I think what's been hardest to find in other games, for me, is the pacing of the BG series. It was a good mix of dialogue and game play. And the game play was a good mix of action and strategy.

Too bad he doesn't seem to be active any more. Would have loved to see Lilly Black in Fallout 3 or Neverwinter Nights 2. I chuckled quite a bit during his 15 minute speed video of Bladur's Gate. =)

He's definitely a long-form LP'er. Baldur's Gate 2 is something close to 850 videos. Though they are roughly 10 - 15 minutes each. He has a pretty good conversational style, so it's not bad to listen to at all.

Flynn

If you haven't already, you *need* to watch this video of his (2 parts):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pASNffQuMI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVK6dslGanA

It's a fight with a dragon in which... well, you'll see. (I note that he chose to play a wild mage, which is a great way to make things less predictable.)

I watched every one of his videos when he was active, and many again since. What happened in those two videos is typical of his LP play style and, alongside his excellent (untypical youtube) running commentary, is one of the things that make him so great to watch. Any other (maybe 99.9%) youtube LP'er would have just reloaded at the initial (hilarious) summoning disaster. Not Tord. I've seen him down to just Lilly left alive, running around, vainly trying to escape inevitable death, throwing her last Magic Missiles. I admire that a lot.

I would have loved to see him do a Pillars of Eternity LP.

Yeah. He got married, found a new job and real life took over, as it has a habit of doing.

Just looked at the GOG-page for BG2... it doesn't work on WIndows 10? :( Just installed W10, and I already regret it as I can see a lot of games here that can't run on it.

Just becase a game isn't mentioned as Win10 compatible doesn't mean it won't work on Win10, it just means GOG did not test the game on that system. Feel free to try and install/run any GOG game on Win10 - it will most likely function. It's not guaranteed of course, but chances are high.

Hah, that was a good fight. Sounds like a calm guy with a good comment voice too.

In another thread, another poster mentioned "outdated interface", I asked what that was but I never got a concrete answer. Judging from the rest of his posts, an outdated interface was an interface that took more than a glance at to understand.

With this in mind, what is outdated quest writing exactly? In dialog, no one says anything from the 90's like "Yo, wazzup G?" or "Yeah, baby yeah!" Also, there are no 90's buzzwords like "Information super highway" either. But I doubt this is what you mean.

Outdated interface is an interface which does not follow modern principles of UI design.

Outdated writing is writing which does not follow modern principles of writing style. Seriously, try reading anything by Shakespeare, any book by Arthur Conan Doyle, feel free to then jump to Agatha Christie and finish up by something more recent. You will then be able to answer the question "What is oudated writing?" Similarily, with how quest writing is handled, I'm pretty sure there's been a leap between 1998 and 2015

Keep in mind "Outdated" does not equal "Bad" - it means "Not in line with modern standards"

I think I see what you're saying. The times those authors lived in would definately have an influence on how they wrote but I'm having a hard time applying this to a DnD game. IMO, writing in DnD hasn't changed much and has often been rife with the same tired cliches.

There's always some big bad doing bad stuff (bonus point if the big bad is a demon) wanting to destroy the world or whatever.
There's always ancient powerful artifact(s) with big time crazy powerful magic to find.
There's always caves filled with goblins / undead / orcs / or some other ugly looking beastie that has nothing better to do than sit in a cave guarding a chest with some minor treasure until the hero puts them out of their misery
There's always "good" and "evil" characters and you can always tell who is who
There's always characters who whine to the PC for help because they lost a book / gem / belt / sword / magical dingus
The big bad has a nasty habit of calling anyone who disagrees with them a "fool"

I could go on but I'm sure you're a sharp person and get the point :)

But anyways, if I'm wrong, feel free to say otherwise but in most DnD game I played, a lot of the writing seems the same and seems to be there simply fo hold the action together (Yes, I am aware not every game does this but those are the exceptions). If modern day writing in DnD has changed, I would love to know how because I simply haven't seen it..

Tend to agree with that, and this is one of the reasons I liked the story in BG1. Largely it still conforms of course, but without going too much into spoiler territory, it's not the same as in BG2.

I'd actually love games with a more 'narrow' or 'smaller' story, without always resorting to the "big bad guy wants to destroy the world" scenario. Tolkien created a fantastic universe, but some diversity in these types of games wouldn't kill anybody, surely?

First of all, I'm not speaking of writing in DnD games, and I don't believe OP is either - I'm talking of writing in RPG games in general. But if you do insist of using DnD as an example, you don't even have to leave the realm of IE games to see Planescape Torment which is entirely built around deconstructing these cliches.

Second, modern games tend to contain somewhat more complex quest design than BG did. The quest design/writing in BG was very barebones - talk to NPC which gives you a wall of text and then you get a single reply, go do a thing, return to NPC which gives you another wall of text, respond. The responces ocassionally led to branching results, but this was extremely rare. It worked very well with pen and paper narrative design, and if you went into the game looking for that, then that's what you got. But vast majority of modern RPGs shied away from this, offering three tiers of quests: Main quests, major side quests and minor side quests. Minor side quests still follow the same formula, but are usually completely skippable and forgettable. Major side quests is what people actually remember and you'll find that's what is lacking in BG. Main storyline is there, but again, it is relatively barebone.

Now, I don't want to criticize the game for doing things this way. It gives it a charm which is yet to be reproduced in another RPG, and it makes the game's focus on 'adventuring' very clear.

Well it's not like storyline in the original BG is particularily unique, surprising or interesting aside from a single point, not really.

hasn't every RPG over the last 20 years been written by the same three people who are obsessed with sewer levels and father issues?

Two of the three got better at it tho. The third went on to Mass Effect.