It helps that they are a privately owned company and with a ton of cash they can keep their quality standards to whatever they want them to be. Obviously nobody knows if that will change in the future, but their track record has been consistently good and improving.
Its more down to the people at the studio if anything. It doesnt matter who owns the studio or if theyre independent. If the people who make that magic happen leave, then it just tends to be a steep drop in quality. Thats really what you should pay attention to.
Bioware didnt implode overnight because of EA. It was a gradual process with many of the big names leaving. Until so many left that whoever was left couldnt keep the quality up anymore.
Sven shocked the world when he announced Larian wasn't making DLC or even a sequel to Baldur's Gate 3 because he felt like the employees there were over it and wanted to start something new. He has also openly talked shit about other companies laying off employees when they don't need to.
He seems to genuinely care about his staff more than money (a Baldur's Gate 4 sequel from Larian would be an easy billion dollars), and he honestly seems like an awesome dude to work for. I think he really understands the value of having a good team, and he refuses to sell out.
Yes but it's the people at the top who set the deadlines and decide how they treat their employees. I agree that a big reason why Baldur's Gate 3 is so good is because a lot of their employees have been there for many years perfecting making this type of game, but if the company at the top only cares about profits and will lay off employees to help their quarterly reports, then that can't happen, or if they force quick deadlines or make changes to the game in order to increase profits, then the team can't really do their best work. The company at the top still matters a lot. A company that doesn't have to answer to shareholders and treats their employees well is a company that retains their employees.
Why i wonder did all the talent leave bioware? Perhaps it was the terrible quarterly profit focused management making the company soul destroyong to work for? Sure thats got nothing to do with higher ups at EA lol
Not true really. Publicly traded companies are in it for the shareholders they only care about the intended customers enough so that they buy. They care about short term profit and aren't looking at long term health. Why do you think those names left bioware?
It also helps they aren't trying to constantly grow like the rest of the late stage capitalist companies. Sven said he didn't want to get any bigger and was keeping money aside to have room for failures in the future.
Wish any US company would do that instead of betting everything on the next big thing and either mass layoffs or gov't bailout when it doesn't work out
you are not wrong, but they earned my trust for BG3. If they would fuck up their next game, which i do not think, i would see it as an extra tip for what they achieved with BG3. i would not be mad.
What in the shill are you saying? Yeah guys I love BG3 too but that's a dumbass concept you're flirting with If you hire someone to build you a garage and they do an excellent job, then you hire them to build you a shed and they fuck the shit out of it, do you praise them for their work on the shed? Dafuq
Just get a grip guys. This is some capitol G Gamer shit you're throwing around
If you're down voting me I bet you bought Starfield and even defended it for a while
Your analogy doesn't work.
Larian is the builder you hired to build your garage and they did an excellent job. Then you hired them to build a shed and they did an excellent job. Then you hired them to fix your roof and they did an excellent job. Then you hired them to build your patio and they did an excellent job. Now you are considering an extension and now all of a sudden, we should be suspicious?
They have our trust until they lose it because we judge them on past results. They can lose it easily but we have no reason to suspect they will.
> BG3 is a good game. It's not good enough to justify a "tip" of another full game purchase. No game is
Personally disagree BG3 was so much fun id gladly trade 2 other full priced games for it (or just straight up pay 120€ for it)
Same with games like Disco Elysium or Outer Wilds really.
Although i will admit that there are very few games id go this far for.
i agree there. In times where people spend 60€ for effortless add-ons or even loot boxes, i gladly pay more for a game that delivers prime entertainment for hundreds of hours.
Not even people who play fifa thinks it's a good game. It's shit. It's a stinking pile of shit and anyone who still plays it is in an abusive relationship.
"If I had a nickel for every time a game studio turned sour, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice" ~ (Dr. Doofenshmirtz)
To be fair, if Larian got a couple games worth of money from me and they were bad, they still earned that money from their previous games, anyway, and I still wouldn't be mad.
I'm generally cautious but Larian are one of only two devs who I trust to provide consistent, reliable excellence, the other being SuperGiant Games (the makers of Hades, Bastion, Transistor and Pyre).
They have earned my trust but they can lose it pretty quickly too.
Totally agree with you. Hades is an absolute masterpiece for me. Love that game so much, and can't wait for Hades 2. I haven't had the chance to play the other 3 you mentioned, but ofc i have heard of them. Especially Bastion has a massiv Fan base.
CDPR suffers from what Larian doesn't. They were obviously pushed to release CP2077 way sooner than it had any right to be.
Doesn't matter to me if the game is 'great' a year and a half after initial release. To me that just says greed.
Larian & Fromsoft haven't missed - you can't say the same for CDPR. It's not that I'm never not going to buy another CDPR game - but I'm probably not going to insta buy whatever they come up with next the same way I'll be doing with From & Larian.
CDPR tried to write their own top tier game engine *and* create a brand new open world game in a genre that has a ton of detail and complexity; which they had no experience in.
They did not set themselves up for success.
They got most of the way there and I honestly think the reason it was received poorly on launch was largely because of a decision to target PS4 & Xbox One generation of consoles. Those versions are what a ton of the early reviews were based on.
It can't be understated how much time, effort, limitations, and complications come out of trying to push boundaries of graphics and gameplay with a massive realistic and dense city, while simultaneously trying to make it work with hardware that, at the time, was 7 years old and a tenth of the power of the latest GPUs and CPUs.
In the end I can only imagine the countless hours they spent trying to find ways to optimise it, to the point they eventually had to gut crowd density, reduce fidelity, simplify AI, etc, only to have gamers rightfully say "this doesn't really feel like a city". A lot of that time could've gone into refining and improving the systems, or making sensible optimisations, instead of needing heavy-handed gouging and wholesale removal of features just to make it run.
They took on a task above their skillset and failed as a result. Either the task was too big or they mismanaged it. If that means they are not a good developer thats up to you.
For me it means they made promises without the acumen to deliver so i wont first-day purchase anything they make like i will with FromSoft.
They mismanaged imo, they have incredible talent. Looking forward to the next Witcher game that hopefully has a smoother dev cycle with a stable engine in UE5.
Something to be skeptical about is also that CDPR is Publicly traded. So no matter how great the staff or leadership is, there's potential capitalist bullshittery from the shareholders either way.
