Playing Pillars of Eternity After Baldur's Gate III
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- čas přidán 10. 09. 2024
- With the first anniversary of Baldur's Gate III having just passed and Obsidian's Avowed on the horizon, I wanted to go back to an old favorite of mine, a game widely credited with sparking the CRPG revival that led us to this point. I hope maybe others may be inspired to do the same.
But we all know that Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood is the real peak of RPGs.
Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
3:00 How Things Begin
11:22 Lore
20:21 Roleplaying Mechanics
26:21 Companions
41:17 Gameplay
44:45 Themes and Story
1:15:21 Conclusion
I start going into full spoilers in the middle of the Lore section up until the Conclusion, though Roleplaying Mechanics and Gameplay only lightly touch on certain lategame scenes.
About nature vs. nurture. If you give the egg to Laezel, she tells us at the end that she let her child choose his own path and he became a scholar. This is a way better exploration of the theme than giving the egg to the society of brilliance.
Consider that an omission on my part. I was aware of it and I think the fact that this is the least likely resolution to the quest because it requires the player to only half-complete it means the game overall still has the iffy exploration of the theme. But it would have still been good to bring this up
@@echobizarre I am very certain that she tells the player to give her the egg the moment it is picked up. I would say that this is pretty hard to miss.
I just double checked and she does get the conversation notifier right after you pick up the egg where she suggests keeping the egg ourselves, but apparently getting the ending requires the egg to be in her inventory at the moment the game ends, so if you have it in camp for carry weight reasons and forget then you can still miss out
@@echobizarre right, but the game is full of stuff like that - easily missed. I can think of so many examples, more minor ones as well as more game-changing ones.
Also, unrelated to the egg, but something else you said: that Gale had the least traumatizing relationship with Mystra. He's the only companion whom you have to talk out of ending their life. He has a people pleaser profile because of his trauma. The trauma being the fact that the godly personification of all magic groomed him when he showed signs of being gifted as a kid. Mystra has done this before btw.
@@dopaminedrought395 I didn't say least traumatizing, I said least dramatized. As in, we only see one interaction between Gale and Mystra directly and while Gale talks about his relationship with her a few times, the specific threat of the orb seems to take priority away from really exploring their relationship dynamic (which is pretty understandable).
Also apparently the current version of Mystra is actually the same age as Gale since different people take up her mantle, but maybe I was misinformed about that - as I said in the video I'm not super knowledgeable about the Forgotten Realms pantheon
One thing not mentioned about the Pillars disposition system when visible that I really appreciated: Clarity of tone, no more of those classic rpg moments where I think I'm saying one thing click it and realize that's not how the writers meant it and now I actually insulted someone I meant to compassionate to of whatever and I'm considering how long ago my last save is.
Yeah, it's really great that you can toggle which bits of extra information the game gives you, because 'tone' is such a hard thing in text and I almost always want some clarification on it, but I almost never want the 'this will influence this specific sub-group', positive or negative, info, and the choice is just so very nice.
Pillars Of Eternity DLC The White March was the first time I, as the player, grew alongside my character. The entire time there's this powerful item that could change the a lot for the player and for the surrounding town. But along the way to acquire this damned thing, there's so much hassle, so much fighting and backstabbing and just straight up exhausting. When it finally got to the part where I got to make a decision on what to do with this item, I mindlessly clicked to keep it for myself, but then the other characters pushed back. They were angry, they were spouting threats, not at me but at each other. I was tired of it. And I honestly didn't know how I was going to solve this peacefully while keeping the damned thing. So I said fuck it, no one should have it. None of them are uncorruptable that I'd feel comfortable letting them keep it. None of them are free of sin from what they did. or what they plan to do. And I, what am I going to do with it? Personal gain, but I'd be a hypocrite. So being tired of it all (the conflict between the groups, and being pressured by them to make a choice) I decided to destroy it.
I was surprised myself, because in RPGs the whole gist of it is get the item. Get stronger. No one else but you can wield power without corruption. Yada yada. But in the DLC, it really changed my mind on the matter. And the characters reacted to it in such a way that made me feel that surprise even more. The entire time I talked to them, I kept telling them I'll take it, I'll weild it honourably. But I knew I couldn't. So i learned. I changed my mind. I could have tried, idk how the ending would change. But in that story, in that playthrough, I decided no. I didn't think i was more worthy than anyone else. Or that I could wield it in a way that wouldn't eventually lead to disaster.
Anyway long story short, great game. Great DLC. Also this is a good video, keep it up!
Haha, great story. I have POE 1 & 2, & all 3 DLC for 2 only, no DLC for 1. I hacked POE 1 (as I do with all single player games since the 90's), gave myself all 99 stats. So my wizard was killing every mob with just 1 shot. Haven't been able to find the stats in 2, just money, so it's good enough for me.
Hey that’s a beautiful moment to share thank you
The way your "learn" about your own character's past in both their present and former lives through conversation choices and the way it all comes together in the climax at the end really made me reflect personally on the story and made it one of the most memorable stories I've ever played. I really hope Avowed can capture some of that magic even though it's going to be a much different style of storytelling.
I think a major factor in favor of PoE's Eora is the fact that it isn't a setting in perpetual stasis. The weight of the past on the present is obviously a big part of the first game as you outlined, and in Deadfire themes of colonialism, empire and social change are much more pronounced - things that require a world and societies that change. The way that technology, economy, and social systems are interleaved each other is important and feels entirely absent in the Forgotten Realms.
I was pleasantly surprised to discover that when I revisited it a few years ago. I was pretty young when it came out, and while I enjoyed the game well enough, I don't think I actually connected the dots on the whole colonialism situation, or the fact that this in game history was more than set dressing. Fantasy has such a problem with revisiting the same feudal social structures over and over again, but rarely ever thinking about them, how they come to be, and how they come to end. It usually ends up romanticizing them too. It was refreshing to realize how much the game was willing to engage with its own world, and the history they wrote with it. The lore of Pillars reminds me a lot of Ann Leckie's The Raven Tower. Both are grounded and material looks at what life might be like in a world where gods are facts of life who regularly act upon the world.
Also the soundtrack of Pillars of Eternity 1&2 and White March expansion does not get enough recognition.
It's simple but beautiful.
I listen to it almost every day when I work.
An underestimated masterpiece.
Man hearing Pillars music brings back some good memories.
shivers down the spine, doesnt it? that soundtrack is brilliant
Justin E. Bell is such a good composer, "Huana" from PoE2 is one of my favorite game tracks ever
To this grognard, it was a return to my childhood. The soundtrack is a love-letter to old school classics like Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale, and Dragon Age: Origins. First time hearing it when I finally got my hands on my own copy of the game and started to make a character made me misty eyed.
Same man.. ;-;
PIllars has the best music out of any CRPG ever, IMO
I like to use this definition: CRPGs like Baldur's Gate 3 and Dragon Age Origins are like watching The Lord of the Rings while CRPGs like Baldur's Gate 1, 2, Pillars 1, 2 and the Pathfinder games are like reading The Lord of the Rings.
Both are great and I definitely have tons of fun with the more cinematic "hollywood-like" approach of BG3 but to me nothing compares to the writing and lore exposition text of Pillars for example. Also as someone who spent my entire life playing JRPGs and turn based games in general, I thought at first that the real time with pause system sucked but ended up liking it so much after it "clicked" with me that nowadays I prefer the tactical and positional aspect of RTwP more than turn based.
Is there a guide somewhere that explains how real-time with pause combat works?
In Pillars, I couldn't figure out the controls beyond clicking on the enemy (the list of controls in the options is so large, that I can't even tell which ones are relevant).
Love that. I think dos2 is a perfect blend of the two, personally.
That's a great way to put it.
@@user-df5nb8zy7e 'Real-time with pause' just means that combat plays out real-time, but you can pause at will to strategize and input commands. Its like blending an RTS (real-time strategy) with a turn-based game. So hit pause whenever you need to check something, select abilities, move multiple characters at once, etc.
For Pillars, the exact controls aren't too important. All that's important to know is 'spacebar' pauses the game; 1-5 selects your party members; use the mouse to select abilities on the UI and select targets.
I couldnt agree more.
Him: "Turn of the century"
Me: Wait, there were no computers in... oh. Oh. He means 2000. I'm old.
28 subs is insanely low for the quality of the video. New sub
i love pillars, BGIII, and Pathfinder. i feel like they are different flavors that scratch different itches, to mix metaphors.
Damn, I thought this was a well established channel. Subbed and liked to help bring attention!
