(note that I don’t really intent this to be a fair or honest review, nor am i trying to judge the game by its own merits)
More then any game before it do I regret installing Baldur’s Gate II on my computer. Not because it was the worst 4 hours I have spent in a game (it wasn’t, not really), but because it made me hate a beloved classic that has received so much praise.
A day or two ago I was chatting with a friend about games in general and during our discussion it came up that I had never played the Baldur’s Gate games and she insisted on their awesomeness. Fine, cool, I have heard the games praises be sung from every rooftop in the western hemisphere of the internet, surely I should indulge myself into such a masterpiece.
After getting a hold of the game and finally getting the network set up my two friends and I started our adventure (another had joined our ranks by this time). I decided to play a mage upon the instance from my friend of their total awesomeness, but immediately on the character creation screen warning lights were flashing in my face, I had more starting spells to choose between then I ever had on my World of Warcraft mage. What the fuck? How the hell am I supposed to know the game mechanics well enough to carefully select the 10-20 spells I needed, why couldn’t the game give me magic missiles and some defensive spell and introduce the rest to me later.
But the moment Minsc started talking everything turned into gold, GOLD I say, real fucking Au. He was one of the main reasons I wanted to play this game, having heard so much about him from various source all testifying his complete and utter awesomeness. And hearing a big man with a hamster speak about the collective butts of evil being kicked my heart melted and my throat was howling with laughter. But then another twist was added to my experience, Minsc stopped talking. And the game turned to stone. While my friends were happily chatting about traps and saving throws I was trying to figure out what was going on, where are my spells, how do they work, why cant I just drag them from my spell book to my quickbar? And why the hell was I supposed to control two characters (we had two each), can’t the computer do that for me so I can try to have fun with my mage? But the game seemed to find me unworthy and refused to relent on any of these issues. Soon my friends told me a little bit about how to use spells and we started our long quest through the initial dungeons that I was again and again assured was way worse then the rest of the game.
Already was I grumbling under my breath about how unintuitive the whole game was. After spending most of my RPG life playing Diablo II, WoW and Oblivion I couldn’t help but feel that the UI was shit, the combat was dull, the controls awful and the fact the game seemed to be laughing at me behind its back. To make it all better my friends started explaining things after a while, like how apparently I didn’t start on level one (I never did manage to figure out what level I was on my own, but they said it was eight so I decided to trust them) or that the game was less of a sequel and more of an expansion pack to the original…
Maybe there was the problem. Maybe I was just approaching the series from the wrong direction. But really, if Baldur’s Gate II is the greatest game of all time, why isn’t it fun? Why does it seem to demand I spend hours understanding it before I can get to the actual fun stuff. Maybe its like a rite of passage, if you can endure the horrible start you can finally stand there with something like Diablo II, but with awesome characters and story. But alas no, I have given up on Baldur’s Gate and possibly the entire world. A game that makes me think of graphs and math instead of glorious monster slaying is not a game I like. And not liking Baldur’s Gate makes me a console tard right? Okay, I guess I accept the title. But I fear not, for after my impending breaking of fast I shall play Call of Duty 4 and laugh like and idiot while I shoot mindless headshot after mindless headshot.
More then any game before it do I regret installing Baldur’s Gate II on my computer. Not because it was the worst 4 hours I have spent in a game (it wasn’t, not really), but because it made me hate a beloved classic that has received so much praise.
A day or two ago I was chatting with a friend about games in general and during our discussion it came up that I had never played the Baldur’s Gate games and she insisted on their awesomeness. Fine, cool, I have heard the games praises be sung from every rooftop in the western hemisphere of the internet, surely I should indulge myself into such a masterpiece.
After getting a hold of the game and finally getting the network set up my two friends and I started our adventure (another had joined our ranks by this time). I decided to play a mage upon the instance from my friend of their total awesomeness, but immediately on the character creation screen warning lights were flashing in my face, I had more starting spells to choose between then I ever had on my World of Warcraft mage. What the fuck? How the hell am I supposed to know the game mechanics well enough to carefully select the 10-20 spells I needed, why couldn’t the game give me magic missiles and some defensive spell and introduce the rest to me later.
But the moment Minsc started talking everything turned into gold, GOLD I say, real fucking Au. He was one of the main reasons I wanted to play this game, having heard so much about him from various source all testifying his complete and utter awesomeness. And hearing a big man with a hamster speak about the collective butts of evil being kicked my heart melted and my throat was howling with laughter. But then another twist was added to my experience, Minsc stopped talking. And the game turned to stone. While my friends were happily chatting about traps and saving throws I was trying to figure out what was going on, where are my spells, how do they work, why cant I just drag them from my spell book to my quickbar? And why the hell was I supposed to control two characters (we had two each), can’t the computer do that for me so I can try to have fun with my mage? But the game seemed to find me unworthy and refused to relent on any of these issues. Soon my friends told me a little bit about how to use spells and we started our long quest through the initial dungeons that I was again and again assured was way worse then the rest of the game.
Already was I grumbling under my breath about how unintuitive the whole game was. After spending most of my RPG life playing Diablo II, WoW and Oblivion I couldn’t help but feel that the UI was shit, the combat was dull, the controls awful and the fact the game seemed to be laughing at me behind its back. To make it all better my friends started explaining things after a while, like how apparently I didn’t start on level one (I never did manage to figure out what level I was on my own, but they said it was eight so I decided to trust them) or that the game was less of a sequel and more of an expansion pack to the original…
Maybe there was the problem. Maybe I was just approaching the series from the wrong direction. But really, if Baldur’s Gate II is the greatest game of all time, why isn’t it fun? Why does it seem to demand I spend hours understanding it before I can get to the actual fun stuff. Maybe its like a rite of passage, if you can endure the horrible start you can finally stand there with something like Diablo II, but with awesome characters and story. But alas no, I have given up on Baldur’s Gate and possibly the entire world. A game that makes me think of graphs and math instead of glorious monster slaying is not a game I like. And not liking Baldur’s Gate makes me a console tard right? Okay, I guess I accept the title. But I fear not, for after my impending breaking of fast I shall play Call of Duty 4 and laugh like and idiot while I shoot mindless headshot after mindless headshot.