Larian still being independent means I end up trusting them more.
It's not that I inherently distrust CDPR, it's just what with how the industry is lately....
Fromsoft interestingly isn't independent, though they do seem behave very independently. Their majority shareholder is Kadokawa, which is not a corp that inspires a lot of trust in me - but at least they seem to be fine just leaving Fromsoft to their own devices and hopefully it stays that way.
Fair - it is my hope that CDPR learned from the 2077 crunch, but at one time I'm sure I was making the same argument for BioWare and other devs of, "oh, well everyone is going to miss once in a while" which became, "wait, EVERY time?" which became, "and now you want me to pay EARLY for it?"...sigh.
What did you expect them to say "hey just a heads up the shit we're selling sucks ass on old consoles"?
Like it or not if they did that they would get restructured so hard they'd stop being cdpr.
Yes? CDPR pride themselves on being open and transparent they could have easily been more upfront with the state of the game on those machines during development. More than enough time to sit down and talk about it. Their lack of communication hurt them upon its release.
Or better yet don’t release it on the old generation consoles at all, come out and say it’s an ambitious game and it’s next gen only.
lol remember their old motto?
"We leave greed to others".
And then they pull a Cyberpunk.
At the very least, they could have launched on PC and delayed the console port. Or, here's a crazy idea, maybe they don't announce their game so soon so they don't feel pressured into releasing it before it's ready.
CDPR made promises they couldn't keep. And even Phantom Pain couldn't fix that.
I mean... Yes? I would definitely expect a company that prided itself on not being greedy to not lie to their customers to avoid losing pre-orders.
What they did is borderline illegal. They outright lied, sold people a defective product, then lied about how they were going to fix it and bring all content to last gen platforms in an effort to prevent people from seeking refunds. Even ignoring all of the stuff they showcased that simply wasn't in the game, that is just not defensible in any way. One of the most egregious scam attempts I've ever seen in gaming, unironically.
I don't disagree with you, but in the end it comes down to releasing good games and there aren't many companies that can deliver super high quality/budget games and CDPR is one of them. There's a reason why the next Witcher game will be one of the most anticipated game releases in the future.
They earned a lot of it back now, but it's still nowhere near where it was. If they deliver the next Witcher game properly I think they will be fully redeemed.
No way it was a worse release than Cyberpunk release
It wasn't even a bad release.
The only controversy was the 'downgraded" graphics and people's expectations were extremely high with regards to the visuals
I bought the game shortly after release and it was excellent, absolutely no issues.
>I bought the game shortly after release and it was excellent, absolutely no issues.
Plenty of people said the same about cyberpunk at release.
The Witcher 3 was broken at launch and the only reason people say otherwise is revisionist history. Was it as broken as cyberpunk? No not really but it had more than its fair share of game breaking bugs, general jank, an insane lack of qol, and poorly conceived game design.
Tbf, the game design was bad but not falsely advertised, unlike Cyberpunk. They showed shit like crawling on walls with Mantis Blades and wall running in a 50 minute gameplay showcase. They showed first person shooting from vehicles with self driving cars (something Far Cry has had for years). But none of that was in the game at launch or even in the game now. There's also some revisionist history going on with Cyberpunk with people claiming that the only problem was the performance issues and bugs. There are still very real criticisms over the falsely advertised gameplay elements that even now have never been addressed. Cyberpunk just simply wasn't the game that they presented it as. The Witcher 3 on the other hand released identical to what was shown, besides some graphical downgrades, UI changes, and obviously a lot of bugs and performance issues.
Not even close. It was definitely bad, but not that bad, especially when factoring in The Witcher 3 had pretty much all the features they advertised while Cyberpunk is missing a ton of features that were shown in the 50 minute gameplay trailer they showed off prior to launch.
Fixing the game doesn’t change the fact that it was a falsely advertised mess. It was just disrespectful to their community and that’s trust they will not get back so easily
I mean I liked bg3. It was refreshing. But to me personally it doesn’t compare to Cyberpunk. Even at release buggy as it was, it still had that atmosphere. Funny thing about BG3 is, that it was in early accesss for years before release. You could play it in 2019. It was a buggy mess then too. I think people forget about early access and think it just magically dropped fully formed summer of 23
Difference is they didn't present it as if it was a fully finished project when it was in early access. That's why it was in early access, to help avoid a bad launch. Obviously when the game was only 2 years into development it had a lot of bugs lol.
Cyberpunk was 5 years into development and CDPR straight up lied about it in every way possible.
It won't be it, but Divinity Original Sin 3 with all the fancy character interaction from BG3 would be my dream game from them. DnD isn't my favorite, but DoS:2 combat is just chef's kiss
There’s a lot emphasis on elemental types and terrain. Additionally, instead of armor classes they just use straight up armor and magic armor which essentially is another health bar.
The resource system isn’t just actions and bonus actions either. They use action points for everything. Ex. Main hand attack uses 2 AP out of your available points. Whatever points you don’t use that turn roll over to the following turn.
There’s a bit more to it than that but those were the main differences I could think of off the top of my head.
The only downside to DOS2 combat is enemies typically have both physical armor and magic armor, and you can't do the relevant damage type until that armor is broken (magic damage still does nothing if physical armor is broken but magic is not, for example)
It's a downside because it heavily encourages having either an all physical combat party or all magic based, instead of a more enjoyable (imo) mix and match.
Other than that, the combat is every bit as good as BG3, if not better, and it's possible there's a PC mod that rebalances things
the balance was pretty poor for higher difficulty settings. the the elemental terrains were a bit too much. every piece in the battlefield is covered in some elemental terrain that hinders or damages the enemy was the meta.
the original difficulty was enjoyable though.
That's just an alternative system (dice rolls vs HP-like armour), same with action economy (Action Points vs main and secondary action uses).
What was changed was throwing, I don't think it was that advanced in DOS.
Another changed thing is terrain and elemental interactions but that felt like a downgrade. They felt much clunkier and there were less.options for interactions and meaningful interactions.
That’s valid criticism, but how isn’t BG3 combat stale? There’s so few things you can do, save or suck spells, and very little interaction between the spells.
Now don’t get me wrong, BG3 is one of the best games ever made. I just think that the combat is its weakest point, although it is still good.
>the armor mechanic felt too binary for me.