Agree
Subbed
Pathfinder kingmaker is what finally got crpgs to click with me then i tore through pillars 1 and divinity and i cant get enough crpgs
That was a great video dude 👍
Some fun facts regarding the Nature vs. Nurture theme of BG3:
- If you place the Githyanki egg in Lae'zel's inventory and convince her to abandon Vlaakith, she would end up raising him after the main story and it is implied in the epilogue that he would grow up to be a good person.
- Withers implied that the reason he was able to resurrect the Dark Urge, getting rid of their urges in the process, is because they gradually built a new identity through their journey and the people they connected with along the way, companions and otherwise. Thus when Bhaal reclaim his blood from the Dark Urge, he was not able to reclaim the person they've developed into (though i suppose this could be somewhat unrewarding if you gave into the urges at all possible instances right up until this moment).
- If you decide to turn Karlach into a Mindflayer, she would tell you that while she feels sad that a lot of what constitutes her identity has changed (such as her love for mutton chops), she still makes an effort to hold onto her morals by only consuming brains of people at death's doors, not only to sustain herself and minimize harm but also preserving their memories (Which is interesting if one consider the theory of Emperor's corruption via consumption of wicked people, as it would mean that Karlach gets to maintain her alignment because of her compassion while Baldurian lost his due to apathy to lowlifes).
So I guess BG3's stand on this theme is that even though nature has a major impact, it is ultimately how one nurtures oneself and others that decide who one is as a person.
Kinda wish they did more with the theme, maybe making it the main one in the 3rd Act like "Grief" in Act 2 (though I'm not sure if it is even possible considering the gigantuan number of questlines that concludes in the final stretch of the game).
Those facts are quite fun.
I think that the stance you describe is probably what the narrative intent was (I mean, that's more or less a dialogue option you can say to Ptaris) but for the reasons I outlined in the video I think they kept undermining themselves too much to get there which is unfortunate
Pillars of Eternity and its DLC was an amazing experience for me... eventually.
Before I managed to get a full playthrough done, I played the first 2-5 hours of the game around 8 times over the course of a year, always running into some issue that stopped me from commiting myself to seeing it through.
I backed it on kickstarter and followed along, cheering, as the stretch goals were fullfilled and grew the castle dungeon. When I finally got my hands on the game, I was mesmerized by the end result, but as I started to build out my understanding of the world, the lore, the disposition system and the themes of the story and character building, I started to grow unhappy with my character build and choices. Shortly after reaching the castle and starting to explore the dungeon beneath, I decided to start over.
This time, I was intending on "gaming the system", using my better understanding of the world and the knowledge of the first ten hours of the game to build my character in the direction I wanted. This time, I got around half way to my previous stopping point before feeling like the character wasn't working. Even with the knowledge of the events, I was not able to navigate it to achieve the outcomes that would be satisfying to the character I was playing, the game simply didn't let me "game" the story.
The third time I decided to try building a very lore-anchored character, to see how the world react, so I went for a death godlike, and was immediately put off by the fact that everyone greeted in the exact same way as any other character, no change in tone what-so-ever. I'm sure there are consequences to being a death godlike at pivotal moments in the story, but I couldn't role-play the character with everyone greeting me with the same cheery disposition as if I was playing a normal human. So I started over yet again.
After this I tried getting into it a few times over a year, but never stuck to it, often because too much time passed between sessions that I had lost the feel for the character I was intending to play.
In the end, I made a very bland character, male human fighter, without any real idea about who this character was supposed to be. I focused on the choices I was presented with in the moment, trying to make the right ones to the ends I wanted, based on what I what information I had and my own morals, rather than gaming it for a specific outcome or trying to play a pre-defined character. That's when everything clicked and I was completely hooked.
Baldur's Gate 3 feels like a classic fable with fairly straight forward morals and subtext. It's a honest hero tale and doesn't overplay its hand. I think it fits what BG3 was trying to achieve with putting the characters and their journey at the center of it. BG3 feels like delicious chicken and noodle soup, that last for 100 hours+ per meal. It's nothing incredibly deep, but it's the most charismatic RPG I ever played. Pillars always came off to me as a very well written book, but without the charisma of its characters to carry it well enough. It failed to keep my attention, I dropped it 20-25 hours in. I wanna go back to Pillars 2 instead if I go back to that series. The philosophical merits of Pillars still stays with with me though, I'm very interested in checking out Avowed.
I don't know by what process the Rhythm of the Al'gor went, "Eenie meenie miney moe, this one!" and shot this video into the stratosphere, but I'm really glad it did. It's a very even-handed take on the games that I would never have found otherwise - it gives words to some feelings I had playing through BG3 and thinking back to PoE. BG3 is _an absolute blast_ to play, but it can feel a bit scattershot at times; almost like the DM had ten modules they wanted to run but was afraid to pick just one, so the campaign ended up being a disjointed collage of Descent into Avernus, Spelljammer, and half of RA Salvatore's opus mulched together. It does so much that it often feels like you're not doing _anything._
I feel that a lot of contents were just put into the game just for "advertising" sake, Hasbro had to advertise for its d&d modules like Descent to Avernus and ride the success of mind flayers induced by Stranger Things.
My super nerdy nitpick of BG3 is that Sarevok and Viconia are both the wrong sort of evil.
Even if you don't redeem Sarevok he doesn't really serve Bhaal, he wants to replace Bhaal or in Throne of Bhaal he wants you to replace Bhaal. Having him show up and just be a big cultist man didn't sit well with his characterisation either of his previous appearances or Throne of Bhaal epilogue.
Viconia is a bit better in that in BG2 she's basically got the same kind of deal as Shadowheart in that she's a Shar cleric who isn't characterised as being overtly scenery chewing evil, and she got where she was because she didn't want to do a really evil thing to someone she cared about and in game its presented as being an improvement for her to be a cleric of Shar instead of a cleric of Lolth. There was possibly something there that could work with Viconia/Shadowheart and cycles of abuse but I didn't really feel Larian pulled it off. Her Romance is one of the more interesting ones in BG2 and with a good character explicitly redeems her if followed to its conclusion which makes her showing up and being much a worse person than she ever was in BG2 kind of suck.
Something I thought of during the "How the Fallout Show Handled the NCR" debate is that if there's a game series with a branching narrative and a sequel comes out that takes things in a direction you don't like, you can just... say it happened in a different route. Alternate universe. My Independent New Vegas ending didn't lead to New Vegas being (maybe?) destroyed in the show's timeline, that's a Legion ending I didn't do, and so on. BG3 is a sequel to the route in BG2 without Viconia being redeemed.
Cope? Perhaps. Healthier than raging? Absolutely
BG3 would have been better if it had nothing to do with the old games. Some of the memberberries were decent in isolation, but as a whole I felt the 'Baldur's Gate' stuff in BG3 were shoehorned and existed to justifying the game carrying the BG name. The Mind Flayer and tadpole story was good enough to stand on its own.
@@nicholasrova3698 It was extremely weird for me to have BG2 characters playable in BG3. These are the guys that could kill gods by the end of BG2 and now they're just weak level 10 nobodies?
@@nicholasrova3698 I think the opposite, we should have had more references to old games, Act 3 only is a bit brutal with how big the game is. Minsc and Jaheira should've been companions from Act 2 or even earlier. I also would love some references to Xan and Imoen.
@KasumiRINA I've always loved Xan and would have been so jazzed to see my favorite chronically depressed enchanter.
Amazing video. I finished Pillars of Eternity two weeks ago, and now have moved on to Deadfire. All of these games are the genre's very best, but I do think Baldur's Gate 3 missed a lot of marks in the story, specially in the third act. In my opinion, the world setting of Eora is incredible, and vastly more interesting than Baldur's Gate 3's setting. Everyone who enjoys RPGs should play these games a try.
Thank you so much!
Funnily enough I think Act One is my own least favorite part of BG3. Act Three definitely has a lot that feels maybe unfocused or unfinished but also a lot of good resolutions to the game-long side arcs and it's satisfying to be playing with your full build. Act One has a lot of good stuff with the companions and is a great introduction to the game but the goblin plot isn't as meaty as taking down Ketheric or exploring the city
The third act in BG3 was clearly cut way down.The player was suppose to go into the upper city and have some adventures there and all that was cut. So I disagree with you that it missed the mark the studio just ran out of time so they had to conclude the game. As for as Pillars never played it heard about it of course .I doubt though that world of Pillars come close to the forgotten realms as far as amazement value goes. There wasn't time to do the forgotten realms D and D justice in one game.
To me Pillars is peak worldbuilding. Funny enough I started replaying pillars 1 a few days ago and it really feels like this game still holds up so well compared to other rpgs
@@ANGRYWOLVERINE2060-ft2ncyou should play pillars before voicing a comparison. You won't regret it.
