Revert to version 1.3? please?

bizzyd1441

There's got to be some way to revert to the previous version of the game? In the middle of a game and started playing today and suddenly all the menus and UI interactions are changed. They look hideous, like some amateur mod.

What happened to the ornate details and artistic touches that were distinctive of BG2 menus? The journal, wizard/priest spells, and character record screens are utilitarian and don't at all match the aesthetic of BG. If I wanted a modded version of BG2, I would install a mod.

After a little while I disabled the sprite smoothing as I couldn't stand the cartoonish look and feel they gave my characters.

I just wanted to enjoy the classic BG2 experience on a modern desktop. Version 2.0 has altered the identity of BG2 with changes there weren't at all necessary to playability

Is there some way to revert to the previous version? I bought through Steam.

So_LoW

Uhh... Right Click on BG2 in steam->properties>betas>select 1.3 in dropdown menu?

How many times it has been said over last days I can't remember. Happy gaming

bizzyd1441

So_LoW said:

Uhh... Right Click on BG2 in steam->properties>betas>select 1.3 in dropdown menu?

How many times it has been said over last days I can't remember. Happy gaming

Thank you for that tip. I tried doing that, and the main menu looked fine! but now the game crashes whenever I try to load any of my save games.... help??

Franpa

Well you can not load a save game created in v2.0, in v1.3. Did you backup your save games before overwriting them in v2.0 (I suspect you didn't think to do this)?

cmk24

Also keep an eye out for an update to BG2:EE's UI (will likely happen within the next week), they launched 2.0 with an older version of the UI since they are still making the art assets for the updated version (that looks 100x better). They wanted to get the updated UI in BG:EE and SoD first, BG2:EE is lagging behind a bit.

Franpa

The current Baldur's Gate One UI (v2.0.62.2) is still not the final version, it is just an alternative version that happened to be better than the place holder one that they were using (Their original place holder was very bare bones looking, the new fan-made one is similar but much more stylish) while they still work on the UI they originally intended to implement. I expect drastic changes to the UI are still in the works and that we will see yet another drastically different UI to what is currently implemented in BG1.

I am unsure if the current fan made UI for BG1 will be ported to BG2, as none of the UI's used by the 2 games are Beamdog's final vision of what the UI should be.

ZeshinX

I do hope they revert it to something far more like 1.3. The new UI for 2.0 and SoD is abysmal. It lost it's Baldur's Gate-ness (it's aesthetic style has been destroyed and a sterile, boring UI has been put in it's place).

Franpa

ZeshinX said:

I do hope they revert it to something far more like 1.3. The new UI for 2.0 and SoD is abysmal. It lost it's Baldur's Gate-ness (it's aesthetic style has been destroyed and a sterile, boring UI has been put in it's place).

I don't think I've seen a single screen of the SoD UI, is it using a UI similar to what BG:EE is currently using, or is it more like what BG2:EE is currently using?

ZeshinX

Franpa said:

ZeshinX said:

I do hope they revert it to something far more like 1.3. The new UI for 2.0 and SoD is abysmal. It lost it's Baldur's Gate-ness (it's aesthetic style has been destroyed and a sterile, boring UI has been put in it's place).

I don't think I've seen a single screen of the SoD UI, is it using a UI similar to what BG:EE is currently using, or is it more like what BG2:EE is currently using?

The layout of things in BG:EE 2.0 UI is the same as the SoD UI....but the SoD UI is just varying shades of black (with a dash of red). There's a few threads about with screenshots that show the various looks to the UI.

Dee

I think what @ZeshinX is referring to is the textures in the Dragonspear UI skin, which is definitely (and intentionally) different from the UI skin without the expansion. We've received a lot of positive feedback about the Dragonspear skin, but that doesn't mean there's no room for improvement--and if there's significant demand for an option to switch between skins, that's something we can certainly look at.

ZeshinX

Dee said:

I think what @ZeshinX is referring to is the textures in the Dragonspear UI skin, which is definitely (and intentionally) different from the UI skin without the expansion. We've received a lot of positive feedback about the Dragonspear skin, but that doesn't mean there's no room for improvement--and if there's significant demand for an option to switch between skins, that's something we can certainly look at.

