Baldur’s Gate 3 is an engaging and extremely vast entry-level cRPG that looks beautiful and made to appeal to even the most casual of gamers. It’s one of the most popular games at the moment and critically acclaimed, bound to win every GOTY award there is. This game is still in its honeymoon phase and it has the luxury of being a game with a developer that’s dedicated to making the game better and is receptive to criticism. However, I feel like I was largely correct in my original rant about Baldur’s Gate 3. This fantastic game has some serious flaws and as a whole it just doesn’t really resonate with me as much as I’d like it to.

This game is incredibly unique, on a surface level it feels like you’re playing the tabletop D&D 5e. A system that redefined ttrpgs and brought in a whole new wave of fans, becoming more popular than its predecessors that had their own dedicated fanbases but the systems themselves were not beginner friendly. BG3 and D&D 5e are the same in that regard.

When I first played it I would’ve easily given it a 10/10, especially when I was in Act 1 because it was the most polished. Act 2 was fun albeit not as good as Act 1. Act Three was a slog and it took me three months to fucking beat it. It seriously felt like a chore. Mustering the motivation to beat it (mind you, I got to Act 3 back in August) took a lot out of me. Acts 1 & 2 were some of the most fun and engaging gaming experiences of my life and the end of the latter was epic. However, Act 3 just fell off hard. All of that build up was for naught and nearly soured my experience for the whole game. The villains feel like an afterthought and in hindsight add nothing to the story.

The game gives the illusion of freedom, employing clever tactics to make the game seem like it isn’t linear experience. It’s all smoke and mirrors. I have no problems with linear games, in fact I love them, but this game was marketed as this expansive immersive sim when it really isn’t. The game will on occasion break your immersion if you try to roleplay a certain way e.g. if you want to be non-lethal the quests will still act as if you’re a murderer. Discovery and exploration are probably the most fun to be had. They’re done at your own leisure and aren’t required for progression which usually leads to the most memorable stuff in the game like side quests (not including the milquetoast companion quests).

The companions are designed to be as lovable and romancable as possible which is why they work on the timescale that they do. Most companions are hot, young, single, and VERY READY to mingle. Compared to even the previous Baldur’s Gate games (which I still need to beat), their companions are a lot more varied albeit cliched. All of this is bait for horny gamers (which I am one don’t get me wrong) so they’ll be manipulated to like a character when they’re pretty much a sexy plank of wood with a basic character arc, if at that. Oh how I long for the days of KOTOR or just BioWare in general when they were at their peak.

This also goes into my critique of D&D 5e in general where the characters feel like superheroes. This ends up making everything feel unearned, especially when you start out as an already accomplished person at level one. We don’t even need our own mc to illustrate this point, look at the companions. They’re all level one when you recruit them and yet Karlach, a level one barbarian who looks beautiful survives the frontlines of the Nine Hells. Gale, a level one wizard, has a deep and intimate relationship with Mystra, the goddess of magic, and one of the most powerful spellcasters in the multiverse. Wyll, with his light-skin acting ass, being this corny-ass, edgy, idiot with all this power at level one.

Here’s the thing, the things that I don’t like about 5e are what most people love about it and are literally its main selling points. It’s a matter of taste and what you like playing. BG3/5e is definitely fun to play if you’re looking for an easy-to-learn, jack of all trades, power fantasy. What I felt as a DM for 5e is that it can be frustrating, especially since most of the rules revolve around combat encounters. 5e assumes that you’re gonna punch your way out of your problems which is inherently problematic but once again it is a power fantasy. 5e isn’t my preferred system which is okay, my opinion is just as valid as those who prefer the system which is most tabletop gamers, including my friends. I like how older D&D editions are more exploration oriented rather than combat focused and they often felt like survival horror games. That’s probably why I really like OSRs or even PBTA systems over D&D.

I even explained some gameplay differences between older editions of D&D and 5e to my friends and they prefer 5e. They didn’t like how it sounded to play older editions where death is a real option and it required more forethought and longer preparation in battles which you were encouraged to avoid as opposed to 5e’s gung-ho approach to combat and storylines tailored to make your characters feel like great heroes facing insurmountable odds (which I do adore) rather than people trying to survive and explore dungeons for loot. While combat can still be dangerous in 5e, death doesn’t always mean the end of a character which is exacerbated by Withers’ inclusion in BG3.

The combat in BG3 can be monotonous and frustrating and this is coming from somebody who likes Musou games. Like the rest of the game, the combat is a mile wide but an inch deep. There are too many variables and too much RNG involved with encounters, it’s somehow worse than XCOM. There are so many terrible rolls in this game. Modifiers and enemies per encounter need rebalancing as it can often be unfair. If there’s a lot of enemies then the game not only slows down to a damn near halt but it feels like the game is just playing itself (seriously, there’s no fast forward option?). Not only that but the enemies just swarm the absolute shit out of you, making save scumming essential to progress. While I didn’t find actual combat that hard, the roll of the dice and piss poor balancing can suck the fun out of the room. Thank the gods for cheese strats. It feels like you’re being DMed by somebody who just wants to kill off your characters and do away with the campaign. There’s a lot of trial and error which despite my issues with 5e, is not an issue there at all.