BG3 is stuck in Faerun, the McDonald's of fantasy settings.
Frankly amazing what they did with it lol would have been nice of they finished the third act though.
Fantastic video. Even post-BG3, I think the pillars series is the gold standard for modern RPG world building and story telling.
Pillars 1 is like my BG1. The nostalgia attachment is real and that first play through was unlike any other.
Keep up the great work.
It could be the gold standard if they got rid of the bad baggage of past games. Not being voiced and having pause and play gameplay basically ended the franchise. People bought the nostalgia for the 1st game but almost nobody came back for the sequel for a reason.
@@CC-of5xl no, you.
@@CC-of5xl "Nobody came back for the sequel" is first of all wrong, second of all the sequel's issues had nothing to do with voiceacting - which it had, or pause and play.
Horribly disjointed main story, extremely polarising exploration mode, "pirate" setting, ...
@@jerrywheyland7324 Pirate setting is great, it made Greedfall stand out among 100s of medieval European meadow field of boredness with population density of wild west trope.
@@KasumiRINA I think one of the DEVs is on record saying the pirate setting (it's not supposed to be one, but was viewed as such by players) wasn't received well.
Standing out isn't necessarily a good thing.
Personally I can't get into POE2 at all while POE1 is my all-time favourite setting and top 3 crpg.
I loved Pillars' attribute and disposition checks in dialogue, and found playing with all the meta tags hidden was very immersive. Deadfire went even further with that insane mutual companion relationship counter. I've heard talks where Josh Sawyer said he feels they went way too far with those systems and they didn't turn out how he liked, but I still loved playing with them.
I liked BG3 as a party game, but as a story nothing tops Disco Elysium and the narratives it presented. This is truly the most unique of it's kind
It's a damn shame how things went down at Za/um after it came out. DE was so good, and I would've loved to see what that team might've done next
Can confirm Divinity: Original Sin 1 did not let you play as companions, because your player characters were a set of 2 source hunters. On the other hand, the game did play around with personality dispositions in that game, since your central pair could have very different outlooks on the world. The game gave you moments to react to things (which usually had a personality tag) and your 2 PCs could disagree about it--in some cases, where the moment was about how to resolve a situation, there was even an argument mechanic (it wasn't very good, but it was there).
Hey, this is genuinely my favorite CRPG analysis video essay thingy that I've ever seen, and I have watched a lot of BG3 content. I'm also so glad to find a fellow Grieving Mother enjoyer in the wild. She's so cool conceptually and... as a vibe?
so glad the algorithm put this in my recs! I've been replaying the obsidian crpgs (pillars 1 and 2 + tyranny) this summer and loving my revisit to the older favorites. excellent video, thank you!
18:25 A Taskmaster reference inside a great video essay talking about Pillars of Eternity?! Well sir, you've rightfully earned a new subscriber!
I hope I get five points
Both Pillars of Eternity games feel like a meaningful journey.
All Larian games honestly feel like a dark comedy amusement parks with a weird emphasis on animal cruelty.
Basically, if PoE was all Iselmyr dialogue and using Critter Cleaver, it could have been a perfect Larian game.
Great video, have been playing pillars the full way through for the first time recently it is awesome
Amazing analysis. I was a backer for PoE and was disappointed at first - misplaced nostalgia - but going back to the two really makes me love them now. BG3 was great, great reactivity AND great presentation, but it felt very constrained by sticking to the crackpot DnD lore and the changes they made to it I don't think were the best. Not to mention, I don't really like the learing romance scenes, though I guess they are very popular among a general audience and got a lot of people to experience CRPGs for the first time and loved it. I got my wife to play Pillars and Deadfire after loving BG3 and now she's a fan of the subgenre. Again, great video, keep up the work!
I hope you enjoy the backer achievement that non-backer completionists must hate with a passion like Magran's flames
I couldn't agree more, BG3 feels very contrained world wise, it's very bland with little actual story being added.
Compared to DOS, pillars, pathfinder, all those game series actually expand the story of the world they are set in.
DnD remains the static world that doesn't change, while the worlds of DOS and pillars in particular shake on their very foundations.
Echo said BG3 feels like a DnD campaign and that's both praise and criticism and very aptly so.
I'm glad Larian isn't making BG4 and DOS being a more intresting universe along with them having more freedom in their own IP is a big reason why.
I started playing bg3 because I heard you could fuck a bear. 300
hours later and I havent fucked anything. Playing Dos:2 and afterwards going to play pathfinder:wotr
I share this sentiment re: lore when it comes to BG3 and specifically DoS 2. The lore and setting are just so disjointed and all over the place. The Forgotten Realms are just so cooked now. While the "kitchen sink" vibe is fun as a sandbox, PoE (especially Deadfire) built what felt like a living breathing conceivable world. The history mattered. Factions where more rooted. That's special.
@tobiasL1991 I think the thing I hate most about WotC is why they don't let people use the ruleset for other lore setting in a video game. DnD is actually a good system, it is a great balance between flexible RP and Strategy depth. I use a slightly altered form of DnD rules for dming (as I bet 95% of people do) but I don't give a crap about the lore, which like he said is coated in racist tropes and bad world design. I would absolutely kill to have a video game that is like "Ivanhoe with magic" and using DnD rules. You could make a really funny game spoofing medieval tropes and have some cool strategic combat and a great journey, but WotC wants to sell their campaigns badly to the 5% dopes who slurp up all the garbage they pump out.
No RPG will every be "perfect" and that's a good thing. BG3 took the genre to new heights along many different dimensions making it a worthy GOAT if ever there was. But that doesn't mean it was the best at absolutely everything. The fact they are still tinkering with the thing means there was a lot left that could be better. And I do think game makers will keep trying to do better, its just that at the scale BG3 is, that's an incredible feat to pull off, one we likely won't see for a while yet.
The beginning of BG3 bothered me too. Until I heard a particular fan theory: the nautiloid went rogue kidnapping random people because The Emperor broke free from the Elder Brain and assembled a team to defeat the brain once and for all. Meaning The Emperor was the one to infect the player and all their companions.
What I find to be the greatest strength of BG3's story is the focus on character. Suddenly this plot contrivance to kick off the story gives us more insight into The Emperor's mind. My eyes used to glaze over when people talked about vampire weaknesses and hierarchy. But throw in a lovable character whose suffering is a direct result of being a vampire, suddenly I know everything there is to know about vampires. I'm not a fan of sci-fi elements in my fantasy narratives. But ground that aspect of the story using one alien companion having the worst day of her life and I'd raze the cosmos for her. I usually roll my eyes at the themes of destiny and the gods in a game, but throw in a man used and discarded by a particularly slappable god? Steal the agency and sanity of my player character? I'm ready to fight the whole damn pantheon.
Edit: I also want to go out and defend Orin here. On my first playthrough, she did not leave much of an impression on me. However, after playing as the Dark Urge, that changed completely. Orin mirrors what the Dark Urge used to be and who they would still be if Orin had not lobotomized them, unintentionally giving them the chance to start a new life. Her great act of vengeance against her sibling saved them. I don't know what thematic lesson is to be learned there, just a tragedy to mull over. One child of Bhaal was able to escape his influence while the other was completely consumed by it. If Orin had her memory erased would there be a person left to even fight for her independence? What caused the Dark Urge's inherent resistance against Bhaal? Does Orin deserve a second chance, the same as the Dark Urge. Did the Dark Urge deserve theirs?
Also, also, Astarion's story ends with a similar moral dilemma. If he resists the ritual, you have to make the decision of whether the spawn deserve a second chance. They could unleash carnage on the world, but does that justify punishing crimes pre-emptively and indiscriminately? If you think Astarion deserved his second chance, what makes the spawn any different?
My problem with Pillars is that I spent 180 hours playing it about 4 years ago and I can barely remember it. I don't think I'll ever forget BG3. I also had the same experience as you in wanting to immediately replay BG3, something I've never really had with any CRPG before. I think it is the interactiveness and flexibility; the ability to solve problems in multiple ways.
Dude, same. I was on a CRPG binge at the time, beat Pillars, planned to go into Deadfire immediately after, but was just burned out on the genre (and the engine used to make it). Now starting Deadfire is a bit of a task, because I remember next to none of it.
Its probably because its so verbose and overly wordy you can tend to zone out a bit sometimes when reading? I'm not sure. But I definitely remember BG3, and I played it prior to Pillars, IIRC
Funny how for me it's exactly the other way round - the story and writing in bg3 were so bad and the ending so stupid that i didn't want to touch this game ever again. And that's considering the fact that i love forgotten realms.
