Baldur's Gate

Baldur's Gate
File:Baldur'sGateLogo.png Title screen of Baldur's Gate, the first game in the series.
Genre(s)	Computer role-playing game
First release	Baldur's Gate 30 November 1998

Baldur's Gate is a popular series of computer role-playing games that take place on Faer�n, the main continent from Dungeons & Dragons's Forgotten Realms campaign setting, set in the years following the cataclysmic Time of Troubles (1358 DR).

The original series, developed for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS by BioWare, includes Baldur's Gate (1998), Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast (expansion pack, 1999), Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn (2000) and Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal (expansion pack, 2001).

Overview

The Baldur's Gate series brought many technical advancements over computer-based role-playing games of the past. BioWare's Infinity Engine offers a pre-rendered isometric worldview, with sprite-based characters. Baldur's Gate was also the third computer game ever to make use of the Lua scripting language. The engine was also used for Planescape: Torment and the Icewind Dale series.

The games are based on a real-time modification of the second edition AD&D (Advanced Dungeons & Dragons) ruleset. The player's party can have up to six members, either created by the player according to the AD&D rules or NPCs recruited by the protagonist from the game world. Numerous side quests and plot twists are associated with particular NPCs and can be activated if they are found in the player's party. Through extensive, context-dependent dialogue, many characters inside and outside the player's party are fleshed out and given an added level of complexity.

In 1999, Baldur's Gate won the Origins Award for Best Roleplaying Computer Game of 1998, and in 2000, Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast won Best Roleplaying Computer Game of 1999. Baldur's Gate has also been often compared to Diablo (an action RPG), perhaps for similarities in dungeon-crawling and the isometric view, but is much more story driven with less hack and slash.

Games

Cover art of original Baldur's Gate game

Bhaalspawn Saga Series

Baldur's Gate

Main article: Baldur's Gate

The first game in the series introduces the player character as a powerless orphan raised in the monastery of Candlekeep, south of Baldur's Gate and north of the kingdom of Amn. The main character searches for the killer of his or her foster father, Gorion, and becomes involved with the region's iron crisis which causes metal to crumble, all while battling to stay alive.

Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast

Main article: Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast

An expansion pack for Baldur's Gate, Tales of the Sword Coast did not add anything to the primary storyline, but presented the protagonist with more areas to explore along the Sword Coast, more powerful enemies, more spells, better equipment, and allows the player character to reach higher levels of experience. It also made some general changes to gameplay and altered the original game's final battle.

Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn

Main article: Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn

The main character is captured by Jon Irenicus and must escape into the city of Athkatla, the capital of Amn. Here the protagonist faces several different ways to figure out the reason behind the capture as he or she journeys through the region of Amn and the Underdark. The game presents a number of innovations over the first Baldur's Gate game, including further specialization of character classes, better graphics and higher power levels. It also allowed for more interaction with the game's joinable NPCs, including friendships, romances, and your own party members' interactions with one another.

Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal

Main article: Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal

Throne of Bhaal is an expansion pack for Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, and includes both an expansion of the original game -such as new areas to explore- as well as a conclusion to the Bhaalspawn story arc started in the first Baldur's Gate game.

Dark Alliance series

Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance

The Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance series was produced by BioWare's publisher Black Isle Studios, a division of Interplay Entertainment. Although they take place in the Baldur's Gate rendition of the Forgotten Realms setting, the plot is unrelated to previous games, and they were console-exclusive titles. These were not released for Windows and Macintosh platforms and were not created using BioWare's Infinity Engine.

Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance II

Due to the highly positive success of Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance, Interplay released a sequel as well, Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance II. The game was just as critically received as its predecessor. However, due to Interplay's financial troubles at the time, the game is not that common.

Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance III

Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance III was canceled when developer Interplay Entertainment Corp. was forced to shut down operations in June 2004, to the disappointment of fans of the series, especially after the teaser trailer at the end of Dark Alliance II. It has been said that the Champions of Norrath series is a "continuation" of the series by virtue of the fact that it uses an identical game engine; however, as the Dark Alliance franchise uses the D & D universe and CoN uses the Everquest universe, this has been disputed.

In 2007, Interplay raised additional revenue by selling the IP for Fallout to Bethesda Softworks for $5.75 million, though they retained a license to create and develop a "Fallout" MMORPG.

On April 8, 2008, Interplay declared their two-pronged MMORPG-and-Sequels strategy, which included pursuing funding for the Fallout MMOG.

