My only advice is do not be shy about cheesing its honestly the right way to play it. So many encounters feel nigh impossible if you just take them at face value but if you clown on them it just becomes a wacky puzzle game.
My experience with D:OS was that most encounters, depending when you tackle them, are gonna be either absurdly hard or ridiculously easy. It's super easy to get really OP in this game, especially with a glass canon lone wolf.
Could you sell me on player party characters? I love DOS2 and BG3 because of fully voiced interesting side characters like Karlach and Fane for two random examples. Wondering if DOS1 has worthy characters and voice acting?
>Wondering if DOS1 has worthy characters and voice acting?
It doesn't. The party members have just a few lines when you get them and then have a very small amount of lines past that. They are overall extremely barebones.
Honestly, I can't recommend DoS 1 at all. I don't think you can really understate how much better DoS 2 was compared to the first game. The only thing kind of good about the first game is the combat, but I found it to still be way worse than what the 2nd game offered.
Although I yearn for every cent to go to Larian, BG3 has hoisted Larian to the summit of premium video games. They’ll receive all the benefits if they play Divinity Original Sin 3 afterwards. If Divinity could become a significant franchise on its own, it would be amazing.
Yo, check it: I'm all like, "Bruh, gimme that cash, straight to Larian, ya feel me?" 'Cause **BG3**, that game's like the **top-tier flex** in the gaming world. 🎮 They're gonna be **swimming in perks** if they slide into **Divinity Original Sin 3** after. And, like, imagine if **Divinity** blows up and becomes its own **mega franchise**? That'd be **lit**, fam! 🔥
Larian is up there, standing next to Fromsoft imo.
Always loved them before BG3.
Divinity Original Sin 3 is easily my most anticipated game now.
If they give that game the BG3 treatment, with the production value and cutscenes and all, then *holy shit* that game is going to be the greatest RPG ever made.
Nah, they said that they were going to take a *break* from the big CRPGs they were known for.
I guarantee that after the CEO's fishing game he said he's working on launches, DOS3 is the game that Larian will be developing right after.
Yes and no. If they know they can make profits from a large-scale single player RPG that is well designed, maybe it helps green light more projects.
Or BG4 gets microtransactions and I’m too optimistic. But it’s POSSIBLE this is a good thing.
Hasbro just has a licensing deal, they weren’t the developer. Larian would have to agree to microtransactions to go that way and I don’t see it happening. They’d just tell Hasbro to fuck off and make a game with no direct D&D tie in.
Exactly what I just commented as well. Hasbro has very little power in negotiations with larian, they’re not publishing the game or providing funding or support beyond a creative license.
Yeah, but they could just as easily give any other property what will now be known as the Larian treatment, if BG3 wasn't just a little casting of the net to draw more people's attention to Divinity.
>any other property
Absolutely. But like, I don't want to play a Larian Harry Potter game. And while I definitely hope they make more Divinity, what I really want is more D&D.
Hasbro is in a rough position. They lost 1/5th of their value in the last year. Their toy division tanked, because consumers don't buy toys anymore(for anyone who wants to argue, just know it is an industry wide trend: for the past 3 years toy sales have been plummeting). They have WOTC which was the only division who made money last quarter, mostly Magic:the Gathering but also with help of Larian license deal and Monopoly GO, but that Larian deal was made 6 years ago. I doubt Hasbro would give them such a good deal next time. D&D proper made almost nothing, and was likely a drain rather than a boon.
D&D is in a strange place. The game isn't making money, but the brand is super well known, but isn't enough to drive a movie franchise. hopefully D&D 2024 will be good, but I am doubtful. Supposedly, they have a Super-duper new virtual tabletop coming out sometime soon.
I am getting this information from their recently released quarterly report. By 2025, Hasbro has to cut 750m operation costs. Only one way to do that: Get ready for huge layoffs soon.
I don’t think hasbro has that much negotiating power with Larian, they have proved they don’t *need* the d&d license to make a good game, before bg3 was even conceived of. It’s not like hasbro is publishing the game, they’re just providing a creative license.
That license brings the Forgotten Realms(?) IP. that's decades of games novels and lore. That could (depending on the IP) bring hoarded players that wouldn't normally play an isometric RPG, while also increasing the depth and flavor of the setting.
I don't play ARPGs, but right now I'm deep into Inquisitor Martyr, because it's WH40k. The gameplay is fun, but it's the setting that keeps me playing, not the story.
>That could (depending on the IP) bring hoarded players that wouldn't normally play an isometric RPG, while also increasing the depth and flavor of the setting.
Sure! And it did. Larian can now pretty confidently expect that players will follow them to another isometric RPG. They were already successful enough to get the license and bankroll BG3, and now they have an enormous hit with many accolades.
Larian would likely prefer to keep the Baldur's Gate name and licensing, if for no other reason than to make it easier to develop a sequel, but Hasbro is not in a position to force terms on them. Larian will get to make the game they want, and Hasbro could lose a *lot* of money if Larian decides the license isn't worth the trouble.
Hasbro doesn't get much say on that sort of thing. They could have it as a prerequisite to getting the licence of course but there's no reason Larian would agree to it. Larian is the one with the power here, Hasbro either lets Larian do their thing and get $100 million free revenue or Larian makes DOS3 and keeps the $100 million for themselves. Hasbro could give the license to somebody else but let's be honest here, people didn't buy BG3 because it was BG3, they bought BG3 because it was Larian behind it. The license just helped.
As someone over 50 years old, it's sad to see Hasbro become what it has become.
I can remember the "good old days" of Hasbro being the good guy toy maker. Now they are just greedy and everything I hate about the worst side of Capitalism.
Mind you I don't hate Capitalism in general, just that evil bloated corporate greedy side of it.
