I'm the same. I'm in that old school class that prefers my nice box, (hell i have boxes for every game i ever bought that came with one) with my nice shiny disc(s) and manuals and maps and and......you get the picture lol. I resent being forced into using things like steam, battle.net or origin to run my bloody games and i'm not fond of digital d-loads. But i recognize that sometimes if you love something enough like BG, I do what needs to be done and resort to digital d-load to get a new shiny version.
Speaking as someone who moves around often, carrying an external hard drive is easier than carrying a crate full of game boxes and disks! There is something nice about having the box, and paper manuals (I do love my Elder Scrolls maps) but from a practical point of view I do quite like not having those things too, or at least not needing to have them. Having the option is good.
I wouldn't mind a manual being released before the actual game. I never play an RPG without going through the entire manual to figure out the best way to play (or how best to do what I want), all the while cringing at all the time I'm spending not playing the game about which I'm so excited that is sitting right in front of me.
Releasing a manual before the 18th will save me the stress of having the game in front of me and not letting myself play it yet, though it would also take away the experience of putting the manual down softly after the long delay, slowly turning to the computer, placing my hands on the keyboard and mouse and saying, "Bring it." (Ok, I never do that, but you may know the feeling.)
The reason we don't get nice physical manuals with games like we used to is because time marches on. As costs for the hardware fell, printing costs went up. I'll bet that if you wanted to have a 100 page full color manual today it would cost the company more than the box, the disc and probably the shipping to the store combined! (esp since the weight of the manual would also add to the shipping costs)
Sadly I doubt you will ever see one again outside of a collector's edition.
Call me an old school sucker but I for one love my games as boxed copies with big printed manuals. I'm still not really used to all the online manuals that hardly have any decent information at all, and even the PDF manuals do not have the same feeling as browsing through a booklet; just the smell of it alone beats any PDF. Where are the days when games got released with 200+ page manuals stuffed full of info and artwork. I would absolutely love a boxed copy of BG:EE and BG:EE 2 with a printed manual - even if I'd have to pay a bit more for it.
I hung onto over 100 old video game boxes and manuals until last year, when I finally cracked it and chucked it out.
However, deep in my heart of hearts I couldn't bring myself to chuck out my original BG2 manual and the BG2 cloth map, so I've got them hidden away, ready for the EE!
When we get the new pdf manual(s) I'll be printing out the most frequently used pages. I want to play fullscreen but don't want the hassle of alt-tabbing every time I need info not present within the game.
Comments
Releasing a manual before the 18th will save me the stress of having the game in front of me and not letting myself play it yet, though it would also take away the experience of putting the manual down softly after the long delay, slowly turning to the computer, placing my hands on the keyboard and mouse and saying, "Bring it." (Ok, I never do that, but you may know the feeling.)
Sadly I doubt you will ever see one again outside of a collector's edition.
I would read the manual! I like the idea of a pdf manual for baldurs gate, sounds enhanced and I just like pdf's haha :P
I would read the manual! I like the idea of a pdf manual for baldurs gate, sounds enhanced and I just like pdf's haha :P
However, deep in my heart of hearts I couldn't bring myself to chuck out my original BG2 manual and the BG2 cloth map, so I've got them hidden away, ready for the EE!