zlacker

>>redbel+(OP)
I am a bit shocked by how popular this game is. All the signs were there, though.

- Their previous game Divinity: Original Sin 2 was critically acclaimed, very popular for a pretty hardcore CRPG, and had long legs.

- DnD has a lot of brand power and has been strongly in the zeitgeist for years.

- There's a big cohort of millennials who have strong nostalgia for Baldur's Gate and who have plenty of money to buy games (if not time to play them).

- The Early Access release for this game was wildly popular beyond the developer's expectations, and maintained interest for years.

I definitely underestimated the brand power of DnD and Baldur's Gate because they aren't very important to me, personally. But also there have been a load of really good CRPGs in recent years and there seemed to be a pretty low ceiling to how much interest they could get. Tyranny, Pillars of Eternity, Pathfinder: Kingmaker, and a few others were amazing and beloved CRPG games but were lucky to have a tenth of the success of BG3. But those games were generally less accessible, mostly not multiplayer, and again lacked the brand power.

>>mastax+nc
> big cohort of millennials...

I feel slightly offended being thrown into the same pot as those weird millenials ;)

Absolutely everybody who owned a PC for gaming in the late 90's played BG1 and BG2, no matter the age. Video games are not just for teenagers you know.

>>flohof+De
While I think "everybody" is stretching it... the general idea here is accurate. From my memory, the first two "rounds" of good D&D games on the PC were the SSI games (Eye of the Beholder, Pools of Radiance, etc) and then Baldur's Gate. Both of those series, when they came out, set the bar for D&D RPG games (and RPG games in general, to some extent). If you played that type of game, you played those games (and likely Bards Tale and Wizardry).

To this day, there are quotes that live on from Baldur's Gate ("Go for the eyes, Boo!"). It has place in a lot of people's hearts. Had BG3 been bad, it would have been a horror show of hate for the developer. But it looks like they delivered, and the adoring fans of decades ago appreciate that.