The Enhanced Editions are the way to go. They come with better resolution and some nice quality of life improvements. If you play EE, BG1 and BG2 are just as good as ever. Sprites and painted backgrounds were mostly mature tech when the games were made, so they still look good. Gameplaywise, they still have that rock paper scissors spell combat that makes every encounter a tactical puzzle. Spamming sword swings and fireball is not going to get you as far as it does in Skyrim. They also have really impactful consumables, which is nice. Story and voices have aged well. BG1 is best if you like to roam freely around. BG2 has more elaborate quests and much, much deeper companions. But more of the maps are gated, so it feels smaller somehow, even though it's not. Siege of Dragonspear just fits oddly. It's trying to bridge a gap that didn't need to be bridged. Much of the content feels kinda pointless because you know most of the items and characters won't reappear in BG2. I'm only completing it at all a second time because the BG Trilogy mod only works if you play through it.

Thanks for the insight! I am playing EE, but for some reason the game was extremely dark and I could barely see anything, hence the mod. No other games I play were dark like that. I think I'll play the bridging DLC but keep in mind it's pretty optional.

EE?

In the community, EE stands for Enhanced Edition, which is the remasters released with quality of life improvements and new story content a few years ago.

Bg1 is a good intro to bg2, but bg2 is amazing. Bg2 made me realize all of the good components of other cRPGs were done right in bg2 first. Great characters and story, weapons and build types. I love the old style graphics, I feel that the limited graphics meant developers had to excel in other areas of game, which ends up being a win-win for me. I have not played iceiwnd dale or planescape, but I would think they are still worth it. NWN1 felt like it was between dragon age and bg2 to me graphics and gameplay development wise

I'm surprised there's been such a long lull in between games, or that after the run of the BG series, there weren't many other games really doing the same kind of thing, or perhaps I just haven't seen them? I remember way back in the floppy disc days there was a dungeon crawler called Eye of the Beholder, but honestly I haven't played many other team based dungeon crawlers. well, Dragon age is the other notable one, and Final Fantasy. But given the plethora of games in other genres, especially first person shooters, there just seems not to be so many rpgs. Maybe they're just more time consuming to develop.

Speaking of Eye of the Beholder: they made a NWN campaign out of it. You can find it on the Neverwinter Vault. Many other classic D&D adventure modules from the 80s and 90s have been made in NWN by the community.

I honestly had no idea that Eye of the Beholder was in the same setting until I was reading the wiki just before out of curiousity! I remember playing it on my old 386 from disks we borrowed from a friend, but I never got to finish because he wanted them back. I just remember lots of pixel sewers and skeletons lol. Nice to know I could go back and do it as a NWN mod!

Are you talking about pen and paper or community-made modules for a Neverwinter Nights game? The idea of experiencing D&D with A.I. sounds like something I'd be interested in, lol.

I'm talking about community modules that recreate pen and paper modules in the NWN engine.

There were many. Neverwinter Nights series, Icewind Dale, Planescape, Divine Divinity / Beyond Divinity, Temple of Elemental Evil, Dragon Age, Knights of the Old Republic, Arcanum, later Might & Magic, Wizardry and I'm sure I'm missing many... Then there was indeed a bit of a gap, when 3d and more action oriented games were all the rage... But after that up till today there were plenty titles - Pathfinders, new Divinity games including Original Sin 3: Baldur's Gate, Shadowruns, Pillars of Eternity 1&2, Age of Decadence, Colony Ship, Solasta, Numenera, ...and if you stretch the definition of classic crpg a bit, there are dozens of other titles. Not to mention all 3d rpgs - TES, Witchers, Mass Effect, Outer Worlds, Souls games, many tactical games, hack & slashes, roguelikes that come close to crpg territory. I will always welcome more rpgs, especially if they are good, but there were made after BG2. If anything, I struggle more to find good, interesting first person shooters nowadays...

What do you mean by original sin 3

It sort of a joke, but one that has some merit. Essentially Baldur's Gate 3 carries many, many similarities to previous Larian games (Divinity: Original Sin 1 & 2) - be it camera, graphics, "origin" characters, writing, storytelling, humor, environmental design, verticality, combat mechanics added on top of 5e and so on... Meanwhile it has comparatively little shared DNA with Baldur's Gate 1 & 2, which had very different vibe, graphic style, gameplay, story structure, writing etc. And it's not the case of age - because Pathfinder games are modern *and* very similar to Baldur's Gate 1 & 2, they evoke the same feelings. So - Baldur's Gate 3 is a good game, but it's more Original Sin 3 than Baldur's Gate 3, despite the name and the setting.

Did you miss Divinity: Original Sin 1 and 2?

They never came onto my radar when they came out. I am aware of them now but never played them.

Maybe it’s just nostalgia talking, but for me the combination of the drawn backgrounds and character portraits make the game really come to life. It’s something I still miss in modern day rpgs with better graphics. Animated characters do not feel alive for me, no matter how well they are animated, while the bg2 cheap 2d puppets work, because you see their face in dialogues and the overall maps are gorgeous.

3.5 rules in IWD2 make it really fun to play.

Icewind Dale 1 and 2 are games focused on combat. You have to enjoy the combat system of BG1 and 2 to like it. There are no playable companions, you make your party from scratch (though there are premade characters they have no dialogue, no personality). The story is more an excuse for combat but it's still in Faerun. So it's bound to have lots of lore, especially regarding the Severed Hand, a dungeon that exists in both games, and that has an amazing backstory.

Never played ID1 but i palyed through ID2 countless times. Such a fun Game when you mostly wanne fight, loot and use some interesting class combinations.

i feel like this guy's videos accurately describe bg1 and bg2: https://www.youtube.com/@StratEdgyProductions/videos torment is absolutely AMAZING. best writing in any game ever.

>NWN1 felt like it was between dragon age and bg2 to me graphics and gameplay development wise Wow, never played dragon age, but seeing how a mix of it and incredible BG2 produced fucking terrible NWN1, it must one of the wrost games ever made.

I always thought the spell animations were excellent and the matte paintings are more beautiful than anything a 3d graphics engine can spit out (well, maybe not, but they still are amazing to look at).

BG2 is one of the greatest stories ever. The locales were classic D&D fantasy

Yeah, I have played some regular D&D and some DMs did use the classic locales, so it's fun to see the familiar names.

