The Impact of Baldur’s Gate III on the RPG Industry: Setting Standards or Setting Up for Disappointment?

2023-07-11 05:34:21
Strange Scaffold developer Zalavier Nelson, who worked on Hypnospace Outlaw and Stranger Things VR, took to Twitter to discuss the upcoming Baldur’s Gate III and its possible negative effect on the industry. Nelson himself is looking forward to the new Larian, but fears that players will use it as a “new standard” for other projects in the RPG genre. According to the developer, not all teams can afford the conditions that Larian had. He noted that the development of Baldur’s Gate 3 began in 2017, Larian already had a wealth of experience behind him and the necessary technologies, as well as a large staff (over 400 people) and a license for one of the largest IP. In addition, we should not forget about the “incredibly successful early access”. Nelson emphasized that Larian has much more to offer and that, despite the weight of expectation from fans, the studio is “clearly on a roll.” But Baldur’s Gate 3 is “an anomaly, not a new standard for RPGs.” In the future, comparisons to it could lead to high expectations, disappointments, financial failures, and other unfortunate consequences for various teams, including possibly Larian itself – when it comes time to make a new game. Nelson asked gamers to just enjoy the upcoming role-playing adventure, and he was supported by many in the gaming industry. Josh Sawyer, writer and game director at Obsidian Entertainment, who worked on the iconic Fallout: New Vegas and Pentiment, also called the conditions for creating Baldur’s Gate 3 atypical for the modern industry. At the same time, he praised Larian and expressed his hope that the game will be truly outstanding. Chris Balzer, senior designer for Diablo IV at Blizzard, cited The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom as an example, with its custom development environment that would not be easy for other teams to adapt. Ryan McCabe, design manager at Insomniac Games, agreed that using one game to set standards in the genre is useless and reckless. Justin Groot, Senior Writer and Narrative Designer for Overwatch 2, likened Baldur’s Gate 3’s ambitious level and scale to grand cathedrals that may look like historical anomalies in the future. But Coty Craven, a producer at Epic Games, drew a parallel with gamers’ expectations of a certain standard of accessibility settings. According to him, if The Last of Us: Part II was able to succeed in this regard, then this does not mean that subsequent games that did not implement the same level of accessibility should be considered a failure.
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