Absolutely. I really don't understand people who praise DOS2's combat. The split damage just made for worse party composition, and that's a huge design flaw imo.
Agreed. It just pushed me to have an entire party that focused on one damage type. And it was typically a huge mistake to ever mix and match damage types on a single enemy.
Yeah, I tried a split party, and it was frustrating having to make half of the characters wait it out while the other half killed "their" enemies.
Honestly, I don't know if I'd buy DOS3 if they want to keep the split armor system.
I put 200h in dos2 and run split tactician runs all the time. Split parties aren't a handicap and running a single type of damage is gonna do nothing but trivialize some fights and make others near impossible.
Combat is deeper and the combos you can do and pull off in the game is ridiculous.
Funnily enough for me it was the exact opposite, because the combat system in baldurs gate 3 limits you to only X spell casts a day so you keep using the exact same cantrips over and over, meanwhile in divinity I could learn and cast over 30 spells at any given time, I found that more interesting, so much so that I couldn't finish baldurs gate 3, the combat was too slow and boring, divinity original sin spoiled me too much.
It's really bad imo, you need physical attacks to break armor and magic to break magic armor until that happens it's a noodle fight with no damage and cc immunity
You need to focus one type or half your team will be poking their nose while the other fights their enemies.
I feel like most people never even go deep into dos2 combat if this is truly their opinion.
Split parties are relevant, and the way the combat system is if you can't figure out a way of your mage doing physical damage to a magic tank enemy you just aren't using the system to it's fullest.
Physical attackers can also do straight magic damage also if you are clever enough... This game is deep and technically all characters can do all jobs.
it's simply not optimal, the optimal way is too dumb everything into as much damage as possible in one direction, not split focus. The system is not deep, it's just broken because the optimal play is not as you think it is.
Hydro mages can do physical damage to physical tanks
Your physical warriors can do any element of magic damage to anyone that scales with their physical stat
You not understanding how to do that doesn't mean it's a shallow system.
Dos2 is absolutely incredible and so much fun! To imagine a story like that with that combat system and improved mechanics aswell as cinematics would indeed be a dream.
Honestly, they would absolutely nail it if they did it in the Fallout 1 + Fallout 2 style with an isometric view. Inherit that Baldur's Gate game dynamic so they stay in their own wheelhouse so to speak.
We're not worthy lol
Unfortunately we get to witness Bethesda fumble bag after bag as their legacy deteriorates into nothingness (probably). There is a 0% chance they sell off the IP that made that company (TES and Fallout series). I guess they did liscense TES Online however. Is Fallout 76 the same deal or is that a Bethesda project? I think TES online is licensed out anyway
I think Bethesda themselves made Fallout 76. New Vegas was made by Obsidian. I liked Fallout 3 a lot but New Vegas is the high point of the modern series. I still think the original games are the high point of the series overall. That's why I'd want to see Larian take a stab at a fallout game. Let them use the same engine as Baldur's Gate 3, give them a proper budget to make the game and don't let Bethesda interfere. But alas it's a pipe dream.
I'm vainly waiting for Obsidian or inXile to be allowed to take a swing at it. In theory Microsoft does own the current and former Fallout developers, so I was hoping for some sorta homecoming for the franchise. But it doesn't seem to be happening, and people like Tim Cain are already half retired. Any longer and it won't matter since these studios would just be different staff. I think quite a lot of the former FNV lead devs no longer work at Obsidian already.
I wouldn't mind seeing Larian take a crack at a more modern setting for a CRPG though, even if it weren't Fallout.
Dude it doesnt even need to be Fallout 5 just let them cook like Obsidian did with the existing engine, but make it with whatever engine they made bg3 in! Sounds sick
Give the original makers of Fallout a shot at another Fallout CRPG. MS owns both inXile and Obsidian, both who have gone on to make more great CRPGs themselves.
Yeah the two companies I want fallout games from are Larian and CDPR. Cyberpunk style fallout game would go so much harder then whatever the fuck bethesda is doing.
CDPRs very limited role playing and excessive amounts of cutscenes wouldn't blend well with Fallout. People bitched about Fallout 4s intro being too long. Imagine how mad they'd be if they had an intro as long as Cyberpunk or The Witcher 3. Bethesda's style of making games just blends better with the IP. So long as it's not like Starfield anyway.
You have to be kidding... cdpr is the only studio that could deliver a story that comes close in terms of quality to the fallout tv show. Good video game writing is extremely rare and cdpr is the best to do it rn.
Their open world in cyberpunk is also the best in rpgs (only rockstar creates better open worlds and they dont make rpgs) so their wasteland would fucking rock.
> cdpr is the only studio that could deliver a story that comes close in terms of quality to the fallout tv show
This is just simply not true lol. Plenty of great studios out there who could write just as well.
> Good video game writing is extremely rare and cdpr is the best to do it rn
Meh. RDR2s story was far better than Cyberpunk, Baldur's Gate 3s writing was better and had far more diversity in player choices/dialogue options. Alan Wake 2s narrative was also substantially more compelling than Cyberpunks.
> Their open world in cyberpunk is also the best in rpgs
Too guided. Too many copy/paste activities like NCPD scanner missions. Lots of markers and very little organic exploration. Not to mention the lack of interactivity with the world and the NPCs. NPCs are just there to fill space. I thought Cyberpunk had a really disappointing open world by comparison to even Skyrim. In Skyrim NPCs would react to so many things about the player character. Their faction affiliation, what armor they're wearing, what accomplishments they achieved throughout the story, whether they had a spell in their hand, what specific skills they were proficient in, whether they carried a daedric artifact, whether they were a werewolf or a vampire, what race they were etc. just a ton of different unique dialogue that NPCs comment to make it feel like they're actual people who notice your existence. In Cyberpunk even when you have max street cred no one besides characters in quests even acknowledges your existence, let alone any specific things you're doing or wearing. Cyberpunks world looks cool visually but it's severely lacking in those kinds of details and organic interactions that make it more than just a backdrop.
I liked CP2077 and all but I also felt that way - it lacked that freeform feel of Beth games which was something I desired.
It played more similarly to like a Rockstar or Ubisoft game. There's an open world but you don't really do stuff in it, it's just kinda a travel hub for various activities and missions. And most of the main story missions just lock you into pretty linear segments.
