I sit and read about the plans for BG3:

"Though BG3 won't be a direct sequel to the storyline of the first two BG games, Atari intends for the game to have similarly epic scope and feature a large gaming world populated by memorable characters.

It will feature cutting-edge 3D graphics, although the gamemakes haven't decided whether to license an existing engine or develop a new one. Atari ambitious design goal is to make a visually stunning RPG that both lives up to BG's great heritage and evolves the genre.

When asked if the follow-up would stick with isometric perspective, John Hight, Atari Executive Producer, indicated that Atari wasn't "afraid to move the camera for cinematic effect. [Your viewpoint] will be immersive then the traditional isometric perspective and bring you closer to the action. You want to see the fear in the orc's eye as you blast him with a fireball, don't you?"

BG3 will use the DnD 3.5 rules for an authentic roleplaying experience.

While there'll naturally be a lot of combat, Atari plans to include a wide variety of quests and incorporate non-combat-oriented skills to give bloodless solutions to some quests

Hight's bottom-line promise: "It will be epic""

(who else wants to strangle this man, go for the eyes boo)

This is a sales pitch. I am about to puke. The highlights in effect explain that we can look forward to a lovely graphics engine requiring a new video card and more ram. They have also stated that they are polling fans about what classes/npc's they would like to see in the sequel.

This is what happens when no artists are left to design games. This is what happens when the corporation takes over. They ask you for what you want and give you what you ask. And this may seem like a good thing but you must understand what it implies. A real artist, a real designer does not ask his audience how he should shape his sculpture, he shapes it to his mind and imagination, he does what he pleases with it, hoping to communicate with you(the audience) in the manner he hopes to.

Polls designed to gauge what the "player" supposedly wants will only result in stupid vacuous elements that contribute little or nothing to the gaming experience, alas such is the world we are in at this point. "Hmmm, it would seem that they like the kensai from the last game, so lets throw it in this one, and the sorcerer too of course, and everyone loves minsc and his hamster, so lets put his ancestor in there too! (not made up, it was hinted at in several articles/press releases).

I consider a good video game, regardless of its genre to be a work of art, it engages you in many stimulating and interesting ways, it allows you to escape sometimes, to learn about yourself sometimes, to express beauty, hate, suffering, justice, whatever you want. It is a work of art when properly made.

Look where we are headed, sequels, sequels, sequels. And even the non-sequels are sequels. Games that reconstitute elements from previous games and sell it in a new graphics engine with a new name and a new image and the consumer can't tell the difference. What is World of Warcraft? But a bunch of Warcraft 3 icons and characters and races mixed together in a massive pay me by the month take your social life away monstrosity?

And now, the last bastion of hope, the refuge true CRPG gamers came to, the BG saga, fallout, torment, it is all being sullied and ruined by brainless marketing moguls interested in making money by selling us what they think we want to see and hear. This is the wrong process, this is not how it works, this is not how magic is made. This is not going to create anything good, they are making a frankenstein, creating life where it should never exist, and you are all witness to it.

yes you will say that its just a video game, life goes on. Indeed it is just a game, and as such it will be released, likely get good reviews despite the fact that its ***, and be bought despite the fact that its not really any good, and players will be remeniscent of the old days when they were passing through baldur's gate invisible trying to avoid flaiming fist mercenaries under sarevok's control. And you'll see a reference to minsc and it won't be original or funny and you'll laugh about it anyway.

None of this may seem important, but the fact is that what is important is how industries and corporations are turning a previously creative and innovative field into a mega corporation only capable of evil and stupidity. It's dying, new ideas are sparce and barely ever make their way to the forefront, and when people actually DO try to make a decent game with good character interaction etc.. the corporation forces them to release it asap to make as much cash as possible and they remove half of the games damn content for an expansion or sequel so they can make you pay twice for a game you should have gotten in one shot in the first place( ahemm....kotor 2...kotor 2...).

Regardless, I hope Dragon Age will be good, but whatever monstrosity these corporation goons are turning my lovely BG saga into, I will just turn away with revulsion and flipper babies, experiments gone horribly, horribly wrong.

Nice passionate analysis, except for:

only capable of evil and stupidity They're hardly "evil".

Anyway, if you don't like what they produce, don't buy it. If you think you can do better, then make your own game. If it's any good, it'll be bought by all the other people who care about that sort of quality. If nobody buys it, then that'll show that hardly anyone really wanted such a product.

My comments above notwithstanding, I do agree with the general sentiment you express.

the fact is that what is important is how industries and corporations are turning a previously creative and innovative field into a mega corporation only capable of evil and stupidityOf course, this was bound to happen as soon as computer/video games became mainstream entertainment. It's no different than what's happened with the movie industry and Hollywood. The majority of the stuff coming from H'wood is same old, made pretty much by a template to fit a certain mould. Every now and then you get something out of the ordinary, but it's rare. And if you don't like what Hollywood is serving, you're left with other movie productions which tend to have severely limited budgets (even if they have better ideas), compared to what Hollywood has at its disposal.

The current situation with computer games is nearly identical. Sequels spiralling into infinity, a handful of genres and game types being redone to death every month, but the games are still selling very well. And as long as people support this approach (and they do, by buying such games), things won't change. It's as simple as that.

This is why a subscription to an impartial gaming magazine that reviews the games in the state they actually ship (not based on betas, like certain well-known US hype mags do) is an absolute must for a gamer with a conscience. And even supposedly impartial gaming mags often fall victim to the hype surrounding certain games, but it's the best you can do to make informed decisions when it comes to buying games.

