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General discussion (archive)GOG loves D&D: The Baldur's Gate series(47 posts)(47 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted September 15, 2012
GOG loves D&D! Here's why:

<i>While our [url=http://www.gog.com/en/promo/hasbro_stacking_promo]Diamonds of D&amp;D promo is in the works we--the GOG.com staff-- would like to share some very personal memories with you. Let's start at the beginning, shall we? I mean with Baldur's Gate, which might not be the first of the epic open-ended D&D adventures, but it sure as hell started a whole new chapter for the computer role-playing games. Here's a few of our favorite memories and sentiments associated with that milestone of a game.

Baldur's Gate brought a new quality to skipping school, as we played with three of my pals on one computer. It was like the biggest thing ever for us. I even had a hamster I called Imoen. It died after like a week. Today, I think it would live much longer if I didn't try to be original and--like six other guys on my block--just gave it the noble name "Boo".
--Krash, the GOG.com heavy-duty game tester


Since Baldur's Gate was first released there wasn't a year when I wouldn't play it. Somehow I rarely manage to actually finish it, but I enjoy spending time in the Sword Coast so much, that I always have an ongoing game of Baldur's Gate I or Baldur's Gate II on my laptop. I love to know that I have it with me everywhere I go and I can escape to the Forgotten Realms at the push of a button. Just don't tell TET!
--G-Doc, the GOG.com clickity-click guy


Ah, I remember the first time I laid my hands on Baldur's Gate . Stop. That's not true. Actually, I hardly remember anything about the first time I tried to play BG. I didn't know what to do and I hardly understood anything that was going on, probably because of the language barrier and I-have-never-played-RPGs barrier. It was difficult and, I guess, kinda boring because I uninstalled it the next day. I WAS 13 GODDAMIT, OK?

Luckily, there was this daring polish company named CD Projekt (sounds familiar?), that spent bucketloads of money to make Baldur's Gate the first ever major fully localized video game in Poland. Yep, they chose Baldur's Gate: probably the biggest and most difficult game they could pick for translating back then. I mean, 150 hours of dialogs, narration, spells, armors, weird creatures, quests, etc. in a fantasy world almost unknown before then. And they've hired the cream of the crop of polish actors; I mean really BIG names, like you had De Niro, Pacino, and Nicholson in a frickin' video game. What's even more incredible, is that they managed to pull it off.

Baldur's Gate became a tremendous success and everyone wanted to play it. Everyone but me. Because I played the *imported from Russia* 150% legit version few months earlier I was feeling hipsterish and used "Meh, already played it" as an intolerable excuse to justify my ignorance. Only after Tales of the Sword Cast came out I've decided to give the game a second chance and it was one of the best decisions I have ever made in my life. So when Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, the second game in the series came along I was ready to embrace it with all the due love and enthusiasm. Once you played Baldur's Gate you're like a "mature gamer" and you can grow a beard, start booking 'gaming time' in your calendar, work for the best digital distributor you could find, and keep rolling high on your d20's--like I do.
--MDyzzle, the GOG.com "do this" man


So, there you have it. Our very own Baldur's Gate series love stories. Care to share one of yours?
Posted September 15, 2012
First :)

I love D & D as well. Nice promo.

However:
Nice, you own all games from this promo.
Have fun and don't forget to check out our next offer.
Post edited September 15, 2012 by amcdermo
Posted September 15, 2012
I'm like G-Doc. The BG titles are games I'll rarely finish, but are game worlds I love to visit. My most vivid BG memory is getting my own fort in BG2, lol.
Posted September 15, 2012
The Baldur's Gate series rocked - and I just bought every game in the promo!

The only "problem" is that the scope of the games and my OCD-like tendencies to explore and find absolutely everything has meant that I never saw the end of any of those games before something else eventually grabbed my attention! Great value for money!

Nevertheless, my most powerful memory of the games isn't as much about the games, but more about the context. I was playing Baldur's Gate II at my friend's house on September 11th 2001 - but was interrupted by the ultimate attentiongrabber on TV!

I'm pretty sure everyone remembers exactly where they were and what they were doing (or playing) on that terrible day...
Posted September 15, 2012
Baldur's Gate brought a new quality to skipping school, as we played with three of my pals on one computer....

I WAS 13 GODDAMIT, OK?
Wow. This really makes me feel old.

I remember getting the game... one of the first games I bought after moving out on my own. I remember getting home, carefully opening the packaging, and spending hours reading through the manual, trying to figure out the D&D rules and understand what eating Tacos had to do with armor.

