GAMEBOOMERS provides you with all the latest PC adventure computer games information, forum, walkthroughs, reviews and news.

GB Reviews

Latest & Upcoming Adventure Games

GB Annual Game Lists

GB Interviews

BAAGS

GB @ acebook

About Us

Walkthroughs

free games galore

Game Publishers & Developers

World of Adventure

Patches

GB @ witter

GameBoomers Store

Print Thread
Baldur's Gate III Additional Updates from the Larian Gazette: Early Access is on the Way #1210349
02/18/20 12:20 PM
02/18/20 12:20 PM
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
Trail_Mystic Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
Trail_Mystic  Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
Additional updates will be added as a new entry towards the end of this thread as they come through wave


Years in the making, this Next Gen RPG, leveraging some of the latest technology will be revealed on live stream at PAX East.

See more here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=maijYOOO-pE&feature=youtu.be


Save the date, Thursday February 27th 3:00pm ET.

smileJUST ADDED: Live Stream Link to the Albatross Theatre This will be where the live stream will take place starting at 3:00pm ET smile


TM thumbsup

Last edited by Trail_Mystic; 03/05/20 11:49 AM. Reason: Corrected Time to 3pm ET and added link

I feel a lot more like I do now, then when I first got here

Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1210917
02/24/20 09:52 PM
02/24/20 09:52 PM
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
Trail_Mystic Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
Trail_Mystic  Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
What I know so far: The Live Stream will be on YouTube from PAX East 3:00pm ET.

The recent virus scares have caused a few of the larger corporate attendees to back out (like Sony), but Larian has assured that they will be live streaming not only in-gameplay, but also a chat Q&A session as well.

While I don't have an exact link yet, going to YouTube and Searching under "PAX East Baldur's Gate 3 Live Stream" should bring you to it. Usually YouTube has the Live Streams listed in their suggested under the games category, so you can go that route too.

Now, for the elephant in the room....I know a number of folks were a little put off by the somewhat gory teaser/trailer for this game. Being who they are, it wouldn't surprise me that Larian would have a control for that. Also, I wouldn't judge the entire game on a single teaser scene.

Larian is known for their storytelling and love of RPG's. The fact that they've been granted license from Wizard's of the West to do a full on production of an iconic Dungeons and Dragons video game like Baldur's Gate, and are putting so much work into it - You might want to give it a chance.

Also, since we "lost" Obsidian to Microsoft - (still enjoy their stuff though wink ) Larian is one of the few large Independent gaming houses putting out AAA games. Wouldn't hurt to show them a little love grin

TM thumbsup

Last edited by Trail_Mystic; 02/26/20 06:16 PM. Reason: Corrected Time to 3pm ET

I feel a lot more like I do now, then when I first got here

Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1210918
02/24/20 10:05 PM
02/24/20 10:05 PM
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 48,224
near Yosemite
Marian Offline
Global Moderator
Marian  Offline
Global Moderator
Sonic Boomer

Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 48,224
near Yosemite
I will be interested to see what Larian has in store for us. Thanks, Trail. wave

Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1210951
02/25/20 02:30 PM
02/25/20 02:30 PM
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 8,105
B.C. Canada
hagatha Offline
BAAG Specialist
hagatha  Offline
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 8,105
B.C. Canada
Not sure why gore in an RPG would be off-putting, since that is kind of the point. You know, what with all the killing and so forth.

I'll definitely be giving this a chance.


I think I'm quite ready for another adventure.
Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX [Re: hagatha] #1211058
02/26/20 06:01 PM
02/26/20 06:01 PM
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
Trail_Mystic Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
Trail_Mystic  Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
Thought I'd post up a couple of related links for those that might be interested:

Thursday February 27th 3:00pm ET
smileJUST ADDED: Live Stream Link to the Albatross Theatre This will be where the live stream will take place starting at 3:00pm ET smile

Baldur's Gate III/Larian on Twitter

Larian Studios YouTube Channel Assuming that the Live-Stream link from PAX East on Thursday will also reside here.