Problem with Pillars was it lacked the two core things that make a CRPG hook. Strong characters & interesting mechanics. The mechanics all feel very homogenized & flat, overly balanced with no discernable way to gain any edges by choosing one thing over another. I'm sure there are some ways to do this later, but in the first portion of the game it seems like your choices make no difference.
Even worse, I couldn't tell you even one character from Pillars even though I put about 10h into it before I gave up.
i remember the white march DLC very well and most of the key moments of the main quest, but the companion quests kinda sucked
Amazing analysis, I played pillars of eternity when I was younger and never fully understood all of its themes but it stuck with me and was in the end the reason for why I love crpgs in this style so much. This was very heartwarming for me to watch and I thank you for it.
I think part of the beauty of having such strong themes is that it's never really something you fully understand, or at least not in the same way that you might fully understand a story that is more surface level. Good themes are like a mirror in that they reflect back parts of yourself at the time.
I would say Baldur's Gate 3 has the best story written by Larian in all their games, having played D:OS and 2, Dragon Commander, and Divinity 2. Even as recent as D:OS 2, their story structure had some tongue and cheek-ness to it that gave it a "Fun B Movie" level vibe. So, in comparison, Baldur's Gate 3 is leaps and bounds improvement on their story structure and narrative development. But I am not surprised Pillars of Eternity under Josh Sawyer's lead development within Obsidian would be able to create a tighter and more cogent narrative and story structure.
the only other Larian game I've played so far is D:OS2 but I agree, I was pretty impressed with the improvement in writing despite me feeling certain aspects don't live up to something like Pillars
I feel like DOS2 had interesting characters on paper but struggled to keep them interesting afterwards. It doesn't help that most of Act1 is some kind of weird retrospective on DOS1 despite being 1000 years later
This video is made for me. Any content on CRPGs is always appreciated. And I, personally, loved Pillars, both 1 and 2. The writing is very compelling. Wish someone gave Obsidian BG3 levels of funding to create Pillars 3 so they can improve on the parts Pillars 1 and 2 lack. I have room in my heart for a lot more CRPGS.
if they made pillars 3 trash turn based i would finally have to go through with my suicide threats
@@ricardosantos6721 I prefer real time with pause also, but turn based isn't that bad if done right. The turn based they added to PoE 2 left a lot to be desired since the game wasn't designed for it.
Glad to see some nice Pillars coverage. Much love went into its creation, so it’s nice to see it being recognized.
Pillars has the best class in any RPG, the Cipher. It's really the only good dedicated only STR/INT class in any RPG tabletop or otherwise, that I know, aside from Fromsoft or Bethesda games where you can use magic and melee at the same time.
The real magic though is the world. It is so damn unique and interesting. Two major cultures based on the cultures of the Pacific Islands that developed in different ways, Deadfire literally being one of the few good pirate games, and the whole overarching arc with the gods who aren't really gods, both with Thaos in 1 and Eothas in 2. It's all stuff that you rarely see in the RPG space.
Most CRPGs like Pathfinder and BG give you a set of choices that range from good to evil. I prefer the style of Bioware, CDPROJEKT and Obsidian RPG's however. They give you choices that mostly feel like moral dilemmas. I prefer that style. The good or evil style isn't any worse though, since they cater to roleplaying different characters better than the dilemma style, and can still be well written. I just prefer the harder, moral dillema choices.
What an interesting and thoughtful video, many thanks! I'll share my perspective on PoE. The game was released when we were expecting or second child. I did not have that much time to play the game so I used the story mode. It turned out to be the most emotional gaming experience of my life. The theme of hollow born children in general and grieving mother's story in particular hit hard and left a deep print in my memory. It is a very well told game that I much recommend - even if it is just for the reading.
yeah a lot of people have commented who hate RTwP, I say there's no shame in using story mode just to experience a great story if that gameplay style is so annoying to them. And damn I can only imagine what it's like to experience the Hollowborn plot while actively expecting a child
Hey twin so I actually got Pillars of Eternity on PS4 and I was playing it alot before Baldur's Gate 3 came out and then I spennt all of my time into Baldurs. So I haven't been able to go back to Pillars of Eternity so this video is like right up my alley thank you so much for making it
I have absolutely adored and loved just about every CRPG I've ever played. There was a time where Pillars was my all-time favorite and I played through it from start to finish multiple times. This also became true for DoS: 2 when that took the mantle of my favorite and has now been unseated by BG3. I literally still have not stopped playing it and don't plan on stopping anytime soon, even after dumping 800 hours into it. Larian did a wonderful job of adapting DnD mechanics into a PC game and I mostly agree with their changes to the rules. Their presentation is hands down the best I've ever seen in this style of game and their dedication to continued updates is unmatched.
edit: It seems like you put a lot of effort into such a long video that I'm sure is MUCH longer in your editing timeline, good stuff!
45:38 This had me in stitches.
And the rest of the video is amazing! I love both Pillars and BG3, and I agree with most of the video. Thank you for your work!
the thing about mindflayer Karlach: the Baldur's gate 3 doesn't spell it out but the tadpole literally eats the brain of infected person. Yes, it absorbs their memories, so the first person they eat has the strong influence... at least at first. The tadpole can grow and infect incredible variety of creatures leading to different end products but if they do not have this big, intelligent first brain to eat they just grow into neothelid: blind, driven purely by instinct, unable to speak, unable to learn.
I do understand why they would be categorized as evil by the designated prey species.
But the gith thing is just plain stupid (even just in this game, in githyanki colony, you do see records of githzerai present. THE SAME species, simply living in different conditions, already in the lore: morally neutral, philosophical, independent. the "nature vs nurture" debate was already solved before it was actually introduced)
Yeah again the game's nature vs nurture stuff is messy, I would have loved a sidequest to see githzerai society for the counterbalance rather than it being in easily missable books and side-conversations. I'm not counting Orpheus and Voss because neither are really with the githzerai during the game
I would consider the whole existing mindflayer lore to be completely irrelevant to this game, a mindflayer with memories of the previous host isn't supposed to exist and is supposed to herald the end of their civilization. Yet this game seems to treat the netherese infused tadpoles more like a transformation where your brain is left intact and just your shell that changes, but not your brain. But then it also influences your apostolic afterlife (but not really, because even as a mindflayer you can encounter withers in an epilogue cutscene if you decide to end things as a mindflayer durge). Or basically to say, there's no sense in analyzing mindflayers in this game, because it seems even the writers leave it quite open or contradict themselves on what the hell ceremorphosis even entails in this game.
@@studentt6064 good point, they really did screw up the lore part
Obsidian makes some of the best RPG stories in games ever!
Too bad they lost Avellone. Him and Sawyer carried Obsidian and Avellone is gone and Sawyer has recently said he doesn't think he'll make another RPG.
@@CC-of5xl shame. Fallout 2, Planescape Torment and KOTOR 2 were easily three best written RPGs of all time. All of them a broken unifinished mess on release to various degrees. But then again, Torment: Tides was a slog to read through I wish it had more combat and less than hour to go through one screen of dialogue so maybe Chris Avellone just not as good anymore.
I feel like the comparison of calling POE a book is perfect. I find it near impossible to actually get into Pillars of Eternity because i just dont have the time to read a good book, and i feel like i just haven't had the time for like 8 years straight. The games still sitting there waiting to be played. I think i might try to get back into it again now after watching this.
Books require a bit more deliberate time commitment these days. Just recently it took me about a year to finish Ursula K. Le Guin's The Farthest Shore even though I really liked it (and also it's a kid's book lol) just because I wasn't making the time for it, which is a shame.
Just try it my way. Do not haste at all cost and pretend to "I have to finish the first act in one day" - it is wrong.
This game feels perfect when you go through in small steps because there are many texts, many quests and trying to complete them all in one while can frustrate that "you have no so much time to do it".
I haven't played PoE, but WotR is my favorite even after playing BG3. It's just how the characters are written and how epic some of the moments, how much variety there is in builds, how interesting the various zones are, how much depth there is in the campaign. I think WotR writes the shades of evil better than BG3.
Evil path is the only real problem of BG3 to me. It's crazy how good pays ALWAYS more than evil.
It's like the game has a moral message, but then, evil falls flat : beside psychos, who would be evil in a world where you never get anything out of it ?
I think they simply ran out of time. Considering the huge scope of the game...
@@aerkel4860 not only that, but some choices a character could make (like siding with the druids against the tieflings) are objectively stupid in-game and gives you no reward at all. Being xenophobic with the tieflings is basically worse for the game than just killing them.
