izigame.me

“Mobile vegetable peddling versus heroism, the eternal question.”
~Gorion's Ward

Making a sequel to Baldur's Gate was an impossible task. The original BG was the most anticipated CRPG of 1998 and guess what? It was one of them rare cases when game actually exceeded the expectations. While acting as fantasy take on Fallout (both heavily revolved around dialogues that originated in Star Control II), it also delivered a fantastic rendition of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons tabletop rules, while looking and feeling like our usual real-time CRPG. More importantly, it gave us full control over our ethics. Like in those tabletops, our characters were free to be good, evil and everything in between. Should I say it felt awesome? There was nothing like it before and up to this day, it's one of the very best fantasy RPGs you can play. Yet somehow, its makers were supposed to make it even better.
Like I said, an impossible task, but guess what? They did it. BG II kept everything we loved about the original, but it was better in pretty much every way. The global map became a bit confusing (you can't just go, say, east to unlock new location that lies that way anymore), but BioWare fixed their D&D mistakes (rangers, for example, finally got their dual-wielding), made dialogues deeper, added romances and... Yeah. The story became much more dark and complicated. Again and again game wanted to remind us that life is unfair. We were to lose friends, make sacrifices and do our very best to shape our own future the way we want it. It was amazing. Rarely we get a game that feels like a good fantasy novel, yet BGII was exactly that.Good thing to have it in Steam, right? Well. About that...
As you can easily tell by looking at the title, what we have here is not the original version but so-called Enhanced Edition, heavily modified by Beamdog, a company founded by a couple of ex-BioWare employees – Trent Oster and Cameron Tofer. And if you've played the Enhanced version of previous game, you know just how butchered it felt. It had mobile-oriented enhancements (god mode included), it had features it wasn't supposed to have (like “press button to show secrets” thingy that allowed you to get one of the very best armors in game soon after prologue) and pretty much every new thing played against balance, which wasn't that great to begin with.
Thankfully, when it's about BGII, it was a little bit easier. For example, that “press button to reveal stuff” feature was planned this time and therefore there's nothing wrong with it. Same thing with dual-wielding rangers. Like I already mentioned, BGII was supposed to have 'em, no impact on balance. Yes, this version does have all the mobile-oriented crap too, but oh, well. Also, not all of it is bad. Old geezers like yours truly, for example, will sure appreciate things like bigger fonts. The problem is – while the first game had quite a lot of new content (including one heck of a new expansion), this here? It doesn't have much. It comes with a sequel to so-called “Pit” (which, pretty much, is just an arena with some basic excuse), there are new companions and quests, but that's it.
Moreover, neither of that feels good. Not like the new stuff felt good in the previous game, but here? It's a disaster. It's so easy to break things for yourself without even knowing it. Like, there's a new location with some new quests in it, but if you'll finish a certain one of them first? You'll render the others unbeatable. Or take another new quest for example. It lets you either agree to cooperate with one of the most infamous villains in Forgotten Realms or refuse his offer and fight him. Naturally, if you're a Lawful Good guy (like Paladin, for example), you'll want to take second option. Guess what? Bad idea. Just because it'll break your quest and left it unbeatable. Like... what? The game literally gives you an option that... leads to the dead end? And it's not like it's only one quest or somethin'. Wow. Just wow. Even arena I've mentioned, they've managed to mess up even that with bugs and overly confusing parts. And when there was a real need for a change? They didn't do a thing.
I'm talking, of course, about Throne of Bhaal expansion. I haven't seen detailed interviews about what exactly went wrong, but the general knowledge is – the big guys screwed us all again. Originally planned as much bigger thing, Throne of Bhaal ended up being a much smaller experience. It wasn't, by all means, bad, but it did commit one major crime – it took away our freedom. There were still choices, of course, but pretty much every major part? It was linear as F. And not in Shadows of Amn way (SoA made some peaceful solutions impossible on purpose to play with our ethics, like there was that certain quest, in which the only solution was to kill the poor guy's best friend, while knowing there won't be any punishment or penalty for doing so). Throne of Bhaal was just... linear. It needed you to do certain things because screw you and your wishes. It was about combat, OK? There was a lot of battles and you were able to reach very high levels, but... Let's just say it felt lacking. Even despite the fact that story-wise it was a perfect conclusion to Baalspawn saga and even came with Fallout-like postscript for your party members, it was hard not to feel disappointed a bit. Why must we give part of our soul to that evil sucker while being righteous Paladins? Why there's no alternative solutions to quests that are asking for at least a couple? Some mods did try to fix that. Beamdog did not. They had one in a lifetime chance to make arguable expansion shine and they didn't even bother.
What they did manage to achieve, though, is adding new bugs. Tons and tons of new bugs. Personally, I've experienced so much that... it didn't even feel like playing BGII, really. I mean, BGII was never the buggiest game out there. It sure had its share of bugs, but I was never annoyed by it. And I did play it on release. Beamdog? They brought bugs. And unlike some other guys, who kept working on their products until things finally became smooth, they didn't really care. I mean, they did release some updates, but at some point they've just stopped the support and called it a day. Which means that the game ended up being more buggy than it was originally. Again, wow.
K, I complained a lot, which may make you think that this here is a terrible release, but the truth is – it is not. BGII is a fantastic game and even in this form it's totally worth playing. Beamdog did quite a lot of good too. New characters and their stories are good, romances include some non-straight options now (not enough and for a lesbian lady, for example, the only option will be evil Vampire, but still, choices are there), and, of course, the fact that this version was made to work in modern environment is a good thing. The problem is – the Enhanced Edition doesn't feel like a commercial product. If something, it feels like a mod. Clunky, rough and buggy alteration. Something you may expect from ModDB, not Steam. The good idea will be to let us choose. To make fully customizable version that lets us switch between mint version, the new features and everything in between. Like Paul Reiche and Fred Ford did in their free version of Star Control II called Free Stars: The Ur-Quan Masters that allowed us to to combine features from the original DOS version and enhanced 3DO port. Beamdog thought they knew better. They did not. So make sure not to expect much here. Still, like I already said, BGII is a great game. And no matter what, you should play it at least once in your life. Dixi.