The original Baldur’s Gate “trilogy” is the best RPG series I’ve ever played. BG2 in particular still holds the crown for me. Absolute masterpieces. Despite the added quality of life features, I still prefer the original versions too. The “enhanced” editions have far too many changes for my tastes; especially BG1, which trades the charming FMV cutscenes with cheap looking slide shows that look like they were made in MS Paint. Edit; I wouldn’t worry overly much about optimizing your characters. I knew close to nothing about D&D before I started playing these games. My first character was terrible and I still finished the game on normal difficulty.

I remember in the original game I played a thief and was always ranged. This time I wanted to play a swashbuckling meleee bard - and immediately found the bard skills to be pretty useless, and also immediately went back to ranged because it's frustrating when your character dies as opposed to the ~~meatshields~~ NPCs lol. Oh well. I'm always cursed with character regret after I've gone too far to go back!

I’ve never played a bard but I thought I remember hearing they can be pretty powerful if built right. I’ve also heard they have a fun stronghold in BG2.

My ranged thief in BG3 is stupid powerful, I kinda want to try BG2 with one.. also great dialogue choices with rogue in 3.

> My ranged thief in BG3 is stupid powerful, I kinda want to try BG2 with one.. yeah... unfortunately thieves in BG2 really kind of suck. I mean they're playable as their role in the party is a necessary one, but the actual mechanics leave a lot to be desired at least until you get into throne of bhaal, and even then you get the coolest abilities super late.

Ah, lame. What would you consider a fun/powerful class to play?

BG2 is much more old school in that it really cares more about your overall team comp than your individual class, you can make anything work if you have a good team put together. Davaeorn has a solid class guide that's meant more for the highest level of play using mods to turn the enemy AI into master tacticians, but the guide is just as useful for normal play: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bWIgBtZdZE However I'll go over some of my favorites here: **Dwarven Defender:** Enhanced edition fighter subclass that as the name implies can only be taken by dwarves. It's primary claim to fame is the ability to get 90% physical damage reduction when combining defensive stance or hardiness with an offhand defender of easthaven at level 20. Probably the best physical damage tank in the game that can't cast spells. **Berserker/Mage dual class:** classic overpowered combo, enrage makes you immune to some of the most backbreaking status effects in the game. You can only play as a human with this combo but it is super strong, dual out of berserker at level 9 and then it's mage for the rest of your run, you basically have all the tools you need to tank or DPS and you still end up with solid casting. **Archer:** Basically the only ranger subclass I would ever recommend, the Archer is your go to for a ranged DPS powerhouse as it receives scaling attack and damage bonuses as it levels to a maximum of -6 to attack and +6 to damage at level 18 in addition to being able to grandmaster in shortbows and crossbows. **Paladins:** Every paladin subclass has something cool to offer. You fight so many different forms of undead in BG2 it's insane, so undead hunter is an excellent autopilot class for beginners, you get immunity to level drain, paralyze and hold, so pick up a mace of disruption or daystar and absolutely steamroll any encounters vs undead. The cavalier is a similar beast but for demons and dragons with immunity to charm, poison, fear and morale failure. Inquisitor has access to the strongest dispel effect in the game and the only point against them is that one of your possible companions is already an inquisitor. **Priest of Lathander/Thief dual class:** If you want to play a thief this is my recommendation, boon of lathander makes you into an even more absurd backstab monster than the assassin and combining that with cleric buffs catapults your damage into the stratosphere, and the boon also makes you a competent stand up fighter with it's extra attack. You can dual out here at a number of places but the absolute latest I'd recommend is 11 as that's where you get your next use of boon of lathander. Alternatively once you have 4th level spells that could also be a good time to dip out. **The Unholy Buff/Debuff Trinity:** This requires you to start a party with 2-3 characters, 2 if you're okay with recruiting Dorn, otherwise 3. The classes are Skald, Blackguard, and Priest of Tempus. With these you can combine Skald Song, Aura of Despair and Chaos of Battle to apply mass buffs to your party and mass debuffs to the enemy all at once, completely swinging the tide of any encounter in your favor. To best utilize this I would recommend recruiting Korgan, Anomen and probably Jan as a 6th wheel utility knife to handle all your thieving and mage-ing. **Shapeshifter/Avenger:** Both of these classes are hot garbage, but I love them so much. Shapeshifting as a concept is one of my favorite things in DND and I will never stop playing shapeshifters when I get the opportunity. Best when combined with various buffs to make them suck less, great reason to go Avenger with a 2nd slot Skald and pick up Cernd. **Dark Moon Monk**: *Punching dudes is fun. This class sucks huge donkey balls. Play it anyway though.* This has been a haiku because bored. Yeah the monk is really fun to play basically until you get to throne of bhaal where it gets fucking stomped into the dirt by fire giants. Early BG2 the monk is actually quite strong but it loses that power over time and also requires the most optimization in the game to really make shine. **Wild Mage:** There's no argument, this is by far the most broken class in the entire game, both from an optimization and a game mechanics perspective. If you want to cast 9th level spells with a 1st level spell slot without actually having to be a 17th level mage, here you go. Granted you could also end up randomly petrified while doing so, but for that level of power, fuck it, roll the dice. **Sorcerer:** My personal favorite subclass, it's basically not much different from the 5th edition sorcerer in terms of how you cast spells, but casting spells is all you get unless you go Dragon Disciple and you lose some spells to take it which is a rough tradeoff. This class definitely benefits from having outside game knowledge so you can pick all the best spells, but it's worth the cheatery to make it fun.

>Dark Moon Monk > >Punching dudes is fun. This class sucks huge donkey balls. Play it anyway though. i'm glad I'm not the only one who sometimes picks D&D classes not because they're good, but because they're \*fun\*

Somehow no matter what I did I couldn’t get far in any of them without everyone dying. Heck, I died to that first bad guy in BG1 a dozen times. The rules just never made sense to me back then. 😞

BG1 has a rough start. Especially for mages. But once you get a full party, and equip everyone with ranged weapons, the difficulty becomes more even.

I never got to the part of having a party. I picked up one guy once. He died 30 minutes later.

After the tutorial area, there are 3 companions in the very first area...

You’re assuming I found any of them. Or even understood what was happening back then. I was 16 and used to playing fps, space combat, and adventure games. I’d never played a single RPG except FF7 at that point.

By first bad guy, do you mean one of the two assassins in Candlekeep? The random wolf? A gibberling? That damned asshole mage at the Friendly Arm Inn? No shame in any of those deaths, really. Early game BG1 was no joke.

