this post was submitted on 17 Sep 2023
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I'm trying to get a refund from GOG, after spending nearly a month truly working my most to love the game, to understand what makes people say Baldur's Gate 3 is a masterpiece.
People said Read Dead Redemption 2 was a masterpiece, and I found myself in agreement. Same with Half-life 1, 2 and 3 (Alyx).
But the almost overwhelming attention to every detail and aspect of those games I cannot see in BG3. Everything from janky animations, buggy combat pathing, awful tutorials, visual glitches, the worst journal I've seen since Morrowind, and no pause button in 2023!!
Ironically, nothing of which this article brings up since it seems to shit on save scumming which I don't care about, all power to the player.
You cannot argue this game is 'bad'; the story and characters along with competently designed game play would prove that. But it's no masterpiece to me, and I feel I fell for the the overhype from the fans who just love the franchise.
I understand that this game isn't for everyone, especially people who want a pause button in a turn-based game.
Most of the time, it's not even turn based. You run around in real time, or did you forget that?
I've missed dialoge since I can not pause a conversation in a single player game ffs.
You can hit the big round turn-based button in bottom right of your HUD to activate turn mode at any time, even outside combat. This effectively pauses the game. The game even makes a sound effect of a clock slowing down and stopping.
I'm aware, but no, it's not a pause since it can not be used to pause the game, for example, when in dialogue.
The fact that you didn't find it fun is totally valid. BG3 is a very opinionated game that gets a huge number of things right for its target audience - the people who really enjoy CRPGs, branching paths, and choice driven gameplay. It does sound like that you're really not into those things, so BG3 could never have been an excellent experience.
The games that you list are designed to be mostly linear experiences, so it was possible for the devs to make the core gameplay shine because they had time to really polish those systems and interactions. There was enough people and time to really tune RDR2's gunplay, the horse riding, the hunting and tracking, and make the world feel organic.
BG3's dev time was spent on tuning the combat encounters, tuning the class building options, and making sure the world (almost) always made sense. While baking in hundreds of stories about your companions, side characters, abusive store owners, and lost puppies. The game never holds your hand, only asks "here you are, this is what you've done, what do you do now?". The amount of effort put into respecting the moment to moment choices made by the player is staggering.
The complexity in these systems in BG3 left preeetty clear issues with things that would otherwise have time to be polished out of a game before release (animation jank, visual bugs, pathing, pausing). For me, they were more like bumps in a very scenic road. But I hear you when you come in expecting a shiny polished RPG but there's all these fourth wall breaking bits that kind of stall the whole show every like 5 minutes.
I think there's enough nuance here to have both sides of the coin be true - it's an absolute masterpiece for the players who enjoy the specific experience it offers, and it only makes sense to feel it's overrated when you're coming in expecting a cinematic or visceral experience.
I would consider The Witcher 3 a masterpiece as well, far from a linear experience. And I love Fallout, so I know what a good turn based compat rpg is like. And few games have had me so on the edge of my seat as Xcom 2, so I know what an excellent turn based combat system is supposed to be.
BG3 just doesn't live up to that. The polish fails it, and the combat is just not very fun. The role playing is excellent as long as the other things don't get in the way, which it does.