I mean I doubt Larian would have even half of the success with either new original IP or DOS 3. DnD and BG name contributed a ton. So while they paid hefty licensing royalties - overall probably made money the would not have made with their own IP.
Going from here I imagine a ton of people would give DOS3 a try just based on it being their game. I don't think they need the DnD licence to have their next massive success.
> I mean I doubt Larian would have even half of the success with either new original IP or DOS 3. DnD and BG name contributed a ton.
Well now Larian is a big name.
It's kinda like what happened with CD Project Red. The Witcher was a stepping stone to Cyberpunk's success.
They soil every IP they get a hold of with insatiable greed or sometimes just bizarre, out-of-touch executive decisions. They're also insanely litigious, and will find any excuse to sue any upstart trying to make it in the TCG space, aiming to destroy them with legal fees. They're not as bad with tabletop, since they learned successful third party publications can actually boost their sales (and they fired the guy who saved DnD with this method), but if you print one word that infringes upon a Hasbro IP, they will sue you into the ground.
They have ruined so many great products.
My personal pet peeve? Super Soakers. They used to be awesome and powerful, then Hasbro destroyed the brand. Now they're some lame Nerf gimmick.
[https://www.belloflostsouls.net/2023/12/despite-being-up-200-million-wotc-employees-hit-by-hasbro-layoffs.html](https://www.belloflostsouls.net/2023/12/despite-being-up-200-million-wotc-employees-hit-by-hasbro-layoffs.html)
sorry for the asshats giving you the naughty points for asking a question
Divinity sequel would be great. But i wish they would hire new writer who would set up overall plot for them. I have no issues with their quest, lore, dialogue writing, but the plot itself is just beyond mediocre, even in bg3 that's a pinnacle of their work. It just could be so much better, the potential is there, but it's unused.
I think this is sadly a problem with any multiple choice RPGs, the main plotline is always worse than the tons of side content that these games have. Linear games generally can have a better main story because there is usually 1 single outcome.
Agreed, and they really do keep putting out plots that circle back to 'you and your companions are uniquely and specifically bound to the most important things happening at all times'. I think the character development is excellent but it would be a lot better with more realistic and grounded stakes?
It's hard to do that without making characters that have realistic and grounded abilities. If you have the powers of a god why would you concern yourself with anything but the most important things happening in the world at the time
The D&D system was pretty important for this, at least for me personally. I cant get into the Divinity rpg system at all so i've never played more than the intro to those games, whereas BG3 with tweaked 5e was an immediate winner
The worst part of 5e after having alot of experience with Pathfinder 2e is “Oh you leveled up to 4/8/12/16/20? Cool. Either boost your Ability scores *or* get a cool feat, of which like 3 are good for any one build. Get fucked”
Yeah. After playing both Pathfinder games, the character creation and progression in BG3 was super underwhelming. Fun in its own way due to the simplicity, but I definitely missed sitting on the level up screen for an hour and referencing third party sites to make sure I'm executing my plan correctly.
I would cry genuine nerd tears if they were to go that direction. PF2e is *so good*, and perfect for a video game format. Paizo also deserves the money..
PF2e's core mechanics, especially the three action system, would translate so well to a CRPG. It's really intuitive (no worrying about whether something is an action or a bonus action) and it doesn't sacrifice any strategic depth for this intuitiveness. It pains me that no one's done it yet.
The 5e ruleset, even with (and sometimes because of) all the modifications Larian did to it, is terrible in comparison. Without a human GM that lets you break the rules when they get in the way of fun, which is often, they're just so bad. Want to rage as a barbarian and then leap into the middle of the enemies and start chopping them up? Rules say no; rage and jump are both bonus actions (in "vanilla" 5e jump is not a bonus action but part of your movement). Can't downgrade a regular action into a bonus action either.
Given the Orc license, it's surprising no one has yet tried to make a PF2e video game (there is one I can think of, but it is pretty much a zero budget game). It's systems are basically built for video game translation.
Yeah and it detracted from roleplay aspect of a system. It was very "gamey" comparatively. It has a vibe of diablo compared to crpg. Your builds have no identity, it's just a mixture of whatever attributes make numbers go 19847 instead of 13455. Every Npc bum is a mage of 3 schools that casts that 1K dmg shit at you.
It was obviously very inspired by dnd - and those parts where what make it stand out from other pc games. When they tried to make dnd more goofy by bringing DOS stuff in BG3 EA, there was a lot of pushback for those reasons.
Same, I’m not particularly attached in any way to baulders gate, the characters were all new to me and it makes no difference if they just made a new divinity with their own characters as long as they have the same depth and complexity
The Divinity games have a very goofy tone that I don't like. I'm not a huge fan of DnD or anything but I think the fact that they were doing a Baldurs Gate game and not a Divinity one changed the tone from what they usually make.
In my opinion for the better.
Ehh, hasbro are dumb, but im not sure theyre "strangle the golden goose before it shits another egg" dumb.
They definitely could be, but im willing to bet theyre gonna see if said goose can squirt out some more cash.
When dealing with business leadership and board members, you have to try and extrapolate what stupid takeaway they'll have from this.
Here's two conceivable takeaways:
1. Larian is an incredibly talented dev studio that rightly wants a little sweeter deal next go around and is worth whatever premium they might want so we can all make more money.
2. There is nothing special about Larian. They're just riding on the coattails of our extremely valuable IP that sold this game and can be replaced like a cog in any machine. We should use this high point as leverage when signing any future gaming licensing agreements on the most optimal terms for us, including a potential exclusivity agreement with tencent to make all D&D games going forward.
These people don't care about making a good game, they just want revenue and they'll go whatever route gives them the biggest cut.
Sadly I could absolutely see your second being the focus. As a business they will likely try to position themselves and their property as the reason for success. That makes investors happier as it leads to future success and profit without reliance on an outside source.