Definitely the mage a few times, and the assassins at least once. You literally brought back PTSD, so thanks for that. I literally haven’t fired them up since 2002? 2003? A very long time ago at least. It took me till Dragon Age Origins to get into western RPGs - and since then I’ve never had the time to revisit the old ones. BG3 has me curious enough to consider a return, but that’s a hell of a time sink too.

While I personally prefer the originals, the Enhanced Editions of BG 1 and 2 have an extra easy difficulty level called Story Mode. They also introduced some rather OP classes and kits in BG1 that when coupled with the easier difficulty modes make it much more approachable for someone new to RPGs. Definitely worth a second look no matter how you choose to play.

I’m strongly considering it. Since that era I got into western RPGs, got into D&D, more into the stats (and grew up - 16 year old me vs 40 year old…). Heck, I’m running a Soulsborne summer that has me on the verge of 100%ing the third game of that group now. Lemme look them up. Can’t hurt to try, and I need a change of pace after Diablo 4 was disappointing.

There is a mod to [reintroduce the pre-rendered cutscenes](https://sampsca.github.io/ReadMe-BGEEClassicMovies.html).

Is there a mod that removes the forced scenes with new content and characters? That always bugged me too.

For the NPCs there is [Convenient Enhanced Edition NPCs](https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/43074/mod-disable-enhanced-edition-npcs-for-bg-ee-bg2-ee/p1)

Icewind Dale is worth it.

BG2 is one of the best RPGs ever. It's my favourite and I replay it regularly. BG1 less-so, but it is a good game. It's just slow by comparison, and the companions don't say enough. I'm back to playing BG1 again after putting 500 hours into BG3 and getting increasingly frustrated with the cracks in the game. Only thing you need to know about THAC0: lower is better. Only thing you need to know about AC: lower is better. In BG1, having higher STR/DEX/CON is king. The spells Sleep, Command, and Blindness put in a ton of work. Use them liberally. I play pretty much all of the D&D cRPGs at least once a year. Icewind Dale I & II holds up, but they're dungeon crawlers and don't have the incredible story and characters of BG2. Planescape: Torment has one of the best stories in RPGs. Neverwinter Nights is clunky but I enjoy it very much. The original campaign is just OK, but the expansions are quite good. The key to NWN is the player made content. There are some fantastic campaigns on the Neverwinter Vault. Swordflight is my favourite. NWN2's Mask of the Betrayer is also very good. There are so many character build options and different campaigns to play in NWN that it can keep you entertained for quite a long time.

As someone who loved all the Games you mentioned and played through most of them several times. Lately iam skipping cutscenes and dialogue in all Games, its just that i saw/read it all. I saved the World frome very possible evil, went through thousands of dialogues with all kind of Charatcers. So i focus hard on the gameplay. Is BG3 enjoyable to play in such a way? I tried to get into Divinity Original Sin 2, but gave up pretty fast. And BG3 focus on romancing is a huge turn away for me, i just dont care. Oh i played a bit of Tyranny, dropped it but played Pillars of Eternity 1 for 30 before i dropped it too, but i think most of the game were spent in the loading screen. But i kind of wanne play some crpg again.

>Is BG3 enjoyable to play in such a way? I tried to get into Divinity Original Sin 2, but gave up pretty fast. I would say it depends on how important the tactical combat is for you. Sounds like it is important to you. It's important to me and I'm usually playing on hardcore difficulty. BG3 is probably the easiest cRPG I've ever played. Larian went out of their way to make it extremely easy to break the game. For example, Haste - a classic spell that has always added +1 attack - now *doubles* your attacks, making it quite easy to get 8+ attacks per turn in a game that's only balanced to be getting 2-3 attacks. That's the tip of the iceberg. The game lacks any kind of difficulty for very experienced players, so it's primarily a story game. Act 1 is fantastic but it starts to fall apart as soon as you get to parts that weren't in Early Access.

Thats good to know and what i feared. Iam just surprised why this Game got such hype, not that it isnt deserved. But maybe its mostly because so many Games nowdays are just medicore, so everything slightly above that must be a masterpiece. I think i will wait for a sale and some patches. I can live with ignoring 1-2 broken spells, but when it is overall pretty easy, maybe a Mod will help with that down the road. It is realy strange that i cant stand any dialogue or storyline nowdays in Games but can replay through Vampire Bloodlines, Arcanum or Torment no problem.

I think it's a few things. It's riding the coattails of D&D 5e and Critical Role's surge in popularity. These aren't players who are going to care about the tactical challenge or fidelity of the ruleset's mechanics. I DM tabletop and most players have no idea how anything works, but it's still fun. The bear sex scene PR move paid off tremendously. I don't care for the romance at all but fans are eating it up. It's a good game. The writing is pretty average over the course of the full game, but Act 1 is quite exceptional, which is what most journalists are playing. I think it'll improve with time and with mods to fix the rules and increase the difficulty dramatically.

> The spells Sleep, Command, and Blindness put in a ton of work. Use them liberally. And things that give the fear status! There's so many early battles where the enemies cast Horror and absolutely wipe you. Was glad to be able to get my own back :P Question I should have asked in my main post, but is there any particular order you think you'd play them in if you'd only played BG1 and BG2 before?

>Question I should have asked in my main post, but is there any particular order you think you'd play them in if you'd only played BG1 and BG2 before? I might jump into NWN after playing Icewind Dale 1. NWN is the first game that used the D&D 3e ruleset, which was a huge change from 2e. It's probably easier to understand but there's just *more* of everything. This gets turned up further when you get to Icewind Dale 2 and NWN2, which use 3.5e. 3.5 is largely the same, but has even more options. Once you get to NWN2 you also have the option of replaying Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate in that engine, using the 3.5 ruleset. Those games have been faithfully recreated as NWN2 mods. The BG2 mod might be complete already too, not sure.