This is the wrong process, this is not how it works, this is not how magic is made.Nope, but it's how money is made. And these days, that's really all that matters in the gaming industry. It takes millions to make a game, and it needs to make millions in return to cover the development costs. Copying what's already been done and has sold well is the easiest and most secure way to do it.

Theres always a light at the end of the tunnel.

That's just the incoming train. :shake:

Why did it have to be atari :-( (I haven't been keeping up on my BG3 news so this is the first I've heard of BG3 connected with atari). The only two atari games I've got have both taken good things and turned them into utter rubbish [enter the matrix :vomit: and RCTycoon 3 (turning it 3D and screwing the menus and ooo coaster cam yay, riding a roller coaster is a feeling, a sensation not simulatable with just visual stimulia dammmit!!!!)] so I guess this looks to be where BG3 will be going to.

Time will tell.

You have to admit that we would all be pleasantly surprised and happy to admit that we were wrong to doubt them if the game is great.

Of course the "We told you so" outcome is also a good chance as well.

We'll just have to wait and hope that they learn from their mistakes (or Troika's as the case may be.)

Gotta agree with many of the gripes though,

I am going on record as fully agreeing with AmericanIdle. But it won't much matter to me as I simply cannot afford to buy a new PC every two years just to be able to play games.

I will not play this game. That fact has to do with my dying eMAC and lack of income to support my expensive CRPGing habit the way I should like. I probably would play the game otherwise. I would play it because they called it Baldur's Gate. I would assume that it had to be somewhat like Baldur's Gate. I have a feeling it will be a sort of Diablo 2 thing. Regardless of whether you like the Diablo frnchise or not the fact was that Diablo 2 was massively seperate from Diablo. Had elements and a minor story tie to make it a Diablo, but that couldn't hide how insanely different the games were while at the same time being similar.

In this fashion I believe Baldur's Gate 3 will do well by taking a game that people played, making a supposed sequel so that the kids who are getting into gaming and never got around to playing the game it came from, but still hear great things about, will want to play it and a completely seperate fanbase will be created, with the odd person who saw past the industy BS and found the seperate merits of the games to become a fan of both.

Whether or not it can withstand the chages to acctually have merit to a large enough fanbase to justify the mangling death of a most beloved franchise remains to be seen.

I imagine it will be shallow like Heroes of Might and Magic 4', but I hope I am wrong.

I'm going to wait and see - I'm really looking forward to it, because it's either going to be a refreshing surprise (fingers crossed), or a turkey, in which case there'll be much to make fun of!

You wouldn't happen to be TheInquisitorOfDoom would you? Only, I saw a post identical to the one that you just made on the Bioware boards.

It's got to be, or synchonicity's gone insane!

Is that a yes?

Personally, I'm gonna do what I always do. I'll wait. When I see it reviewed, THEN I'll buy it. The one time I didn't wait, I bought Pariah.

Whoops.

Yes im the inquisitor of doom

i dont play many video games lately although ill keep my eye out when BG 3 hits the shelves.

Sadly (or perhaps not) i have suddenly found myself in the midst of a rather active social life and job and dont have time to play much, sad but true, all of you while you can shirk your responsibilities!! play like mad, believe me once you hid your early 20's things get messy.

Peace

a mega corporation only capable of evil and stupidity This can't be true, you forgot mass psychosis and the spontaneous generation of massive murderous mobs of CRPG players (MMMCRPGP). Try saying that one :p .
On a more serious note, I nearly destroyed my computer when I found out Atari had taken over. I hope they have learned from ToEE, but I doubt it. As has been said before, only time will tell.
Of course, the graphics comments aren't terribly hopeful, either. Only a VERY few games/movies/TV shows that advertise their graphics/special effects/etc. have come out well.

Let us be hopefull.
Let us give them the benefit of doubt and hope(human sacrafice) that they have learned from ToEE.(was not that bad, only to close to the rules, yes and buggy)
Let us be thankful to have something to talk about and not be forced to play(the horror)fps and rts games.
let us hope that the places we live in are full wih willing pretty elven priestesses

Just be thankful its not EA in charge. The successor to Tiberian Sun is coming out and I'm not excited in the least, all beacuse of those cursed two letters.

reading that made me want to cry, I'm so happy the sequel to BG2 one of my favourite games will fall victim to the "It must have pretty graphics" spell. As long as it doesn't hurt to look at, I don't care about graphics. I frankly don't want to see fear in the orcs eyes before I fireball him, mainly because he shouldn't know I'm fireballing him. I doubt took ranks in spellcraft. I don't want to see lifelike gore and blood, if I play an FPS(which is very rarely) I'd perfer Dooms cartoony demons to seeing the soldiers blood spurt out relistically. I hope they don't get caught up in the graphics and forget gameplay. I hope the poll thing was a joke though. Asking the fans is a terrible idea, because they are mostly idiots. And Fel is going to have a cow when he finds out they're making it 3.5. :p

And Fel is going to have a cow when he finds out they're making it 3.5.Doubtful. I'm sure Fel knows that all licensees are required to use the most recent ruleset. He's likely known that BG3 will be 3.5 since 3.5 came out.

Yes, I have known for a while, and as a result I won't be buying the game. But after experiencing what they did to IWD with HoW (and to a lesser extent the blatant ignorance in BG2), my reaction was simply a weary sigh.

EDIT:
fel you cant play the bg saga forever... I beg to differ. Over a dozen times with BG1 and several times with BG2 and the vanilla games are still fresh and fun. Add in the possibility of mods if it ever gets stale, and it could last me decades.

[ July 16, 2006, 07:02: Message edited by: Felinoid ]

fel you cant play the bg saga forever...
what happened to troika anyway...?

Troika wound up their operations earlier this year (or was it last year? Time flies...) as new commissions meeting their needs were not forthcoming.