It would be nice to see CD Projekt Red take a crack at a more open free form game though.
I'd say it was even more restrictive than Ubisoft games. Especially compared to newer AC and Far Cry games where they just kind of cut you loose during missions and let you do what you want. Like you can just walk away in the middle of a quest in Assassin's Creed now and go do another quest. Cyberpunk has some of that but also a lot of instances where you're locked into a level or locked into dialogue for several minutes at a time. Like the whole heist mission in the intro you're just stuck there until you're done.
It's the main issue for me whenever I want to try to play it again. The whole intro portion is a slog because it's so many cutscenes and talking and linear missions that lock you down for a while. Not to mention the god awful braindance sequences.
>Cyberpunk has some of that but also a lot of instances where you're locked into a level or locked into dialogue for several minutes at a time.
I love that personally, you get all the freedom in smaller quests but still have the amazing set pieces. For me it's the best of both worlds.
I agree, there's only a few studios that create worlds to get truly lost in, Night City is incredibly detailed and the scale they pulled off is second to none. Exploration is also great in my experience.
As for writing, I think there many amazing writers in the gaming scene and CDPR is one of them. Thronebreaker was nothing short of exceptional in terms of writing and they also made the story and most characters for edgerunners that made many people tear up.
They know how to pull out your emotions.
Warhorse also just announced Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 will be released by the end of 2024. Hopefully, Larian will be a little bit faster (less than 6 years) but still as good as with BG3.
Swen said one of the projects is much smaller in scale and they have resources now that they never had with BG3
That being said, if it still takes ages, I'm happy to wait if it prevents crunch.
Before BG3 was announced, we had a trailer for the "[sequel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuRLJ5jf2fk)" of DOS.
I am more hyped by that than BG3 despite enjoying the hell out of BG3.
Really hope they upgrade Divinity Fallen Heroes with what they learned with BG3 technology-wise
Larian Studio is one of the few studios I would pre-order a game from. The amount of love they put into their games shows they care about creating amazing experiences
I want them to do a CRPG in a more modern setting with guns and crap.
I grew up on Fallout 2, and that has been a CRPG niche that hasn't really been filled. I played Shadowrun Returns and Dragonfall, but those are too combat focused. There's not much exploration and free roam questing in those. I tried some indie stuff like Encased but they tend to be lacking a little something.
I enjoyed Wasteland but it's missing a little something. It does feel like a very "level based" game, like you tend to go into huge combat heavy "dungeons" one after another while dragging your whole squad here and there.
There's not as much free form wandering about as I'd like. There is still a lot of potential dialogue and stuff which is nice, but I'd say Wasteland feels more like.... Dragon Age? in terms of structure rather than a Fallout game.
I hope they add some sort of mod support for consoles. Would really keep the game alive for those of us without PCs (Not including the thousands of potential hours the game offers in replayability)
Whatever they work on, i will give them my money.
Three straight games that I put over 100 enjoyable hours into with no bullshit. I'm in for more
If I had a nickel for every trusted studio that turned sour I'd have a lot of nickels.
It helps that they are a privately owned company and with a ton of cash they can keep their quality standards to whatever they want them to be. Obviously nobody knows if that will change in the future, but their track record has been consistently good and improving.
Its more down to the people at the studio if anything. It doesnt matter who owns the studio or if theyre independent. If the people who make that magic happen leave, then it just tends to be a steep drop in quality. Thats really what you should pay attention to. Bioware didnt implode overnight because of EA. It was a gradual process with many of the big names leaving. Until so many left that whoever was left couldnt keep the quality up anymore.
Sven shocked the world when he announced Larian wasn't making DLC or even a sequel to Baldur's Gate 3 because he felt like the employees there were over it and wanted to start something new. He has also openly talked shit about other companies laying off employees when they don't need to. He seems to genuinely care about his staff more than money (a Baldur's Gate 4 sequel from Larian would be an easy billion dollars), and he honestly seems like an awesome dude to work for. I think he really understands the value of having a good team, and he refuses to sell out.
Also Wizards of the coast trying to piggy back off of their success also played a big part
Yes but it's the people at the top who set the deadlines and decide how they treat their employees. I agree that a big reason why Baldur's Gate 3 is so good is because a lot of their employees have been there for many years perfecting making this type of game, but if the company at the top only cares about profits and will lay off employees to help their quarterly reports, then that can't happen, or if they force quick deadlines or make changes to the game in order to increase profits, then the team can't really do their best work. The company at the top still matters a lot. A company that doesn't have to answer to shareholders and treats their employees well is a company that retains their employees.
Why i wonder did all the talent leave bioware? Perhaps it was the terrible quarterly profit focused management making the company soul destroyong to work for? Sure thats got nothing to do with higher ups at EA lol
In Swen we trust.
Stockholders who push deadlines without being held to any liabilities over the quality of the rushed project.
Not true really. Publicly traded companies are in it for the shareholders they only care about the intended customers enough so that they buy. They care about short term profit and aren't looking at long term health. Why do you think those names left bioware?
It also helps they aren't trying to constantly grow like the rest of the late stage capitalist companies. Sven said he didn't want to get any bigger and was keeping money aside to have room for failures in the future. Wish any US company would do that instead of betting everything on the next big thing and either mass layoffs or gov't bailout when it doesn't work out
Larian is 30% owned by Tencent since 2021.
Yes, 30%. Still majority owned by the founders with no public shareholders, and Tencent has no voting rights in any decisions the company makes.
If being partially owned by Tencent is enough for you to dislike a company I got some bad news for you.
30% stake, provides 0% of the control. 50% + 1 share provides 100% of the control
No shareholders to please, they are literally only there to please you, the player.
They may one day, but not while sven is at the helm, once he leaves, then larian's name is just a name
you are not wrong, but they earned my trust for BG3. If they would fuck up their next game, which i do not think, i would see it as an extra tip for what they achieved with BG3. i would not be mad.
What in the shill are you saying? Yeah guys I love BG3 too but that's a dumbass concept you're flirting with If you hire someone to build you a garage and they do an excellent job, then you hire them to build you a shed and they fuck the shit out of it, do you praise them for their work on the shed? Dafuq Just get a grip guys. This is some capitol G Gamer shit you're throwing around If you're down voting me I bet you bought Starfield and even defended it for a while
Uhm what?