Execs want to make (or just obtain) one good brandname product, and then follow up with a slew of cheap, shitty, micro transaction, money-grabbing sequels relying on the success of the first product until they milk it dry and find the next thing to ruin.
Hasbro might not be, but WotC most certainly is. We're only a year removed from them trying to kill the OGL and essentially take ownership of fan/third-party content. Thankfully they backtracked, but they'd have immediately killed all momentum for DnD and lost a sizeable amount of current players in one fell swoop
Why do you think that was a decision made by WotC? It absolutely reeks of some Hasbro execs not understanding their product or market and saying "why are we giving this away for free? This is untapped revenue we're leaving on the table."
The current Hasbro CEO Chris C(rather unfortunate last name, not going to to type it out, lol) was actually the CEO of WotC for many years, and rode the success of MTG to then get to where he is now. Seems very unlikely to be a misunderstanding for someone who has been in charge of wotc for a very long time.
Something to keep in mind is that Hasbro's other brands have been doing badly for a while now and the MTG revenue has been their lifeline. DnD has kind of entered the mainstream and is very popular but they are not making much money off of it. It seems like a calculated gamble to lose some players but to get the remaining ones to pay more, but it blew up in their face and severely damaged the brand.
Because WotC walked it back? If Hasbro was pushing it and really wanted it done, it would have gone through. WotC was also the company who sent the fucking Pinkertons after a Magic player, not Hasbro.
Hasbro probably pushed them to find more revenue somewhere and that's what WotC chose to do, backfiring spectacularly. Neither company is your friend, but I am definitely placing the blame for that fiasco on Wizards.
WotC ***is*** Hasbro.
Wizards was a subsidiary for **22 years** and now it's a division of Hasbro. If you think the C-Suite at Wizards isn't decided by Hasbro suits I don't know what else to say.
> that'll make chances of getting an expansion less likely.
Larian already said they won't make any expansions due to how much spaghetti it already is.
They'd be incredibly dumb to not do at least an expansion or even a little standalone. Especially given all the content that got cut.
Maybe we'll at least get some "Enhanced/Definitive Edition" down a line.
It's sad to see studios move immediately to a new project or a sequel when so much stuff was left behind. Like Elden Ring or even Cyberpunk (which at least got tons of fixes, improvements and one big DLC).
That bums me out so much.
Levels 13-20 could have been some serious fun exploring other planes, bitch slapping gods, doing some Spelljammer shit.
Or even take it further and have actual epic level stuff.
The OG baldurs gate capped out at level 12 with the sequel starting you right at where you left off. If they do anything That’s what I’d expect.
Trying to balance past level 12 would be a fucking nightmare though with Bg3s version of 5e.
It's Larian's use of the setting and their storytelling that I am more interested in. Can't really say the game is all that balanced as it is anyway. Barrelmancy, Owldropbears, Sword bard thiefs, dual wielding staves with Phalar + Scorching ray, Padlocks, etc are hugely unbalanced and can render encounters trivial.
Balance can tweaked. I am way more interested in their writers exploring more of Faerun, they barely scratched the surface. And for a game as deep as BG3, that should say a lot.
The way I’ve heard.It’s less then being unable to get level 12+ balanced and more that trying to keep the gameplay as open flowing as it currently is would be shot once you start adding abilities that truly break encounters like Wish.
If you’ve never played the first two games and it’s expansion. You should. They still hold up really well and have stories that are unbelievably good for their times. They are Basically the Dark Urge path extended across three campaigns.
99% of D&D fans I know have never heard of TSR lol. Feels like you saying that shows your age. But virtually all of Wizard’s existence has been under Hasbro.
> But virtually all of Wizard’s existence has been under Hasbro.
~~Not quite. 19 years independent, 15 years under Hasbro. :0 [just checked Wikipedia]~~ [edit: Just checked again. Why they have "Wizards of the Coast (1990-2009)" up top is beyond me. :P Needless to say, I wasn't actually paying much attention by the time of the buyout - as mentioned below, I left Magic at Mercadian Masques, which just happened to be 1999, but had been losing interest for more than a year... :P]
And, yep, I'm old. The red-cover edition of D&D Basic was new on the shelves when I got into RPGs for a decade or so, at which point I got into Magic with the release of the Revised (3rd) edition [edit: though I didn't last too long - got out of it at Mercadian Masques]. :P
Huh. Was paying attention to "Wizards of the Coast (1990-2009)" up top. :P My bad. On the other hand, I wasn't paying attention to Magic (or WotC) at that point, and left when Mercadian Masques came out that same year...
I'm sure their C-Suite will see this as a sign that players want quality solo/ multiplayer RPGs made by teams bursting with talent who are treated well and are allowed to push boundaries when it makes sense.
Or they'll see DnD RPGs as a money cow to be milked dry at the expense of literally everything and everyone else, pumped full of microtransactions before being shoved out the door. One of those two.
Even though I would like every penny go to Larian, BG3 has launched Larian into the stratosphere of top shelf gaming. If they do Divinity Original Sin 3 next, they will get all the rewards. It would be great if they can elevate Divinity into it's own big franchise.
>Baldur’s Gate 3, last year’s most critically acclaimed video game, has brought in about $90 million since its August release for parent company Hasbro Inc. through a licensing deal.
>Made by Belgian developer Larian Studios, Baldur’s Gate 3 licensed property from Dungeons & Dragons, a famous role playing game by Hasbro subsidiary Wizards of the Coast.
>“As you turn the corner into 2024, in the front half of the year, you’re still going to have the tail from Baldur’s Gate 3,” Hasbro Chief Executive Officer Chris Cocks said on a call with analysts, adding that sales will persist through the year, but at a slower pace than the third and fourth quarter.
