For the record, Magic Users did just kinda suck in AD&D. Sure at higher levels they got good, but in real life few lived to play those high levels. Hence why most would Dual Class or Multiclass into Magic Users. (normally wizard, since most the cool priest classes weren't allowed) Part of why the rare roll of Paladin (required you to roll god tier stats) was so powerful.
Thanks but thanks to modding (and Beamdog weird ideas) your character seems very unusual between crazy stuff I made... like 5 Sarevok companions for the main character.
I remember playing this on my phone when I was in the army. My oil and grime covered fingers made some decisions without my consent due to the nature of the touch interface. Good times.
A true legend for playing Baldur’s Gate on mobile, just as I had a month or two after playing a tabletop DnD campaign irl. Never that, I’ve played it on PC; just never got around to actually completing it. Btw, thank you for your service my g
@@quint3ssent1a eh baldr isnt that nice of a god hes just nice for asgerdian. he only became nice when those missionaries made him the christian god to get the norse people to convert.
I mean, the city was created by a sailor named Balduran, so the Baldur's part of the name wasn't far off. It's basically a dude saying "this is my city"
Having only heard the name and nothing about the actual game, I always assumed it was some Norse thing about a portal to another world. I never suspected it was so straight up DnD
When I was a kid, before I played the game, I thought the the skull thing on the cover was the "Baldur's Gate". Like it was a huge Fallout-style vault door, and you'd have to go through it to get to a guy named Baldur.
Funnily enough, in early versions of the original game, Gorion could, if he rolled well (he needs to kill both ogres in 1 spell each and then rolled better than 50% on all damage rolls while fighting Sarevok), just barely kill Sarevok during their fight, and since they were were lazy and just copy-pasted Sarevok and renamed him Armored Figure, it fires all the same flags that killing Sarevok does, except that the game doesn't expect it to happen while trying to go into the Chapter 1 screen and locks the game up. they eventually buffed the Armored Figure's health so there was no chance of it happening a few patches post-release.
It's about as funny as when it actually happens during actual DND sessions when the level 5 party meets the BBEG and then go through all the dumbest and bold preparations they can imagine to try and kill the BBEG early. Edit: game designers shouldn't be lazy and should allow these kinds of things to happen and let the players have some god damn fun for once. Fun to see BG3 have that with the first tutorial mission where you can kill everything and rack up a ton of XP and a bunch of op items.
@@kardoxfabricanus7590 or at least make a joke about it before reloading "and so gorion wasted the villians and saved the day oh wait isn't this your story should probably reload"
My boyfriend talks about this series of games a lot! Interesting to see it presented in this way. It allowed me to see it from an interesting persective--a pretty common thing to happen when watching your amazing videos. Thank you for the great work!
As a kid I thought Baldur's Gate had this air of importance to it. It was the same way for the Hobbit book. An intense, epic name that only smarter people than me could understand. Imagine my surprise when I played Baldur's Gate 1 in 12th Grade and found it filled with silly humor, bright colors and dorky DnD shlock. Likewise, my childhood sanctifying of The Hobbit proved to be unwarranted when I finally did read it in 9th Grade and found out it was, in fact, the simplest and most straight-forward of Tolkien's works.
My thoughts as someone who has heard the name Baldur's Gate frequently, but has never even seen footage of it before: I was extremely surprised in this video to learn that Baldur's Gate was the name of a city; although I can't imagine what else I thought it might've been. The only mental image I get when hearing it of an actual massive stone gate, though somehow of a very generic sort. The name really does feel like in some way the limit asymptotically approached by an endless chain of knockoffs of knockoffs of knockoffs of Tolkien--an almost Francis Fukuyama-like end of fantasy.
I felt something similar when I found out that neither Baldur, or a gate, are important parts of the game Baldur's Gate. Like I guess I thought if they'd called it that, surely the name would reflect something of the story but I don't know why I think that when so many works have titles that don't reflect the story, characters or content. Also my favorite Francis Fukuyama works was The End of Fantasy and the Last Dwarf.
What is most surprising is that prior to the game "Baldur's Gate" wasn't even a big deal in-setting (unlike Neverwinter or Icewind Dale) and wasn't a focus of any big stuff that would make it recognisable for fans of D&D. It's like naming Deus Ex after that abbadoned gas station you visit.