My first character was useless. I remember wishing that I could just remove my main hero from the party and just use Minsc all the time. My hero was such a waste of space, and kept getting killed, ending the game with that disintegrating hand movie... I saw that movie WAAAYYY to much.

But once I got the hang of it, it was an awesome game, and one that I still have installed on my work laptop to pass the time in airports and hotels.
Posted September 15, 2012
The BG and Icewind games were great (and I owned and now re-own them) but the greatest and, I felt, most under appreciated was Planescape.

The story, from the strange start to the finish were great. I was just disappointed there wasn't a follow up.
Posted September 15, 2012
I have a love story with Baldur's Gate too.

I think I was 11 or 12 then... First, I heard about the game because of its whooping 5 cd span. I also remember that I thought the game would be bad... The video-adventures that were released that year and earlier also used lots of cds, and they didn't stood a chance against point and click classics such as Gabriel Knight or King's Quest.

But then I tried it. I mean. I tried to try about 5 times. The first time I spent hours just to get through the character builder, when the actual game started I were already stuffed. The second time, I explored Candlekeep, and thought the game was incredible. I remember I took lots of hours just to finish that part, and then I got to the Gorion/Sarevok part. I was SO crushed I wasn't able to boot the game for days. I couldn't believe a game could have a opening like that.

After realising Baldur's Gate was such a plot-driven game, I stopped playing it and started researching fantasy literature: Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, Elric of Melniboné... Boy, I really miss those days, discovering the lore for the first time, learning to appreciate the background of a well stablished fantasy universe... Also, I met a couple new friends that shared my recently-discovered passion for fantasy. One day, I told them about the game that made me read those books, Baldur's Gate. They were thrilled!!

They asked me to lend the game to them (Well, you know, when your parents only gives you like 3 euros a week, it's really difficult to buy a game, lol), and we started to play, this time, telling each other our discoverings, our routes and secrets. I remember the day one of these friends called me by telephone "MAN, I FOUND A MAGIC RING BURIED IN A FARM!!". Just hilarious.

And it was only the beginning. Then we discovered the joys of lan parties: Playing Baldur's Gate with a couple friends is an experience only topped by the same kind of game in Icewind Dale, seriously. Cool days, until we moved on to other games like AD&D, Magic or Warhammer...

Well, enough with the nostalgia. That's my story, and seriously, Baldur's Gate gave me days I will never forget. And friends that, no matter how much time passes... They'll always answer to your call with a "TO THE EYES, BOO!! TO THE EYES!!".
Posted September 15, 2012
Here's what I remember from Baldur's Gate:

What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?

*get XP*
Posted September 15, 2012
Okay.

I never liked Baldur's Gate. I had a french version, the voices were horribly cheesy, and the selectable character portraits were all antipathically serious, trying too hard to look all epic. I played it a bit, and, it felt like tediously cleaning up maps of monsters. I re-tried it recentely, years later, and the interface struck me as horrible. I was more of a Fallout guy.

Now, to the story.

I gathered some hints and advices in a french Baldur's Gate forum. I criticised the game there, too, pointing at what I disliked in it, in front of some absolute fans. Needless to say, the discussion broadened quite fast. In fact, it became so off topic that the site owner and moderator asked us to either stop and get back on the topic of Baldur's Gate, or to accept to go to some specific subforum he'd build just for us.

We took a third path out. We started communicating through collective emails. We became some sort of e-mail club, discussing all sorts of matters. We were roughly a dozen (some new member would sometimes appear or disappear). We spent years exchanging 60 mails a day, sometimes a hundred mails arrived in the box. At some point, we all put money in common to help out one member who was having huge difficulties in her life. We also had a huge meeting in Paris, which was heroical given that some of us were canadian. And then, time passed, I had to leave the group for some reason (things got "complicated" with a member, who left the group too, but I wanted her to feel at ease to rejoin it so I preferred not to be in it). I heard the group fell apart a bit later. But today, I'm still in contact with several members. We disappear, we reappear. We give news, we sometimes meet again, but individually. The bond is not broken. And some of these people are still very close to me.

So, there. That is what the words "baldur's gate" represent for me. A bunch of fans of that game, who became a group of friends-for-life with me. And, at the peak of our collective communications, some really fun, stimulating, interesting times, with a solid little community of varied ages and locations. And today, the occasional surprise of news, meetings, invitations, by members of this ex-club.

So, I don't like this game very much. I still always considered a duty to play it, and its sequel, out of respect for these friends (and confidence for their collective judgement on this game's story quality), but I'll wait for the enhanced version, because I really fail to overcome its interface as it is today. Still, it's indirectly a very special game to me, with a very specific emotionnal meaning. And, in its own way, it played a respectable role in my life.


