffling. 
 
If Jeff can play Funky Barn for four hours and still make it entertaining while actually being interested in playing it right, anyone on the staff can pretty much make an effort to do anything if they care to try. 

Watching Ryan play this as a big Baldurs Gate fan, is excruciating.

Though this Enhanced Ed. dosnt seem much better than the original with some mods. But maybe if it is released on Steam or GOG I might get it.

@atombrain said:

Great game back in the day, epic battles with 6 party members. What exactly has enhanced? Everything looks '98 terrible. The interface hasn't changed much and they did not cut the lame "the main character has died" crap. This could of been special but it's just the same thing you played 14 years ago.

While I agree it doesn't look that enhanced, I'm not sure why you think that you should be able to keep playing despite the main character dying.

On Ryan's comment on the keyboard shortcuts - I think the J for Journal or Quest Log. I for Inventory and C for Character stats have been around in the genre way longer than this. Didn't even Roguelikes like Nethack have that stuff? I think at least the Ultima, Might & Magic and Wizardry games had that. The specific BioWare style and their contributions to the genre are more about how they hide the turn based stuff, making the games feel like they play in real-time, and still using the space bar to pause the game to let you make the detailed decisions that are easily lost outside turn based RPG's, and of course their narrative style.

I also think they screwed themselves by replacing that AC7 armor with AC8. Wasn't this use the D&D rulesets where lower armor class is still better?

@kpaadet said:

Watching Ryan play this as a big Baldurs Gate fan, is excruciating.

Though this Enhanced Ed. dosnt seem much better than the original with some mods. But maybe if it is released on Steam or GOG I might get it.

The original Baldur's Gate is already out on GOG, and they put up an "Mod spotlight: Enhancing Baldur's Gate" article a few months ago, that pretty much helps you improve the original game way beyond any effort Atari put into this one.

I'll wait for the Quick Look Throwback to Bard's Tale.

"You're a real magical asshole" needs to be a shirt. Hot pink shirt, black Impact text under a picture of Ryan wearing a wizard hat with his fingers up.

Resurrection beer?  Someone make it happen.

You know that game graphical held its age pretty well.