Main Baldur's Gate Website at Larian This contains the somewhat graphic teaser of a knight slowly turning to a Mind Flayer in a fairly painful transformation. As I mentioned the first time I posted links to this trailer, it's worth it to watch the sky in the background after the transformation. Not only do you see many other Mind Flayers in the air, but also what appears to be a giant Cthulhu like creature outlined against the dark clouds. What a cross-over that would make eh? grin



TM thumbsup

Last edited by Trail_Mystic; 02/26/20 06:19 PM. Reason: Corrections and added link

I feel a lot more like I do now, then when I first got here

Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1211074
02/26/20 11:24 PM
02/26/20 11:24 PM
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 8,105
B.C. Canada
hagatha Offline
BAAG Specialist
hagatha  Offline
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 8,105
B.C. Canada
The flying Mind Flayers are a new and nasty twist.


I think I'm quite ready for another adventure.
Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX-Corrected Time and Live Stream Link Added [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1211139
02/27/20 04:04 PM
02/27/20 04:04 PM
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
Trail_Mystic Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
Trail_Mystic  Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
Well, even in it's pre-alpha state the game is looking pretty good. I appreciate Larian's honesty by showing true gameplay at this state in the game, bugs and all. Swen (Larain's leader) was great at the presentation, and played through issues like a champ. Graphics look quite good, definitely triple-A worthy. Characters are fully voiced with a good variety of dialogue options based on Character type. Speaking of characters, there are lots. You can be all the usual, but they also allow you to hybrid, like half-elf, Vampire-Spawn, Half-Teifling and so on. Most if not all of the D&D character types and classes with game modifiers for all thumbsup

Cut scenes were pretty impressive as well, especially the opening scene. It appears the Cthulhu like thing in the trailer was some kind of ship, used by the Mind Flayers. Backgrounds and character costuming is very detailed. Sound effects also seem great. I've got a pretty good sound system on my gaming PC, and spell effects were pushing pretty hard through my sub-woofer, so another nice piece of immersion.

It's definitely D&D:
>Turn-based
>HUD style mini-map
>Character action readouts
>Mouse controlled
>Pause is available
>character, party and foe portraits along with on-screen skill selections in the form of classic style Quick-bars. I'm assuming those will be movable to fit player preference as in other D&D games.
>Dice rolls are done in the background during combat, but the results are broadcast to your character in the form of numeric results including things like "Critical Fail" and so on. Outside of combat, they actually use dice graphics that show the roll and result (i.e. during a persuasion roll in conversation)
>Controlled inventory for yourself and party members
>Looks like the save system is manual, but includes auto-saves at crucial points and death saves, so you can go back to the point you were done in. Not sure if they have a tunable auto-save system.

New features though are things like moving into Turn-based mode outside of combat, which allows you to use skills like Sneak and so on, even before engaging a foe. There's also more environment interaction as well, like moving things to jump on, and dipping bows, arrows into fire to gain more damage during an attack.

Game view during this playthrough for combat and travel was overhead, isometric. Not sure if others will be available at release. Dialogue and cut scenes were brought to eye level, with good emotion displayed by your character, plot characters and NPC's.

Update from the Q&A: One somewhat surprising thing, apparently based on request from Wizards of the West due to the new D&D system, alignment (i.e. chaotic neutral) will be downplayed and may not even be displayed in the character sheet. That's a little disappointing for an old school D&D gamer like myself, but there is still lots to like in this game.

Looks like it's going to be a fun one. bravo


Last edited by Trail_Mystic; 02/27/20 04:32 PM. Reason: added update on alignment

I feel a lot more like I do now, then when I first got here

Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX-Corrected Time and Live Stream Link Added [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1211141
02/27/20 04:51 PM
02/27/20 04:51 PM
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
Trail_Mystic Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
Trail_Mystic  Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
Here's a link to the video rebroadcast of the gameplay demo from PAX East courtesy of IGN


Baldur's Gate Pre-Alpha Gameplay Demo at PAX East


I feel a lot more like I do now, then when I first got here

Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX-Update and Link on Demo Playthrough Added [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1211142
02/27/20 05:03 PM
02/27/20 05:03 PM
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 34,312
United Kingdom
Mad Offline
Sonic Boomer
Mad  Offline
Sonic Boomer

Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 34,312
United Kingdom
Wow !! So many of those features are ones I really like, TrailM, and thank you for posting them, but I'm bound to need a more powerful computer 🙀


Time : The Most Precious Commodity
Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX-Update and Link on Demo Playthrough Added [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1211147
02/27/20 06:01 PM
02/27/20 06:01 PM
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 8,105
B.C. Canada
hagatha Offline
BAAG Specialist
hagatha  Offline
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 8,105
B.C. Canada
I am looking forward to this, I have to say. Every now and then I load up the originals and play for a bit, but end up abandoning the game because I've replayed it so many times. New BG sounds just about right.