Not just the textures, but yes, that's a huge element to my not being a fan of it. It's lost a LOT of other, admittedly aesthetic, qualities. Spellbooks, tabbing over avatars and the scroll parchment, the audio feedback of selecting things is now silent...really, the whole thing is just ugly when compared to what it was.

It's functional for the most part, I'll not argue that, but Baldur's Gate it ain't.

At this point I'm pretty much stopping playing SoD until something less visually distanced from BG is implemented (be it from Beamdog or mods). Likely I'll be uninstalling both BG:EE and BG2:EE and installing my GOG 1.3 versions (yep, I buy both from Beamdog and GOG, and will be buying SoD from GOG as soon as it's up).

Despite the intense criticism and dislike of the 2.0/SoD UI, I still want you guys/gals making money.

Dee

@ZeshinX if you're playing on Steam, you can "disable" the DLC to play the un-expanded BG:EE (which still uses the "blue stone" UI skin). If even that is too much of a departure, you can opt into the "bgee_1.3" beta to continue playing on v1.3, although you won't get the myriad enhancements and bug fixes from the v2.0 update.

ZeshinX

@Dee The Steam version is the only version I don't buy lol. :P

I don't mind the dance of uninstalls/reinstalls. I've read over the 2.0 patch changelog and document and while there's a LOT of great stuff in there, I can happily live without it until the 2.0/SoD UI is modded or altered to better stick to Baldur's Gate's aesthetics.

*Edit: And really the UI is the only issue I have. Beamdog's been doing great work in every other department. Please don't think for a moment I don't appreciate the efforts Beamdog puts in, because I really do. Beamdog does good work...I just think they stumbled on the 2.0/SoD UI (changed too much as it were).

Dee

That's fair.

In that case, though, you should be able to install the un-expanded BG:EE through the Beamdog client. Just ignore the warnings it gives you about how you should install Siege of Dragonspear instead. You won't be able to switch to v1.3, but you can at least play with the blue stone GUI.

ZeshinX

Dee said:

That's fair.

In that case, though, you should be able to install the un-expanded BG:EE through the Beamdog client. Just ignore the warnings it gives you about how you should install Siege of Dragonspear instead. You won't be able to switch to v1.3, but you can at least play with the blue stone GUI.

Yep, that's pretty much the plan. I can live with the new layout of 2.0/SoD...it really boils down to that visual aesthetic of the blue stone GUI, parchment, sounds, etc for me. The "modern" UI just doesn't visually work for the game (the lack of said blue stone, parchment scrolls, sounds). That's as much as part of Baldur's Gate's visual identity as the characters and story (to me, and I think many others).

Anyhoo, the fact you're in here talking to us and putting up with us critiquing your work is why I gladly buy your stuff more than once lol (and the fact it's good stuff in the first place).

ZeshinX

You know....honestly....thinking about it more...I can even live with the 2.0/SoD UI if it's colours were lightened up a bit (the varying shades of black with splashes of red is just depressing).

Give it the blue stone GUI-ness and I think I'd have nothing to complain about lol.

bleusteel

As a beta tester, I recall there was a lot of concern over the new UI. Those concerns queited as people started becoming more familiar with it. And once they saw how customizable it was, I would say most folks fell in love with it

My advice, give it some time. It's like when your longtime significant other makes a drastic change in appearance. They might look a little different, but the person you love is still in there.

ZeshinX

bleusteel said:

As a beta tester, I recall there was a lot of concern over the new UI. Those concerns queited as people started becoming more familiar with it. And once they saw how customizable it was, I would say most folks fell in love with it

My advice, give it some time. It's like when your longtime significant other makes a drastic change in appearance. They might look a little different, but the person you love is still in there.

I don't mind the layout and where things have moved around to. That's easy enough to get used to (though I question the need for it....17 years is a long time to get used to it...but that's philosophical warbling lol).

If the colour scheme of the 2.0/SoD (mostly SoD) went back to or better approximated the blue stone GUI, then I'd pretty much be okay with it (the un-expanded BG:EE with 2.0...that's decent).

The custom portrait selection however...boy howdy is that borked and needing reworking.

Jarrakul

ZeshinX said:

The custom portrait selection however...boy howdy is that borked and needing reworking.

For what it's worth, I like custom portraits being included in the normal portrait menu, but I would prefer that functionality to exist alongside the old functionality, rather than replacing it.