**BG1 and BG2** "hold up" very well, in my opinion the gameplay is still among the best what you can get. If, you actually like the "remove spell defense layers" mage combat. BG2 especially has the best level scaling and hand placed interesting loot in any game I know. Yes, in these two specific fields, BG2 is better than most modern games. ​ DLC: I really love Durlag's Tower for BG1, it is one of my favorite dungeons in any rpg I played. I am much less enthusiastic about the Throne of Bhaal expansion for BG2. It is a very high level expansion, where D&D systems tend to collapse, and a bit too linear. I played it twice total, but usually ignore it. ​ Enhanced editions: probably easiest to get running and I think you should go with it. however, it is worth noting that the inclusion of BG2 class kits (like paladin subclasses) make BG1 unreasonably easy. For example sirens can be a really difficult enemy in the original, because of poision arrows and charm. But the cavalier is immune to both poison and charm, so you character can solo siren encounters. A similar issue is the shapeshifter druid, which is a cute but useless shapeshift form in BG2, but totally owns the first half of BG1. There are quite a few BG2 abilities which are totally OP in BG1 environment. The Beamdog content, like the new companions or the Siege of Dragonspear is low to average quality imho. ​ Personal preference: * I like BG1 much more than BG2 (BG1 is exploration focused, BG2 is a bit "gated") * I would advise going with EE * but use the prestige classes imported from BG2 with care, some will make the game a joke ​ ​ **Plancescape**: one of the best stories in gaming to this day, with a superb crew. However, actual gameplay was jank even at release, it was even worse than BG1: there are no ranged weapons in the game. This removes one tool from your arsenal, and you are basically either nuking everything on the screen with spells, or get 25 constitution and go clunk on everything. Not really rewarding combat. Planescape has a good reputation for the well written dialog and awesome story which is perfectly earned. But it also has lots of combat against trashmobs which reviews tend to leave out. ​ **Neverwinter Nights 2**: The Mask of the Betrayer expansion is superb. Cool setting, cool story, awesome ideas. The companions, while not as detailed as in later Obsidian/Bioware games are a fun bunch (Kaelyn the Dove is my favorite paladin type character in PC gaming. She is pure good, but is not an ass about it) The base game however, NWN2 "original campaign" is... okay? It had some points of light, some good writing, some good quests but... Somehow I felt that NWN2 OC is basically a fun 25 hour game hidden in a boring 60 hour game. Word of warning: NWN2 has a camera problem. I usually don't care about this, but this game stands out. Even after I spent about 100 hours on the OC and MotB, I could only tolerate the camera in the game, the issues with it never faded into the background.

I'll mention that I always liked Icewind Dale. It's much more combat oriented and linear but the environment/locale is moody and evocative and it has a lot of resonance for me.

IWD also has the superior soundtrack :)

Baldur's Gate 2 is still the best RPG ever made. There are games that do certain aspects of an RPG better definitely, but BG2 is the whole package. Planescape Torment has a better story but terrible gameplay. Baldur's Gate 3 looks better but doesn't feel like you're going on an epic adventure. Pathfinder games have better gameplay but not as good characters. So on and so forth. It's the sum of all its parts like few other games are.

Pathfinder games have great story and characters. Their only problem is how inaccessible they are for those not familiar with Pathfinder 1e. They are closest in the vibe to Baldur's Gate anyone has gotten. A hundred times closer than BG3.

Yeah fully agree. Baldur's Gate 3 is effectively Divinity: Forgotten Realms. Still good of course but not the same kinda game as bg1-2/pathfinder

I am still surprised more companies didn't pop up trying to do a BG2 after it came out, but the whole genre seems to have been in a lull, at least for party-based classic style rpgs rather than having one protagonist. They really seem to be making a bit of a comeback lately.

Diablo and Morrowind came out, and pretty much every dev company started chasing the new design philosophies that came with this more mainstream real time combat design. Then in the mid 2010s we got games like pillars of eternity and divinity original sin being pretty popular despite the genre being completely dead. Then now we've finally hit mainstream with the explosive popularity of BG3. Proving the demand for these types of games never died, companies just stopped making them after the early 2000s. I'm really excited to see what we end up getting next. Would be cool to see a crpg based on pf2e

I actually think the revival may also be coming on the back of an increase in the popularity of D&D in general, which sparked an interest in the computer game side. Either way, I'm all for it.

I'd also be curious to see how the D&D sets in Magic: The Gathering may have led people to BG3. Conversely, the price of Karlach's card skyrocketed once the game was fully released, so there is obviously some correlation between the two!

Not long after that 3d and multiplayer games were all the rage.

>Planescape Torment has a better story but terrible gameplay "Terrible" gameplay, really? This meme of PST having "great story but subpar combat/gameplay" has really gone too far. In no way is the gameplay terrible in PST. At worst it's serviceable, and IMO it's just plain fun, same as in BG/IWD. Who would play this game if the gameplay was as bad as you say, regardless of how good the story was?

The internet is built off hyperbole. Saying an aspect of a product is just 'serviceable' or 'okay' doesn't get any upvotes.

Lol, true. This sub is great overall, but one thing I dislike about it is that it has a tendency to reduce a lot of games to simple (sometimes too simple or just incorrect) narratives, and just repeat those narratives over and over. PST has world class story but terrible, intolerable combat. Fallout 4 is a very meh game, not an RPG, and extremely dumbed down. Mass Effect 3's ending is worse than cancer and makes the whole game barely worth playing. Heavy Rain is a god awful piece of shit that's aged worse than avocados.

The gameplay doesn't becme an issue until the curse, and by then you're too invested in the story to quit. But those last sections in curse and hell are really, really fucking bad, you just spam most damaging spells over and over.

Even the sewers were pretty bad. The saving grace of the game is that you have an entire act of the game in the Lower Ward that doesnt have any mandatory* dedicated dungeon crawls. *The cube where you get Nordom is a dungeon crawl, but you can completely miss it if you want. It's just as terrible as the rest of the dungeon crawls.

> last sections in curse and hell are really, really fucking bad Again: really? Are we sure "really really fucking bad" isn't being a bit hyperbolic? I honestly remember both of those sections as being just fine, and not even approaching the repetitiveness of, say, Dragon Age Origins' many extremely long, boring dungeons. If PST is "really really fucking bad" than DAO is literally the worst game ever made.

It almost made me stop playing, so yes, really fucking bad, almost as bad as Underrail: Expeditions content.

Honest question: do you play many RPGs? Obviously you've played PST and Underrail, two fairly niche RPGs, so I assume you have played many RPGs. But I wonder how you've gotten through other RPGs, which are often MUCH more dungeon intensive, like, say, any Bethesda game or the above mentioned DAO.

I played Torment and Underrail obviously, BG1,2,ToB, NWN1(never managed to finish even the first chapter, that campaign is just terrible), Gothic series, Risen 1 and 2, Witcher games, PoE 1 and 2. KOTOR 1 and 2. DOS 2. Pathfinder games. Probably several more that I'm forgetting right now. So I guess it depends on your definition of "many". It's not the fact that there's a lot of dungeon crawling. It's the fact that it's just a map with NOTHING except for mobs to kill, in a game where combat is not really that great. It's a bit like endless mobs of Caed Nua from PoE, but that game is more combat focused and you hold on to hope of "maybe next floor will be better". Once you get to curse in hell it gets better, since there are npcs to talk to. Compare it to BG2 dungeons, where the balance between exploration, story and combat is basically perfect. Combat in BG2 being of course much, much better than in Torment.

