Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition

its my first time playing BG1 and ive been hearing about for years, after playing BG3 i couldnt help but be curious what other stories have been told in this incredible universe...ive been happpily pleased with the game and gameplay. Its very different but familiar enough to play and enjoy. the stakes are very high bcs anyone in the party can die off for good if youre not careful! but its a big treat with a huge adventure spanning dozens of plots and substories and variety. give it a chance !

I'm very grateful that GoG has Baldur's Gate and includes the original game, which in many ways, is better than the enhanced edition. In fact, I'd say that many people, such as myself, buy this game because the original edition IS included. Except, it's not. That is to say, you can't be sure that when you buy the game if you will get your copy of the original. Because GoG only has limited keys for the original games, less than they have keys for the EE version it seems. I bought this 'bundle' on December 24th, only to find out after purchase that the keys for the original version were depleted. I emailed Customer Service, and they simply said they had no keys, and I had to check myself if they were back in or not. a) They should let people know BEFORE they purchase a game, if the stated included items are not available. b) There really should be a mechanism in place to alert customers if currently depleted keys are back in stock. The website already emails you if wishlisted items are available, so why not extend that to depleted keys for paid for purchases? Everyone knows there are 'other' ways to play these old school games. But many of us buy on GoG to support the platform offering us these classic experiences. It's just disappointing that in some cases, finding 'other' ways to get games might just be easier than having to check each day if keys for bought products are back in stock or not. Tldr; if you want to buy Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition in order to get the original version, don't, because even GoG themselves don't know when you'll be able to get it. PS. GoG don't like reviews that aren't about the games themselves. But I already emailed customer service, which didn't help, and people only visit the forums after they buy a game, not before. So it's better to write about my disappointment in teh reviews, and rate the purchase on what i got (and didn't get) for my money, so that people know what to expect before they buy.

Removed the gamma/brightness settings. Too Dark, Massive Eyestrain, (In Durag's tower dungeon especially.) Requires a third party mod/addon to be able to see what your characters are doing. In 2021. NEXT!

This game - considered a bonafide CRPG classic by most - is a disappointment for one reason: Its gameplay does not hold up. It's not a matter of archaic UI's, confusing journals or other things one might associate with old games. The EE fixes most of these issues, and even if it didn't I'm perfectly used to playing games like Fallout 1 and 2 along with Planescape Torment, games that are known to unintuitive, wonky and somewhat outdated. No, Baldur's Gate is simply a game that fails to challenge or provide fun combat encounters. I went into it expecting tactical battles where I'd have to utilize potions, spells and weapons in a variety of ways in order to beat colorful and differentiated enemies. But most battles are against samey looking goblins, gibberlings and goblydoinks that simply line up for the slaughter, while all I have to do is press the attack button and watch the animations play out. They're spread out across dozens and dozens of samey looking forests and mines that my OCD compels me to clear, but provide me with no exhiliration or excitement at all. It's been a chore, really, and the only reason I carry on is to import my character into the vastly superior Baldur's Gate 2. I don't know if it's an issue with the EE or if I'm merely a much better player than 15 years ago, but I don't remember this game being so easy. In my 27 hours of playing, I've had a total of five hard battles. Most of them in Durlag's Tower, a dungeon that appears to have been designed by someone else entirely. I went into this game well aware that it's unremarkable in the story department, that the companions have no personality to speak of and that most quests are of the basic "go fetch my boots from a bridge troll" variety. I didn't mind that. What I did mind is that what I had percieved to be the game's saving grace, its combat, was no good. Now I just hope Baldur's Gate 2 holds up better so I haven't wasted my time playing the first one.

Baldur's Gate is a very, very good game. This is an average-to-good update of it. The more modern UI is a welcome change, the widescreen and high resolution support is good, and it's great to see a beloved old series resuscitated. Those two things are the biggest changes and I don't know if maybe I was expecting a bit more. That said, they have done a lot of bug-squashing and improved the game and engine in ways which are less obvious at first-glance. Mods are available for the orginal, of course, but you can't crank the game to the standard of the EE. Plus, modders don't owe you updates, bug fixes, or a working product in the same way that a paid developer does. I don't think it hurts to incentivise and reward pros for taking care of classics. I rather like the idea that someone is locked into giving a damn about this game for the near future - Beamdog have kept it bouncing along for a good few years now whereas it was becoming widely forgotten by the broader gaming community before they picked it up. Unfortunately, despite all the good they've done, they did feel the need to tinker with the plot and world a bit. As with most writing teams who want to put their own stamp on a classic, the guys who were tasked with adding new stuff messed it up: The new characters are incongruous and irritiating. To be clear though, the new characters are partly avoidable. They might dominate the occasional scene but can be largely payed around in the grand scheme of things. The other major creative change they made is the cutscenes. I think they're fine. It's obvious that (a) the janky late 90s cgi animations had to go and that (b) whatever creative choice they made would upset some people. I don't have an issue with their solution except they have removed some very dialogue from the into (I didn't check the rest but probably the same). Overall though, this is a very, very good game and the EE is probably, now, the best way to play it.