The mechanical depth and build variety are nowhere close to something like Owlcat’s Pathfinder games, Pillars of Eternity, Arcanum, Arx Fatalis, etc (all of these games flawed in their own right). Combat in something like Persona 5 Royal, there’s this constant feedback loop and you have to pay attention. Having knowledge of the game’s rock-paper-scissors style turn-based combat system allows you to counter enemies in a way that makes for a very satisfying experience. Divinity: Original Sin 2, Larian’s previous game, did a better job with somewhat satisfying turn-based combat than BG3 and it wasn’t even that tactical. Hell, Baldur’s Gate 1 and 2 have better combat (fight me), they played in real time which you could pause whenever you wanted, and they were based off of AD&D. The replay value for BG3 is definitely diminished by its combat. Even if you like the story/characters/dialogue/worldbuilding, the combat is not on par with any of those aspects even though sometimes you’ll get pigeonholed into combat by saying or doing the wrong thing, forcing a reload.

The UX is clunky and inventory management can be a slog, taking up a lot of precious time in this already overwhelmingly large game. If you’re anything like me, you need your items organized and sorted a certain way. The game does have the bag system where it’ll automatically sort similar items together but correct me if I’m wrong, you can’t do it manually so you’ll have to rely on your camp chest. Otherwise, your companions basically just become your mules and there aren’t really any consequences to the weight system either unless you’re a massive hoarder.

The game’s story can be summed up as just okay. It’s corny as hell, feeling like it was fan-fiction written by a DM whose knowledge of The Forgotten Realms (the least interesting setting at D&D’s disposal) comes from YouTube lore videos. While it does feel like you’re being DMed by an actual person, like people, it is flawed and often trite. I think the story should’ve been straight forward instead of making you feel like you have a choice. There’s only one real choice that matters which is the ending. The game feels heavily railroaded and despite how big everything is, it’s all very linear. Everything is an illusion of choice and freedom. Everyone will ultimately have the same experience like a rollercoaster.

The tadpole acts as a copout whenever it’s convenient in the story or in a companion’s character arc. The Emperor and the stuff with Orpheus is just awful. On top of that, the villains’ plan makes literally no sense. Harvest souls by turning people into mind flayers yet when they turn into one they lose their souls, rendering their plan utterly useless. The Elder Brain/Netherbrain takes over the reigns as the final villain and you got a few worthless choices; take its power, destroy it and the crown, or assimilate. The final arena was also just ass. After two hours of slogging I just ended up using Gale’s exploding shit but he didn’t die so there was no point in wasting that time since I didn’t want to get the bad ending anyway. Act 3 just soured the entire game for me and it just kept getting worse with unbalanced encounters that have over-leveled enemies bombard you with AoEs and force damage. Kind of a mistake making the level cap 12, especially when enemies can go over that.

Skill checks mean nothing when the opposing character basically just accepts whatever you’re trying to do with no pushback. I’m literally playing god(s) and there’s no drawbacks whatsoever which is pretty much The Sims. This game holds your hand every step of the way. The dialogue options are extremely limited and feels like Fallout 4 at times. People say the narrative is strong but I think it’s on par with an MCU film— like seriously, the narrative and writing is no where close to Disco Elysium, Fallout 2, or Planescape: Torment. This is not to say the writing is awful (though it definitely can be), I just don’t think it’s worthy of praise.

On my murder-hobo playthrough with my friends, despite the obvious consequences to our actions (like no longer accessing vendors we murdered) the game doesn’t react accordingly. The morality and reputation system is basically non-existent. This has been a thing that cRPGs have gotten down a long time ago and Baldur’s Gate 3 is missing a simple but very important role playing mechanic. The world is not reactive and stays stagnant aside from quest related shenanigans here and there. People aren’t afraid of you, they don’t close down shop whenever you’re nearby, you’re just an average jo-shmoe as if genocide and mass-murder isn’t noteworthy.

Baldur’s Gate 3 is basically Mass Effect all over again. This is coming from someone with a huge soft spot for the Mass Effect series as it was practically my first rpg experience. Presentation and production value are superb, rpg aspects are dumbed down in favor of appealing to a mass audience, and everything is simplified albeit done extremely well. Very linear, very railroady. As stated prior, it gives off the illusion that there’s freedom of choice especially with the ending which negates everything that came before.

Like Mass Effect for me in my teens, for many Baldur’s Gate 3 is a life-changing experience. Many experienced veterans looked down on Mass Effect back then for the aforementioned reasons but to allow for a whole new generation of fans to keep their favorite hobby alive and well they have to hold their tongues as to not discourage the newbies. While I don’t look down on BG3 (far from it), it doesn’t live up to my expectations as a cRPG. Its reception is similar to The Witcher 3; a critically acclaimed game with quality content, lots of stuff to do, and a passionate developer that kept adding in new content. However, when the honeymoon period was over it was criticized (The Witcher 3’s and Blood and Wine’s stories still go hard). At the moment, Baldur’s Gate 3 is a cultural and gaming phenomenon, its flaws be damned.

There are definitely better games, systems, etc that are more fleshed out, are more balanced, and have a better way of approaching systems in a much more in-depth fashion. However like D&D 5e, it reigns supreme not because it’s the best, specializing in what it does. It’s due to being above mediocre at everything it does. There’s no shame in that, it allows people from all walks of life to enjoy rpgs and that’s a beautiful thing. While I’m not totally convinced that Baldur’s Gate 3 deserves all of the hype, most people do and it’ll probably win all of those GOTY awards. The game is a technical masterpiece and it obviously resonated with the gaming community at large. It just wasn’t for me and that’s okay. Games like Baldur’s Gate 3 need to exist, we want more devs to feel like rpgs are worth investing time and money into them. Baldur’s Gate 3 triumphs and stands tall in the sea of mtx, lootbox-filled dogshit flooding the market. Baldur’s Gate 3 is a defining game of this generation but I don’t think it’s the definitive cRPG, nowhere close, and that’s okay. It does what it needs to and does it extremely well. Happy gaming everybody!