I am actually a huge fan of Diablo.

Theres a lot of things that make Diablo a really good game. Yes, it is fundamentally different. As been mentioned, Diablo is primarily an action adventure game with certain customizable features. Now this sounds like a watered down kind of idea, but there is a surprising amount of gameplay depth to Diablo. For instance the Horadric cube is hugely important, and lets you generate rare weapons. The dungeons are generated at mostly random (within certain perimeters) and the amount of fun you can have playing through Diablo 2 with friends is certainly unparalleled. The story also, often looked down upon or missed completely, is actually very good. The world is extremely atmospheric, and the cinematics were amazing for its time. To sum up, Diablo is a fantastic cinematic-driven linear experience, thats not meant to be anything else.

Baldurs Gate is truly a whole other ballgame. Yes it did simulate the tabletop experience well, and it is very story driven. But it is also alot less linear. Which is both good or bad depending on how you approach it. I have become a fan of Baldur's gate. I can spend quite awhile in just experimenting with different parties, which is my opinion quite brilliant. However understand that the combat is very different. This is a game that requires tactics and forethought. You will use your brain in this game. In a sense you are playing an active part of a story, and not just watching it.

Both are good. Both are favorites.



Bottom line.

Ha! Imagining BG as a jerky DM:

DM: OK the actress suddenly turns into a witch and attacks you! Roll initiative!
Player: *rolls* I got 12.
DM: The witch initiated combat so she gets a surprise round. She casts a spell on you. *rolls* *rolls* *rolls* You take 25 points damage.
Player: What the balls? I'm only level 1! I've got, like, eight hit points!
DM: Well then you're DEAD! I win, lewzor! *fap* *fap* You got completely owned! *fap*
Player: This is bullshit.
DM: You shouldn't have taken the bodyguarding job. You need to be at least level 4 to do that quest. Ha! *fap* I completely wasted you! *fap*
Player: How was I supposed to know that?
DM: *fap* I can't hear you, Dead Mouth! *fap* *fap* *fap*
Player: This sucks arse. OK I'll try again from before I took the job.
DM: What? You're dead. You can't do anything! That's your guy there all over the cobblestones and the walls! *fap* On, like, minus seventeen hit points! You're going to need to roll up a new character.
Player: Yeah, but I saved. Remember when I said "I save"? So now I load from there.
DM: What is this? You can't "save" and "load"!
Player: Either I load from before I took the job, or I leave your stale-smelling basement and spend the rest of my evening with my girlfriend.
DM: No, you have to roll up a new character. But I'll be kind: I'll let you start in Beregost. Even though it completely ruins the integrity of the story.
Player: You have man-boobs; Amy has girl-boobs. Good night, Duncan.
DM: OK fine, you can "load". Cheater.

....Okay, you get points for that one.

Baldur's Gate is the first game to really bring the full Dungeons and Dragons experience to the PC. Success It requires cunning battle tactics, and the world feels alive with NPCs and lush landscapes.
Diablo is essentially just a modernized version of Gauntlet with an emphasis on getting better and better items to help you kill more and more enemies. It's fun and addictive. And there are a lot of times when it is just the kind of game I want to play.
As far as fun goes, Diablo is the arguably the most instantly gratifying and fun game of the two. But it is a shallow arcade-like game. Baldur's gate is the real deal when it comes to depth.

Gotta go with everyone on the whole, they're completely different end.... but what I'm really trying to figure out is how they have the same art style O.o

I agree.

Damn! No multiplayer. I'll have to tell my friends those times we played through it didn't actually happen. That's too bad, 'cause I thought it was great fun. Oh well... thanks for your completely unbiased review. Good thing we have people who can give their opinion on games without actually having an opinion about those games.

Unfortunately it did not do it well.
I am a HUGE fan of D&D (admittedly I prefer 3.5 over 2), the problem is D&D is not video game friendly, especially not 2E. 3/3.5 were "better" but still not video game friendly.. I think 4 is there (which is half the reason I don't like 4)

2E was a very.. unfriendly system for n00bs. And the fact that for the video game they slowed the XP progression waaaaay down just made it worse, and unfortunately with BG they really didn't take ADVANTAGE of the strengths of the D&D system, to allow a player with a good tactical mind to really stand a chance in trying to play the game.

Ice Wind Dale was the first to come close to giving us the proper D&D feel in a video game, and that one too clearly had an evil DM >.>
(And despite it's buggyness, ToEE was my favorite. nothing like being able to build a party for synergy in a system you understand! Admittedly, it's plot was.. nonexistent.)