@@Sandwich1414 Yeah, I thought that since D&D sometimes uses real-world mythologies, "Baldur's Gate" had something to do with the Norse god Baldur, not some dude named Balduran.
Neverknowsbest, whitelight and raycevick are my favorites on top of this guy. He will have 100k in less than a year from now for sure. Neverknowsbest is above 100k and had 20k at beginning of covid :)
Idk if you'll actually read this, but I want you to know that I love these videos you make. There are so many games I want to see you cover and give your unique take on. I hope you continue to enjoy what you do, because I can't wait to see what's to come. Best of luck!
I like Raycevick credits question answering spreading further and further. In my opinion It always ads some nice aftertaste to such comprehensive long reviews such as his or Mandalore's. Btw I really like your take on this RU-vid review format. I watch many channels of this type and yours sticks out as one of my recent favorites. About Baldur's Gate name question (I've never played it or much of similar games even) I always perceived it as something much darker than it turns out to be apparently. Probably due to ominous cover art and not distinguishing much between it and Planescape. I was expecting the titular "Baldur's Gate" as something akin to gates of oblivion in Oblivion for some reason. Baldur sounded like some demonic name straight out of Diablo and then the skull... It's funny to find out how wrong my idea of it was.
Ironic part about the name and cover right? Baldur's Gate 1 is one of nicer if not nicest game made on infinity engine. Icewind Dale has more down to Earth title with a Tree on the cover. At the same time this game is 90% dungeons and except for goblins and orcs all enemies are at least twice as big as your heroes. Oh, and also undead do not show up in two like in this video but whole armies.
BG1 is one of the few games where I prefer my local german translation to the original english version. They somehow managed to keep the same vibe of the original voice acting but actually localised it with german dialects and such. Just too bad that BG1 gets completely outshined by its sequel for me. I view it and SoD more as a prologue to power my charakter up and prepare myself for BG2. That being said, having your character complete the whole saga and go from wimp to demi god is great
Oh yes, especially the first Baldur's Gate had amazingly campy German localistation. My friends and me still quote stuff from it at each other even in our 30s now - the choice in voice actors was amazingly memorable and often hilarious.
@@r3v4n21 Definitely, both have great memorable moments. I think in BG2, the whole sequence after leaving Irenicus' dungeon in the beginning is burned into my mind the most, just from how often I heard it back then.
Nothing sick about it. Playing Baldurs Gate is like driving Toyota Celica '73 despite having new BMW in the garage. There is special charm to theese things.
The name Baldur's Gate always made me think it was a literal gate, a monolithic archeway which traversing through would transport you to other worlds or parallel realms. It sounded like the endpoint of a grand and expansive quest, or the instigator of an apoctalyptic cataclysm.
You inspired me to do a no-reload-import-and-restart-on-death run like you, and so far it's interesting how much it made the experience of a game from my childhood I basically played to death feel fresh again. I also added that all companions that die have to be booted from the group and replaced. It raises the stakes significantly.
10:50 Elminster is like Atlantis. Glorious hubris now long buried. He was a showcase of what a 20th level wizard player could do back in 2nd Edition. When his sponsor got deaded, the road was cleared for more sane power levels.
I am so happy to have found your channel. As a child, I was intrigued by the box art of Arcanum, (already saw your video on it too, but didnt think to comment there) and was fascinated with these kind of massive storytelling games. Unfortunately I was absolute garbage at playing them, poor sense of direction, figuring out what I was supposed to do, and sometimes plain impatiance prevented me from truly enjoying them. But now, trough you, I can finally experience them.
"Is Beam Dog writing better or worse than Baldur's Gate writing?" The answer is "no, they are not better" because no one writes better stories than my mom.
I think BG is so epic because even 20 years later games are trying to recreate the magic people felt when playing it for the first time. Like Pillars of Eternity, espesially PoE1. I think it holds up still when compared to other infinity engine / infinity engine like games. Unpopular with the old old fans but i even like the EE content and companions. I dont think it gets enough credit for making an Evil playthrough so enjoyable though. Even the "best" modern crpg, Pathfinder Kingmaker, or its sequel, the Evil portions feel like an after-thought. Arcanum is also good for allowing your character to be evil, and felt so different than all the other crpgs even thought its pretty similar. Awesome stuff to come, BG2 going to be great.
Back so soon, big guy? Over an hour long this time as well. Life really ain't that bad after all. Seriously, though... the way you combine obscure old games/mods and niche classics with political science and philosophy without actually getting political... it's brilliant. That's the way it's done: do something new or do something better. I love it.