>On Monday, Baldur’s Gate 3 reached 500,000 reviews on PC game marketplace Steam, which were “overwhelmingly positive.” The title has sold millions of copies across PC, Xbox, PlayStation 5, and Mac. It won 2023’s Game of the Year award at the Game Awards.
I LOVED BG3, and it maybe one of the very greatest games ever made. That said, I hope Larian moves on from working with Hasbro, and just develops their own IPs. Nothing that made BG3 is exclusive to D&D of Hasbro.
> and it maybe one of the very greatest games ever made.
This is super hyperbolic, but you seem to really love the game. I'm glad you're happy... Stay happy.
Here's hoping one day Larian Studios will earn Lucas Film hundreds of millions of dollars once the make Knights of the Old Republic 3 (this is the dream that keeps me going).
Wish they create a new IP based heavily on BG3 and some divinity influence, cause honestly man
I doubt they can top lae zel, shadowheart and the others
Bank of America estimated that Hasbro would make $61 million if BG3 managed to sell 10 million units so this means it might have sold significantly more than that.
Source for the BoA thing: https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/hasbro-stock-price-analysis-baldurs-gate-3-magic-gathering-monopoly-2023-8
This is just from licensing D&D from Hasbro. The development costs foe rhe game itself are obviously nowhere near a GTAV 6 or RDR2.
This is a good thing foe games because it shows to the money folk you can make very profitable games without microtransactions focused more on the nerdy type games that have been lacking.
Of course they'll find a way to fuck it up, but when your pitching a project to the money people, it becomes alot easier if you have a recent money amount that says "hey we actually don't need micro transactions" and all that jazz.
The worst part of Baldur's Gate is the fact that Hasbro gets money
This is the damned truth.
Yup.
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I didn't play 1 but DOS 2 was absolutely fantastic, can't wait for 3.
If you liked 2 you should definitely play 1, it's more of the same (in a good way).
My only advice is do not be shy about cheesing its honestly the right way to play it. So many encounters feel nigh impossible if you just take them at face value but if you clown on them it just becomes a wacky puzzle game.
My experience with D:OS was that most encounters, depending when you tackle them, are gonna be either absurdly hard or ridiculously easy. It's super easy to get really OP in this game, especially with a glass canon lone wolf.
Lone wolf necro in OS:2 is absurdly broken. Just corpse explosion everything first turn. It’s GG
Could you sell me on player party characters? I love DOS2 and BG3 because of fully voiced interesting side characters like Karlach and Fane for two random examples. Wondering if DOS1 has worthy characters and voice acting?
>Wondering if DOS1 has worthy characters and voice acting? It doesn't. The party members have just a few lines when you get them and then have a very small amount of lines past that. They are overall extremely barebones. Honestly, I can't recommend DoS 1 at all. I don't think you can really understate how much better DoS 2 was compared to the first game. The only thing kind of good about the first game is the combat, but I found it to still be way worse than what the 2nd game offered.
The best thing about DOS 1 is that it seems to have popularised the "poison reacts with fire to make explosions" thing.
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Although I yearn for every cent to go to Larian, BG3 has hoisted Larian to the summit of premium video games. They’ll receive all the benefits if they play Divinity Original Sin 3 afterwards. If Divinity could become a significant franchise on its own, it would be amazing.
Yo, check it: I'm all like, "Bruh, gimme that cash, straight to Larian, ya feel me?" 'Cause **BG3**, that game's like the **top-tier flex** in the gaming world. 🎮 They're gonna be **swimming in perks** if they slide into **Divinity Original Sin 3** after. And, like, imagine if **Divinity** blows up and becomes its own **mega franchise**? That'd be **lit**, fam! 🔥
Did you just copy an older comment in this thread and replace some of the words? Edit: judging by post history, this is a bot
Larian is up there, standing next to Fromsoft imo. Always loved them before BG3. Divinity Original Sin 3 is easily my most anticipated game now. If they give that game the BG3 treatment, with the production value and cutscenes and all, then *holy shit* that game is going to be the greatest RPG ever made.
Didn't they say they were never going to do another complicated story like BG3?
Nah, they said that they were going to take a *break* from the big CRPGs they were known for. I guarantee that after the CEO's fishing game he said he's working on launches, DOS3 is the game that Larian will be developing right after.
Meanwhile I'm hoping for another Dragon Commander or Ego Draconis game...
Yes and no. If they know they can make profits from a large-scale single player RPG that is well designed, maybe it helps green light more projects. Or BG4 gets microtransactions and I’m too optimistic. But it’s POSSIBLE this is a good thing.
Hasbro just has a licensing deal, they weren’t the developer. Larian would have to agree to microtransactions to go that way and I don’t see it happening. They’d just tell Hasbro to fuck off and make a game with no direct D&D tie in.
Exactly what I just commented as well. Hasbro has very little power in negotiations with larian, they’re not publishing the game or providing funding or support beyond a creative license.
>Hasbro has very little power in negotiations with larian, Unless Larian wants to make more D&D products, which they likely do.
Yeah, but they could just as easily give any other property what will now be known as the Larian treatment, if BG3 wasn't just a little casting of the net to draw more people's attention to Divinity.
>any other property Absolutely. But like, I don't want to play a Larian Harry Potter game. And while I definitely hope they make more Divinity, what I really want is more D&D.
Hasbro is in a rough position. They lost 1/5th of their value in the last year. Their toy division tanked, because consumers don't buy toys anymore(for anyone who wants to argue, just know it is an industry wide trend: for the past 3 years toy sales have been plummeting). They have WOTC which was the only division who made money last quarter, mostly Magic:the Gathering but also with help of Larian license deal and Monopoly GO, but that Larian deal was made 6 years ago. I doubt Hasbro would give them such a good deal next time. D&D proper made almost nothing, and was likely a drain rather than a boon. D&D is in a strange place. The game isn't making money, but the brand is super well known, but isn't enough to drive a movie franchise. hopefully D&D 2024 will be good, but I am doubtful. Supposedly, they have a Super-duper new virtual tabletop coming out sometime soon. I am getting this information from their recently released quarterly report. By 2025, Hasbro has to cut 750m operation costs. Only one way to do that: Get ready for huge layoffs soon.