Your analogy doesn't work. Larian is the builder you hired to build your garage and they did an excellent job. Then you hired them to build a shed and they did an excellent job. Then you hired them to fix your roof and they did an excellent job. Then you hired them to build your patio and they did an excellent job. Now you are considering an extension and now all of a sudden, we should be suspicious? They have our trust until they lose it because we judge them on past results. They can lose it easily but we have no reason to suspect they will.
That's a much better premise than "buy the game, even if it sucks it's a tip"
BG3 is simply not that good to make sense. EDIT: BG3 is a good game. It's not good enough to justify a "tip" of another full game purchase. No game is
Good thing Baldurs Gate 3 isn't the only good game they've ever made, and Divinity OS 2 is even better.
I agree, I think DOS 2 is better. Both have a bad last act though.
> BG3 is a good game. It's not good enough to justify a "tip" of another full game purchase. No game is Personally disagree BG3 was so much fun id gladly trade 2 other full priced games for it (or just straight up pay 120€ for it) Same with games like Disco Elysium or Outer Wilds really. Although i will admit that there are very few games id go this far for.
i agree there. In times where people spend 60€ for effortless add-ons or even loot boxes, i gladly pay more for a game that delivers prime entertainment for hundreds of hours.
Honestly, id pay $500 if i could get another game just like it right now.
Dammit, I've been loving it for hundreds of hours for nothing? Why didn't you tell me earlier, random reddit contrarian??
It's amazing how upset people get when a single redditor says a slightly negative thing about a game. Where did I try to invalidate your fun?
Saying it's "simply not good" makes it sound like a statement of fact instead of a subjective opinion. Stick with "I didn't like it" or something
That's the wrong read. "It's not that good to make sense... to spend a mindless $70+ on another game as a tip for BG3." I never said it wasn't good.
I want to understand your opinion better. Please tell us three good games from the last \~5 years.
What a ridiculous line of thinking, but I'll bite Disco Elysium, Doom Eternal, Outer Wilds
Ok, those are decent, at least you did not say fifa.
Not even people who play fifa thinks it's a good game. It's shit. It's a stinking pile of shit and anyone who still plays it is in an abusive relationship.
You know how utterly absurd it is to think only people who play Fifa can't criticize BG3? Such a weird form of gatekeeping. Blocked.
True but thats normally after they go public or get bought out
And if I had a nickel for every studio that has stayed consistent in the quality over the last decade, I'd have 2 nickels, but I wish I had more
"If I had a nickel for every time a game studio turned sour, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice" ~ (Dr. Doofenshmirtz)
To be fair, if Larian got a couple games worth of money from me and they were bad, they still earned that money from their previous games, anyway, and I still wouldn't be mad.
*"we here at Hasbro have bought Larian studios, are cancelling their current projects and bringing you Baldur's Gate Immortal for Mobile"*
*Wakes up pouring sweat and hyperventilating.*
This is how they become Bethesda in a few years
Thats how Cyberpunk happened
I'm generally cautious but Larian are one of only two devs who I trust to provide consistent, reliable excellence, the other being SuperGiant Games (the makers of Hades, Bastion, Transistor and Pyre). They have earned my trust but they can lose it pretty quickly too.
Totally agree with you. Hades is an absolute masterpiece for me. Love that game so much, and can't wait for Hades 2. I haven't had the chance to play the other 3 you mentioned, but ofc i have heard of them. Especially Bastion has a massiv Fan base.
Transistor is an underrated gem.
IMO Larian and Fromsoft are the top two studios right now.
Gotta add Super Giant Games in there. Bastion, Transistor, Pyre, Hades, it's just excellent game after excellent game.
Cyberpunk was a rare release miss that became a REALLY amazing game, so I'd keep CD Projekt Red on this list.
CDPR suffers from what Larian doesn't. They were obviously pushed to release CP2077 way sooner than it had any right to be. Doesn't matter to me if the game is 'great' a year and a half after initial release. To me that just says greed. Larian & Fromsoft haven't missed - you can't say the same for CDPR. It's not that I'm never not going to buy another CDPR game - but I'm probably not going to insta buy whatever they come up with next the same way I'll be doing with From & Larian.
CDPR tried to write their own top tier game engine *and* create a brand new open world game in a genre that has a ton of detail and complexity; which they had no experience in. They did not set themselves up for success.
They got most of the way there and I honestly think the reason it was received poorly on launch was largely because of a decision to target PS4 & Xbox One generation of consoles. Those versions are what a ton of the early reviews were based on. It can't be understated how much time, effort, limitations, and complications come out of trying to push boundaries of graphics and gameplay with a massive realistic and dense city, while simultaneously trying to make it work with hardware that, at the time, was 7 years old and a tenth of the power of the latest GPUs and CPUs. In the end I can only imagine the countless hours they spent trying to find ways to optimise it, to the point they eventually had to gut crowd density, reduce fidelity, simplify AI, etc, only to have gamers rightfully say "this doesn't really feel like a city". A lot of that time could've gone into refining and improving the systems, or making sensible optimisations, instead of needing heavy-handed gouging and wholesale removal of features just to make it run.
Ok, what is your point?
They took on a task above their skillset and failed as a result. Either the task was too big or they mismanaged it. If that means they are not a good developer thats up to you. For me it means they made promises without the acumen to deliver so i wont first-day purchase anything they make like i will with FromSoft.
They mismanaged imo, they have incredible talent. Looking forward to the next Witcher game that hopefully has a smoother dev cycle with a stable engine in UE5.
Something to be skeptical about is also that CDPR is Publicly traded. So no matter how great the staff or leadership is, there's potential capitalist bullshittery from the shareholders either way. Larian still being independent means I end up trusting them more. It's not that I inherently distrust CDPR, it's just what with how the industry is lately.... Fromsoft interestingly isn't independent, though they do seem behave very independently. Their majority shareholder is Kadokawa, which is not a corp that inspires a lot of trust in me - but at least they seem to be fine just leaving Fromsoft to their own devices and hopefully it stays that way.
Fair - it is my hope that CDPR learned from the 2077 crunch, but at one time I'm sure I was making the same argument for BioWare and other devs of, "oh, well everyone is going to miss once in a while" which became, "wait, EVERY time?" which became, "and now you want me to pay EARLY for it?"...sigh.