I had that Lilura1 blog, in another tab, for her Neverwinter Nights' Red Dragon Disciple build. About a minute, after I started thinking to myself just how salty she would be to hear you say these things about her beloved Baldur's Gate, you popped it on screen. There was a brief moment of panic, wondering if I'd accidentally clicked off of the video.
Baldur's Gate 1/2 is one of those things, where I played it at such a young age, I can't remember if bits of the plot were real or just my brain going into maximum overdrive again. Things like Minsc and Boo, I thought were fake, until I stumbled across them in the present again.
I played Baldur's Gate EE in ~2016, when I was 14 but (1:04:40) it was still a magical adventure that I will remember forever. After this game, I fell in love with the whole genre. Unfortunately I don't have too much time for playing, so most of the games are still waiting for me. For me, most of the fights were average in difficulty, with a few exceptions of really hard battles. I feel that it was a good mix, but I was a kid so my perception would probably change now. I really loved the writing though! As some other comment said, the voice acting in my own language (polish) was also exceptionally good. I also loved the tavern music (I actually listen to it from time to time while working or learning :p) It wasn't actually the first D&D game that I played, because I had already played original Neverwinter Nights that my uncle bought for my father, but I was like, 7 years old, and couldn't read much. Somehow I still managed to finish the first act, but immediately got stuck in the second one with kind of a "soft lock". 2 years later I tried to play the game again, after Windows got reinstalled on a family PC, so I lost all the saves and have to play from the beginning. I thought that "now, when I know how to read, the game will be easy as butter". It wasn't really easier in terms of fights, but the writing... I really enjoyed it. Unfortunately the pc's gpu/motherboard got burnt and after the repairs we had our Windows reinstalled... again. Recently I bought the Diamond edition and I swear to Helm, I will fucking beat it.
Hey, Sarevok Bane Joke on the thumbnail?! You never fail to make me feel happy, my dude! Thanks for making a vid on one of my favorite games! I haven't finished it yet, but once I'm done I'll give my thoughts.
@@38procentkrytyk yeah, "insult" might be too strong a word. However, I've felt mostly alone as a fan of this game, so someone else having a similar experience to me, enjoying the highs and lows in a similar way, is very cathartic.
wow bg3 got me into crpgs and i have been playing others while having YT videos playing BG1/pathfinder lore/retrospective videos on the other.. and this is 100% the best video i've seen so far.. great job crafting and narrating your story to us while also letting us in to the game's narrative. first time i actually paused the game and moved the video to my main monitor.
If you like keeping your character a female and want to make her part wizard, you can use EE Keeper to keep that skintight rogue outfit. You can even make interesting class combinations like Wizard/Assassin instead of Wizard/Rogue.
So this is my opinion about BG1. People might disagree a lot. I like the "filler" you mentioned here. This is the highlight of this game at least if you compare it with others. With each game Bioware escapes from the sandbox elements here we see it at its fullest. It creates the feeling of freedom which got missing in later games. After you leave Candlekeep you are free to visit any location and because level scaling only changes few things like number of enemies it feels like making our own choices to visit specific places to fight specific things our own choice and it feels rewarding to do so. In Skyrim and other Bethesda titles it always bugged me how world becomes only harder for player to explore and rewards are... often generic or reduced to your level. So I do not feel like hero in training in TES while in BG it is it's best charm. One other thing; in Tales of Sword Coast there is a quest which we need to get on the boat and sail to specific place. However in other games travel is the least fun thing. Here the travel is narrated so well it feels like we can encounter anything and might lose to just small enemy on the way. I miss that in modern games... or maybe I'm just too old to feel that way.
@@JS-wp4gs kinda, the BG 1 generates number of enemies based on your level. In theory it means 6 characters vs 6 kobolds. In practice it ends with 6 characters vs 36 elite ice archers.