I think I'm quite ready for another adventure.
Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX-Update and Link on Demo Playthrough Added [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1211760
03/05/20 11:45 AM
03/05/20 11:45 AM
Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
Trail_Mystic Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
Trail_Mystic  Offline OP
Dragon Breath - Darkside Moderator
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Feb 2004
Posts: 6,919
Hogwarts
The following article is taken from an email distribution of the Larian Gazette:



"Though this journey began now years ago when we visited Wizards of the Coast for the first time in 2017, these past few weeks have been momentous and emotional, since this was the first time we were able to share Baldur’s Gate 3 with all of you, the people for whom the game is being made.


We will soon embark on an epic adventure as Baldur’s Gate 3 enters Early Access, and we couldn’t possibly venture forth without first gathering you, our party. One thousand of you gathered with us as we streamed the game live for the first time at PAX East in an auditorium filled to the brim, and an extra thousand of you were sadly turned away because there was no more space. Hundreds of thousands of you gathered online which - we’re told in confidence - broke some records. Thousands of you each waited three hours to gather with us at our PAX East booth, to see what would have happened if the dice rolls weren’t against us. It has been humbling and exciting to gather together as we start this new journey, venturing forth, going the way of the dice.

What you will eventually play has been in the planning at Larian and closely with Wizards of the Coast for over 4 years now, with their key creative people colliding with our key creative people in ways that we will eventually talk about in greater length. Our task is to create the ultimate Dungeons & Dragons game; a loving and modern sequel to Baldur’s Gate 2. Oozing with 5e D&D greatness, set in the world that you know and love. You will explore Baldur’s Gate 100 years after Baldur’s Gate 2. The Bhaalspawn saga has ended, and a new threat is converging on the city of Baldur's Gate. But the gods do not forget, and the shadows and scars of the past will not stay silent. You will meet and get to know many new characters, and encounter some of the legendary characters you know and love.

Most importantly, you’ll learn how their stories have evolved. And as you play, you will heavily influence their fate. Over the course of the past 3 weeks, the final missing ingredient has been added into our new development pipeline: you.



Let’s look at how we’ve evolved since the release of Divinity: Original Sin 2 in 2017. Firstly, we finished Divinity: Original Sin 2 with 120 people. DOS2 was shipped on the second version of the Divinity engine (we still haven’t found a cool name for it yet), and our Producer David Walgrave said recently in an interview with TechRaptor that in BG3 "there’s about 20-30% of the Original Sin engine left and we rewrote so many systems and so many things." We’ve been colloquially calling this 4.0 engine the “Baldur’s Gate Engine”, and it’s designed from the ground up for Baldur’s Gate.

But how does this happen? Between 2017 and the announcement of BG3 we’ve grown to 250 people + we have over 100 outsourcers working on this. Still independent. Funded entirely by yourselves who dived so eagerly into Divinity: Original Sin 2. We were quiet since the announcement just before E3 of the previous year. But internally, kinetic energy has propelled us forward with new systems, pipelines, and people who when not playing D&D were all helping us to put together what you saw at PAX East, 2020. There’s quite the adventure ahead.




We’ve built an engine that allows all 250 people at Larian collaborate to become the ultimate DM. Allowing for near-limitless reactivity, responsiveness, and a memory that never forgets who you are, or what you’ve done. No matter who you roll, dice-rolls, modifiers, and physical simulation have all been designed to simulate a D&D experience that feels as though it’s straight from the imagination, where no matter the dice roll the story will continue. It’s also a game that is intended to span the entire range of human emotion. It is in equal parts a dark and a light game. “We always want to make failure as interesting as it possibly can,” said Senior Writer Adam Smith. “We don’t put everything that’s cool and interesting behind success.”