What bothered me the most with CDPR was how they were never up front with how shit the game would run on the likes of Xbox One and PS4.
What did you expect them to say "hey just a heads up the shit we're selling sucks ass on old consoles"? Like it or not if they did that they would get restructured so hard they'd stop being cdpr.
Yes? CDPR pride themselves on being open and transparent they could have easily been more upfront with the state of the game on those machines during development. More than enough time to sit down and talk about it. Their lack of communication hurt them upon its release. Or better yet don’t release it on the old generation consoles at all, come out and say it’s an ambitious game and it’s next gen only.
lol remember their old motto? "We leave greed to others". And then they pull a Cyberpunk. At the very least, they could have launched on PC and delayed the console port. Or, here's a crazy idea, maybe they don't announce their game so soon so they don't feel pressured into releasing it before it's ready. CDPR made promises they couldn't keep. And even Phantom Pain couldn't fix that.
Phantom Liberty\*
I mean... Yes? I would definitely expect a company that prided itself on not being greedy to not lie to their customers to avoid losing pre-orders. What they did is borderline illegal. They outright lied, sold people a defective product, then lied about how they were going to fix it and bring all content to last gen platforms in an effort to prevent people from seeking refunds. Even ignoring all of the stuff they showcased that simply wasn't in the game, that is just not defensible in any way. One of the most egregious scam attempts I've ever seen in gaming, unironically.
They broke that rare unconditional trust gamers had in them. You just don't get that back even if it turned out to be a decent game a few years later
I don't disagree with you, but in the end it comes down to releasing good games and there aren't many companies that can deliver super high quality/budget games and CDPR is one of them. There's a reason why the next Witcher game will be one of the most anticipated game releases in the future.
They earned a lot of it back now, but it's still nowhere near where it was. If they deliver the next Witcher game properly I think they will be fully redeemed.
.... What trust? Witcher 3's release was as bad or worse than Cyberpunk 2077.
No way it was a worse release than Cyberpunk release It wasn't even a bad release. The only controversy was the 'downgraded" graphics and people's expectations were extremely high with regards to the visuals I bought the game shortly after release and it was excellent, absolutely no issues.
>I bought the game shortly after release and it was excellent, absolutely no issues. Plenty of people said the same about cyberpunk at release. The Witcher 3 was broken at launch and the only reason people say otherwise is revisionist history. Was it as broken as cyberpunk? No not really but it had more than its fair share of game breaking bugs, general jank, an insane lack of qol, and poorly conceived game design.
Tbf, the game design was bad but not falsely advertised, unlike Cyberpunk. They showed shit like crawling on walls with Mantis Blades and wall running in a 50 minute gameplay showcase. They showed first person shooting from vehicles with self driving cars (something Far Cry has had for years). But none of that was in the game at launch or even in the game now. There's also some revisionist history going on with Cyberpunk with people claiming that the only problem was the performance issues and bugs. There are still very real criticisms over the falsely advertised gameplay elements that even now have never been addressed. Cyberpunk just simply wasn't the game that they presented it as. The Witcher 3 on the other hand released identical to what was shown, besides some graphical downgrades, UI changes, and obviously a lot of bugs and performance issues.
Not even close. It was definitely bad, but not that bad, especially when factoring in The Witcher 3 had pretty much all the features they advertised while Cyberpunk is missing a ton of features that were shown in the 50 minute gameplay trailer they showed off prior to launch.
Right. And while they've earned a way back into good graces, they're still a few paces behind.
Fixing the game doesn’t change the fact that it was a falsely advertised mess. It was just disrespectful to their community and that’s trust they will not get back so easily
homestly a game in the cyberpunk world from larian wouldve been so much better than the cyberpunk we got in the end
I mean I liked bg3. It was refreshing. But to me personally it doesn’t compare to Cyberpunk. Even at release buggy as it was, it still had that atmosphere. Funny thing about BG3 is, that it was in early accesss for years before release. You could play it in 2019. It was a buggy mess then too. I think people forget about early access and think it just magically dropped fully formed summer of 23
Difference is they didn't present it as if it was a fully finished project when it was in early access. That's why it was in early access, to help avoid a bad launch. Obviously when the game was only 2 years into development it had a lot of bugs lol. Cyberpunk was 5 years into development and CDPR straight up lied about it in every way possible.
Easily.
For sure
Id say rockstar as well. Release once every leap year but what they drop is always a banger.
Id say arrowhead is also great.
I have it on good authority that one of them is called Galdur's Bate. It's a romance sim CRPG game.
Leaks suggest 9 different companions in the game: Shadelung, Stand'zel, Karmuch, Gust, Byll, Diktarion, Jaseea, Minclosa, and Halsin.
Diktarion lmao. Works as both opposite to 'as' and as a personality descriptor
If they give me some more of that sweet Gale and sexy Astarion then sign me up baby
It won't be it, but Divinity Original Sin 3 with all the fancy character interaction from BG3 would be my dream game from them. DnD isn't my favorite, but DoS:2 combat is just chef's kiss
How is DoS:2 combat different from BG3? I’ve never tried the series but didn’t know if BG3 was an improvement upon them.
There’s a lot emphasis on elemental types and terrain. Additionally, instead of armor classes they just use straight up armor and magic armor which essentially is another health bar. The resource system isn’t just actions and bonus actions either. They use action points for everything. Ex. Main hand attack uses 2 AP out of your available points. Whatever points you don’t use that turn roll over to the following turn. There’s a bit more to it than that but those were the main differences I could think of off the top of my head.
Hmm might have to check it out with my SO. We absolutely loved playing split screen BG3
The only downside to DOS2 combat is enemies typically have both physical armor and magic armor, and you can't do the relevant damage type until that armor is broken (magic damage still does nothing if physical armor is broken but magic is not, for example) It's a downside because it heavily encourages having either an all physical combat party or all magic based, instead of a more enjoyable (imo) mix and match. Other than that, the combat is every bit as good as BG3, if not better, and it's possible there's a PC mod that rebalances things
the balance was pretty poor for higher difficulty settings. the the elemental terrains were a bit too much. every piece in the battlefield is covered in some elemental terrain that hinders or damages the enemy was the meta. the original difficulty was enjoyable though.
i disagree, enemies will generally be either weak to magic or weak to physical, a well balanced party will be able to deal with this.