I suppose that's the sort of story we're supposed to mention, in this thread.
Post edited September 15, 2012 by Telika
Posted September 15, 2012
Baldur's Gate 2, on its own, represents probably the biggest non-MMO chunk of my gaming life. I originally got it as a filthy pirate - borrowed from a friend, on the first CD burning excursion I had - and played it to death, admittedly quite badly. I was first roped in by a desire to learn about the storylines, read the romances, and enjoy the exploration of these vast, beautiful places - by the standards of the day. And it was voice acted! It was a huge world and it was amazing to me.

Then I got better at it. I started skipping sections of the world. I started picking quests based on speed and convenience to finish. I started playing combos based on power. I got into the community on newsgroups, I revelled in the expansion packs we as players made for it. It was a living, breathing gaming experience, with a difficulty curve that ramped up. It taught me to play with the hand on the keys and the other on the mouse. It taught me to read things in depth and taught me a lot about how games work and are designed. It also taught me a lot about strategy, all while making me hanker more and more for the worlds in which it existed.

Ironically, I got into D&D, as a tabletop game, thanks to getting into Baldur's Gate 2.
Posted September 15, 2012
avatar
lowyhong: Here's what I remember from Baldur's Gate:

What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?
What about now?

*get XP*
You must gather your party before venturing forth.
Post edited September 15, 2012 by Jaime
Posted September 15, 2012
I remember the first BG because it had many cd-roms and the map included in the retail box (first time I had to use one). I never felt the game was difficult but I got quickly bored of constantly changing cd's and the loading times (I think I had a 486 SX with 8Mo of ram) so I never played it again although it looked interesting. Now with the gog version and the general PC power, those defaults don't exist anymore :)
Posted September 15, 2012
I don't remember much of my first forays into the game of Baldur's Gate, but either it or Icewind Dale (or both) - I don't remember which I got first - had such an impact that the Infinity Engine games are still my favourite games by far.

I do remember I copied Baldur's Gate off a friend (Icewind Dale was bought) and later bought the expansion and wondered if I had the European or American version of the game, and if the European expansion would work (it did).

I know I've played the first 1/4-1/2 of Baldur's Gate dozens of times but only finished it twice or thrice.
Posted September 15, 2012
avatar
GOG.com: Luckily, there was this daring polish company named CD Projekt (sounds familiar?), that spent bucketloads of money to make Baldur's Gate the first ever major fully localized video game in Poland. Yep, they chose Baldur's Gate: probably the biggest and most difficult game they could pick for translating back then. I mean, 150 hours of dialogs, narration, spells, armors, weird creatures, quests, etc. in a fantasy world almost unknown before then. And they've hired the cream of the crop of polish actors; I mean really BIG names, like you had De Niro, Pacino, and Nicholson in a frickin' video game. What's even more incredible, is that they managed to pull it off.
The thing I was looking forward to the most when signing up here, 4 years ago, was the exact opposite - a chance to finally get my games in English. The irony of the situation is not lost on me, especially since I remember buying Baldur's Gate all too well...
Posted September 15, 2012
Ah, I vividly remember the day in the early 2000s when I bought my Baldur's Gate + Tales of the Sword Coast bundle from a store. Anxiously, I got home with the box, admiring it as I put the box into the cupboard with the rest of the games I had bought but barely touched. Sorry BG, have to play some more TeamFortress!

Probably a couple of years later,I finally installed the game, admiring the number of CDs included. I started playing with a fighter type character, decided nah I want to play a cleric, so I started over. Played a bit, nah, I think I'd better be some kind of mighty wizard! So I restarted again.

Now, almost a decade later, I'm still playing the same character (I moved my save games to the diskless GOG version at some point), and I've picked up quite good and trusty party members along the way, who don't even argue with each others. Still close to the end, if I just could be arsed to finish the game. I got also bitten by the "must complete every sub quest you can possibly find!" bug, that has been hindering my progress too.

And I am still unsure what the whole game is about, why am I going around doing stuff. I just do, no real motive. Wait, I faintly remember something, did someone kill my father in the beginning, and I'm trying to find the culprit and get my revenge? I've forgotten (hence, forgiven) already, after all it was almost a decade ago. I guess I'm into it for the money and adventure mostly now.

Ah, the memories...
Post edited September 15, 2012 by timppu
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General discussion (archive)GOG loves D&D: The Baldur's Gate series(47 posts)(47 posts)
(47 posts)