The next Baldur's Gate game isn't even out yet and it's causing a ton of hype. One would be forgiven for thinking that this is simply a Divinity; Original Sin reskin, but that's not the case: according to Producer David Walgrave, about 70–80% of the Baldur's Gate 3 engine is brand-new.
"We didn’t want people to say this is just Original Sin with different characters," Mr. Walgrave said in an interview with geek.com. "There’s about 20-30% of the Original Sin engine left and we rewrote so many systems and so many things."
One of the improvements is to the game's dialogue systems. According to David Walgrave, the "tag system" introduced in the first Divinity: Original Sin is also being used in this new game, but it has a healthy expansion.
"There are many dialogue choices that are custom-built for origin characters," he said.
If you're expecting to see a fully-voiced game, however, you're going to be disappointed. Citing "budget and manpower", Mr. Walgrave reiterated that only select dialogue options are going to be voiced, though it seems that there will be an awful lot of them.
What Improvements Are There in the Baldur's Gate 3 Engine?
Many things from Original Sin are being carried over in this new Baldur's Gate game. As an example, the "systemics, the interactivity, and the item interaction" will be well-familiar to players of previous Larian RPGs. What new things are coming?
"The renderer has become much more realistic," Mr. Walgrave began. "We support photogrammetry right now. There are realistic textures you can zoom in on endlessly but it’ll still look like a rock or tree or sand."
"We want to make it realistic so you believe in the story and characters. We want their personalities to become real so the interactions and the relationships between you and your companions mean something to you."
Companions are also serving as a big focal point for the graphical improvements coming in the Baldur's Gate 3 engine.
"If you talked to people that played the original games, they always talk about all the companions you could pick up and how much they love or hate them," David Walgrave explained. "That is something we also wanted to do. You can increase the relationship people have with characters by showing them. Showing their emotions, zooming in on their faces. They make dialogue come alive and that was one of the things we wanted. We wanted to create a D&D world you recognize as D&D. This has nothing to do with Larian or Divinity. This is very D&D."
You can read the full interview about the Baldur's Gate 3 engine and more over at geek.com. No release date for the game has been officially announced just yet, but you can add it to your wishlist on Steam for now.
What do you think of the improvements coming with the Baldur's Gate 3 engine? Do you think this game will stack up against its predecessors? Let us know in the comments below!