For me it's pre and post BG3 Era. I prefer a rich Story over Combat in my RPGs. For 23 Years it was Planescape:Torment. Now I wish for Larian's way of storytelling for a remake of that Epic. BG3 is the Standard for me and after 4 playthroughs I'm still enjoying all the different ways to play it.
Basically Pillars of Eternity is a game ran by someone who really cares about world detail and lore of his setting, but can be so deeply interested in it, that kinda omits the fact that combat encounters might feel a bit boring and main story while has lots of detail, to be frank, isn't really interesting to follow, even if it has pretty good payoffs.
In the contrast - Baldur's Gate 3 is a game by carefree DM who bought bunch of D&D rulebooks, glanced over them, saw some cool names and decided to make game, where he and group of people are UNDER BIG THREAT AND HAVE TO DEAL WITH SHIT FAST! But as soon as someone asks him for details, he gives haphazard answer, trying to badly remember what was in the books and half-makes it up, and his explanation for inconsistancies is "Ah, don't think too hard of it"!
Both can run great campaigns for right crowd.
Something I also remember is Josh Sawyer said recently his reluctance to do PoE3 was because of how big the budget went to presentation in BG3 and how his tastes in romance and plot just wont vibe with the BG3 crowd. While I totally agree Obsidian would need a massive budget, studio expansion, and lots of time to make PoE3 at BG3 presentation quality (and I completely doubt Microshit will give them any of that without 3x the control) I disagree that the BG3 crowd wouldn't enjoy something cerebral and thoughtful that the Pillars series offers. I think the biggest criticism I here from people who got into CRPGs from this game is the variety and how the stories are kinda samey. I think the thing that keeps BG3 people playing is the great combat encounters and level design, and while the c&c is pretty good and the characters dialogue is great, there's not much interesting in the story. I think if the stars align, a high budget PoE3 game would totally be worth it, socially and fiscally, but it seems Sawyer is pretty cynical as a career veteran and I think Avellone burnt all his bridges (I can't tell who's right in the drama, since Avellone is the only one who is talking about his side of the story, but he certainly makes himself out to be a victim and a lost artist. While I love everything he's worked on, I can't help be suspicious of that kind of attitude)
Yeah I don't think that BG3-only fans would dislike something more cerebral as long as it had the same presentation style, which is obviously where all the budgetary concerns come into play. I think Sawyer was so burned out after PoE2's development and initial commercial failure that he's a bit harder on himself than he should be
@@echobizarre something I loved about the Outer Worlds was being wingman for Parvati. It's something I think everyone who I've talked to loved about that game. I think you can totally do creative kinds of "romance" plots with characters, but the learing "imma segs you and -fix you-" plots only work on sexy bisexual characters who have no personal tastes. to me, it really kills my imersion in the story and turns into romance novel type shit, but I genuinely think people who like the dating-sim aspect of BG3 would love more complex romance RPG questlines, because every girl who's into RPGs I've talked to said explicity as such. It would be cool to play a game were a totally sexy badass is only into dwarf players, or a game where you start a romance but fall out and can't fix it, but you chose how to handle the breakup. That is super interesting to me, and I think BG3 is a very clear example of how learing Romance is very bad, especially when pretty clearly designed "ideal endings" are dependent on Romance.
If you couldn't tell, Karlach's story killed me and I can't tell if I hate or love larian for that story, but I do think it's kinda sussy that Karlach just has variations on shit endings for her where she is the least karmically deserving of them.
Just a quick correction/more info on what Sawyer said: Josh stated that he felt as though he no longer has his finger on the pulse of what the audience wants. After the flop that Deadfire was (money wise), he seems to have lost his faith in his abilities. Or maybe he's being realistic in thinking that capturing a rapt audience involves a lot of luck as well as talent. Because he definitely is talented, but Deadfire did not do well.
That said, Sawyer also said that he holds no attachment to these projects. So he ultimately does not care where the series goes with or without him.
@cgijokerman5787 From what I got , he doesn't have a understanding or doesn't like what bg3 made so good.
It's seems like he doesn't like how BG3 wrotr their romance and how was such big reason to their success. Also he doesn't seems to be a fan of DnD 5E.
The BG3 crowd needs quirky modern writing. While BG3 is amazing it's just the quintessencial "loud is fun" trend made into a game.
BG3 and POE are both great games that deserve to exist side by side with each other, genuinely some of the best rpgs we've had in years
i think its presentation is the main reason for baldurs gates success. most people will be turned off by reading wall of texts in a game so having the game full audio, cutscenes and character closeups during dialogue made the game way more mainstream appeasing
When I saw this vid in my recommendations I was overjoyed bc the core concept alone felt like its perfectly tailored for my own interests (pillars being my favorite game and having spent most of last year being very into bg3). I honestly love this video bc you do a very deep and smart analysis about both of these games and you dont seem to be afraid to critique games that you like (which is surprisingly rare in video essays about games). I also love that you dont just tell everyone what the games are about but to proper literary analysis. Also a lot of themes and main points you bring up sound like stuff i discuss w my friends lol so maybe thats why I'm so impressed. My one critique is that you did not really talk abt bg3's theme concerning specific paternal power and how it gets introduced by Ketheric and his posessive obsession w his own daughter, then further explored through the dark urge storyline (and orin's connection to the bhaalist cult and her place within it. im thinking specifically abt what happens if you manage to break her faith a little as the dark urge). To be honest i dont think bg3's overall story works at all without a dark urge player character bc so many of the mayor themes are just so meager without it. (i also believe that the combat of pillars is a bit better bc its more suited for crpgs and not ttrpgs) Also my god rogue trader is just bad. like not in comparison to bg3 but as a story standing alone it fails to be proper narrative and its so sad bc instead of focusing on those shortcomings it really is just dumbasses crying its not like bg3. At the end of the day I dont really feel hopeful for the future of video games bc of the state of the industry and how fans are interacting w the medium but thats a different topic altogether LOL. All in all great work on this video!!!
Even as Dark Urge the story of bg3 doesnt really work all that well past act 2.
Kerthetic was the only well developed villian and once he's dead , you're left with three to four villains that are basically different versions of crazy with very little substance.
Why you dislike rogue trader story? I thought was fine.
@@alsaiduq4363 i personally found Orin very compelling but the game does not present you with a lot of easy to see options to understand her (most of the information is somewhat hidden behind specific stuff you need to do) but yeah its not the strongest narrative that ever existed for sure.
For rogue trader... i played it 3 times to see all 3 versions of the main story. There are so many setups that dong really go anywhere. Most of your actions have no lasting consequences only minor things that do not truly matter for the grand scheme of things. also this was just a thing that started to bother me but the "goodguy" options were the ones that were also flat out just better than the two other possibilites you had (as in you just got more stuff out of it) and i did not expect that sort of thing from a story set in 40k which is THE edgy grimdark setting and could be the perfect place to explore maybe some kind of moral complexity but this never happens. Also the pacing is just horrible imo after a very strong start and a good act1 act 2 drags on forever and nothing of importance happens. THEN act3 is awesome again (bc finally something happens!! ) but its followed by act4 that is just as weak as act2 was. for most of the game there is no villain at all also and the other hook of space exploration is just not done in an interesting way imo. i dont think i could have finished all 3 playthroughs if not for the combat which is blast but even then playig on hard i got the feeling that some fights are just too easy (with the exception of one specific fight being insanely harder than everything else in the game lol). like imo rogue trader is a story that ends up being about nothing and its kind of frustrating bc 40k has the potential to be interesting
That's an excellent point about paternal power, I just hadn't considered it. But that's the beauty of analysis, different things will jump out to different people.
If you want more proper literary analysis of games before I figure out what my next video is going to be you should check out Duke of Whales
@@echobizarre yeah exactly! and ty for the rec I'll check his stuff out!
@@quenthel thanks for the great answer 👍
BG3 is such an amazing game. Like yes there are issues and sometimes it can be slow and janky but god damn it it’s INSANE how every conversation could turn out 5 different ways, and they really don’t hold your hand too much through investigation and exploring. I think what really captures the heart of bg3 for a lot of players is the pure flexibility in the story telling and options you have to complete a task.
BG3 felt incredibly forced to me personally. Take for example Shadowheart. The game really just tries really hard to shove her into your party.
@@egonomics352 It really doesn't imo?
@@egonomics352 you can just refuse to have her - yes you do need the artifact to survive. thats just part of the story lol
9:12 - Barbs can jump crazy high and Wyll actually could fly, they all mention how their powers are significantly diminished after the tadpole. I assume this was Emperor after he got the prism and freed himself from the Absolute, since we see a lot of dead mindflayers on the ship. His plan was probably a desperate attempt to gather his own army which he could control via his protection, meaning "You don't obey, I let the Absolute have you" or maybe he planned to actually let them turn into mindflayers, because that's something he REALLY wants you to do later in the game. So yeah, he was probably building a rival army of mindflayers to fight the Absolute.