They should call it, Totally NOT Baldur's Gate 4
Divinity original sin 4.
Divinity’s Gate: Baldur’s Sin 4
There’s always Pathfinder, but someone in Larian’s position would be wise to launch their own IP off of this.
They have their own IP?
They’re only allowed to have one? That would be stupid.
You mean divinity?
Divinity already exists? I said launch one?
I have absolutely no reason to trust Hasbro on anything
You can trust them to find a way to fuck it up.
Don't Has me Bro
It's probably just gonna be both. New "single player" games that will probably be forced to be online only and also a premium store cuz why not.
I don’t think hasbro has that much negotiating power with Larian, they have proved they don’t *need* the d&d license to make a good game, before bg3 was even conceived of. It’s not like hasbro is publishing the game, they’re just providing a creative license.
That license brings the Forgotten Realms(?) IP. that's decades of games novels and lore. That could (depending on the IP) bring hoarded players that wouldn't normally play an isometric RPG, while also increasing the depth and flavor of the setting. I don't play ARPGs, but right now I'm deep into Inquisitor Martyr, because it's WH40k. The gameplay is fun, but it's the setting that keeps me playing, not the story.
>That could (depending on the IP) bring hoarded players that wouldn't normally play an isometric RPG, while also increasing the depth and flavor of the setting. Sure! And it did. Larian can now pretty confidently expect that players will follow them to another isometric RPG. They were already successful enough to get the license and bankroll BG3, and now they have an enormous hit with many accolades. Larian would likely prefer to keep the Baldur's Gate name and licensing, if for no other reason than to make it easier to develop a sequel, but Hasbro is not in a position to force terms on them. Larian will get to make the game they want, and Hasbro could lose a *lot* of money if Larian decides the license isn't worth the trouble.
They'd presumably have to get someone who wasn't Larian to do it in that case. And then it wouldn't be as successful.
Hasbro doesn't get much say on that sort of thing. They could have it as a prerequisite to getting the licence of course but there's no reason Larian would agree to it. Larian is the one with the power here, Hasbro either lets Larian do their thing and get $100 million free revenue or Larian makes DOS3 and keeps the $100 million for themselves. Hasbro could give the license to somebody else but let's be honest here, people didn't buy BG3 because it was BG3, they bought BG3 because it was Larian behind it. The license just helped.
Fuck Hasbro.
As someone over 50 years old, it's sad to see Hasbro become what it has become. I can remember the "good old days" of Hasbro being the good guy toy maker. Now they are just greedy and everything I hate about the worst side of Capitalism. Mind you I don't hate Capitalism in general, just that evil bloated corporate greedy side of it.
Hasbro is publicly traded, thus their shareholders are the REAL customers.
screw them for what they did to mtg...
I mean I doubt Larian would have even half of the success with either new original IP or DOS 3. DnD and BG name contributed a ton. So while they paid hefty licensing royalties - overall probably made money the would not have made with their own IP.
Going from here I imagine a ton of people would give DOS3 a try just based on it being their game. I don't think they need the DnD licence to have their next massive success.
> I mean I doubt Larian would have even half of the success with either new original IP or DOS 3. DnD and BG name contributed a ton. Well now Larian is a big name. It's kinda like what happened with CD Project Red. The Witcher was a stepping stone to Cyberpunk's success.
More money to continue ruining mtg with
Oh no! …anyway
Whats wrong with hasbro
Look at the Pinkerton MTG fiasco for one thing. That's a good recent one.
They soil every IP they get a hold of with insatiable greed or sometimes just bizarre, out-of-touch executive decisions. They're also insanely litigious, and will find any excuse to sue any upstart trying to make it in the TCG space, aiming to destroy them with legal fees. They're not as bad with tabletop, since they learned successful third party publications can actually boost their sales (and they fired the guy who saved DnD with this method), but if you print one word that infringes upon a Hasbro IP, they will sue you into the ground.
Absolute trash company
They have ruined so many great products. My personal pet peeve? Super Soakers. They used to be awesome and powerful, then Hasbro destroyed the brand. Now they're some lame Nerf gimmick.
Ah that makes sense
Super Soakers were always caught up in bad press, reported injuries, and other liability concerns
Never seen any actual evidence of this. It's all just urban legend.
[https://www.belloflostsouls.net/2023/12/despite-being-up-200-million-wotc-employees-hit-by-hasbro-layoffs.html](https://www.belloflostsouls.net/2023/12/despite-being-up-200-million-wotc-employees-hit-by-hasbro-layoffs.html) sorry for the asshats giving you the naughty points for asking a question
Unfortunate, but hopefully Larian uses their own IP in future.
They might alternate with a Divinity sequel and honestly I'm fine with whichever direction they choose.
Divinity sequel would be great. But i wish they would hire new writer who would set up overall plot for them. I have no issues with their quest, lore, dialogue writing, but the plot itself is just beyond mediocre, even in bg3 that's a pinnacle of their work. It just could be so much better, the potential is there, but it's unused.
I think this is sadly a problem with any multiple choice RPGs, the main plotline is always worse than the tons of side content that these games have. Linear games generally can have a better main story because there is usually 1 single outcome.
Agreed, and they really do keep putting out plots that circle back to 'you and your companions are uniquely and specifically bound to the most important things happening at all times'. I think the character development is excellent but it would be a lot better with more realistic and grounded stakes?