BG and PS:T are like the manga to the anime (every other rpg) when talking about boomer rpgs. I love how casters have to spend hours in reading and trial-error to be just "meh" and x10 as much to actually feel like you control magic (and not the other way around).. and a half orc barbarian with a good roll can kill everything np by just clicking the get me meth button and watching everyone -vampires, liches, dragons, SHADOW dragons... turn to gibs. That's some serious 90s power metal reference, maybe
I love how well that Arcanum teaser works. That soundtrack is so iconic and unique for RPGs, and so great, that just the first swell of the violin instantly takes me back to when the game was first released and I booted it up.
all of the infinity engine games were simply called by their notable setting. Planescape takes place in planescape (the setting as a whole, actually visiting a good chunk of the locations), Icewind Dale takes place in Icewind Dale (and is a prequel to the Icewind Dale Trilogy of books), Baldur's Gate is the main location of the core of the story. Neverwinter Nights was cancelled after repeated delays but would've taken place in and around Neverwinter (it was supposed to come out the summer of the following year after BG1, with Tales of the Sword Coast meant as a place holder to kill time), restarted as an expansion pack for BG2...cancelled again due to all the crap happening at Interplay at the time and them having to turn Baldur's Gate 3 into the Throne of Bhaal expansion just to get an ending to the story. And eventually finally seeing the light of day as a completely different game and concept. Not be confused with Neverwinter Nights (1991), the first true MMO (which shut down it's servers the year before Baldur's Gate came out), though there are rumors that Neverwinter Nights (the Infinity engine game) was delayed due to legal issues with the name (though this is uncomfirmed) due to the rights owners of the MMO still mulling over the idea of splitting it off into it's own thing. (at the time it was heavily connected with AOL servers, but was considering migrating it to an open platform but decided they couldn't compete with these newfangled 3d MMOs that already taken off by then. NWN was made on the Gold-box engine.)
'Baldur's Gate' actually reminded me of 'Ishtar's Gate' and ancient Mesopotamia when I was first exposed to it, back as a kid. I suppose the blue and gold color palette of the second game (the first I played) reinforced that idea. Don't really know where I got that from, though.
I love this video man, I come back to it all the time. I can't wait to see you cover TotSC and SoD, especially since I just played through Siege for the first time and actually found it to be fairly enjoyable despite it's reputation
Really glad you showcased the SCS mod as well. It's great, I have interesting memories getting one shot in bg2 by random mages in creative ways (sequencer triple fireball). I think it's a lot more forgiving in the first game due to mages having less instant you lose spells (although chaos kinda fits that bill if it hits your whole party).
I remember playing Baldurs Gate 1 a lot when I was in middle school. I even remember making it to Sarevok once, though I don't think i ever beat the game. That said, a lot of this video was incredibly nostalgic. I remember playing Baldurs Gate 2 *significantly* more though. There was a time where I could recite the entire dialog between Irenicus and the Cowled Wizard police word for word from memory. You bore me mageling, you may take me but you will take the girl as well. What no I've done nothing wrong! I only remember bits of it, like a faded memory. But I do remember all of Yojimbo's barks however :P
I first played this, maybe 15 years ago, picked it back up maybe three years ago on my phone, and then started again a week ago. It's taken me a decade and a half, but I finally got to Baldur's Gate... And immediately stopped playing after getting overwhelmed with all there is to do in the city.
POW: I played BG 2 about 12 years ago (and even then, only the first chapter). "This is an unsanctioned use of magickulll energy. " "All involved will be held."
I never got around to posting it when you initially uploaded this video. But what popped in my mind for Balder’s Gate, is is exactly the Norse God-Baldr’s gate.
I had like a whole 5 min pause when he asked that because I was like I never thought about it but like the title tells me nothing and makes me feel nothing.
I played through this, and the sequels, multiple times. I tended to go Half-Orc Fighter/Thief, and True Neutral. Having the party dynamic so you could literally recruit anyone, of any alignment, made for some insanely amusing NPC- NPC dialogue. Mazzy and Korgan in particular.
For anyone playing this for the first time, get the BG1NPC project mod. It completely changes the game to become an actual RPG with excellent writing, stories and quests for every party member. If you miss the mechanics only first introduced in the sequel BG2, the mod integrates perfectly into the story adding depth and complexity missing in the first one. What the characters should have been. That is, if you do enjoy making decisions and reading walls of texts of story dialogue.
47:06 the reason you die instantly, is because the grand dukes both died leaving Sarevok as the only not dead not sick grand duke, and he just orders your death.
