User Ratings on Metacritic (*SPOILERS*)
Purudaya
Member Posts: 816
Congrats, everyone – we might not get future BG content because people are actively trying to tank this game. If you've actually PLAYED SoD, I would strongly encourage you leave a review of your own.
Post edited by Dee on
8
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
To be blunt honest, I haven't found the gameplay very very interesting. It's me vs an entire encampment of enemies over and over. And half the time they're neutral and I have no idea why.
Giving a 0 to it for a few SJW lines is just beyond asinine.
Boo smells injustice served, and possibly - just possibly - it could be made to lead to a favorable outcome.
I enjoy this game and I know a LOT of people on here do as well. People like you want to take that away from these players by negatively reviewing the game en masse because it offends your worldview.
You are like a child throwing a tantrum because you don't like what's on your plate. There's no need to purposefully ruin the meal for the rest of us. Enough.
"There is no such thing as bad publicity" -PT Barnum (probably)
As a bit of a cynic, I can't help but think the Beamdoggers know what they're doing. After the Dorn and Hexxat backlash they can't be surprised. Trent is no dummy :-)
I wholeheartedly support Beamdog and think they're doing a great job keeping the franchise fresh. This too shall pass. Hang in there true believers.
Incidentally, this would go for any game. I'm sure many of the games I enjoy are developed by people who have views that I would strongly disagree with - but they don't push their agenda in the game, and they don't brag about it in interviews and on forums.
Beamdog should have known better than to shoehorn in politics and agendas into this beloved franchise. Well over 90% of gamers couldn't care less about that and many react extremely allergic to it (as we have seen).
Sad indeed, but "you reap what you sow" I guess...
I also say this when ever any game gets released and starts off getting negative reviews.
Those who are not enjoying the game will come on first and explain why they do not enjoy it. They lose interest in it, feel ripped off and want to prevent other people from this feeling as soon as possible.
Players that are engaged in a game and not experiencing any difficulties won't stop playing it to write a comprehensive review on why they are enjoying it. Those reviews, as well as reviews that are well balanced come later.
Not related but I'm a bit shock with a certain review that because SoD is fully voiced, it is out out of place, it doesn't fit in the BG world where voice acting is minimal. Seriously, that's your problem?
I would like to know how you've missed a large portion of the game story. I'm going to spoiler the next part of my commentary only because it's my policy not to give anything away on the game.
* There is no "encampment" in chapter 7.
* The only "encampment" in chapter 8 is pre-coast way crossing, and I don't suspect you're talking about this.
* This leads us to Chapter 9, the first place where you really get involved with/engaged with the Crusade. I assume you're talking about being able to walk through the crusade encampment unmolested here? There are a couple comments I'll address below.
* Then there's Chapter 10 where your quest takes you both to the Castle of Dragonspear and to the entrance to the Underground Cavern. Both of these I'll address below also.
* From chapter 11 on, there's no encounters with the crusade that's "friendly".
Generally
You're in medieval times, it's not as if you've been photographed and put up on the internet for the world to see. The VAST MAJORITY of the crusade and the entire sword coast wouldn't recognize you from Adam unless you introduce yourself.
And...in many cases you have the opportunity to do exactly that. In some of those cases, the NPC's refuse to believe you (such as out front of the Crusade Encampment). I mean, after all, who the hell is suicidal enough to walk up to the enemy encampment and simply ANNOUNCE they're the dreaded person that everyone is looking for?
In other cases, announcing yourself does, indeed, provoke the reaction you can expect from you doing so...You're who? GET HIM!...in many cases starting mass combat.
Chapter 9
So lets talk chapter 9 specifically. You can meet crusaders trapped in cells in the Temple of Cyric. Were you in that scenario, would you really care who it was saving you?
You can also meet crusaders out front of the encampment. Maybe this is the most egregious place, but by this point your reputation isn't such that you're one to walk up to someone and say "hey, i know you have an ARMY full of armed people, behind those walls, but i'm the dude you've all been fighting this entire war to get ahold of...just, wanted to let you know!"
Once you get past those guards at the gate, you have Caelar's Seal...an item that ONLY people who follow Caelar carry. Ok, maybe it's naive of the crusade to think that anyone with a seal is one of them (addressed in chapter 10) but please remember how this crusade is coming together: Caelar is marching through towns and farms and cities, burning them to the ground, killing and looting as most mob armies do, and conscripting people or persuading them to join her cause. People are flocking to her banner left, right and sideways. As a member of that camp even says: They're getting recruits faster than they can know who they're getting.
Sure you're wandering around the encampment without being questioned...so is everyone else. It's not as if you're an armed guy in an unarmed encampment, this is an ARMY you're one of THOUSANDS.
AND to top that off there IS even an encounter you can trigger within the encampment in chapter 9 that DOES give you away, you ARE recognized and it DOES start the battle...I am trying to figure out where we missed the boat here
Chapter 10
That brings us to chapter 10. UGR is the same story as the fort in chapter 9...Caelar's army is just too large and too spread out to know every single individual. It'd be MORE non-sensical if everyone DID know who you were and WAS able to spot you from a mile away. Even the Daggerford and Waterdeep contingent of your OWN ARMY end up addressing you with things like "Oh, so you're the hero of Baldur's Gate huh?"