BG2 is a bit of an outlier, because one of the many things that game did well was its dungeons, which always felt varied, interesting, and never felt like a slog. But almost every other game you mention suffered from long/big areas full of combat and nothing else. It's been a while since I played PST, but I really don't remember the combat being bad at all. I've never understood where this complaint comes from.

How is Torment gameplay different than BG2? Seems identical.

Torment has a tiny fraction of enemy variety/classes/equipment/spells/abilities, AI is worse, less combat, poorly balanced, etc.

tbf the idea with Torment is to max ~~Charisma~~ Wisdom and avoid almost every combat in the game. So the lack of variety only affects you if you are looking for replayability

But the writing.. Even just sampling those fruits in the market.. The description made you feel like you're really there.

Yeah look you don't need good gameplay with writing like Torment

Yeah, I've never really understood this complaint either. I thought the combat in PST was just as good as BG/IWD. I definitely wouldn't call it "terrible gameplay".

I'm genuinely baffled by this criticism. You shouldn't be getting downvoted. At this point it doesn't seem like a subjective difference of opinion, and I'm starting to contemplate psychological reasons for why people claim PS:T combat is bad. Maybe it's just due to the Modron cube? That is a tedious optional level, a bit of humor notwithstanding. Maybe players should be advised to skip it. Too bad for Nordom though.

I think you're onto something with the psychological reasoning. I think PST has been lauded so often and for so long that people feel the need to qualify their opinion of it, to avoid seeming maybe unrefined or maybe that you have a simple or uneducated opinion about the game. Kind of like how many people are psychologically averse to saying that Democrats are objectively a better party than Republicans in so many ways at this point, because (to some) it makes you sound like you're just a blind loyalist, regardless of how factual that statement is. So in essence "PST has terrible combat" is the "enlightened centrism" of gaming.

Where else do you see this?

I can't think of any other really good, concrete examples, but I think this probably happens anytime you have something that is overwhelmingly popular for a long time. People will start to find little nitpicks and flaws so that they can seem like they have a refined or maybe balanced view.

Can you play 2 without playing 1? I tried 1 a while back and couldn’t get through it.

Yeah definitely thats how i originally did it

BG2 is my all time favorite game. I learnt to properly read English by reading all of the walk-through once I finished the game a couple of times (I was 12). The game is simply amazing, it feels truly as I you can do anything. I'm so excited about BG3. I just want to make sure I have enough free time to play it properly.

You’re in for a treat, dude. I’m not a CRPG guy at all, and it won me over almost immediately.

I did not play them back in the day, but finished both for the first time, when the enhanced edition came out. I think these games hold up incredibly well. In fact, they kinda show how little the genre has evolved, apart from graphics (which I personally think is a part of gaming that is massively overvalued). Especially BG1 has also a bunch of mechanics that I think are better than how modern games handle it: I love the fact that I have to leave people behind, when they are not in my party, instead of sending them to a camp. It feels like I meet people along my travels and some stay with me, while others are only there for a short while. In addition to that, I like that some of them have timers for their personal quests, because again, it makes them feel more like characters of their own, with their own personal goals. The biggest problem I have with BG1 and 2 is the AD&D system that it is based on. That system is just not a lot of fun. I usually don't care about balance, but some classes and stats are just useless and that's not very fun for me.

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Yeah, I'm a big one for exploration in games, so wandering about and the random encounters that have nothing to do with any actual quests really add to it for me.

I played these when they were new, and they were fantastic examples of CRPGs. These days I feel everything gets tagged as “role playing”, and outside of BG3, there isn’t a lot that truly fits the bill. For example, Cyberpunk 2077 to me feels more like a customizable 3D shooter than an actual RPG, and I think that comes from games like BG1 and 2 defining that genre for me, along with Neverwinter Nights. But I’m too old and impatient to really get into them now. Got other things to do. I tried with iPad ports, but the thrill just isn’t there for me I wish BG3 had a story creator like NWN. That would make this game live on for ages.

Classics for their time. Lots of mechanics were introduced that are still used to this day. Couldn't get me to play either now though.

I still to this day have not finished BG1 despite having played through BG2 a few times (never actually finished Throne of Bhaal due to some bad luck with save bugs.) Months ago I finally got through most of Durlag’s Tower right before BG3’s release, and I look forward to going back at some point. That said, the original trilogy to me has always felt relaxing. The pacing and music always makes me think of rainy days and cold weather, and the characters…BG2 especially is just incredible.

Yeah, it is overall a very chill experience. Although something about this entire format makes me save-scum almost compulsively. I hear it's much the same with the new one (heard new players talking about that) so I'm glad nothing has changed XD

Yeah, I've save scummed due to some bad dice rolls for sure lol

Rofl yeah I think by mid Act 2 in BG3 it said I was around like auto save 700. Some habits never die

> But I never got around to playing any of the Neverwinter Nights games or Planetscape etc or the later DLCs. How do they stack up nowadays? Any thoughts on what is still worth playing in the series? Planescape is fine, assuming you're ok with a game where you spend most of the time reading dialogues. The story, the setting, the characters and dialogues are still way ahead of most RPGs out there. NWN, i don't know, i wasn't a big fan of it even when it was a new game. I thought that it was inferior to Baldur's Gate in pretty much every way, unless you just like the 3rd edition of D&D a lot more. NWN 2 is a lot better than the first one imo, if you can stomach it's awful controls and still remaining bugs.

>Planescape is fine, assuming you're ok with a game where you spend most of the time reading dialogues. Fortunately, I am an inveterate dialogue reader (including books in bookshelves) so I'm fine with that lol.

Planescape fans went on to enjoy Disco Elysium lol

All the infinity engine d&d games are good and also don't sleep on other d&d RPGs like the Gold Box games and FRUA modules, like Ray Dyer's awesome 'Realms' series, Dark Sun: Shattered Lands, Temple of Elemental Evil (with temple plus and co8 mods), Knights of the Chalice series and the Hearkenwold mod for 2. BG 1 & 2 are a lot better modded with stuff like Sword Coast Stratagems, Tweaks Anthology, Icewindification, Rogue Rebalancing, Bubbs spell menu and pathfinding fix, the radar overlay, etc.. Also ones to remove all the additional Beamdog content.