At the same time, the company will leverage its portfolio of gaming properties by creating sequels to some of its most successful games, including Earthworm Jim, Dark Alliance, Descent, and MDK.

An Interplay representative confirmed for GameSpot that the company owns the Dark Alliance name, and can continue to make fantasy role-playing games under that banner so long as they don't use the Dungeons & Dragons license, which includes the Forgotten Realms world and the Baldur's Gate name.

The company has recently reinitiated its in-house game development studio, and is hiring game developers.

However, through the Interplay Forums, Chris Taylor has confirmed that Dark Alliance 3 is not in the works, the company does want to create the game, though.

Black Hound Series

Baldur's Gate III: The Black Hound

Baldur's Gate III: The Black Hound (code named Jefferson and FR6) was mentioned in early 2001 as a new game in the Baldur's Gate series to be made by Black Isle Studios using a completely new 3D engine.

The Black Hound was originally going to be a departure from the high-powered epic of the Bhaalspawn saga to a low-key, roleplaying plot. With protagonists progressing to around level four at the end of BIS' typically enormous campaign and a hard cap at level eight, gameplay was refocussed to a flat and wide adventure emphasizing quests over combat. In fact, the game was only titled "Baldur's Gate" due to Interplay having lost the general D&D license to Atari, but still retaining the right to make "Baldur's Gate" and "Icewind Dale" branded D&D games (the same reason as for BGDA's title.) The game was not going to be connected to the previous Baldur's Gate series in any way and would start a new series, the Black Hound series. Like Bioshock Infinite it would have been a sequel in terms of gameplay and not story.

The game was announced in 2002 and was said to have used the 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons ruleset, the gameplay of the previous Baldur's Gate games would have been updated to fit the ruleset. Many new gameplay features were also going to be added to fit the 3rd Edition Ruleset better, elements from the Dark Alliance series would have also been borrowed. The game used the Jefferson Engine which featured 3D effects such as casting dynamic shadows. The game was 25% finished before it was canceled. Its cancelation happened due to Interplay losing the right to publish Baldur's Gate games on the PC yet retaining the Baldur's Gate name for consoles, this is how Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance II was created.

The game appeared to be canceled in 2003, just before its engine was re-purposed for Black Isle's ill-fated Van Buren Fallout 3 project. Subsequently, Josh Sawyer, one of the designers of the canceled game, resumed development of The Black Hound as a module for Neverwinter Nights 2. As of 2009, this remains a side project for Sawyer, who works at Obsidian Entertainment.

However, in April of 2004 IGN released information that a Baldur's Gate III was in the works at that time, no longer to be developed by Black Isle and published by Interplay, but to be published by Atari.

In the January 2008 issue of PC Gamer UK, the editor claims that he knows that Baldur's Gate III is indeed being worked on - this has further been reiterated in the January 2009 edition.

On December 2, 2008, Atari stated in a press conference that the Baldur's Gate series (among others) would be revisited after 2009.

On February 7, 2010, in an interview about Mass Effect 2, IGN asked Ray Muzyka of BioWare about the future of Baldur's Gate, noting the sighting of Boo in the Citadel souvenir shop. He replied, 'Hey, that's just a space hamster. Boo's brother. And again, you'll have to talk to Atari about that, they've got the license.'

Baldur's Gate Compilation

In 2006, Atari re-released the entire series on DVD-ROM in Europe, the Dark Alliance series is not included in the compilation. The package includes both games, and their expansions, of the Bhaalspawn Saga Series.

Related media

Official novels

Philip Athans, editor of the Forgotten Realms novel line, wrote the first two novels in the Baldur's Gate trilogy of novels: Baldur's Gate and Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, both based on the storylines of the computer game series. The novels follow the bare basics of the original stories, but eschew several of the games' numerous subplots and include only a few of the NPCs. The Bhaalspawn main character is named Abdel Adrian in the novels. The third, and final, novel - Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal - was authored by Drew Karpyshyn. The novelizations are considered to be the canon in the Forgotten Realms universe.

Baldur's Gate

• Athans, Philip (1999). Baldur's Gate : A Novelization. Wizards of the Coast. ISBN 978-0786915255. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)

Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn

• Athans, Philip (2000). Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn. Wizards of the Coast. ISBN 978-0786915699. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)

Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal

• Karpyshyn, Drew (2001). Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal. Wizards of the Coast. ISBN 978-0786919857. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)

External links

• BioWare website