Baldur's Gate - Retrospective

Not knowing D&D rules at the time didn't lessen the experience for me at all. The BG games were challenging, but never frustrating to me. I also loved the huge variety of different monsters. I was already a fan of D&D monster lore from reading some of the monster manuals, even though I had never actually played D&D.

skavenhorde said:

You gotta remember this was way back, I believe in EGA days. Things weren't all that pretty back then

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But it's all relative - you didn't KNOW things weren't all that pretty until later when graphics advanced.

I have to look at videos or pictures of some of those old games since sadly, I got rid of all my DOS games back in 93 or something like that and didn't get back into PC gaming until 2000 with... wait for it... BALDUR'S GATE! And I loved every minute of it thinking how far PC RPGs had advanced since those Gold Box titles.

Anyway, looking at those videos/images I think "wow, that's pretty hideous"... and even playing games today like M&M 5 & 6 which I just downloaded from GoG... BUT back then those were actually awesome graphics.

I remember gaming on my Tandy PC in CGA (4 color graphics!!!). What about those Atari 2600 games? I'm old enough to have been around for those... we huddled around the TV in AWE!

Baldurs Gate Big Picture

If you want the best Baldurs Gate experience, you have to get the Big Picture Modification.

It has BG1 & BG2 in the updated engine with tons of addons and bug fixes.

http://www.spellholdstudios.net

Relayer said:

But it's all relative - you didn't KNOW things weren't all that pretty until later when graphics advanced.

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Can't agree more. I remember being in awe of Ultima 5. I drooled over the screenshots in RUN magazine. They looked ten times better than Ultima 4. You could actually see your reflection in the mirror!!! That was beyond cool (at the time)

Still even back then CGA sucked. I played the CGA version of Defender of the Crown and while I liked the game I still thought CGA was horrible (compared to intellivision or even the C64).

When Baldur's Gate hit I couldn't believe my eyes. Like I said before, you could actually see the armor/weapons. A huge graphical leap from the Gold Box days as far as I was concerned.

I still didn't mind the graphics in the gold box games and play FRUA from time to time. They still have a small, but dedicated modding community that have done some amazing stuff.

rune_74 said:

You don't remember having to read the manual for text in the game?(a primitive copy protection).

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PoR's (and CotAB's) copy protection used the irritating code wheel. Sometimes it was pure guesswork matching the characters: fluid, curvy elvish script doesn't lend itself to rendering by a C64 or Apple II. Later entries in the series used the Journal as copy protection.

Printing the Journal was really a matter of necessity rather than DRM. It contained hand-drawn maps to aid navigation, and illustrations for clues and flavour. Those would not have been possible to render to the screen with any fidelity on 80's systems. Also they would have had to package yet another disk to contain the text, which would have meant more expense and disk swapping.

Relayer said:

And I loved every minute of [BG] thinking how far PC RPGs had advanced since those Gold Box titles.

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I find it's a case of one step forward and one or two backwards. PoR featured a non-linear main quest. A free roaming game world without hand-holding devices like level scaling. Flexible party composition, hirelings, and quest related joinable NPCs. Challenging combat, with decent enemy AI and an auto battle option that actually works. There are even multiple solutions to certain quests throughout the series. I can think of several big name modern RPGs which fail to rise to Gold Box level. It's true SSI's games lacked social skills and NPC interaction, but, considering how badly written most CRPGs actually are, it's not much of an omission.

What about those Atari 2600 games?

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I can still recall the blisters from that damn unergonomic joystick, and the wood panelling effect which was mandatory on all '70s electronics

joxer said:

I loved both BGs… And will never forget the "you must gather your party before venturing forth" annoyance. Although it was getting on my nerves back then, somehow I miss that thing in recent party based RPGs.

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There is kind of an inside joke in Dragon Age: Origins about this. When you go to transition between areas it asks "Do you wish to gather your party before venturing forth?"

My daughter wears the guy who did that voice in BG/BG2 was the same guy who played Teal'k in Star Gate. Anyone know if that is true?

By the way, my first commercial RPG was Wizardry on an Apple II. And then some of the RPGs on the PLATO system from CDC.

At the time it came out Baldurs Gate left me cold - I was totally hooked to the first person sandbox RPG (Daggerfall, mostly) and strategy games at the time. When I played it several years later, I wasn't all that overwhelmed either - partly becasue I don't like the D&D system much (always preferred other systems even in my P&P days). The game only really grew on me when I played it coop with my wife - although clunky, that was a very fun experience.

Oh, and to submit my entry to the geriatric gamer contest: My first RPG was Bard's Tale, on the Amiga. Difficult game, I never got very far. My brother however hex-edited the savegame files to boost his party a bit, and actually finished it... My first PC RPG was Ultima Underworld, which blew me away at the time, first FP 3D game I played. And it completely changed my view on PC's as a gaming platform...

GhanBuriGhan said:

Oh, and to submit my entry to the geriatric gamer contest: My first RPG was Bard's Tale, on the Amiga. Difficult game, I never got very far. My brother however hex-edited the savegame files to boost his party a bit, and actually finished it… My first PC RPG was Ultima Underworld, which blew me away at the time, first FP 3D game I played. And it completely changed my view on PC's as a gaming platform…

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Hehe, seems quite a few of us started out with Bard's Tale

Incidentally, I first played it on my brothers Amiga - but got the C64 version for my birthday - because I didn't have an Amiga of my own

It was the Amiga 1000 - which cost something like 3500$ at the time!

I also happened to experience Ultima Underworld as one of the first PC CRPGs and I was floored by how amazing it was. Then again, we're talking Looking Glass

skavenhorde said:

You could actually see your reflection in the mirror!!! That was beyond cool (at the time)

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Nowadays no-one would do that anymore. Would be just considered as "cost-intensive" and be dropped.

I also have Bard's Tale [PC version] - but never played it - from an anniversary edition of Interplay games I once found on a flea market.

DArtagnan said:

Hehe, seems quite a few of us started out with Bard's Tale

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Yeah, The Bard's Tale on the C64 (well, 128 in 64 mode). I recall watching the tape counter slowly click upwards while I waited for my game to load … so many hours of watching the tape counter.

Yeah, The Bard's Tale on the C64 (well, 128 in 64 mode). I recall watching the tape counter slowly click upwards while I waited for my game to load … so many hours of watching the tape counter.

You encounter
99 Berserkers,
99 Berserkers,
99 Berserkers,
99 Berserkers,
…