Having spent decades working on Bethesda games, including many of The Elder Scrolls and Fallout releases, Bruce Nesmith knows a thing or three about solid RPG design. Naturally, then, he became enthralled by Baldur's Gate 3 just like the rest of us, largely because of how it rejected principles of his former workplace.
In an interview with The Examined Game, Nesmith discusses what he enjoyed about Larian Studios' take on the world of Dungeons & Dragons. "Bethesda Games have always had the philosophy of, let the player play everything," he explains.
"You can play the entire thieves guild, you can play the entire fighters guild, you can play the entire mages guild, there is nothing your character can't play," he continues. "That's a very good philosophy, I support that philosophy. But I was pleasantly surprised to see how positive it felt to me to make consequential decisions that closed off gameplay in Baldur's Gate 3."
Larian's sprawling fantasy RPG is very decision-focused. Your choices, through dialog and actions, consistently dictate the narrative for you, requiring multiple playthroughs if you want to see every which way the central plot can go.
Morrowind, Oblivion, Skyrim, and Fallouts 3 and 4 are more streamlined, even though there are some forks in the road across each. It's worth highlighting Morrowind here, because you can only join one of the three great houses in the game, introducing some consequences to your actions, but minimally compared to Larian's web of storytelling.
"That felt good, because it was done well," Nesmith goes on. "I felt like the decisions I made had more meaning in certain ways, because there were actual consequences, and if I wanted to see that other gameplay, I'd have to bring up another character and try different paths."
It's no wonder that the average Baldur's Gate 3 playtime on Steam is north of 100 hours. People complete it, then circle back to see what else they can get up to. But the big question now is: Who did Bruce romance? Anyone in the know is free to contact me.
