Genre: Western RPG
Platform: PC
Developer: Overhaul Games
Publisher: Atari
Price: 19.99
Release Date: (Out now!)
Where to buy: Beamdog
New Features:
“Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition for Windows contains the following enhancements:
- New Adventure: The Black Pits
- New Character: Dorn Il-Khan
- New Character: Neera the Wild Mage
- New Character: Rasaad yn Bashir
- A new collection of player character voice sets
- Native support for high resolution widescreen displays
- Over 400 improvements to the original game
- Improved multiplayer support, with connectivity between all platforms”
The following is provided from the official website with descriptions on a few of the characters directly.
PC gamers alike, as well as Western RPG fans all know of the Dungeon and Dragons series of table tops(Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (AD&D) 2nd edition rules). Pencil and paper this time and replaced by keyboard and mouse in this expansive adventure in the forgotten realms. What this edition of this PC classic is a ton of extra content. Content from “Baldur’s Gate 2 The Shadows of Amn” were also introduced to this game. While I can explain this story to you I will keep it brief and short. You are in your home city, then you hear of urgent news. Your mentor guides you out away from a threat. Then soon discover you are on your own with a old friend. (notice I did not use any names trying to hold off on anything related to pilot.) You are getting more and the same with this game. Gameplay as explained is a point and highlight kinda game where the combat automates. Skills require you to toggle on the enemy. You use the arrow keys to navigate the camera through the landscape or locations.
Interesting to note, undiscovered areas are covered in a “fog of war”. As you move towards them you uncover them. In those areas can be NPC characters or enemies. You are given quick slots which you equip throwing weapons or swords or blunt clubs. As well as if you got a potion you could place it in that range of three slots to cover any magic or wounds during battle. Combat is set up in a D sided die (Dice) format based in Dungeon and Dragon rules. Rolls varied from Critical hit, all the way to physical attacks. Magic is somewhat advanced to perform in this game, having macros to aid some of your AI during combat (making your life a little easier). while being old fans of the game our minds needed to settle with the old routes of writing down spells (this allows your character to learn the spell to use it for various tasks).
Mortal choices are clocked through with conversations or actions with NPC characters within towns or in the wild. Such such examples you recall from Bioware’s Hit title Mass Effect. Or perhaps Dragon Age. Characters can be recruited with simply talking to them how they want to be talked to. Ether politely, or bluntly. The reading in this game is legendary. Scoring a ton of lore to locate and discover.
My Closing thoughts:
Truly you perhaps already played this game, so is it worth spending that twenty dollars? Before I give my final answer on that, the game does have a issue or two that needs some work on. The graphical tares. First noticed when I got a message on your Skype/Yahoo when someone logs on. Mind you this is a pretty common and old issue that older games had. (Also some new games as well, but who is taking score!). At points I notice the game dispenses a sound glitch as well. While this happens randomly, it does do it more commonly during voice over speech. The Multiplayer with other friends Is a blast, with barely, if not no lag on ether end. Exploring the game together held more game play to this already lengthy beast. Within the Calimshite monk Rasaad yn Bashir, the half-elf wild mage Neera and Dorn Il-Khan, a half-orc Blackguard. The Wild Mage aka Neera was my favorites out of the new characters. With a perky personality and something lively to this grim and dark game. the improved Graphics in this game are fantastic, and Lush. The game overall keeps its challenge and difficult nature, leaving many whiny gamers out in the cold for this sitting. The other two characters while interesting, did not stand out to me. However experiencing all 3 of there side adventures were fantastic. All holding a candle up high, using a blow touch to light it. At the same time blending into the game as if you never would think twice they were new. All newly voiced by pretty decent voice actors (If the company sees this review i would like them to email the voice actors a big hug from me!)
Other then those few issuesI mentioned above. This game still stands to the test of time for many fans of the series. Offering at least eight more hours of game play.The Black Pits is by far a very nice addition. Adding weird characters and pretty challenging game play to this 7 hour bit of content. Personally however the Pits dragged slightly, leaving me pushing back towards the main game. To this they went ahead and added a few new characters. Overall improving the already fantastic classic. In closing this game is a must have for those missing there routes in the Forgotten Realms.
Note to the Developers:
Get rights to Baldur’s Gate Dark Alliance one and two for PC!
9.0