Also you are so right about how romance in games seems to narrow what kind of characters are created ... Bro, just throw in a few ugly ones who we won't romance, that's okay.
Really nice essay. Keep going with it, waiting for more of the kind
I always thought it was so weird how the game insists the city in the opening cutscene isn't Baldur's Gate. You can litterally find a destroyed watchtower in Baldur's Gate identical to the one knocked over by the nautiloid in the opening. It seems like Larian just changed their mind late in the process.
Fantastic analysis and comparison between the two games. Thought provoking on what the future or RPGs is.
One thing that I liked about both games was that the Monk classes were very fun to play at high levels. BG3 feels like an agile striker with somewhat more grounded but still useful abilities like stuns and other abilities… but POE’s presentation of monks feel like borderline wuxia.
I’ve yet to see another CRPG in which I can punch someone into a wall, spin-kick another dude 30 feet into the air, then flash-step past a mob of enemies while attacking all of them in the same movement so I can go full Hokuto no Ken on the dude I teleported to. This along with the darker and more contemplative aspects made PoE a 10/10 game for me.
Being limited to three followers at a time is what cripples the party banter in Baldur's Gate 3. Often you simply don't have the right combination of characters with you at the right time. Using a mod to increase party size helps a lot with this, but throws the combats entirely out of balance, unfortunately.
(Also, a quick nit-pick: you say demon multiple times when you mean devil. The distinction is very important to the lore.)
Ah damn, I'm not surprised I made that conflation, I think mentally there's a lot of overlap for me unless it's a situation like Mephistopheles in Wrath of the Righteous where the Devil/Demon difference is front and center; meanwhile only Devils are really relevant to BG3. But yeah in both TTRPG worlds I know they're quite different
If you haven't played BG3 (or Divinity OS 2) as a Origin Character (Dark Urge counts) then i strongly recommend it. As a long time Larian fan this feels like the true way to play those games. You get so much more options to express yourself and you are so tightly connected to the story. It feels really great to be entirely in control of one of the named npcs because you see the world through their eyes and get extra info based on their experiences.
My biggest issue with BG3 is the fact that i never know when im supposed to rest. I don't like resting often because it feels like im making the game way to easy. I love to get the most out of my resources and spell slots and trying to rest as few times as possible. But this way you miss out on fun interactions and character development. I wish they had some kind of optional fatigue system where it forces your character to rest when it makes sense for the story.
I had the opposite problem. I rested too often and missed out on saving a particular character.
Feels like the game doesn’t want you to have a perfect golden ending naturally. We can chalk it up to that’s just how life is I guess.
My evil run was as Dark Urge and yeah it does feel more like that's the "real" story of the game in many ways. I appreciate having the option to go for someone fully custom, a complete blank slate to make up whatever backstory you want, and I think that helps replayability, but the Dark Urge actually has a personal stake in the story like the Watcher in Pillars or the Nameless One in Planescape: Torment or the Jedi Exile in KOTOR II.
My (so far only) playthrough of DOS2 was as Lohse. I think DOS2 incentivizes you to play an Origin character more than BG3 because of the "we'll kill everyone not in your party after this point" decision, so in order to get to know as many companions as possible you have to be one yourself (which admittedly you wouldn't know going in blind like I did, I just felt like trying out an Origin, so that's more retroactive justification on my part). I also think that Lohse's whole arc is by far the best written part of an otherwise lackluster narrative, but I wonder if I'd feel the same if I'd played as a different Origin character.
@@echobizarre I played DOS2 with my Brother in co op. We really enjoyed the idea of being champions of different gods who were working together, but also competing for divinity. Depending on your choice of character your interactions with your god are completely different. The red prince for example has a completely different stroy compared to Lohse and you don't get to know the full extend of this story without playing the character yourself. Everytime your individual story progressed we would tell each other what we just experienced and it added to the mystery.
Its also funny how you criticised that the other npcs die after a certain point. We never noticed that even though we played the game twice because the other origin characters were dead at this point. I mean the story makes it clear that you are competing for divinity and your god tells you that you are the only correct choice. So ofcourse you would eliminate your competition.
And yes Lohes story is amazing :D. But thanes story is super cool as well. If you play as him you feel like you are constantly uncovering a mystery.
But i wouldn't agree that BG3 is less about origin characters. I mean the original version of the game had no customizable characters. This option was added during development because people demanded it. And yes Dark Urge feels like the true experiece ^^. But the other origin characters are amazing as well. My first playthrough was as Shadowheart. (My brother played DU as my co op partner). I was heavily immersed while playing as her. It fealt great to uncover her secrets and i had so much more agency about shadow hearts story compared to when i have her as a npc. When you play an origin character you experience the story through the viewpoint of your character which completely changes the feel of the story. You also get more unique options. I plan on playing the game with every origin character at some point and im really looking forward to getting the full gale or wyll experience next.
I can't imagine playing the game as a non origin character. It seems boring to me because you are missing out on having a unique story to change up the main story of the game. I kinda get the roleplay aspect but for me thats achieved by playing as Dark Urge. You can customize DU enough to fill every roleplay need and you still get the cool story.
Just outstanding work, subscribed. Thank you for deepening my understanding of BG3, I haven't gove it enough credit. PoE will be forever in my heart as one the first cRPG that made me love entire genre
I have a feeling that Baldur's Gate 3 is going to be an example of something that simply *never* happens again.
It has, conservatively, twelve times the budget of the next most expensive game like it. *Thirty times* the budget of Pillars 1.
Absolutely nobody is going to be given a budget like that to make a point and click turn based RPG to come out in six years. Maybe even Larian won't be able to take the risk again.
And a lot of the people who jumped onto it won't follow into the broader genre because without that production budget smoothing their way in they'll say "fuck all this reading" and bounce off.
(The other big thing that's never going to happen again is Elden Ring. Miyazaki has said he's never going to make another game that size and nobody's ever quite fully grasped the Fromsoft alchemical formula to make as compelling a soulslike).
Really well thought out and presented compare and contrast, subs +1
Thank you for the part about Grieving Mother. To be honest, when I recruited her I more or less forgot about her. She went on a few stronghold quests, I think. So yes, her perception filter worked on me, the player, as well.
Thank you for shining a spotlight on her, I really should start another playthrough.
her caul is too powerful
The gameplay/game design of BG3 is its crowning jewel for me. It's this aspect that makes me want to go back and play the game again, to see how I could approach different battles in different ways. I love the amount of freedom you get to do your own thing, I love the way that the turn based mode works in conjunction with the environmental stuff. Overall it's an insanely fun game to play. However, the story was very disappointing for me. Like you, I also think that Act 2 is the best part. I found myself so, so disappointed progressing through Act 3 and realizing that they weren't going to keep the momentum. Act 1 was simple in terms of its stories but very fun to explore, especially the underdark stuff for me, Act 2 was brilliant, and then Act 3 was also in the game.
To be honest, I also have gripes with the characters... the actors and animators did an amazing job of making them charismatic and loveable. I find all of them so fun to be around. However, I find them as characters to be quite boring. With the exception of Shadowheart, I don't think any of them have a particularly interesting or compelling story to follow. Laezel is potentially the only other, but I do think a lot of her story ends up being underbaked.
The villains are terrible imo. They had a lot of potential and none of it REALLY gets explored imho.
In my opinion BG3 characters feel like they were created by fellow players in DnD campaign while most others feel like they actually live in that world. There are pros and cons of both concepts though I personally prefer the latter rather than the former. If I wanted the BG3 type I would just play with my friends and I would not be so constrained by the simplistic ruleset that is 5e. Overall I understand why people love BG3 but its not for me.
Years later, i still go back in memory to some of the story beats of PoE characters. Durance story influenced a lot of my perspective on cleric characters.. and failed Sigani quest and follow-up ending, still hunting me.
The thing about BG3's characters having lots of options that are there "just because" struck a chord with me. BG3 is filled with options, to a crazy degree. And sometimes it feels like those options are not there for any real reason other than someone said "hey, what if the player wants to do THIS?" For someone who loves being able to do all sorts of weird crazy things it's great, but it does sometimes devalue the character interaction process with a bunch of options that don't "feel true."
This contrasts notably with the combat, where all the interactivity and ability to do weird stuff is almost always just a positive and source of fun.
This is a great video! Based on the username though, I really want to see this person make a similar analysis of the Fallen London universe (including a discussion of how the lore shifts and is handled/expanded upon in the spin-off games. Like the changes, not necessarily for the worse or the better, in how the Liberation and the Ravens were handled).