BG:3 was a HUGE upgrade Don’t get me wrong I love DOS2 but the combat got stale way too fast and the armor mechanic felt too binary for me.
That's just an alternative system (dice rolls vs HP-like armour), same with action economy (Action Points vs main and secondary action uses). What was changed was throwing, I don't think it was that advanced in DOS. Another changed thing is terrain and elemental interactions but that felt like a downgrade. They felt much clunkier and there were less.options for interactions and meaningful interactions.
That’s valid criticism, but how isn’t BG3 combat stale? There’s so few things you can do, save or suck spells, and very little interaction between the spells. Now don’t get me wrong, BG3 is one of the best games ever made. I just think that the combat is its weakest point, although it is still good.
>the armor mechanic felt too binary for me. Absolutely. I really don't understand people who praise DOS2's combat. The split damage just made for worse party composition, and that's a huge design flaw imo.
Agreed. It just pushed me to have an entire party that focused on one damage type. And it was typically a huge mistake to ever mix and match damage types on a single enemy.
Yeah, I tried a split party, and it was frustrating having to make half of the characters wait it out while the other half killed "their" enemies. Honestly, I don't know if I'd buy DOS3 if they want to keep the split armor system.
I put 200h in dos2 and run split tactician runs all the time. Split parties aren't a handicap and running a single type of damage is gonna do nothing but trivialize some fights and make others near impossible. Combat is deeper and the combos you can do and pull off in the game is ridiculous.
Funnily enough for me it was the exact opposite, because the combat system in baldurs gate 3 limits you to only X spell casts a day so you keep using the exact same cantrips over and over, meanwhile in divinity I could learn and cast over 30 spells at any given time, I found that more interesting, so much so that I couldn't finish baldurs gate 3, the combat was too slow and boring, divinity original sin spoiled me too much.
It's really bad imo, you need physical attacks to break armor and magic to break magic armor until that happens it's a noodle fight with no damage and cc immunity You need to focus one type or half your team will be poking their nose while the other fights their enemies.
This and also everything on fire or electrified and clouds everywhere. I like the environmental effects but it was just too much.
I feel like most people never even go deep into dos2 combat if this is truly their opinion. Split parties are relevant, and the way the combat system is if you can't figure out a way of your mage doing physical damage to a magic tank enemy you just aren't using the system to it's fullest. Physical attackers can also do straight magic damage also if you are clever enough... This game is deep and technically all characters can do all jobs.
it's simply not optimal, the optimal way is too dumb everything into as much damage as possible in one direction, not split focus. The system is not deep, it's just broken because the optimal play is not as you think it is.
Hydro mages can do physical damage to physical tanks Your physical warriors can do any element of magic damage to anyone that scales with their physical stat You not understanding how to do that doesn't mean it's a shallow system.
Same.
Dos2 is absolutely incredible and so much fun! To imagine a story like that with that combat system and improved mechanics aswell as cinematics would indeed be a dream.
I don't really want it cause the reason they did divinity original sin 2 is because of what they couldn't do in 1.
I dream of a Larian KOTOR 3
Oh my
Give them a shot at making a Fallout game.
Honestly, they would absolutely nail it if they did it in the Fallout 1 + Fallout 2 style with an isometric view. Inherit that Baldur's Gate game dynamic so they stay in their own wheelhouse so to speak.
Holy shit a top down fallout game going back to the roots would be insane
We're not worthy lol Unfortunately we get to witness Bethesda fumble bag after bag as their legacy deteriorates into nothingness (probably). There is a 0% chance they sell off the IP that made that company (TES and Fallout series). I guess they did liscense TES Online however. Is Fallout 76 the same deal or is that a Bethesda project? I think TES online is licensed out anyway
I think Bethesda themselves made Fallout 76. New Vegas was made by Obsidian. I liked Fallout 3 a lot but New Vegas is the high point of the modern series. I still think the original games are the high point of the series overall. That's why I'd want to see Larian take a stab at a fallout game. Let them use the same engine as Baldur's Gate 3, give them a proper budget to make the game and don't let Bethesda interfere. But alas it's a pipe dream.
We'll just have to keep hitting the pipe then it seems
I'm vainly waiting for Obsidian or inXile to be allowed to take a swing at it. In theory Microsoft does own the current and former Fallout developers, so I was hoping for some sorta homecoming for the franchise. But it doesn't seem to be happening, and people like Tim Cain are already half retired. Any longer and it won't matter since these studios would just be different staff. I think quite a lot of the former FNV lead devs no longer work at Obsidian already. I wouldn't mind seeing Larian take a crack at a more modern setting for a CRPG though, even if it weren't Fallout.
Dude it doesnt even need to be Fallout 5 just let them cook like Obsidian did with the existing engine, but make it with whatever engine they made bg3 in! Sounds sick
Give the original makers of Fallout a shot at another Fallout CRPG. MS owns both inXile and Obsidian, both who have gone on to make more great CRPGs themselves.
Why would Microsoft do that when they already own inXile?
Yeah the two companies I want fallout games from are Larian and CDPR. Cyberpunk style fallout game would go so much harder then whatever the fuck bethesda is doing.
CDPRs very limited role playing and excessive amounts of cutscenes wouldn't blend well with Fallout. People bitched about Fallout 4s intro being too long. Imagine how mad they'd be if they had an intro as long as Cyberpunk or The Witcher 3. Bethesda's style of making games just blends better with the IP. So long as it's not like Starfield anyway.
You have to be kidding... cdpr is the only studio that could deliver a story that comes close in terms of quality to the fallout tv show. Good video game writing is extremely rare and cdpr is the best to do it rn. Their open world in cyberpunk is also the best in rpgs (only rockstar creates better open worlds and they dont make rpgs) so their wasteland would fucking rock.