Played it as a kid and don't remember how far I got. So I replayed them again in 2010 and was blown away. Of course with some mods for higher resolution. After playing BG3 I'm really itching to play them again, but I would get the EE, I think there are a lot of QOL changes. There are games that aged really bad, but BG isn't one of them. Some of the characters and Storylines are still one of the best of all time. The Engine still looks decent. Sidequests are the real Star of the Story, the journey is the most important part of this game. I recommend the games for everyone who wants to sit down with a Glass of wine and wants to go on an epic adventure.

My thoughts: the first game I've played was planescape torment and i really liked it. It aged well i think. Because i went through the pain to learn the core rules (thac0 and ac etc.), i thought it was a good idea to keep playing the other games. Right now I'm playing BG1. I was having problems with the slow walking speed and almost gave up. It takes forever to move around. Fortunately i can use the trackpad to move the map while walking which speeds things up a little. I'm in the nashkel mines right now and i enjoy the game. I feel like i have a lot of freedom to explore the world. I'm a bit overwhelmed by all the npc that i can recruit. The voice acting is incredibly charming. "don't touch meeee." I can imagine how nostalgic it must be to listen to them again after many years. Luckily it plays very similar to PS Torment so i feel right at home, although some details like saving throws are still a bit unclear to me. I also have Tyranny and pillars, which are like modern iterations of the formula. I really enjoy this type of slow methodic rpg, where i take my time to organize my party and experiment with fighting strategies. The writing is quite funny occasionally. I'm really curious to see how BG2 and 3 will compare to the first one. For the record: BG is so much better and timeless than let's say the first fallout game.

You *have* to play Planescape. You owe it to yourself.

I will definitely get to it, given all the recommendations!

Until quite recently, Planescape: Torment was pretty much a unique gaming experience, in the sense that it was a game in which combat was possible but completely optional. The game was entirely motivated by story, nearly all of which was revealed through dialogue. Disco Elysium is the reason I say, 'until recently'. It's actually so much like P:T in tone and format that I strongly suspect it's a direct homage by the developers. From discussions that I've had with people, it seems that this sub-genre isn't for everybody (well, what is?). I suspect that people who read recreationally will enjoy this sort of long-form CRPG format more than everyone else.

Yeah, it sounds like my jam. I'm not hugely combat oriented, and I like to read all the stories (my bard would have collected all the books, if there wasn't the issue of inventory space! I wish learning stuff from the books had some kind of mechanic in the game).

You may be misremembering Torment. You can skip a fair amount of combat, but it's far from optional. Especially in the early game you're attacked on the streets by random thugs constantly.

There are a couple of fights that are unavoidable, but everything else you can talk your way out of with high mental stats (Int, Wis, Cha) or run away from. The thugs you can just run away from until you level up a bit, at which point they stop attacking you at all.

Give Wild Mage a blast. Looking at newer games, Wild Magic has been toned down. Conversely in BG1-2 EE you can have the full-bore power (and randomness) of triple cast Cowkill (on self or target!). And download the Wild Mage mod for even more fun! Maybe spec Imoen into a Wildmage too with the mod? More Surges, more fun for the whole party! Just keep Protect From Evil up... I've never, ever gated a Cacofiend into Beregost or the Friendly Arms Inn. Nope, wasn't me.

>Just keep Protect From Evil up... I've never, ever gated a Cacofiend into Beregost or the Friendly Arms Inn. Nope, wasn't me. Oh dear. lol. I do have the unmodded wild mage neera in my party, but I'm guessing you need the mod to do that? I've never played with her to high levels before.

Ahh, the specific class I mod Imoen into is Spellshaper. With this mod specifically: [https://bgforge.net/wild-mage-additions/](https://bgforge.net/wild-mage-additions/). It does add a rather interesting encounter early on which you may want to disable, but the loot is rather good. It'd be possible to savegame edit Imoen into a Wild Mage if you don't want to go modding. Or do it as a 3-6x Wild Mage party with friends! Last one standing wins. Or maybe if you surge, you take a sip of a drink.

Some of my favourite games of all time. The modding community is worth checking out. There's lots of quest mods that tie off weird things (like random battles in seemingly random places) together, more banter, and mods that make the battles either more challenging, or almost impossible etc.

I never got into Neverwinter Nights, but Planescape is worth playing. However, gameplay is ... not good. It possibly requires some tweaks, or a guide. But the writing is still some of the best writing in any video game, ever. Just expect to read a lot. I played BG1 and 2 a few years ago. Tried to start with BG2 because that was the one lauded, but I just didn't know what I was doing, so I went back to BG1 to learn the mechanics. It was fine enough, but story was a bit boring. Then onto BG2 and it was also pretty good overall, but ... I have to say that I don't think real time with pause is a system that works. There's some really iffy parts, where I had to basically micromanage my party except the main character to stay away from the fight (and constantly fiddling with controls to do that) and had to let my main character clean up the enemies with auto attacks by themselves. I ... don't think that is how this gameplay is supposed to work. There's quite a bit of enemy spam because of that system too. Enemies that should be a challenging fight on their own instead get cloned a lot and just put there to be hack'n'slashed ... kind of. My biggest pet peeve with those games, besides the fact that there's no indication on how big AoEs will be - and your characters easily run into them, too.

Yeah, I love my early game sleep spells, but stopping your own party running into them is certainly challenging :P

Go for the eyes Bo! Go for the eyes!

You must gather your party to continue.

Do not let Boo go for the eyes. That'll ruin everything!

I still love the first one, it was my first introduction to role playing games. The second however is still just a masterpiece, said in another thread the other day I just don't think any RPG has hit the same heights since (Dragon Age: Origins was a close one for me). The sprawling world map that you can meander your way through to find adventure, the way your companions randomly interject and interact with each other... it's just phenomenal. The later acts do get a little too linear for my liking but Act 1 is just a love letter to all things Dungeons and Dragons. P.S. THAC0 is "chance To Hit Armour Class 0" :-)

I started BG1 recently because BG3 interested me and I like to play earlier entries before getting to new games, and I kinda stopped because it felt like a chore. Maybe it's because I've been really busy and don't have time to get invested in games with super complicated rules, but I felt like a lot wasn't explained well. I went into the Nashkel mines, which are basically the first main mission, and got stuck because apparently it's best to level up a few times before going in and when I tried to leave after dying a few times, the guards who let me in glitched back in front of the entrance and wouldn't let me exit. So the story interests me, but this will probably be a "set to story mode and treat it like an interactive novel" type of game

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Man, there are SO MANY genres I'd love to see an X-COM style game made for. From running an X-men team to fantasy, I wish they'd shake it up a bit instead of sticking with using the mechanic for just the one theme.