Dragonspear Castle is another story entirely, but I still believe we've covered our bases writing wise. Unless you feel like the entire sword coast should know you by face on sight, Dragonspear Castle also seems to work for me. By this point the Crusade is busy planning it's attack and it's not ready to just let anyone into the castle...the front gate stops you and will not let you enter unless you are ALREADY one of Caelar's chosen...again, identifying that the crusade is getting more cautious.
That said, if you have the seal you are still able to identify yourself as one of Caelar's faithful and be let in...but again, you're in under cover...and there are more places where you can trip yourself up.
I'm really interested in your opinion of what you missed in the story that didn't catch you as to why you're allowed to walk free in Caelar's Encampments. The story elements are there (or at least we feel they are). How should we / should we have made it clear that you're simply an unrecognized person?
Or do you feel after spending all your time around Baldur's Gate in BG1 that your face and name should be on the eyes and lips up and down the entire sword coast? (Not intended to be sarcastic, if that's your opinion I'd like to hear that).
IF YOU PLAYED IT, go review it please, the LGBT thing is being blown out of proportion and a vocal minority (lgbt haters and sjw haters) is trying to have an impact on the game that I have followed for a few years, that I have supported and hoped for for such a long time.
If you're like me and you've never done a review because you didn't care enough for it or you were happy with the reviews about the game you played, go make a review on metacritic. We need to drown the haters review under the sheer number of honest reviews, and if honest review means 7/10, then go give it 7/10 and if you hated it after playing it, then go give it 3/10.
I put 9/10 because while this game leaves me with feelings similar to the first ones and to the great rpgs I've played, it's not perfect, just as BG was not.
Go voice your opinion if you're part of the silent majority, it matters right now and here, http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/baldurs-gate-siege-of-dragonspear.
This extension pack leaves me wanting more of it and I can only see future extensions getting closer and closer to perfection as Beamdog will do their best.
@Dee @Amber_Scott Do not fall for the apparent hate, the game is receiving, people who are making reviews right now mostly made them out of frustration after ending the prologue, people with honest reviews are still playing it to make sure they can leave honest reviews. I know it can be heart breaking when you've worked so hard on something and it gets hate for a minor details, you can feel wronged because you feel like your work isn't appreciated at full value. This isn't the case.
Almost all of this conversation seems to be coming from a perspective that half of the game revolves around LGBTQ content.
Not to pick on you specifically (these exact words have been said many times) but "shoehorn in politics and agendas" gets a little hard to swallow....I'd love to hear a justification for how the amount of LGBTQ content within SoD equates to an agenda or political position.
The fact that a Transgender character exists somewhere within the Universe of the Forgotten Realms is somehow what? A surprise? A mystery? An abomination?
Why is a story teller not allowed to make a character within that story Transgender? Did I miss something? We've given the main PC player character the ability to pursue a relationship with something close to 15 different characters through three games, and many of those relationships are same sex relationships...and a minor NPC Character stating a handful of lines about being Transgender is as if we hired the anti-christ himself to write for us?
Did the writers perhaps go off on tangents somehow and somewhere in a dialog I've not seen about how the character is unaccepted and how horrible the realms treat people like that, and how we should all be nicer to LGBTQ People?
A little perspective here:
A Single post in ANY Thread talking about this part of the game has MORE LGBTQ CONTENT in it than the ENTIRE SOD GAME DOES.
I personally don't really care what your motivation is or your opinion on that content, you're entitled to whatever opinion you carry. I just find it utterly absurd that in 50 hours of game play we're holding 30 and 50 page discussions and spawning thread after thread after thread of arguments and hate over what amounts to somewhere around 1/10000'th of the content of the game?
This is nothing more than "THERE'S A WORD MISSPELLED OMG THE GAME IS UNPLAYABLE!!! OMG!!!" all over again.
Another little perspective here:
Identifying a few lines of text in a 30-50 hour video game as a political statement or a political agenda might be taking things a little far.
As a matter of fact, there might very well be an argument to be made that anyone calling that exceptionally microscopic portion of the game an agenda might, I don't know, have an agenda themselves?
I'm also here to help pass constructive criticism up the chain and answer questions.
That said, I also have a hard time hearing how horrible a game I've spent the last year helping to QA test is because a minor character in a minor zone happens to have been made slightly less zombie-like Grey NPC with no flavor and no background by being called Transgender in a few lines of text.
If anyone here or anyone anywhere else wants to read what I've posted and give a second thought to why we're all going off at a hundred miles an hour over what amounts to a rock in the ocean, so be it. If not then there's nothing anyone's going to say one way or the other to make any real difference. This is all just so much noise...my post included.
Have no fear, I'm sure the gaming industry will eventually learn it's lesson and make ONLY the 250th copy of League of Legands and the 999th version of Call of Duty because those will be the "safe" bet.
Real stories told by real people with creative ideas will assuredly be put down by the masses so they can sit in their ivory towers and pretend their world view is exactly as they wish it to be.
Same with steam, you just got to look at the top comments if it has bad rating and see there is an agenda. many poor ratings are at a protest at something and don't reflex the quality of the game and can't be taken seriously.
The final score means nothing to me, it is what is written in the review that counts.