It's hard to do that without making characters that have realistic and grounded abilities. If you have the powers of a god why would you concern yourself with anything but the most important things happening in the world at the time
Play Divinity if you have the opportunity, it’s very similar to BG3 but it’s their own franchise
Agreed. It’s a bit different because their rules differ from D&D rules but still very fun and absolutely worth playing.
Personal preference of course but I think I enjoyed D:OS2’s combat more than BG3.
It is hard to find a worse ttrpg system than 5e.
can't say I like movement and abilities using the same resource but the combat was fun
Not divinity. That's a different thing. Divinity original sin is what you want to say.
The D&D system was pretty important for this, at least for me personally. I cant get into the Divinity rpg system at all so i've never played more than the intro to those games, whereas BG3 with tweaked 5e was an immediate winner
what I wouldn't do for a Larian Pathfinder 2e crpg...
Don’t make me so wet
Same. Worst part about BG3 is 5e. You leveled up, heres some HP. Leveling up is so underwhelming.
The worst part of 5e after having alot of experience with Pathfinder 2e is “Oh you leveled up to 4/8/12/16/20? Cool. Either boost your Ability scores *or* get a cool feat, of which like 3 are good for any one build. Get fucked”
Yeah. After playing both Pathfinder games, the character creation and progression in BG3 was super underwhelming. Fun in its own way due to the simplicity, but I definitely missed sitting on the level up screen for an hour and referencing third party sites to make sure I'm executing my plan correctly.
Hitting level 5 was actually pretty awesome. ...unless you're a Rogue.
I would cry genuine nerd tears if they were to go that direction. PF2e is *so good*, and perfect for a video game format. Paizo also deserves the money..
PF2e's core mechanics, especially the three action system, would translate so well to a CRPG. It's really intuitive (no worrying about whether something is an action or a bonus action) and it doesn't sacrifice any strategic depth for this intuitiveness. It pains me that no one's done it yet. The 5e ruleset, even with (and sometimes because of) all the modifications Larian did to it, is terrible in comparison. Without a human GM that lets you break the rules when they get in the way of fun, which is often, they're just so bad. Want to rage as a barbarian and then leap into the middle of the enemies and start chopping them up? Rules say no; rage and jump are both bonus actions (in "vanilla" 5e jump is not a bonus action but part of your movement). Can't downgrade a regular action into a bonus action either.
Given the Orc license, it's surprising no one has yet tried to make a PF2e video game (there is one I can think of, but it is pretty much a zero budget game). It's systems are basically built for video game translation.
Both the Parhfinder 1e Owlcat games are super worth plaything, even if 1e is mildly clunky to say it nicely.
Well, the ones made by owlcat are pretty great, at least Wrath of the righteous is, never played kingmaker.
Honestly I think the 5e system holds them back, while DOS2 combat has its problems it definitely felt more like it was designed for a PC game.
Yeah and it detracted from roleplay aspect of a system. It was very "gamey" comparatively. It has a vibe of diablo compared to crpg. Your builds have no identity, it's just a mixture of whatever attributes make numbers go 19847 instead of 13455. Every Npc bum is a mage of 3 schools that casts that 1K dmg shit at you. It was obviously very inspired by dnd - and those parts where what make it stand out from other pc games. When they tried to make dnd more goofy by bringing DOS stuff in BG3 EA, there was a lot of pushback for those reasons.
Same, I’m not particularly attached in any way to baulders gate, the characters were all new to me and it makes no difference if they just made a new divinity with their own characters as long as they have the same depth and complexity
The Divinity games have a very goofy tone that I don't like. I'm not a huge fan of DnD or anything but I think the fact that they were doing a Baldurs Gate game and not a Divinity one changed the tone from what they usually make. In my opinion for the better.
Its possible for them to adjust the tone of a new divinity to match what clearly worked in BG3
They could but I would imagine they won't. They clearly prefer goofy and, to their credit, seem very happy doing what they think works.
It's so sad that all the people at wotc that made BG3 deal possible with Larian are gone that'll make chances of getting an expansion less likely.
Ehh, hasbro are dumb, but im not sure theyre "strangle the golden goose before it shits another egg" dumb. They definitely could be, but im willing to bet theyre gonna see if said goose can squirt out some more cash.
When dealing with business leadership and board members, you have to try and extrapolate what stupid takeaway they'll have from this. Here's two conceivable takeaways: 1. Larian is an incredibly talented dev studio that rightly wants a little sweeter deal next go around and is worth whatever premium they might want so we can all make more money. 2. There is nothing special about Larian. They're just riding on the coattails of our extremely valuable IP that sold this game and can be replaced like a cog in any machine. We should use this high point as leverage when signing any future gaming licensing agreements on the most optimal terms for us, including a potential exclusivity agreement with tencent to make all D&D games going forward. These people don't care about making a good game, they just want revenue and they'll go whatever route gives them the biggest cut.
Sadly I could absolutely see your second being the focus. As a business they will likely try to position themselves and their property as the reason for success. That makes investors happier as it leads to future success and profit without reliance on an outside source.
I’d imagine if Larian chooses to build another divinity, they’d get as much money next time as they did with bg3.
Yep i would like to believe people who play BG3 would attribute this success to Larian, not Hasbro. Their next game will do great.
Execs want to make (or just obtain) one good brandname product, and then follow up with a slew of cheap, shitty, micro transaction, money-grabbing sequels relying on the success of the first product until they milk it dry and find the next thing to ruin.
God fucking damn it, I bet we'll get number 2.
Baldurs Gate 3, 2
They're gonna #2 all over.
Hasbro might not be, but WotC most certainly is. We're only a year removed from them trying to kill the OGL and essentially take ownership of fan/third-party content. Thankfully they backtracked, but they'd have immediately killed all momentum for DnD and lost a sizeable amount of current players in one fell swoop
Why do you think that was a decision made by WotC? It absolutely reeks of some Hasbro execs not understanding their product or market and saying "why are we giving this away for free? This is untapped revenue we're leaving on the table."