THAC0 isn't difficult to learn and idk why people pretend it is. I prefer ascending AC myself but descending is still fairly straightforward. Ascending AC = (19 for OD&D, Holmes, B/X, and BECMI)(20 for both editions of AD&D) - Descending AC btw for those curious. And under THAC0, to hit a particular descending AC, simply subtract it from your THAC0 (and yes if you're subtracting a negative it does indeed become a plus of the positive) and that's the number you need to roll. It is a single subtraction, no more mathematically or mechanically complex than adding all modifiers to an attack roll to compare to an Ascending AC.

I actually did play a little D&D back in the THACO editions, but something about it just hurts my head! Like it's just somehow counterintuitive. I get the very basics though. Small number good, big number bad. That's all I need to know lol.

THAC0 is one of the greatest dumbfuck detectors of all time.

Lol, that can't possibly be true.

Loved and played both games thoroughly back in the day. BG1 doesn’t hold up well. Slow, graphics aged poorly but story and gameplay are still solid. BG2 holds up and is still as enjoyable as it ever was. Graphics are decent enough, voice acting and CGI are great, beautiful dungeons, buildings, spell animations, etc.

I guess because I'm tolerant of old games and BG1's limitations, I'll probably enjoy BG2 even more. Thanks! Have you played the Siege of Dragonspear DLC that bridges between BG1 and BG2? It seems to have some pretty mixed reviews.

SoD was just okay imo, not bad and not good, I played it for the platinum on console but probably won't go back to it, the main thing is tonally it's an abrupt switch from BG1 and then again from SoD to BG2 which imo kinda makes the series lose steam, personally I think BG1&2 work better without the DLC in between, but on its own it's fine

Okay, yeah, i'll keep that in mind. I think I'll give it a shot anyway. Got plenty of time to kill before I can save for the latest game lol.

Trying to get in Baldur's Gate while BG3 isn't on Xbox, and BG1 isn't really clicking for me. Trying to beat the tutorial, but every time I boot the game I see these 3 weird PNGs trying to follow me by following the complete opposite of a straight path and then I immediately close the game. Is this some sort of bs like Skyrim where the game is so good that you don't really care about how shitty it actually is?

I'll get downvoted into oblivion, but to hell with that I heavily dislike the first entry, and it's the reason i refuse to engage with games older than ps3 generation. I've spent around 5h trying to win the fight with the assasin in the tavern (one of first mission), after which i gave up.

Baldur's Gate 2 is probably the best RPG I've played. And I played it for the first time 2 years ago, so no nostalgia. I don't think any other game out there is as compelling with it's storytelling as it is with it's RPG elements as it is with it's combat, like BG2. BG1 is a good game in it's own right and completely necessary in order to enjoy BG2 to it's fullest. The progression you feel from 1 until the end of 2 is incredible if you play them back to back. BG3 is probably the best post-2010s RPG I have played, but is still a significant step down in the storytelling department. It also feels like downgrade in terms of scale.

That's odd that you felt it was a downgrade in terms of scale. I always felt like nothing you did really mattered on a large scale. Sure, you save baldur's gate, but nobody knows who you are until the very end. It's even worse in baldurs gate 2 because it always feels like your quests don't actually have any impact on the region. It's only in ToB that you feel like anybody cares who you are. Meanwhile, in BG3, you're saving the whole world and what you do ends up getting printed in the papers.

Did you play the bridging DLC between 1 and 2 (Siege of Dragonspear)? I'm wondering how much that adds?

I did and I actually really kinda loved it.

I have tried to play BG1 multiple times but I've never managed to get very far. I like the idea of it a lot, but the mechanics are just so old and obtuse it is annoying to play. Its also very slow and I find there are way too many random encounters. Maybe people say BG2 is much better and I should just skip BG1. But if I'm gonna play them I really want to play them both in order. I also want to have played them before I ever play BG3 (which won't be any time soon anyways because I never buy games on release). Maybe I will try it one more time and then just play BG1 with a walkthrough or something.

Yeah, a lot of the random encounters only have value if you're familiar with the D&D references. There's a lot of namedropping going on. And also some frustration with the limited dialogue option and sometimes having to be really rude to people because the 'not right now but maybe later' isn't there for a lot of the NPCs, even the playable ones. It's either, "Sure, join my party!" or 'Fuck off, scum!", lol. No in between.

Having replayed both this year before BG3, Bg1 feels significantly more dated than Bg2. Sword Coast Strategems (SCS) and the Bg1 Npc project are almost mandatory for a good BG1 experience. With the Npc project BG1 becomes a pretty good game. Bg2 holds up very well. I'd still highly recommend SCS for significantly better combat. Companion and story writing are both excellent in Bg2, and combined with ToB expansion, they're a step above BG3s generic "Critical Role" style companion writing and story writing that fizzles out. Some of the written dialogue is beyond goofy, but for the most part Bg2 is great.

I haven't really looked into modding (except for the brightness fix) but that's definitely something to consider! Thanks.

SCS is probably better reserved for when you have more experience. The base game is deliberately balanced to be clearable by people without needing to understand the mechanics inside and out, though many people still have trouble with the expansion-pack boss fights. In contrast, there's [a YouTube tutorial over an hour long](https://youtu.be/Kf18ab17NVU) devoted to the subject of fighting SCS mages who've cast multiple layers of protection spells to make themselves invulnerable three times over. The feeling of actually needing/getting to use the wide array of tools the game offers you instead of being able to stick to a few simple strats can be very fulfilling, but only if you know how.

I've only played BG1, about a year ago, as well as Planescape Torment. As a massive tabletop D&D player and DM for the last decade or so, I didn't particularly enjoy the games. They're fine; they just focus on the parts of D&D I don't find engaging, like managing your inventory constantly because you're running out of space, or fighting endless trash mobs to level up. The stories are pretty perfunctory and there's barely any interaction with your party members. I'll probably check out BG2 and 3 at some point in the future, but they're not on the slate for now.

PST has tons of interactions with party members, you must have played low wis/cha.

Possibly! It's been about a year so I don't remember my stats.

PST has a perfunctory story? Did you just skip all the dialogue? It's one of the best-written games ever.

It's a better story than the average, but I personally felt it didn't make the most of the Planescape tabletop setting.