One of the first RPGs I ever played as a kid, it was a magical adventure - one I never really appreciated fully until growing up a bit and coming back to it. It will always hold a special place in my heart as I'm sure it does with many other Baldur's Gate fans. Thanks for the excellent recap Mr. Warlockracy
This is a game of my childhood. I was 8 years old when it was released. I think that the story is extremely well written. Music is also very good and voice acting in my native language was legendary. Unfortunately, as most of this company's products, this game feels unfinished. Side quests are very simple, almost all of optional locations feel completely empty, companions have interesting personalities but are completely underdeveloped, interactions between them are almost non-existent. Despite that it is still one of these games that will always have a special place in my heart.
One thing in which the Enhanced Edition is definitely better than the original : you can fight and even kill Elminster. He has a bunch of funny OP spells (transform to chicken, cow bombardement, etc) and the only chance you have at killing him is with a critical hit backstab at max level, but it is possible.
Just wanted to say that you're a great story teller, and that you have managed to convince me, someone that did not grow up with these old RPGs, to give them a try. Keep up the good work! And stay safe out there!
Oh no. Everytime Arcanum is discussed I start goshing over it like a teenager crush about a rockstar. Expect novelworth of texts explaining why I think Arcanum is so fucking great in its lore, world building, execution despite having one of the most horrible character and combat systems. If you don't break the game, you didn't level right.
I remember playing it back in the day and running into two game-breaking bugs in two back to back playthroughs and just never going back. The setting was amazing, the lore was amazing, the game was kinda garbage... at least pre-patches
@@planescaped yeah I think I had two playthrough in which the same thing occured. Thankfully we have fan patches now that make the game way more playable
@@Superschokokeks That game's depictions of gnomes are probably the most abhorrent fantasy race I have ever seen. The Drow wish they were as fucked up as Arcanum's Gnomes.
First thing I do in the second game is download a mod that makes it so I can use whomever I want. Gotta have both Minsc and Edwin. Especially since they have banter throughout the whole game, even though playing unmodded you'd never see it. :P
A wave of nostalgia watching my dad play the game when I was little as well as playing it for a little bit, I would say it's one of the games that introduced me into the magical fantasy genre.
The premier grinding location is the siren cave, since it spawns infinite flesh golems. Those are about as dangerous, but worth more than 3x the xp! Of course, it's also more of a hassle to get there, and they WILL splatter you.
Crazy work ! :) I loved your video ! and as you ask us viewer what we would do then I'll say : I love BG it was my first RPG game on PC! I would make a Cleric/Mage because I love cleric support spells and high charisma makes turn undead very easy, that way for several turns undead will flee and you're free to take actions. For an evil playthrough I think enhanced edition gives choicies with nice evil aligned spells. I personally often play cleric/something since I love to use spells like Command or entangle. For an overpowered character with constant haste I think playing a holy/evil assassin would be nice.
A man who spends so much time in augmented timeflow courtesy of immersive fantasy worlds that he feels the need to specify "real-life years" in casual conversation (sort of...), has my respect.
never played the games but im icelandic and the name read aloud sounds like "Baldur skeit" in icelandic. meaning, "Bladur shat". note that the name Baldur is common here.
Underrated channel. But not for long if you keep this up. Also, especially with the speed youre posting content now, try finding ways to keep it fun and fresh for yourself aswell :) Always make what YOU want to make, not what you think we will like. No matter how big your channel might become
Because you asked, when I heard of Baldur's Gate for the first time, I actually thought it refers to a physical gate and given the the game has a big skull on the cover, I was guessing it maybe a gate to the underworld/hell or something made by a dude named Baldur. Personally I also prefer names that give you a better idea of what you can expect like "You have to burn the Rope" and "Don't shit your pants"
Couldn't disagree more about "not well told" and "not an expert in game design." I'd heard about Baldur's Gate all my life, but never actually played it until two years ago; by far the saga is the best RPG and overall best video game experience I've ever had, and I don't think it's been topped (not even close) to this day. I must be the odd one out here, because I don't think any modern RPG (including PoE, Pathfinder, and DOS) does any one thing better than or even necessarily as well as in BG (and that includes, the story, dialogue, characters, and especially gameplay). BTW: Just to be clear, that experience was a heavily modded one, with SCS and more. I personally think this is the best way to enjoy the game today. Fully modded, I just don't think BG can be beat.
that whispered "actually it was this", was so spot on. goddamn, dont mind me wiping my snort out of my face. gotta love a hearty belly laugh whilst having a cold. thanks man< 3
baldurs gate voice actors/actress are still among the best compared to nowadays games. soo much variety and emotions, feelings, without even need to show on CGI facial expression like in modern games.