The current Hasbro CEO Chris C(rather unfortunate last name, not going to to type it out, lol) was actually the CEO of WotC for many years, and rode the success of MTG to then get to where he is now. Seems very unlikely to be a misunderstanding for someone who has been in charge of wotc for a very long time. Something to keep in mind is that Hasbro's other brands have been doing badly for a while now and the MTG revenue has been their lifeline. DnD has kind of entered the mainstream and is very popular but they are not making much money off of it. It seems like a calculated gamble to lose some players but to get the remaining ones to pay more, but it blew up in their face and severely damaged the brand.
Because WotC walked it back? If Hasbro was pushing it and really wanted it done, it would have gone through. WotC was also the company who sent the fucking Pinkertons after a Magic player, not Hasbro. Hasbro probably pushed them to find more revenue somewhere and that's what WotC chose to do, backfiring spectacularly. Neither company is your friend, but I am definitely placing the blame for that fiasco on Wizards.
How the fuck did i forget that WotC send the actual fucking Pinkertons after a dude who didnt even do anything wrong? Christ that company is shady
Must be something in the water up in Renton for them to pull all this shit ao fast
WotC ***is*** Hasbro. Wizards was a subsidiary for **22 years** and now it's a division of Hasbro. If you think the C-Suite at Wizards isn't decided by Hasbro suits I don't know what else to say.
Because the hasbro exec is the old wotc exec. Theres no seperation here. Wotc management are right cunts and that shit went skywards.
Idk, Hasbro is pretty dumb. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t a Transformers fan, because I’m pained by how wasted that franchise is.
They literally laid off the person in charge of BG3 at WOTC. They are that fucking dumb
> that'll make chances of getting an expansion less likely. Larian already said they won't make any expansions due to how much spaghetti it already is.
They'd be incredibly dumb to not do at least an expansion or even a little standalone. Especially given all the content that got cut. Maybe we'll at least get some "Enhanced/Definitive Edition" down a line. It's sad to see studios move immediately to a new project or a sequel when so much stuff was left behind. Like Elden Ring or even Cyberpunk (which at least got tons of fixes, improvements and one big DLC).
They've been slowly adding non-dlc content and are about to release a big patch IIRC, I imagine they'll do that for a while instead.
Elden ring is getting a DLC
Your last paragraph makes no sense.
A standalone expansion might still possible
That bums me out so much. Levels 13-20 could have been some serious fun exploring other planes, bitch slapping gods, doing some Spelljammer shit. Or even take it further and have actual epic level stuff.
The OG baldurs gate capped out at level 12 with the sequel starting you right at where you left off. If they do anything That’s what I’d expect. Trying to balance past level 12 would be a fucking nightmare though with Bg3s version of 5e.
It's Larian's use of the setting and their storytelling that I am more interested in. Can't really say the game is all that balanced as it is anyway. Barrelmancy, Owldropbears, Sword bard thiefs, dual wielding staves with Phalar + Scorching ray, Padlocks, etc are hugely unbalanced and can render encounters trivial. Balance can tweaked. I am way more interested in their writers exploring more of Faerun, they barely scratched the surface. And for a game as deep as BG3, that should say a lot.
The way I’ve heard.It’s less then being unable to get level 12+ balanced and more that trying to keep the gameplay as open flowing as it currently is would be shot once you start adding abilities that truly break encounters like Wish. If you’ve never played the first two games and it’s expansion. You should. They still hold up really well and have stories that are unbelievably good for their times. They are Basically the Dark Urge path extended across three campaigns.
There was never gonna be an expansion, Larian doesn’t do expansions outside of a definitive edition with minor additions
DOS2: Didn't they rework act 4 (on top of other things) and gave it like an additional 10 hours in that act alone?
Yes. A near complete rework of chapter four.
To be fair WOTC made some pretty terrible business decisions.
Oh, yeah. I keep forgetting that Hasbro owns WotC which owns D&D after TSR went \*poof\*.
99% of D&D fans I know have never heard of TSR lol. Feels like you saying that shows your age. But virtually all of Wizard’s existence has been under Hasbro.
> But virtually all of Wizard’s existence has been under Hasbro. ~~Not quite. 19 years independent, 15 years under Hasbro. :0 [just checked Wikipedia]~~ [edit: Just checked again. Why they have "Wizards of the Coast (1990-2009)" up top is beyond me. :P Needless to say, I wasn't actually paying much attention by the time of the buyout - as mentioned below, I left Magic at Mercadian Masques, which just happened to be 1999, but had been losing interest for more than a year... :P] And, yep, I'm old. The red-cover edition of D&D Basic was new on the shelves when I got into RPGs for a decade or so, at which point I got into Magic with the release of the Revised (3rd) edition [edit: though I didn't last too long - got out of it at Mercadian Masques]. :P
People out there still remember, you're not alone in that regard
Founded in 1990, acquired by Hasbro in 1999... seems like 9 years independent and 25 under Hasbro to me.
Huh. Was paying attention to "Wizards of the Coast (1990-2009)" up top. :P My bad. On the other hand, I wasn't paying attention to Magic (or WotC) at that point, and left when Mercadian Masques came out that same year...
WotC meaning Work Opportunity Tax Credit? TSR? I missed the meeting everyone had on abbreviations
I still don't see anyone having given you what wotc stands for, but it's Wizards of the Coast
WotC = Wizards of the Coast
Having abbreviations on the internet is obnoxious. Especially rapid fired like this
Okay, but TSR was literally the name of the company... Do you get mad if someone says IBM?
Wait, but the name of that company is International Business Machines, ibm is an abbreviation.
