The most important thing first: The game is practically bugfree now. It might not have been shortly after release, but it is now. I played the orignal version (both modded and unmodded) a lot over the years and here is what I think about EE: The game simply looks more beautiful now. That goes for both the game itself, the local maps and the worldmap. Game elements, like character creation and level up screens have been impoved. Also, it is much easier to get the informations about your characters that you want now, as the chacter screen has benn completely overhauled and restructered. All of that helps a great deal and actually makes a huge difference. You can now choose to automatically highlight all interactable items such as tables, doors and chests automatically plus you can now finally abort cutscenes. Both features are very useful especially when you intend to play the game more than once. There are now several new companions, new romance options, new locations and new items. All of this blends very well into the world of Baldur's Gate and stays true to D&D. One last thing: It is true that some of the improvements were previously available as mods, but many of those are not easily accessible any longer (especially with the download section of gibberlings being broken for months now and shs being down eintirely). Also, with the EE you don't have to spend hours of finding mods, installing them and checking compatibility just in order to have a bugfree game. You can ceratainly still mod EE, if you want though. There are tons of mods available for the EE. Overall I do easily prefer the EE over the original version, and after reading all those negative reviews, that was a true surprise. To be fair, a lot of those things might have changed during the last few years, but Baldur's Gate 2 EE is certainly a great game now and a truly impoved version of the original game.
This game is quite polished and there are several things it does very well. However, it also feels like it was designed for a rather young audience and this might be it's main flaw. Book I and book II are short but they deliver an okay-ish amount of content for the price. The graphics are mediocre and there is no inventory in the style of a classic point and click adventure. Yet none of those things present a problem. It very much focuses on story (which is ok) and everything else is second to that. However, the characters don't feel believeable and this is my main problem with Herald. Now, why do I feel this way? Overall Herald is presented like a story for children and I really wonder why this approach has been taken. The setting is meant to reflect sea voyages in the 19th century, yet all of the characters feel incredibly soft and like out of a childrens book. Both the visual style and the writing seem a bit childish and it never feels like the game gives any credit to the rough life at sea in the real world. Because of this I had a hard time to get emerged in the story. Despite this it seems that like a lot of effort and love went into book I & II, but for reasons mentioned above it just doesn't do the trick for me. If you are looking for a game to experience with your children this might be a great choice (there is one violent scene though). If you are looking for a any kind of authentic sailor story, this will not make you happy.