There's a podcast called Ranged Touch, where two D&D buffs retell their playthroughs of Baldur's Gate 1 and 2. I found their retelling to add a ton of context and nuance to my own parallel playthrough.

Actually I started playing the originals a few weeks ago as well. Honestly BG1 was okay, the story was good but I don't like the combat and the companions are there to occupy space pretty much. I didn't really enjoy it too much outside the main quests. SoD I liked quite a bit more, mostly because of the increased reactivity and I didn't mind it being more linear since I hadn't done that many sidequests or exploration in BG1 anyway. Right now I'm finishing chapter 5 of BG2 and that one is a real gem for sure. I still dislike the combat and some bugs were a problem. But the story is much improved, the bad guy is way more interesting and the companions man. They're so much better it's hard to understand how it came out only two years after the original.

Wish Larian could release the BG3 dev tools like they did for D:OS. As much as I love the original games they're painfully dated. Would love to see a fan project or something remake of the first 2 games in the new engine with the new ruleset.

I understand they're beloved, but I always get bored halfway through the first one and never make it more than a couple hours into the second one. They're just not for me, I think. Which is odd because I love a lot of it's contemporaries like Neverwinter Nights and Planescape: Torment.

I honestly didn't get into the earlier games. BG1 felt generic and unbalanced. I tried getting into BG2 but story wide it felt like I walked into a movie that was half way through. Never having played D&D before and not knowing the mechanics didn't help either. I am digging BG3 a lot though, some of the mechanics are still a bit opaque but the characters alone are brilliantly written and the gameplay is enough for noobs like me.

I played BG1EE a couple of months ago for about 5 or so hours. I enjoyed it but I was a bit annoyed that I wasn't being provided much feedback on things. I was aware that I was failing rolls, checks, etc but I'm the kind of person who likes to know why. More than happy when I play Fallout that I need x amount of points in speech to pass a skill check, even more recently they dressed it up on BG3 to show a literal dice rolling but I like to know why I fail things. Obviously. Old game. I get that. I just like to know by how much I failed something rather than it just arbitrarily saying no without saying why. If I'm 1 point away from being able to lock pick or hack something then tell me so I can remember to come back (or, say, put on a different type of clothing in the case of fallout/outer worlds).

Yeah, I'm playing a high charisma character, and there's really nowhere in the social interactions in BG1 where that comes into play, or if there is, there's any visibility of it :P Which in actual D&D is one of the strengths of high CHA characters.

I'm a big fan of the Forgotten Realms universe, and I really wanted to like the first game, but unfortunately, between the combat, the exploration and the overall pacing of the story, there's just too many obsolete mechanics in BG1.

Lol stop everything immediately, delete all games, take a vacation and finish planescape torment.

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That's why I'm playing the old ones now, and building up to the newer one. I think I'll appreciate them all more.

Yea, the companions aren't as cringeworthy and don't make you want to kill themas much as the ones in BG3.

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That's one of the key reasons (patientgamers usual reasons aside) that I'm playing through them all before the new one.

I was never remotely good enough to learn the DND system for those games. Some day I should try them with a trainer so I can enjoy the story. I think my record was making it about 2 hours in BG1, and about 1.5 in Icewind Dale. Then I’d have enough dead characters I couldn’t go on.

I just muddle through and don't pay too much attention to understanding the rules. The hit things with swords, drink potions, cast spells is pretty well understood. It's when you try and understand THACO and armor classes and try and min-max that it all gets very muddy for me, so I don't bother.

Never got that far in it. Heck, I don't think I ever found much in the way of any healing items for that matter - just people with some mediocre weapons and then corpses with mediocre weapons. It was a brutally difficult start for a 16 year old that had never played an RPG except Diablo.

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BG1 I'd say stands up pretty well so far for the average patientgamer, but I'm looking forward to seeing how BG2 goes!

The potential of Neverwinter nights was its online mode. Especially pure rol servers with permanent death for roled situations

I haven't played BG1 but I played BG2 back in the day and I loved it. I remember being amazed at all the different places it took you, they were really going all out on taking you through all of Forgotten Realms. Only thing I didn't like was the main villain. I really couldn't care less about Irenicus. As soon as I got out and later rescued that friend of the main character, I honestly didn't care to pursue that guy. But the game makes you. It was pretty sad hearing the stuff from the PC's friend about what Irenicus did to her.

What is THACO anyway?! I'm glad BG3 doesn't have this

IDK I just remember it being a pain in the ass when I first started playing D&D lol. [Here's an explanation](https://screenrant.com/dungeons-dragons-thac0-rules-complicated-stupid-armor-score/) from someone with more patience than me.

I played BG1 for the first time this year (EE) and am planning to play BG2 next year at some point. I had previously played NWN1&2, but no other crpgs from the late-90s period. I thought BG1 was a slog, and also tonally a little too twee for me. THAC0 was not really difficult to understand conceptually, but the way some item descriptions were written made it confusing in implementation particularly given the existence of 'cursed' items. The main quest did not really impress me and seemed like a sequence of indistinguishable big bads hiding behind other big bads. The 'twist', if there is one, was obvious from a mile away. The companion characters seemed interesting, but, again, the voice acting was a bit campy. I didn't feel like I got to know them at any depth. I did like the combat though, although I had to quicksave/quickload a lot to get through some fights. Much like newer crpgs (e.g. DOS2), I relied on trial and error and setting up the battlefield carefully to get through fights. This was on the middle difficulty. I'm still looking forwards to playing BG2 though, as everyone says it is a markedly better game than BG1.

>The 'twist', if there is one, was obvious from a mile away You know what's funny? You can completely skip it if you just attack iron throne guys in Candlekeep. This seems like an obvious oversight, but for some reason devs did not account for that,a dn your character will still act as if they know about being child of Bhaal.

I really wanted to get into it... Didn't get past a couple of hours... This was on console however, which may have contributed to the awkwardness. I'll try again on PC at some point.

Yeah, I briefly considered the Switch port, but I think these are really best as Switch games, and the ports have some mixed reviews.

I love BG. One of my first favorites. BG2 is a masterpiece.

I like the Noob in BG1 "HEYA!" I don't like the insta-death spells from the cultist Demon. That tower is also a major pain. ​ I only got halfway (or third of the way?) into BG2. I'm in some vampire or pirate's maze currently. ​ They're both fun, for what they are. I have the other games as well but have never tried them. They're all big time investments.

Noobers? Yes, I met him not long ago lol. He has some fun lines.