Baldur's Gate 3 - Early Access Review @ PC Gamer

Since you've never played them, you should do yourself a favor and play BG 1&2 before BG 3 releases. You'll thank me later. :)

I own old and new EE versions of BG1 and BG2 and I have tried few times to get into them but for some reason stopped. Partly its the "older" graphics and partly its the older D&D rules I am not big fan of.

My first exposure to D&D is with NWN/KOTOR and I think its ruleset 3.5 (??) and really like this ruleset and found it very hard to unlearn this and pick up the older ruleset. The first thing which annoyed me is how AC worked!

But I guess I will have to try it once again as I want the full "BG experience" when BG3 comes out so that will mean playing the older games to understand the references and history of the games.
 
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"Full BG experience" does not exist. One thing that made those games great at the time was the technological push they had. There just weren't games like that those days. I remember being thoroughly impressed by the 5 CDs BG 1 was delivered on (Command & Conquer required only 1 CD). I used days and days devouring the manual which was just amazing at the time.

Those days are gone and it takes much more to impress gamers nowadays.

Another thing that made BGs so great, and why they are still considered as one of the best RPGs ever made, was the story and writing. Both of which were on par with excellent novels (not as good as Lord of the Rings, but close). Those you can still experience, but it requires patience. If you'll take the games as novels you read when it fits for you, it might still be possible. Otherwise, the presentation in games has surpassed the BG times and many people might never be able to catch the magic those games had at their time.
 
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Really glad to hear an enthusiastic, positive take. I am staying miles away for now, and I have to say was feeling super pessimistic based on the early 'takes' coming out of the early access. You made my day :)

Lot of people here have BG1 and BG2 in very high regards. Some people here also have Divinity: Original Sin I and II in high regards. So if you are coming from this kind of background your views might be different :)

I have played older Larian likes Divine Divinity, Beyond Divinity and Divinity II. I really like those games and I can see elements of those in BG3.

This game also reminds me of good parts of Bioware from Dragon Age games as well. I really like the writing, characters and the ambiance they have created. They have made it easy to buy into the world, if that make sense.

Anyway I lied earlier but stopped playing the game! I loaded an older save game to try a different choice and I couldn't stop playing it! I have told my self , I will just play ACT1 in EA :p

One thing I will add is that, I have not been playing any single player games for the last 6 months sinc most of the newer games didn't interest me that much. This could also be a reason why I am liking this so much!
 
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Messages
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"Full BG experience" does not exist. One thing that made those games great at the time was the technological push they had. There just weren't games like that those days. I remember being thoroughly impressed by the 5 CDs BG 1 was delivered on (Command & Conquer required only 1 CD). I used days and days devouring the manual which was just amazing at the time.

Those days are gone and it takes much more to impress gamers nowadays.

Another thing that made BGs so great, and why they are still considered as one of the best RPGs ever made, was the story and writing. Both of which were on par with excellent novels (not as good as Lord of the Rings, but close). Those you can still experience, but it requires patience. If you'll take the games as novels you read when it fits for you, it might still be possible. Otherwise, the presentation in games has surpassed the BG times and many people might never be able to catch the magic those games had at their time.

I think you are right. One of my all times favourite game is Morrowind and I find it very hard to reply it now even with all the mods mods etc. When it was released, I never played such an open world RPG so it was amazing.
 
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Messages
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I own old and new EE versions of BG1 and BG2 and I have tried few times to get into them but for some reason stopped. Partly its the "older" graphics and partly its the older D&D rules I am not big fan of.

My first exposure to D&D is with NWN/KOTOR and I think its ruleset 3.5 (??) and really like this ruleset and found it very hard to unlearn this and pick up the older ruleset. The first thing which annoyed me is how AC worked!

But I guess I will have to try it once again as I want the full "BG experience" when BG3 comes out so that will mean playing the older games to understand the references and history of the games.

I think you'd get past the graphics pretty quicky. The ruleset might seem a little rough at first, but you'll adapt as you play them. The single-player campaign is far superior to what NWN gave you.
 
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