Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition footage may well get your nostalgia gland dripping

From BeamDogInc's Youtube channel.

According to Jeremy and Paul, who've both spent the past week up to their knees in dice-rolls and character sheets, BG:EE (as the kids call it) is an extremely good update of the classic RPG. You can read their thoughts here. Or these extracted, refined thoughts, here:

"Tim: If you haven’t played Baldur’s Gate before, do you think it’s worth picking up?

Paul: Well, of course I’m going to say yes, but it’s not simply because I’m both biased and nostalgic. There’s an enormous indie scene and a great love for retro gaming among PC gamers because we’re obviously the sort of people who want more than just hi-res textures and colossal polygon counts.

That said, I feel a fool even mentioning Baldur’s Gate and retro gaming in the same feature, because the Baldur’s Gate games don’t feel old to me. I still think they’re unsurpassed in their wit and their world-building and I know many gamers feel that Bioware have failed to make anything as good since.

I should add a caveat or two, though. Baldur’s Gate uses the antiquated Dungeons & Dragons Second Edition rules set, which can be a strange thing to get your head around and if you don’t know what calculations are going on inside this game, it’s harder to get a grip on. Also, it doesn’t give a damn about fairness or scaling encounters. You know how I said you start off in the wilderness? Well, guess what happens if you wander into the forest? Yeah, you die, because it has those wolves and bears. This is a world of magic and sometimes there’s a demon around the corner, a demon you still won’t be able to beat if you’re five levels higher. Sometimes the dice are unlucky and you roll a 20 instead of a 1. Baldur’s Gate is hard.

Jeremy: It’s very hard, and Trent Oster tells us Overhaul have done absolutely nothing to change that, though the game does default to a slightly easier setting than it used to.

Here’s the thing: if you’re an old hand you’re going to want to get this for the retroactive Baldur’s Gate 2 additions, the stacked arrows, the new party members and areas. If you’ve fresh, new hands, unweathered by barrages of magic missiles, you’ll buy BG:EE because it’s the most comprehensive version on the market, optimised for modern PCs. It’s enhanced, is what it is."

So, there you have it, a good thing.

You can read more about the game and, if you're that way inclined, buy a copy from here.