Good catch, my username (and profile pic) is a reference to that universe. Though I'm afraid I don't have much to say beyond "I like it and it's great to have non-Lovecraft cosmic horror." Maybe I'll think of an angle someday. I'm really more of a Sunless Skies fan than a Failbetter-verse fan so I don't have a franchise-wide perspective at the moment
@@echobizarre I think that the writing and tone in Sunless Sea are probably better than in Sunless Skies, though the difficulty curve is steeper (there's some good online guides if needed for starting out). Sunless Skies is still great of course.
But regardless Fallen London (the browser game) is still actively being expanded with new story arcs, mechanics, and seasonal events (which are referenced in-universe after the fact). The tigers have been up to something over the last few weeks, and everyone has been collectively putting together clues in and outside of the game to figure out what's going on.
A lot of the concepts that were explored more in Skies have since been fleshed out a bit more in the newer Fallen London content (and yes, there are premium stories, but some of those connect very smartly to the larger setting in ways that you might not expect, but make total sense).
@@jellyfishjig I have played Seas and did like it a lot but it is slower. Maybe we could compare it to the dichotomy in this video to some extent. The High Wilderness and the Unterzee are distinct settings with their own appeals and I like the Judgements being more in the focus in Skies, as well as the unique sort of melancholy in the nominally successful and ascendant British Empire that is now less at the mercy of its surroundings but now bears an emptiness
There is enough room in my heart for both, but not enough time in my life. We are overwhelmed with opportunities for amazing experiences and denied them because of time. It is no wonder why our society is becoming more entitlement-minded. When reality itself becomes your only opposition, many will start to deny reality.
Not everyone can turn out a gripping 80min video. Well done.
It was 100% the right call not to play rogue tradder on release, I did and it's literally the most bugged game I ever played, and I mainly play RPG, the jankiest genre. It's still of my favorite game of all time despite all that, but I wish my first go wasn't tainted with hours upon hours of bug fixing. I think owlcat is my favorite studio nowaday but never again will I play one of their game on release day.
Having said all that it would be cool if you made a video about the pathfinder games and rogue tradder highlighting what they do better and worse than other CRPG, you seem to be a fan too and more people need to talk about their games.
Great video. Can't wait to see more from you, dude. Keep it up. To me, Pillars of Eternity will always be that cozy pillow that I always come back to. For some reason, it feels better to me than the Pathfinder games or even Pillars' spiritual predecessors that I grew up with all those years ago. I liked BG3 well enough, but it was too flashy and it cared way too much about romances for my liking Tbh, I kinda hated most of the companions, except for Laezel who actually felt like an alien who didn't understand Faerun's culture and customs. I somehow see BG3 more like a spiritual sequel to Dragon Age: Origins than BG2, and although they are both great games, Pillars 1 will always have a special place in my heart. Thanks a lot for making this, it was great to watch.
Bravo! I call this first proper review of BG3 I've encountered. And possibly of POE too.
Something I see people these days are not getting: RPG is role PLAYING game, not role CREATING game.
You create your character into an RPG with certain leverage of choice, but your character is a character, which you play. You hear about actors who lose pounds to play a character, or go through a process that is more or less "real" called "method" (which is not really something an actor uses or not, all uses A method, and "the method" non actors often are told to ease up their understanding is one such specific method). But all because they are PLAYING a role. The writer, the screenplay writer, THEY create the role, the character PLAYS it.
I remember for example the player manuals of old RPGs, they give you a lot of tips on how to PLAY a character. If you are for example a character that has the "insane trait" (most of mine did, so I use this example), you cant spend a time "sane" just to solve a plot, or just because you, the player, is tired of playing the insane role. It is what you choose. Choice is not "freedom", choice is choice.
In BG3, good or bad writing critique aside, your character is a specific character. You know there is a difference between being the Durge, or an Origin character, and a custom character, but still, you will not be around flaunting riches and being all around a-roll class rich boy if you are playing a Forest Elf. You wont be having those options if the writer knows anything. You can see those kinds of things if you play a Forest Elf and when you talk with Khaga, you have answers as if you are well versed in Silvanus teachings whatever class you are, because as a Forest Elf, you DO.
Same about ALL options you have. Again, hard to understand by your classic "cultural dem liberal" but HAVING A CHOICE IS NOT FREEDOM.
BG3 does a really rotten job in writing, and much of it is to cater to the demented idea that players have these days that having choice is freedom, but still it follows RPG style, and still YOU HAVE A ROLE TO PLAY.
The more a game strays away from being an RPG, and try to cater to "any player", the worse it gets.
And FFS, stop saying anyone on the industry thinks BG3 is something exceptional. It is JUST POPULAR, and JUST FOR A LITTLE WHILE. You like the game, you might see it all the time, all around. People who dont care about that game, hardly see it around. It is not exceptional in code, graphics or systems. IT is just a game that make MODERATE money. Cent by Cent, FREAKING STARDEW VALLEY gives more profit than BG3.
I was playing Pathfinder Kingmaker by Owlcat games when I got Baldur's gate 3, I was constantly torn between the two, I really liked them both for different reasons. Pathfinder ruleset is just one of my favorite systems, the kingdom scope and management (and making choices as a ruler) all really spoke to me. But I also love the visual feudality, the more impressive cast of characters and the sense of impact even micro choices seemed to have in Baldur's Gate 3.
All to say, I too hope that more people will give the other CRPG's out there a chance with Baldur's Gate 3's impact, but I'm not crossing my fingers.
extremely well thought and argued. i have some small disagreements but i wish there were more youtubers this insightful and thoughtful
Great video! Some of my thoughts:
- I really hope that future devs take the BG3 combat away as a huge positive for it's success. Yes, the cinematic aspects are all nice, but the creativity you can have with approaching solving issues is second to none. I'm begging future games to PLEASE leave RTWP in the past; for me, it just feels more rewarding to actually plan out something to take effect. Also, you mentioned Pathfinder a bit, and I really think that Owlcat bloated the combat encounters bc "Oh, they'll use RTWP, this raid on the Inn won't take forever"
- I feel Lore-wise, Larian did a good job with what they were given. It's just unfortunate that, even with the modern adjustments, Forgotten Realms seems to be a pretty strict setting regarding how cultures, people, and Gods are portrayed.
- Rogue Trader definitely got the short end of the stick with the BG3 comparisons, but I did see a good amount of people praising it for actually making you want to role play as someone who, in our world, would be considered evil. Tyranny also did a great job of that, but unfortunately it was cut short. I'm waiting for a full game that lets you not only be evil but also has a "flavor" of what evil you want. WOTR did a good job giving evil Mythic options, but it did feel like you got railroaded into what kind of person your MC was once you fully comitted to the path.
This is some high quality writing / editing wow.
Durance is a crazy Character, i really liked the duality of that men, neutral evil, but not a psico
Great video, glad the algorithm gods decided to recommend it. My guess about the BG3 companions is that because the game was originally in Early Access, the companions mostly represent the races that were the first to be implemented, like humans, half-elves and tieflings. Dragonborn and Half-Orcs were the two last races to be added when the game released in 1.0, so it's probably another reason why there is no Dragonborn companion, for example, and why you only see them as NPCs in Act 3. This is just me theorizing, but I do think it would have been cool if there was a larger variety in the races for them, as much as I love the ones we now have.
Ah, that makes a lot of sense and I hadn't considered that. My fault for missing context because I wait until full release to play games (except Shadows of Doubt whoops)
Why no shorties tho? Aligning camera too hard? But you can do romances with a hobbit MC.
All of the big Obsidian RPGs are pretty slow in the beginning and honestly pretty hard to get into. Specifically NWN2 and both Pillars 1 & 2. Tyranny is better in getting things going though. All very subjective of course, but a lot of people seem to consider especially Pillars 1 as "boring". And it's easy to see why.
I remember when I got pillars of eternity I loved the setting and characters but I got near the end and never finished it. Years later I got the game on PlayStation for free and played through it, but this time stopping maybe half way.
BG3 on the other hand I could not put down and I think it comes down to gameplay.
I personally feel that pause based gameplay is just less interesting and more tedious then turn based.
you are so underrated dude, i thank the algorithim to bless me with your nerd knowledge, even tho i don't like at all combat with pause games, i really felt like i was missing out, this puts what i missed in comparision to something familiar. Ty so much!
pausing in every turn and waiting every time whether you want it or not is better you ***?
@@ricardosantos6721 At least turn based is consistent on when it will pause, real time w/ pause is a system that fundamentally punishes you for not pressing space every half second. Which means you will spend most of your time paused instead of having the combat "flow" like you're pretending it would be.