“Light and dark are really good sources of advantage,” noted Swen in a recent GameSpot interview. The philosophies that define the rules in D&D 5e also define the narrative, where you’ll often make difficult decisions through initiative or through the roll of the dice. The Baldur’s Gate games were dark - sometimes darker than many people remember. Baldur’s Gate 3 is no exception, though in 2020 we’re able to take the gamut of emotion and experience and stretch it further due to systems, simulation, and of course also our cinematics team. Unfortunately we did not make it to the end of our PAX East 2020 live demo due to a feature (see: bug), but those in the hall witnessed a scene where Astarion’s hunger got the better of him, and through a series of dice rolls (and often audience choice), Astarion sank his teeth into Shadowheart to varying degrees of mortality. Astarion was happy (systemically), but Shadowheart often ended up dead (also without irony, systemically).

Baldur’s Gate 3 is on course to be a ‘Mature’ game, which is publishing language for “if you go any further the ratings board is going to be extremely annoying”. We want to push the limits of every theme within the game, which should allow you to play exactly how you’d like to play. Astarion may be a Vampire Spawn, but that doesn’t mean he has to be evil - if hungry. Though you saw one path at PAX East, there were many possibilities for good, and evil -- note also, everything in between. It has always been Larian’s plan to create games that allow you to play however you wish. This larger team, and this new engine, allow us to push this further than ever before. Much further than Divinity: Original Sin 2.




As you delve into an epic adventure that subverts the binary morality found in many RPGs, and explore Baldur’s Gate with new and existing characters, 100 years after the story of the first two games, dice roll by dice roll, we hope that together we can reignite that great sense of discovery you felt as you dived for the first time into Baldur’s Gate 1 & 2, bringing the experience of an open-ended D&D game to photo-realistic realisation, albeit with 5e rules in place of 2nd edition rules. Things have come a long way in 20 years, but what’s important to us is that you’re along for the ride.


You have many questions, and we have answers. We’ll be hosting a Reddit AMA where you can ask Swen (Creative Director), David (Producer), Adam (Senior Writer), Nick (Lead Systems Designer), and Jiji (Writing Director) your questions. 11:00 PT on March 12, over on Reddit!

See you all in Early Access."



Last edited by Trail_Mystic; 03/05/20 11:46 AM.

I feel a lot more like I do now, then when I first got here

Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX-Update and Link on Demo Playthrough Added [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1211767
03/05/20 02:50 PM
03/05/20 02:50 PM
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 34,312
United Kingdom
Mad Offline
Sonic Boomer
Mad  Offline
Sonic Boomer

Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 34,312
United Kingdom
thanks Trail_Mystic thumbsup


Time : The Most Precious Commodity
Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX-Update and Link on Demo Playthrough Added [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1212131
03/10/20 07:53 PM
03/10/20 07:53 PM
Joined: May 1999
Posts: 2,395
Central Texas
Debra Offline
Addicted Boomer
Debra  Offline
Addicted Boomer

Joined: May 1999
Posts: 2,395
Central Texas
This is gonna be SOOO good. They didn't really answer the question about Minsc and Boo, but gosh I hope they make an appearance even if it's a short one.

Re: Baldur's Gate III Game Reveal at PAX-Update and Link on Demo Playthrough Added [Re: Trail_Mystic] #1212580
03/16/20 03:56 PM
03/16/20 03:56 PM
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 8,105
B.C. Canada
hagatha Offline
BAAG Specialist
hagatha  Offline
BAAG Specialist

Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 8,105
B.C. Canada
I honestly can't wait for this one, and it's been so long since the originals. The EE versions were oaky, with a few extra characters and quests, but they were still the same basic game I've played a gazillion times. Time for new BG!


I think I'm quite ready for another adventure.
Previous Thread
Index
Next Thread

Moderated by  Trail_Mystic 

Who's Online Now
0 registered members (), 252 guests, and 0 spiders.
Key: Admin, Global Mod, Staff, Mod
Newest Members
PierreLombardo, Dux, WillPowerGoat, Ebalon, J7769mon
9388 Registered Users
Powered by UBB.threads™