Sadly now though, this particular genre of RPG (D&D based or not) has faded a way to be replaced by the dime-a-dozen Oblivion clones. the only way you can get your isometric RPG fix is by finding action RPGs, which good ones with staying power are few and far between... and even many of those are shifting in the direction of the Western RPGs.

As far as I'm aware the Horodric Cube isn't in Diablo, only Diablo 2, and if we're bringing sequels into the mix then surely BG2 blows both Diablo games clear out of the water? At least on single player that's true, IMO. I think I would say that Diablo 2 is better than BG 2 if you're playing with other people though, since you lose a lot of the BG2 storyline if you don't have the ingame party members with you.

Sure. I was speaking franchise, wise, as in both games considered. I wouldn't say that Diablo (or the Diablos) is a better game then Baldurs Gate, only that it might appeal to different gamer more then the Baldurs Gates. I think there are genuine players (I know some) who would get frustrated with Baldurs Gate because its too complex in comparison to Diablo. All the character building stuff you have to keep in mind, plus the annoying combat lag that comes with the "dice roll." Not to mention endless text to read and story. I personally enjoy these things, so it doesn't bother me, but to the gamer who just wants to go out and kill stuff then yeah, Baldurs Gate isn't the game you want to play. I wouldnt recommend Baldurs Gate to the casual player.

But yeah I agree with you I think. Both Baldur's Gate games seem to blow the Diablos out of the water.

I completely agree, I have a bunch of friends that won't touch either of the Baldur's Gate games, or IWD, PST, hell even NWN, because 'There's too much reading' or 'The character building and battle tactics are too complex and slow'. Thankfully, like you, I can appreciate both for what they are and I'm damned thankful for that - It's nice to just be able to load a game and start clicking, sometimes, but equally nice to have a game that requires a little careful planning and a tactical approach.

Looking forward to Diablo 3. <3

I dont think Baldur's Gate blows diablo out of the water.


That's like comparing Starcraft to Street Fighter. (both amazing games.)


Diablo is awesome as an action oriented hack n slash game.

Baldur's Gate is a much more traditional RPG experience.

I guess I understand what you mean. But since Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate have basically the exact same battle system, I'm not sure why Icewind Dale did it any better, Icewind Dale was more of a dungeon crawler with an emphasis on battles, so if that is the type of D&D you played at the table, then sure, it's more like the tabletop game to you. My campaigns were always more story-driven with less emphasis on random battles. If I had a fight in my campaigns, it was always to advance the story.

So I guess the real question is whether you preferred Diablo 1 or 2?

BG had what, were is a tabletop game, would be a HORRIBLE game for all but one player:
"You, yes you there, you're the chosen one, go.. be chosen and special and shit." Which, see I hate that anyways.

The real thing though was in BG, you had one character you had any 'real' control over, you had to choose what you were going to try and do.. and then hope to hell that the game threw NPCs at you that would mesh well enough with you both on alignment and powers.

IWD, you had control over the entire party, which allowed you to come closer to the initial metagame of a group building their characters. You could ensure your party would work well together. And your PARTY was the heroes, not a bunch of random schmucks playing second fiddle to someone else.

This is what I mean by IWD taking full advantage of the D&D system for a video game, because quite frankly, D&D 2E was a system that was NOT build for a video game (very few P&P games were).
In order to keep with players interest, there has to be more fights and bigger fights than you would typically deal with in D&D, especially at low level. Yet because of this they have to tone the leveling speed down.
Now, in order to both keep the players interest, and keep the 'feel' of D&D, they have to change up what you're fighting and progress it to harder things.. This is great, except, hey look at that you're leveling really damn slow because of the way they revamped the game.
Pair those details with the fact that D&D was not low level friendly, and designed for only a couple fights a day, especially 2E.. and you have what is basically a recipe for mass amonts of death, not to mention resting every 5 minutes, because your spellcasters have an allotment of spells intended for 1 or 2 moderate fights a day, not half a dozen big fights...

You have all those weakesses.. if you want to make a "traditional" video game, where you have 'the hero' who is sent on 'an epic quest of destiny'.. bloody hell, use a system that's friendly to video games.

The only way it's going to work to put up with those weaknesses in a video game, is if it also takes advantages of the real strengths of that system.. which I still stand firmly by the fact that BG did not.

Could IWD have used a better story? Probably, yes.. But unlike BG, at least IWD had enough of a hook to keep me playing past the frustration factor of "I've only been in this game 5 minutes and my party is all dead."
(BG, just had no 'hook' for me. And if neither story nor gameplay grab within half an hour or so, I move on to something else.. I'm not going to play something I'm not enjoying.. just because I might enjoy it later)

All this said, when I have some money, I will pick up BG off GOG, because I really do feel I didn't give it a fair chance way back when. And I have a (slightly) better understanding of 2E rules now.