Like, real time w/ pause literally allows you to automate most of the combat, how is that not a symptom of a flawed system.
Turn based is also more clear & precise. Units are turns, not seconds or fractions of seconds between actions that *you actively have to follow on screen and time the pause for otherwise you're not playing the game well* and AI doing whatever else when they're done with whatever you told them to do.
@@juicejooos that's not how you play rtwp, you put the difficulty to a level where if you kinda keep your items up to date then you steamroll everyone, you only need to micromanage a little for the bosses, there is your flow. otherwise you are wasting time like autistic turn based players who think time is like water in a high pressure fire hose let loose
@@juicejooos real time with pause is the worst of both worlds fr
@@juicejooos that's not how you play rtwp, you put the difficulty to a level where if you kinda keep your items up to date then you steamroll everyone, you only need to micromanage a little for the bosses, there is your flow. otherwise you are wasting time like *** turn based players who think time is like water in a high pressure fire hose let loose
To add to Pallegina in Pillars. The party member who is anti-god. She is also the Paladin party member. Adding to her troubled view with the pantheon.
Yeah, I mostly agree with everything. While I do generally like the BG3 origin companions, the close up cinematics and excellent performance of the actors make them very relatable, in terms of their story arcs and character development they all feel very similar.
The whole Karlach / Wyll prologue narrative never made any sense to me either, in early access I always assumed Karlach didn't have a tadpole at all, since she only entered the ship presumably moments before returning and with all the fighting going on etc.
This video is a great take on the pros and cons of two different games, with some fair critique in both directions. The point about BG3 almost being overrated, but stopping short of making that claim because BG3 genuinely is pretty great, is very relatable. It's my GOTY 2023 so I'm definitely no hater, but the unanimous praise for it seems to be sweeping its weaknesses under the rug, which I think is unfortunate.
You should absolutely make more videos on RPGs like this. I would love to hear your full thoughts on Pathfinder: WOTR after you referenced it a few times, as it deserves this type of analysis too!
The soundtrack of pillars always gives me goosebumps when I hear them 😍 I never finished it but I truly love the game and I can’t wait to hop back to it and play deafire after it.
Funny how BG3 starts the same way as DC Universe Online.
There is an Alien invasion....
Your character gets captured.....
You get injected with exobites in DCUO.... You get injected a tadpole in BG3
And you gain some sort of powers or superabilities.
;) ;)
Omg I never knew this about grieving mother!
Damn Pillars 1 is such a good game!
I believe part of the reason for there being no short-king companions (and romances) in BG3 is because they did not introduce any of those characters until a good way through development, after the companions had already been more or less completed. Probably something to do with the mo-cap animation process? It was already very janky having playable shorties at the start with things like the kissing animations, and was probably took a significant amount of development time to implement.
this is why they need to ditch the dating sim bullshit altogether. it's dumb shit for the LCD
BG3 avoids short characters cause in their minds all short characters are too "child-like" for romance
same reason they gave them terrible body proportions than just a typical midget or dwarf look
its dumb
@@marcusclark1339 how about we cool it with the slurs..
Watched the video and I think you nailed it. You've gained a subscriber with an excellent analysis
Durance is more attractive than anything in BG3 because BG3 has terrible motion once the characters do literally anything. Moreso if they are talking. Uncanny valley.
When you get millions of subs I'll say I was here when it started.
I appreciate this video because it's genuinely the first video I've seen that's actually critical of BG3 and shows a game that did stuff better. I'm definitely going to have to play pillars now, since I was frustrated with BG3 for most of the game, but especially at the end. And ever since finishing it and moving on, my opinion of it has gotten more negative
Pillars of eternity was my very first crpg. Since then I've played nearly all of them, including the infinity engine ones. The trio of obsidian crpgs have such a unique vibe to them, that I hope doesn't get overshadowed by the smash success of BG3. Which it too deserves.
35:12 bro really said: if not friend, why friend shaped
Really appreciate this perspective on PoE1 and BG3, both had such memorable elements. One of my fav aspects of PoE1 was Caed Nua - having a massive underground dungeon to prog through in a player home was really unique. As soon as I saw the first cutscene of PoE2, where Caed Nua gets god-stomped, I knew I wasn't going to enjoy that story as much.
The alignment thing started as a hard alignment, though the first edition was supposed to line up with the real world in time making the focus living an alternate life rather than the game aspect. In 3rd edition alignment was a suggestion, and most would fit the natural alignment but there are exceptions. 5th edition scrapped the idea of races having alignment. In first edition different characters could be made by the DM that didn't neatly conform to the alignment, but these were very rare exceptions and still had a sort of different way of getting to the other alignment. The difference is more a function of how a race thinks, as earlier considered the other races to be based on animals if they became intelligent and thus with alien ways of thinking, and this transitioning towards more of humans in different bodies.
Think of it like ants that gain sentience. They probably wouldn't have a strong concept of the individual, and thus a lot of morals and ideas of how to act would seem incredibly strange to one. Newer editions get rid of this idea, because they saw the races as stand ins for existing races, while older editions saw them as fantasy ants.
One thing for me is the couch co op/ split screen in bg3 allows me the share this game with many many people, combine that with online multiplayer and what u get are experiences unlike most other c rpgs.
Damn, guess I will be the one to try Pillars of Eternity only after I've played BG3. It seems I have a talent for missing out on great games in general, like I've only played Disco Elysium in '23 or Outer Wilds in '24. Keep up the good work, you've gained a 96 sub in me.
I remeber I was trying to start Pillars like 3 times, every time bouncing away somewhere in 1st or 2nd city. Only when Pillars 2 came out and I got though it's prologue ... i suddenly felt the urge to stop P2 and install Pillars 1 - I did play through entire Pillars 1 then 2 and it was marvelous.
Today I don't even remember what exactly was this prologue of P2 - something with the gods.. but seems there was some narrative nudge, that was missing from P1 but it changed my entire reception of it.
Heh, people don't like presentation of Pillars, while I'm playing crpgs by Jeff Vogel spiderweb. I actually prefer text to cutscenes, just turn on subtitles and press skip as soon as I read it. So the pillars style of "voice first line" works great for me. Not to mention that devs can change most of dialogue even days before release.
Great video. Thoughtful yet not laboring points. I think it is interesting that you called out baldur's gate 3 as the truest tabletop RPG equivalent, because it is the pathfinder games for me due to their long story of multiple distinct acts with their cast of characters and plot themes unique to those arcs. Perhaps it is more that these embody different aspects of tabletop RPG'ing. Baldur's gate 3 is more moment to moment, whilst pathfinder lets you experience the campaign aspect of it.
On the choice of Pillars' secrets, I think it adds to them that it is not the same answer in both cases. I agree that more options would have been better for the expansion, but the context to each problem and your beliefs on a character's destiny may lead to a different outcome to each.
Anyway, thank you for the video!
I am one of those people who are now playing the older games after BG3. There is one thing BG3 does incredibly well. Somehow I wasn't lost in the story. BG3 story is rather rich and complex I think, but the way its all introduced gradually and well, it feels easy to understand. Like watching well made movie. I suspect this is one of the reasons of its success. Consider that BG3 was played even by people who dont play these types of games. It went mainstream. NOW, I tried Tyranny, and quit after couple hours, I was just getting lost in all the factions, gods and whatnot. It throws this bible of different world on you right at the begining, thats not fun. Youre supposed to make decisions about things you dont really understand, it's totally stupid. At the moment I play Pillars of Eternity, I am 15 hours in, and I feel very lost. There are again so many gods and lore, everything is super uniquely named, I am sorry, it just doesn't compare. It feels like i am reading a book, not playing game. I always hate that about games that do that. And second, so far its not even well-written book. Its a lot of fluff without meaning. It feels like asking ChatGPT to generate mega random world and just create lore for it. I will continue playing it, but I totally understand why all these games are kind of niche and BG3 was mainstream. If I fish deeper in my memory to something like Fallout 2, I don't remember it being a confusing. Its like it didnt need to introduce me 15 different factions, rulers, gods, magic types and whatnot to tell its story. Certainly not in the begining, the world was pretty easy to understand and then you just slowly unravel it. Some of these fantasy games feel so unrelatable with their complicated worlds. Its like it doesnt have a function. It feels theres no emotion to it. Compared to BG3, which was thrilling. And you really wanted to know what will happen. In Pillars, I am mostly just curious to uncover more of the map and monsters, thats about it. I know 15 hours is not much, but also, if game doesnt show its best in first 5-10 hours, then its not doing its job too well is it.