ZeshinX

Jarrakul said:

ZeshinX said:

The custom portrait selection however...boy howdy is that borked and needing reworking.

For what it's worth, I like custom portraits being included in the normal portrait menu, but I would prefer that functionality to exist alongside the old functionality, rather than replacing it.

No argument there. Including them with the normal portrait menu works well enough when you don't have a ton of custom portraits, it's more when you have whole custom portrait packs lol.

Still, having both wouldn't be at all a bad thing.

elminster

Jarrakul said:

ZeshinX said:

The custom portrait selection however...boy howdy is that borked and needing reworking.

For what it's worth, I like custom portraits being included in the normal portrait menu, but I would prefer that functionality to exist alongside the old functionality, rather than replacing it.

Make sure to log this as a feature request in redmine then.

Jarrakul

Feature request added. Make no mistake, I love the new functionality, it's very pretty and the seamless incorporation is just nice, but I have kind of a lot of custom portraits and it takes a while to click through them all. And, crucially, there are people out there with more custom portraits than I have.

BillyYank

elminster said:

Jarrakul said:

ZeshinX said:

The custom portrait selection however...boy howdy is that borked and needing reworking.

For what it's worth, I like custom portraits being included in the normal portrait menu, but I would prefer that functionality to exist alongside the old functionality, rather than replacing it.

Make sure to log this as a feature request in redmine then.

Already there:
Overhaul portrait selection screen
Allow different custom portraits to be selected as the Large and Small portraits of a character
Allow custom portaits to be selected from a scrollable list of portraits

Jonnecy

how can I revert to 1.3 if I am not on steam ? none of the games have sound since the update.

SirBatince

Problem is you won't be able to really enjoy SoD if you stay in 1.3. That's why personally I learned to cope with it.

Nildar

As someone who played BG way back when and just bought the EE edition with the release of 2.0 I have to say that I really enjoy this UI. It has so many improvements over the old game.

Sure, there are some things that could use some fine tuning. I personally love the new custom portrait selection method. But I only put the portraits in the portrait folder that I really like so I have to scroll through only ~10 of them and it automatically matches the L and M sizes together, so that is awesome. I can understand if you have 100+ portraits that it would be tiresome though (it is probably much quicker to choose beforehand which one you want and to temporarily remove the rest from the portraits folder, until after character creation).

For me additional improvements would be like icing on the cake and not so much a requirement to enjoy the game. So thank you Beamdog for giving me the opportunity to enjoy this classic again .

BelegCuthalion

Can live with the current state for now if knowing there will be improvement on the way. Interestingly I like the bg2 2.0 layout for its usability (not saying it can't be improved further in detail) and the bg1 2.0 compromise for the style, but that's completely unintuitive when using it ... If forced choosing between the two, I'd go with the bg2 variant and improve the styling, but keep the general layout.

Regarding everything else but the ui: best BG I've ever seen!

bizzyd1441

Franpa said:

Well you can not load a save game created in v2.0, in v1.3. Did you backup your save games before overwriting them in v2.0 (I suspect you didn't think to do this)?

Steam auto-updated the game for me overnight. Didn't realize it had been updated until I opened it up and loaded one of my saves. I've backed up the save files now, but what should I do? How can I get 1.3 to work with my save files? I didn't save anything in 2.0, just loaded some saves.

Jonnecy

SirBatince said:

Problem is you won't be able to really enjoy SoD if you stay in 1.3. That's why personally I learned to cope with it.

well, at present I cannot even 'enjoy' it as the game does not have any sound.

elminster

bizzyd1441 said:

Franpa said:

Well you can not load a save game created in v2.0, in v1.3. Did you backup your save games before overwriting them in v2.0 (I suspect you didn't think to do this)?

Steam auto-updated the game for me overnight. Didn't realize it had been updated until I opened it up and loaded one of my saves. I've backed up the save files now, but what should I do? How can I get 1.3 to work with my save files? I didn't save anything in 2.0, just loaded some saves.

If you go into your steam settings for the game (right click the game and choose properties) there should be a beta tab. You can select 1.3 from there.

Alluren

Got the same problem here : my saves doesn't work when i get back to 1.3, and I never saved under 2.0. By the way, I can't even launch a new game in 1.3 : it crashes.