Baldur's Gate review[Spoilers all](TW:Racism, homophobia, misandry)

So I beat Baldur's Gate III the other day and decided to give my thoughts. Games good, like McDonald's french fries. Not bad, not amazing but good. It felt a lot like playing skyrim back in, whenever the frick that originally came out, lots of suckage with the things you can't do ( like climb that mountain ) but still fun.

Character creation:

Honestly kinda shit, but thats par for the course with these types of crpgs, though this one's a tad shitter that usual, even compared to Divinity :Original Sin II. Deities aren't tied to domains, for some fricking reason, and only clerics can pick one. I don't know how the frick they butchered the ranger so badly out the Baldur's Gate, I know it's kind of a tricky class to implement in a video game, but I can't then of any vidya to frick it up this badly even Sword Coast Legends did ot better and more faithfully than BGIII.

https://i.imgur.com/3cyr8jI_d.webp?maxwidth=9999&fidelity=grand

Larian still doesn't know how to do voices, backgrounds don't mean shit and you can't edit Tav's tags directly, and it's all pretty much the shittiest version of 5e, SRD. So right from the get go the critical roll influenced 5e BIPOCtry hits you like a drunk driver. I decided to player a custom character in a post Divinity: Original Sin II larian game , and I made them a ranger and was looking forward to whatever wholesome fun my sanctified stalker ranger, outlander, and halfling tags will get me into. Oh and there's no boob slider or jiggle physics for breasts, but I'm not a porn sick coomer moid so I don't care about that

Act I:

Nautiloid opening was great, short sweet and to the point and did a good job at framing what the game is going to be like. Tav's voice lines are reddit tier, but aside from that all the voice acting was on point so far. The final confrontation at the helm was really well done, nice risk vs rewars there, cracks start forming after you crash though. The introductions of the initial companions are really well done and their performances are really good, but a lot of their dialogue is just capeshit tier soy garbage .

Lae'zel is properly alien and lawful evil as Githyanki should be.

Shadowheart could do with either being more evil or less fanatically devoted to Shar, I never liked that, "the good side to evil gods" shit, but better they do it with shar than someone like Bhaal or Malar.

Gale has a lot squandered potential like shadowheart, his conflicting feelings towards Mystra II aren't portrayed well so he comes off as a bipolar Is a perfect depiction of some clingy incel moid with a firearm; unhealthly obsessed, unable to take responsibility for their actions, and just a trigger pull away from ending your fricking life if they don't get what they want.

Astarion is a flaming cute twink and obvious fujo bait, and I hate that he comes the closest to being my favorite companion. Best VA, best backstory, most consistently well written companion in the game.

Wyll is a sanctimonious beaner mary sue, and I think that's intentional, he kinda skews to far in the opposite direction morality wise than the other characters throughout most of act 1 so his dialogue is a but jarring.

I love Karlach for obvious reasons () but they do not belong in this game at all, they have the most soyified "badass" dialogue in the game, it's fricking unbearable, which is shame because when their not being a redditor's power fantasy their actually quite compassionate

Got to the druid Grove and me being an alleged holy ranger did ingraciate me to the druids worth a darn decided to go after Halsin first, glad I did too, the goblin camp was very enjoyable, probably my favorite part of act I followed by Ethel's lair. I so I didn't think to knock the drow paladin out rather than kill her. I came into this game assuming Act I would be the most polished, because that's usually how these games work, and it seems I was right for the most part, although a lot of things get their pay off in Act III.

Act II:

Very tunnel visioned, less so if you consider the underdark to be part of Act II. But yeah this whole act is basically 2 mega dungeons, the Githyanki creche and Moonrise. Sneaking into the creche while disguised as Githyanki was fun, mommy Vlaakith was amazing and her killing you with a wish spell if you piss her off was pretty funny too. Didn't enjoy being railroaded by the mcguffin fairy, wasn't hard clearing out the creche afterwards.

Moonrise was a bit long, but interesting, tried to go at it covertly Like the creche but it wasn't all that high security. Never found last light on my ranger so, I just went straight for the night song. While in the temple of shar I realized I just really wasn't having fun as a ranger so I made a new character, they're a bard. Hardest thing about Yurgir is his minions, he's an absolute b-word without them. At the end of the temple I decided to redeem shadowheart, which didn't have as much fanfare as I thought it would, also her domain didn't change with her deity, because what is immersion. I found Last Light on my bard, and met nostalgia bait # 1 and due to this game being mostly SRD, her spell list and subclass options were kinda she was relegated to being a primarily crowd control character. The final confrontation at Moonrise was pretty sweet, I'm a suckered for large scale battles. I'd say Thorm is probably the best boss fight(s) in the game and was the hardest of the chosen for me to fight. I enjoyed Gale's sacrifice ending right up until the point of the game going "you didn't save the day, the worms are still inside everyone's brains as they all turn into mind flayer" this is especially r-slurred because destroying the brain is what cures you of your parasite in act III .

