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HoloDust on 09 December 2023
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Machina said:

Looks like Baldur’s Gate 3 is going to win and I'm going to lose my VG$! I haven't played either, but I just felt like Zelda was way more hyped going into launch, and more mainstream than BG3, and since they both got similar review scores that'd give it the edge. I have seen Zelda fans be more critical of TotK since the initial launch hype died down, however, so maybe that's hurt it come GotY season, whereas something like the opposite has been happening to BG3 as word of mouth is strong for it.

Initial hype was based on Baldur's Gate 1/2 being CRPG' fans darling, D&D brand (and especially 5e being most popular edition ever, especially in mainstream), Hasbro's backdoor "marketing" (though you won't find anyone talking about that) and Larian making BG3 very front loaded with Act 1 being by far the best and giving (to a point) a false illusion of rest of the game (and that's what most "reviewers" played for those 10/10 reviews).

As fan of CRPGs since 80s and someone who has 175 hours in BG3 (though, for that amount of content, if it was better designed, it should've been half that at best), the reason BG3 keeps getting word of mouth is "choices" and systemic based gameplay.
It is not a bad game (I go in details in my review and gave it 7.5 overall), on the contrary, as megadungeon crawler (cause that is what it, unfortunately, boils down to) it's 9/10, but as Baldur's Gate CRPG it's 6/10, at best.

SvennoJ said:
Mnementh said:

Yeah, people are surprised by it. That may be the thing, I did play BG3 in early access and it already as early access game made my TOP 50 in poast years of the greatest game event, so I knew it was good. But I didn't expect it to get so much publicity. Because - let's be real here - a turn based tactical RPG with diverging plot paths based on player decision - that is pretty far removed from the mainstream. So it taking off really surprised me. And the result is many people are blindsided, only hearing about it because it gets so much applause and no trying it. On the other hand Zelda was pretty much expected. So people go in with different expectations.

As much as BG3 must have surprised many out there, as much surprised me Alan Wake by the way. I didn't expect it getting so much awards, currently even being ahead of Zelda. I guess I have to play it.

BG3 surprised me as well, by how bad it is compared to Baldur's gate 1 and 2. I played for 20 hours and can't find the will to continue anymore. It surprises me how popular it is. But it does have the recency bias, Spider-man is just a sequel, Starfield disappointed, 2D Mario is for kids (not my opinion) and TotK launched ages ago. It is a breath of fresh air compared to the standard offerings. However I already found that fresh air with PSVR2, maybe that's why BG3 feels so disappointing.

Baldur's gate is in my top 50, BG3 has no chance of coming near my top 50. I played on PS5 though, maybe it plays much better on PC. Still the campaign and map are a badly paced mess and the party limit of 4 sucks.

Anyway I still consider TotK the best game of 2023, even though it's slightly behind BotW for me.

If you haven't played them, try Pathfinder: Kingmaker (and probably Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, I still have to play that one). It's much more closer to Baldur's Gate, and actually improved on it IMO, by having open world you're exploring on the map and bumping into all sorts of things. It is Pathfinder, so "D&D 3.75e", and that means anyone familiar with 3e will be mostly at home. It's not anywhere near perfect, there are thing that both BG3 (dungeoncrawling and systemic based gameplay) and Solasta (tactical combat) do better, but from my POV, as a recentish D&D based CRPG, it is superior to both BG3 and Solasta.

I voted for BG3 in the poll for what I think would be GotY, cause it was oh so obvious what "journalist" are salivating about, but honestly, I don't find either BG3 or TotK really worthy of that title.