Baldur’s Gate 3 is overwhelming for many. So much so that they don’t even start it. A big mistake, says MeinMMO demon Cortyn and explains what you’re missing.
I don’t need to tell anyone anymore that Baldur’s Gate 3 is a great game that everyone should play. It’s a huge RPG with tons of possibilities and different options for how the story can end. Many report that a single playthrough takes 150, 200 or even more hours of play.
But it is precisely this scope that is not only fascinating, but also intimidating for many. I have a few passionate gamers in my circle of friends who are literally “afraid” of Baldur’s Gate 3.
“Isn’t the game so huge that you’ll have to sit there for weeks?” or “Don’t you have to be extremely careful to catch everything?” are questions I’ve heard more than once.
No wonder – even if you’re not particularly interested in Baldur’s Gate 3, when you surf the Internet you’ll stumble upon countless page-long guides with detailed instructions on what you have to or should do for a particular weapon or a very specific scene.
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But what many people overlook is that none of it is important. None of this is relevant to having fun in Baldur’s Gate 3. None of this is necessary if you just want to experience a good story that is consistent from start to finish.
So when Larian designer Anna Guxens says that “you shouldn’t be intimidated by the systems because they’re designed so you can just have fun with them all the time,” that’s the pure truth. A truth that as a gamer you first have to accept (via gamereactor.eu).
Learning to fail again – because it’s part of it
We gamers are sometimes tiring, especially for ourselves. If there is an unopened box somewhere or a fight resulted in even minimal casualties, then we search the entire environment or reload in order to ultimately complete something “perfectly”.
This is exactly how you stand in your own way in Baldur’s Gate 3. Because a lot of the game is decided by dice. Only if you reach a certain value is the respective action considered successful, otherwise it is considered a failure.
The highlight of the matter: That’s exactly how it’s intended. Baldur’s Gate 3 was designed with the idea that sometimes you’ll pass with flying colors and other times you’ll fail ingloriously. There is (in the vast majority of cases) no “Game Over” because you failed a dice roll. It has negative consequences – even if it’s just that an NPC doesn’t trust you or you can’t do a certain action.
It always goes on somehow and often in a very funny way. Because seeing your own heroes fail sometimes only makes them more likeable and makes the glorious victories all the sweeter and more meaningful.
Failure is simply an integral, planned part of the gaming experience. Failure is not just wanted, it is desired and intended by the developers. Because there are a lot of dialogues and surprising twists only if you fail.
By that I don’t mean that you should “never reload”. We did the same during our run, whenever we felt that the game was really treating us unfairly.
To give a concrete example: In a quest you have to protect the druid Halsin while he performs a ritual and is attacked from all sides. While my teammate protects the left flank with Shadowheart and his character, I hold the right flank with a wall of flames from my sorceress and Karlach’s melee abilities.
After the fight ends, a cutscene immediately starts, Halsin thanks us for our help and wants us to meet him at the camp. The sequence ends and Halsin immediately starts off – only to find himself in my wall of flames within 2 seconds, moving on in slow motion and dying almost immediately before the game even gave me the chance to cancel the channeled spell.
That was a moment where we both said, “Okay, this is just stupid. We’ll play the scene again.”
Not because we were dissatisfied with the outcome of a fight or a dice roll, but because it simply felt unfair to see Halsin traipse into the allied flames before the sequence was fully completed.
With this approach of only repeating something in absolutely exceptional cases, we not only had a lot of fun, but also experienced many scenes that we would probably never have seen in a “perfect” run-through according to the guide.
We had a (spoiler-free) event of this kind in the second act of the game. After arriving at the inn, we talked extensively with all the NPCs and set several events in motion. These ultimately led to the main story suddenly taking a rapid step forward.
These conversations and the decisions made resulted in an epic battle in which there were 20 to 40 fighters on both sides – a really long battle with “back and forth” in which you fought for the survival of every NPC and yet not all of them could save.
That just felt good and right. We never noticed that because of this process we didn’t even get to see some scenes. During the game it was completely irrelevant. We only noticed this months later during our second playthrough – and these “new” scenes fascinated us just as much and only increased the replay value.
Some people here may think: “What! But then you missed great scenes while playing and I don’t want that!” – And yes, you can see it that way. But it never seemed like that to us. Because Baldur’s Gate 3 is so full of great scenes, decisions and different progressions that in the flow of the game it won’t be noticeable if you miss something here and there.
This pressure only arises if you read carefully beforehand what is there and how you can really see as much as possible. But then, at least in my opinion, you lose a lot of the appeal in an RPG with this scope and freedom.
Give yourself a push and learn not to get everything
Ultimately, I can understand if Baldur’s Gate 3 feels daunting and overwhelming because of how big it is. But this feeling only arises if you go into it with the thought of wanting to experience this greatness in its entirety. You don’t have to do that at all. It’s not even advisable.
If you haven’t already, give Larian’s RPG a chance. Get involved in the game world and say goodbye to the idea of having to emerge victorious from every situation or mastering every dice roll with flying colors.
It’s such a “gamer’s disease” to always want to overcome every challenge and really explore every last detail of the game world before moving on.
This will only hinder your fun in Baldur’s Gate 3.
Yes, you can discover little secrets in many places and if you really want to, you will pass every dice roll if you reload every time.
But that doesn’t make Baldur’s Gate 3 a better game, the opposite is the case.
So when the developers say that you should just “go with the flow,” that’s not just an empty phrase – it’s something that went into the game’s design.
The sheer scope of Baldur’s Gate 3 doesn’t seem so intimidating once you let go of the idea of trying to experience everything on your first playthrough. Ultimately, that’s not possible at all and in the end it just makes you think more about a “to do” list than about the great story with lovable characters and lots of great twists.
Twists that sometimes only exist if you don’t play “perfectly”.
Give yourself a push and let the game drive you. You definitely won’t regret it.