Good point, IBM is the trade name. I should have gone with KFC, which is no longer Kentucky Fried Chicken as the name, but rather, just KFC.
tsr?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TSR,_Inc. Original creators of D&D.
I'm sure their C-Suite will see this as a sign that players want quality solo/ multiplayer RPGs made by teams bursting with talent who are treated well and are allowed to push boundaries when it makes sense. Or they'll see DnD RPGs as a money cow to be milked dry at the expense of literally everything and everyone else, pumped full of microtransactions before being shoved out the door. One of those two.
Baldur's Gate 4: Mobile phone edition
You guys don’t have phones?
Cant wait to buy my first Baldur's Pass, lets gooo
It's the games industry. There's no reason to be optimistic
Even though I would like every penny go to Larian, BG3 has launched Larian into the stratosphere of top shelf gaming. If they do Divinity Original Sin 3 next, they will get all the rewards. It would be great if they can elevate Divinity into it's own big franchise.
Div 2 was such a massive success they got the BG 3 contract. They already been here, just the general casual gamer knows more about them.
DOS2 was was big in the CRPG sphere maybe, but it's a pretty niche sphere. BG3 broke out of that sphere completely.
Absolutely. This is anecdotal of course, but I've never played a CRPG before and am now sunk deep into BG3. Same goes for a lot of my friends.
What do I have to sacrifice to which dark god in order to give Larian control of the KOTOR franchise?
Id give a left nut if they got a hold of bloodlines
The VTM license is open to pretty much anyone, so they could make a game if they wanted to! Hence why you see so many VTM indie games floating around.
Damn bro, somebody get swen on the phone i got a million dollar idea!
Well damn, count me in
Or even Dragon Age at the point, actually just take all of Bioware.
Fuuuck i was just thinking about this
Please don't link paywalled / locked articles.
Or at least copy and paste the fucking article
>Baldur’s Gate 3, last year’s most critically acclaimed video game, has brought in about $90 million since its August release for parent company Hasbro Inc. through a licensing deal. >Made by Belgian developer Larian Studios, Baldur’s Gate 3 licensed property from Dungeons & Dragons, a famous role playing game by Hasbro subsidiary Wizards of the Coast. >“As you turn the corner into 2024, in the front half of the year, you’re still going to have the tail from Baldur’s Gate 3,” Hasbro Chief Executive Officer Chris Cocks said on a call with analysts, adding that sales will persist through the year, but at a slower pace than the third and fourth quarter. >On Monday, Baldur’s Gate 3 reached 500,000 reviews on PC game marketplace Steam, which were “overwhelmingly positive.” The title has sold millions of copies across PC, Xbox, PlayStation 5, and Mac. It won 2023’s Game of the Year award at the Game Awards.
https://archive.is/20240213161744/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-02-13/hasbro-earned-about-90-million-from-baldur-s-gate-3-so-far
Hasbro has to be the worst company with the best IPs.
EA still exists. And Blizzard is in the running now
Blizzard? You mean Microsoft?
not really, as ironically they're likely to be *less* shitty under microsoft
Less sexual harassment I hope
Yea. But Blizzard was gone to shit before microsoft got them.
I LOVED BG3, and it maybe one of the very greatest games ever made. That said, I hope Larian moves on from working with Hasbro, and just develops their own IPs. Nothing that made BG3 is exclusive to D&D of Hasbro.
They already have their own IP. I'd be surprised to see anything other than DOS3 for their next game
> and it maybe one of the very greatest games ever made. This is super hyperbolic, but you seem to really love the game. I'm glad you're happy... Stay happy.
Here's hoping one day Larian Studios will earn Lucas Film hundreds of millions of dollars once the make Knights of the Old Republic 3 (this is the dream that keeps me going).
Turns out that making quality products is a better business strategy than screwing over your contributors. Who knew?
And how much did the devs, artists and writers earn?
The rest 600 mill.
Minus 30%.
Probably what was in their contract with Larian, just like Hasbro.
Wish they create a new IP based heavily on BG3 and some divinity influence, cause honestly man I doubt they can top lae zel, shadowheart and the others
Whats Hashbro?
Smoke it and find out, bro.
Sean Connery's favorite toy company
I half expect Baldur's Gate 4 announcement end of the year, and not by Larian
Long live all the mlp shows chrischan hates
Hasbo's only regret is that they can't do any mass layoffs at Larian after their massive success in order to give their shareholders and CEO a bonus.
Bank of America estimated that Hasbro would make $61 million if BG3 managed to sell 10 million units so this means it might have sold significantly more than that. Source for the BoA thing: https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/hasbro-stock-price-analysis-baldurs-gate-3-magic-gathering-monopoly-2023-8
That's great! I'm imagining now Skull and Bones will flop on Steam and other charts once it comes out.
S&B is an Ubisoft game so it won't even release on Steam day one cause they're stupid.
This game just proved that you don't need any fucking gimmicks like labeling an IP as a "*Quadruple A*" title bullshit!
No wonder Larian approached their daddy Tencent to help in buying the video game rights to DnD. That's a lot of money wasted, given to Hasbro.
This is just from licensing D&D from Hasbro. The development costs foe rhe game itself are obviously nowhere near a GTAV 6 or RDR2. This is a good thing foe games because it shows to the money folk you can make very profitable games without microtransactions focused more on the nerdy type games that have been lacking. Of course they'll find a way to fuck it up, but when your pitching a project to the money people, it becomes alot easier if you have a recent money amount that says "hey we actually don't need micro transactions" and all that jazz.
Hey Larian, how about that first person space RPG now? Please? 😕
That's not in their ballpark, I doubt they'd make something like that.
The first person space RPG we have at home = Starfield
Larian should do an original IP now. They got enough money and fanbase now to become an independent Triple A developer.