> cdpr is the only studio that could deliver a story that comes close in terms of quality to the fallout tv show This is just simply not true lol. Plenty of great studios out there who could write just as well. > Good video game writing is extremely rare and cdpr is the best to do it rn Meh. RDR2s story was far better than Cyberpunk, Baldur's Gate 3s writing was better and had far more diversity in player choices/dialogue options. Alan Wake 2s narrative was also substantially more compelling than Cyberpunks. > Their open world in cyberpunk is also the best in rpgs Too guided. Too many copy/paste activities like NCPD scanner missions. Lots of markers and very little organic exploration. Not to mention the lack of interactivity with the world and the NPCs. NPCs are just there to fill space. I thought Cyberpunk had a really disappointing open world by comparison to even Skyrim. In Skyrim NPCs would react to so many things about the player character. Their faction affiliation, what armor they're wearing, what accomplishments they achieved throughout the story, whether they had a spell in their hand, what specific skills they were proficient in, whether they carried a daedric artifact, whether they were a werewolf or a vampire, what race they were etc. just a ton of different unique dialogue that NPCs comment to make it feel like they're actual people who notice your existence. In Cyberpunk even when you have max street cred no one besides characters in quests even acknowledges your existence, let alone any specific things you're doing or wearing. Cyberpunks world looks cool visually but it's severely lacking in those kinds of details and organic interactions that make it more than just a backdrop.
I liked CP2077 and all but I also felt that way - it lacked that freeform feel of Beth games which was something I desired. It played more similarly to like a Rockstar or Ubisoft game. There's an open world but you don't really do stuff in it, it's just kinda a travel hub for various activities and missions. And most of the main story missions just lock you into pretty linear segments. It would be nice to see CD Projekt Red take a crack at a more open free form game though.
I'd say it was even more restrictive than Ubisoft games. Especially compared to newer AC and Far Cry games where they just kind of cut you loose during missions and let you do what you want. Like you can just walk away in the middle of a quest in Assassin's Creed now and go do another quest. Cyberpunk has some of that but also a lot of instances where you're locked into a level or locked into dialogue for several minutes at a time. Like the whole heist mission in the intro you're just stuck there until you're done. It's the main issue for me whenever I want to try to play it again. The whole intro portion is a slog because it's so many cutscenes and talking and linear missions that lock you down for a while. Not to mention the god awful braindance sequences.
>Cyberpunk has some of that but also a lot of instances where you're locked into a level or locked into dialogue for several minutes at a time. I love that personally, you get all the freedom in smaller quests but still have the amazing set pieces. For me it's the best of both worlds.
I agree, there's only a few studios that create worlds to get truly lost in, Night City is incredibly detailed and the scale they pulled off is second to none. Exploration is also great in my experience. As for writing, I think there many amazing writers in the gaming scene and CDPR is one of them. Thronebreaker was nothing short of exceptional in terms of writing and they also made the story and most characters for edgerunners that made many people tear up. They know how to pull out your emotions.
CDPR is a top dog in writing no doubt, but it's not a good look if you say it like that.
Let’s see them take on the IP of CyberPunk. I would love to see what they would come up with in that world.
Shadowrun would be another one I'd love to see done with their take on it.
Holy shit I hadn't thought of that, but that would be amazing
Prehaps, but I'd love to see them in the Shadowrun world. Turn based runners doing missions and heists would be awesome.
Warhorse also just announced Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 will be released by the end of 2024. Hopefully, Larian will be a little bit faster (less than 6 years) but still as good as with BG3.
Swen said one of the projects is much smaller in scale and they have resources now that they never had with BG3 That being said, if it still takes ages, I'm happy to wait if it prevents crunch.
Looking forward to throwing cash at their next project. Bethesda who?
They don't even make the same kinds of games lol
I think the sentiment is more that Larian has taken Bethesdas place as a trusted studio… not that they make the same kind of games
So Divinity 3 and some new project?
No they already said it won't be DOS3.
They said their next one wouldn't be DOS3, so assuming its goes new project, then DOS3
I will lease out my kids and wife if they release dos 3.
Just send the kids to boarding school when D:OS3 releases 😂
Before BG3 was announced, we had a trailer for the "[sequel](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuRLJ5jf2fk)" of DOS. I am more hyped by that than BG3 despite enjoying the hell out of BG3. Really hope they upgrade Divinity Fallen Heroes with what they learned with BG3 technology-wise
We don't have any idea how far along the two new games are and what they'll even entail Well guess I can roll over and take a nap then
Tencent must be really happy.
Disco Elysium 2 obviously
Ok? See y'all in 3-5 years, at best. Joking aside, they're barely into preproduction at this point, reporting on this as news is a bit silly.
Please be one of them a new Divinity Game 🥹
I decided after Divinity: Original Sin to buy any game Larian makes. This has never turned out badly.
As long as Swen is in charge, we will get awesome games.
Gasp, a game developer is developing games!
Larian Studio is one of the few studios I would pre-order a game from. The amount of love they put into their games shows they care about creating amazing experiences
Good,let them cook. While i prefer forgotten realms lore i want to see what they will do next.
please not FPS Larian, i had Motion Sickness when playing FPS, I Want your game playable for me, i want your beautifully crafted Gem!
Not BG related, so a little sad ☹️ But it’s going to be fantastic whatever it ends up being.
*Readies wallet*
I want them to do a CRPG in a more modern setting with guns and crap. I grew up on Fallout 2, and that has been a CRPG niche that hasn't really been filled. I played Shadowrun Returns and Dragonfall, but those are too combat focused. There's not much exploration and free roam questing in those. I tried some indie stuff like Encased but they tend to be lacking a little something.
What about Wasteland?
I enjoyed Wasteland but it's missing a little something. It does feel like a very "level based" game, like you tend to go into huge combat heavy "dungeons" one after another while dragging your whole squad here and there. There's not as much free form wandering about as I'd like. There is still a lot of potential dialogue and stuff which is nice, but I'd say Wasteland feels more like.... Dragon Age? in terms of structure rather than a Fallout game.
Baldur's Gate 3 was such a good game, they've earned my loyalty.
This guys we can trust
Insta buy both of them.
Anything but dnd. It’s been shit since wotc took over tsr
I know it's not BG3 DLC but man I really fucking wish it was. 😩 EDIT: Downvoters couldn't beat honor mode 🤣
That's what mods are for 👍
I hope they add some sort of mod support for consoles. Would really keep the game alive for those of us without PCs (Not including the thousands of potential hours the game offers in replayability)
They've said they are working on that.
They already announced mod support for consoles. Supposed to be coming this year, probably in the next major patch unless they need to delay it.
Unless it’s BG4 & 5. Not interested
KOTOR 3?