Larian Studios - Website Tease

Originally Posted by Silver
The website has music now. Sounds like a Divinity game to me.

Weird… it's not playing any audio for me. I can see the sound icon at the bottom of the page, and it's on, but I'm not getting music.

*Edit* Ok, it won't play for me in Chrome, but it plays in Microsoft Edge.

Not sure what to think. It's a cool ambient track, but it's not very D&D-ish imo. I agree it sounds more like something from a Divinity game.

Originally Posted by Hastar
I have to say the Decent to Undermountain game was the worst I ever played. I could not even get it to work. So I guess I didn't even play it.

To think that was the lead game and Fallout was the dogs extras. It shows how much expectations can hamper a products chances of doing well.

I'm not reading too much into the music - it could also just be that's the sound of the Larian music department, rather than being specific to Divinity games.

More clues it's BG3:

Baldur's Gate 3 Will Reportedly Be Revealed This Thursday

EDIT: Also, there a bunch of tentacles that grab the "III" on their page…

Well even so something as disgusting as Cthulhu needs love.

Or in this case an Illithid.

It's called Rule 34.

If it exists, there is porn of it. If there isn't, there will be

The music suggests the game has a tone which wouldn't be welcoming to silly humour?

@JDR13 Why don't you have Firefox? I thought it was the best browser?


ed: It does sound like BG music to me. I hear 4 notes of BG music. Enough for a hint.

At this point it had better be BG3 or I'll be disappointed! No matter how it's done, which ruleset, whatever, I want Larian made BG3 so much I'd pre-order the collectors edition and if the canvas bag wasn't up to scratch I wouldn't even care!!

…and confirmed: BG 3.

Who was asking for more grimdark? Looks like we might be getting it!

Having complained nonstop in this thread I will of course instabuy it.

And BG always had its grimdark aspects -- the progressively morbid Imoen dreams etc etc.

Originally Posted by Ripper

Who was asking for more grimdark? Looks like we might be getting it!

I don't normally get excited by teaser trailers that don't show gameplay, but gotta admit that I'm pretty stoked right now.

Still hope they don't go overboard on grimdark though.

Yep, that worked for me. I always liked the Illithids, and I have a tatty old DnD compendium about the Underdark races that I used to enjoy reading. If I recall, this is how they reproduce - by taking over a host.

Oh wow, that looks awesome. Larian is finally going dark!

Confirmation that it's releasing on that new Google Stadia thing (presumably not an exclusive)
https://www.pcgamer.com/google-stadia-games-list/

Also, there's lots of interesting info about BGIII here:
https://www.pcgamer.com/baldurs-gate…d-5th-edition/

This is an interesting quote:
There are some things on the chopping block, however. It's an interpretation of D&D, specifically 5th Edition, because porting the core rules, which Larian tried to do, doesn't work. Or it works, Vincke clarifies, but it's no fun at all. One of the culprits is missing when you're trying to hit an enemy, and while the combat system has yet to be revealed, you can at least look forward to being able to smack people more consistently.

"You miss a lot in D&D—if the dice are bad, you miss," he says. "That doesn't work well in a videogame. If I do that, you're going to review it and say it's shit. Our approach has been implementing it as pure as we can, and then just seeing what works and what doesn't. Stuff that doesn't work, we start adapting until it does."


I remember they thought this was a problem when they were developing the DOS2 system as well. I guess they took a review hit on DOS1 because people were missing attack rolls or something?

[I]There are some things on the chopping block, however. It's an interpretation of D&D, specifically 5th Edition, because porting the core rules, which Larian tried to do, doesn't work. Or it works, Vincke clarifies, but it's no fun at all. One of the culprits is missing when you're trying to hit an enemy, and while the combat system has yet to be revealed, you can at least look forward to being able to smack people more consistently.

"You miss a lot in D&D—if the dice are bad, you miss," he says. "That doesn't work well in a videogame. If I do that, you're going to review it and say it's shit. Our approach has been implementing it as pure as we can, and then just seeing what works and what doesn't. Stuff that doesn't work, we start adapting until it does."

Translation = "There's going to be a degree of mainstreaming because we don't want bad reviews from people who aren't familiar with D&D."

Originally Posted by Pongo
"You miss a lot in D&D—if the dice are bad, you miss," he says. "That doesn't work well in a videogame. If I do that, you're going to review it and say it's shit. Our approach has been implementing it as pure as we can, and then just seeing what works and what doesn't.

Is "missing a hit" big problem for CRPG fans???

He also said:

5th edition [D&D rules] is very different to 2nd Edition already, so it is much more accessible — this is also why it’s enjoying an increased popularity. So the videogame will be similar. We’re not going to compromise on depth

About story - there is one unfortunate element:

What he can tell me is that “we are in the city of Baldur’s Gate, we’re in Forgotten Realms and stuff has happened in the world since [D&D’s] 3.5 edition. This game directly follows a new campaign called Baldur’s Gate: Descent Into Avernus, we worked very closely with them on that, and so our story continues right after that.” This makes talking about the game even more challenging, as Ascent Into Avernus isn’t out until September and Vincke doesn’t want to spoil how that story unfolds.

Originally Posted by JDR13
Translation = "There's going to be a degree of mainstreaming because we don't want bad reviews from people who aren't familiar with D&D."

Oof. I'm of two minds. D:OS has the single best isometric TB combat system I've played, so I have some trust in Vincke's judgment.

But a strict interpretation of D&D rulesets in games has been successful with the public, past and present -- from P:K last year to BG itself way back when. So his fretting on this point seems less a response to public opinion and more a sign that he himself isn't really comfortable with D&D. And that makes it seem like taking on BG is less of a passion project and more of a business move.

Larian's commitment to their original IP is a big part of what makes it good -- you really have a sense that the designers know and love their game from a player's point of view. If Vincke is approaching D&D more from an outside perspective, it doesn't seem like a good sign.

Originally Posted by Hexprone
So his fretting on this point seems less a response to public opinion and more a sign that he himself isn't really comfortable with D&D. And that makes it seem like taking on BG is less of a passion project and more of a business move.

The fact that it's tying in with Descent Into Avernus, which is being released this fall, tells me that Larian and WotC planned this in such a way that one would help to promote the other.

That shouldn't have any impact on how good the game ends up being, but it's absolutely a business move.

Originally Posted by JDR13
The fact that it's tying in with Descent Into Avernus, which is being released this fall, tells me that Larian and WotC planned this in such a way that one would help to promote the other.

That shouldn't have any impact on how good the game ends up being, but it's absolutely a business move.

I actually like this. Might even coerce me to pick up Descent Into Avernus even though I don't play the tabletop. I was a bit worried that it would tell the same story, but BG3 being a follow up of sorts is the best thing IMO.

Hopefully they will release a book maybe that describes the story of Descent into Avernus for those of us who don't play tabletop D&D.

I like what I read so far, and its impressive they have 300 people working on this game! That must be very expensive. And they said they don't even need to do crowd funding either? Wow, this game will probably be 20 million or more, I'm guessing.

Originally Posted by Ripper
Who was asking for more grimdark? Looks like we might be getting it!

My thoughts exactly!

Btw, does any D&D lore buff know how a mindflayer can burst or transform out of a human?