Halsin is a creepy libertarian nut hugger that doesn't do anything but creep in your camp until you fulfill his BL haram fantasy and then he joins you proper. Halsins only character motivations are little boys, lifting the shadow curse, and defeating Ketheric for good. This is all accomplished shortly after he joins you properly, so by act III he has no reason to really be with you and no more impactful story beats outside of trying to buttfrick my halfling. Apparently he has a strong straggy sexual appetite, but I didn't bring him along enough to discover this.

Act III:

Burnt out for a while at this point. The guardian's reveal was r-slurred (why was the neighbor thinking breathing hard?) And I don't see the point in making them in the beginning. I liked Orin because she's a coomer Venus flytrap, but knowing moids that's just a plus. I actually like the whole kingdom hearts/final fantasy getup Goretash has going on, compliments his permanent smug grin if nothing else. Ethel's return was the highlight of the act for me, hags are my favorite monsters in D&D. I then went on to encounter nostalgia bait #2. The experience was very borderlands. After that I stepped away from the game for a while, came back and finished up the companion's questlines

Lae'zel kinda lost her shine after the creche, and her questlines doesn't really finish until after the game ends, but either way it was a bit lukewarm, although the house of hope musical finale was pretty sick.

Shadowheart's questlines was touching but mostly clinically satisfying. I let her parents live, I think her parents relationship was the best depiction of what a relationship between something that will live for almost a millennium and something that'll barely make it to a century would actually be like, in the whole game.

Wyll's questline was Mexican garbage.

Gale's questline doesn't have a satisfactory pay off on screen, much like Lae'zel.

Astarion's questline was the best, one of the few things in the game that actually made me feel something.

Karlach's questlines ties into the main quest like Lae'zel and Gale's, you have to fight the weakest chosen, and he doesn't have much bite without his steel watchers, just stun locked him with poisons and Otto's irresistible dances (wich is very resistible)resistive. Her speech at the end was heartfelt but felt more appropriate for something like cyberpunk or shadowrun.

I recruited nostalgia bait #2 and honestly, he did make me laugh a few times, borderlands makes me laugh too.

After that I went after Orin, and honest the gratuitous asshot and her jobbing to a fricking buffed up woad was starting to leave a bad taste in my mouth, but the lore in her personal chambers made up for it greatly

After that decided I'll just make one big push to finish the game. The Netherbrain going all tzeentchian on you was cool, but the rest of the finale was just a prettier, yet inferior version of Dragon Age: Origins finale, where instead of a new take on a classic (dragon) it's just a freakshit brain monster with shitter reinforcements. I turned Karlach into a mind flayer because she was going to die anyway, and honestly it greatly improved most of the complaints I had about her character, props to larian, mind flayers don't act like fricking chavs. She used the mcguffin on the other mcguffin, got really big and smacked the little brain, and the day was saved. Ending sequence was a bit weak, but serviceable, as always Astarion had the best bit ( I talked him out of ascending)

The epilogue was for every good thing I can say about it there's a bad thing. The end credit scene was enjoyable from the perspective of a nerd whole likes D&D lore always cool to se Jergal laying the smack down to the dead three.

Final thoughts (?):

All in all, the gameplay was solid, but not that different from the Divinity: Original Sin games. Code what you know I guess.

The story is fun D&D adventure

The companions are , I don't really have a favorite like I do in other RPGs, I think this is only real RPG I've played where I have very neutral impressions of all the companions. Didn't romance anyone because engaging in deviant s*x with deviant individuals isn't something my halfling would do.

Writing was like 40% reddit tier soy goyslop

Art direction was solid. I think the shadowlands and the temple of shar were the only areas the popped out to me.

Music direction was pure kino, I could listen to the title screen for decades.

Overall I give it 3.5 out 5, games good, great even, but I can't really point out anything it does better than Pillars of Eternity, or the Pathfinder games. In fact I was goingn to go back and play those for a fresher comparison but Rogue Trader came out

Opinion subject to change after Dark Urge playthrough, feel the game intends for you to be capshit anti-hero type more than anything, so things might fit into place better as that rather than a Bilbo Baggins expy... (Karlach is dying immediately in that playthrough)

Seeing redditor's and normienigs calling this game groundbreaking is horrifying though, The Elder Scrolls VI is going to be some shit