My own perspective on the condition of BG:EE is ultimately simple: the game experience, in overall aesthetic terms, is inferior to both my original experience playing the game in 1998, and a more recent experience with Tutu.
The game has been stable for me and loads lightning fast, which is an unalloyed good. The new 2D videos are more timeless and visually acceptable in 2012 than the crude CGI of 1998. This is also good. Installing the whole game as a single package, with no fuss necessary, is another good.
However, when I actually get into the game, my experience is inferior. I am not upset at the relative lack of new content, nor the fact that the game isn't fully rendered in 3D, nor any such nonsense as that. In fact, I originally expected that Beamdog and Overhaul would make as FEW changes to the original game as possible, and allow me my nostalgia. However, many of the changes--such as the new font on journal and item description text, and the the appallingly ugly spellbooks--are not just "not updated", they are visually jarring and aesthetically inferior to the original fonts and icons. Not to mention all the new bugs, of which I gathered a long list from just an hour or two with the game. Why can I play BGTutu in widescreen where everything looks as it should (by which I mean, exactly as I remember it from 1998), but this professional redesign has all the hallmarks of reckless amateur part-time mod?
Beamdog and Overhaul deserve the benefit of the doubt for now; the challenges in revamping a 14-year-old game without any of the original assets were made clear at the outset. However, that doesn't quite answer why amateurs can produce a better "enhanced" edition than paid professionals selling their work as a product on the market. One would expect it to go the other way around. The people responsible for BG:EE deserve an opportunity to correct their mistakes, as all men do--and if they do, we should let bygones be bygones--but unless and until that happens, there is little to recommend enthusiasm for BG2:EE or BG3.
Sometimes, I wonder what people expected. I'm able to play BG on a big screen with it looking decent. Not ground-breaking (nobody should think it would), but decent. And not wide-screen distorted the way it does with the mods I've seen. What else?
1) Quick transitions. I thought I'd miss the screens in between, but no. They're fast 2) Quick-Save in <1 second; quick-load just as fast 3) Buggy, but excellent record sheets and the like 4) Professional voice-work; I can swear I've heard more lines from Imoen (new ones)
So what? They work. I can install and play my GOG.com versions of Fallout, Crusader: No Remorse, Little Big Adventure, Beneath A Steel Sky and all the Ultima games on my MacBook Air now without having to do a bunch of research and jumping through all kinds of confusing hoops to get them to work. And it didn't cost me anything -- they made the announcement, I logged in, and the installers were there. For free. And they just added Mac support to a dozen more games this week and will continue to add more, with the next batch coming in December.
So why wouldn't or couldn't they release a Mac installer for their BG:TOS? As I said -- these guys are very good at what they do and have gotten games that nobody had been able to play for years to run on modern OS'es without problems.
I wouldn't count on a Mac installer for BG: TOS. That's a Windows game therefore the custom version of DOSBox they're using for their Mac ports wouldn't help. They would need to use Wineskin and so far the only game they've used that with is their own game, The Witcher Enhanced Edition. I'm fairly sure I read somewhere where they stated porting Windows games using Wineskin wasn't a trivial matter and therefore wouldn't be happening anytime soon if ever. Hopefully I either misunderstood what they were saying or read it wrong but I remember that being the gist of it.
Even with that said what they're doing with that custom version of DOSBox is awesome. The whole process of purchasing, downloading, and installing their "Mac" games is great. And this custom version of DOSBox really give these "Mac" versions a Mac-like feel, at least as much as it's capable of, with those extra options and features built into the emulator. The games just work and work well. Hopefully they'll figure out how to do ports of Windows games in an efficient manner but in the meantime they'll be getting business from me for what they're already doing and doing well.
Well, I can't find any references, and don't have time to try, but maybe I'm wrong, I was sure I've heart it in old jazz and blues songs before 1992 and the movie, but I can't remember.
No matter, I understand you concerns, but I would still only take the line as a little wink from the developer back then, but I know what you mean,
There might be. I was born in '83, so there very well could have been. Army of Darkness is just the only reference I know of, and I should probably consider myself lucky my parents even let me watch it at that age.
Well, I can't find any references, and don't have time to try, but maybe I'm wrong, I was sure I've heart it in old jazz and blues songs before 1992 and the movie, but I can't remember.
No matter, I understand you concerns, but I would still only take the line as a little wink from the developer back then, but I know what you mean,
There might be. I was born in '83, so there very well could have been. Army of Darkness is just the only reference I know of, and I should probably consider myself lucky my parents even let me watch it at that age.
You know, I actually just ran across another pop reference while reading about some of the companions. Apparently Xzar will say that he "ate someone's liver with a nice chianti and fava beans". Don't remember that line in the game...
I couldn't play the game on launch day because of work, but I went to the forums and got worried about the game judging from people's comments about bugs, movies' quality, UI etc. So I managed to start the game last night (only had time for 15 minutes) and I don't know what people were talking about.
These are the sort of comments I don't understand when people are saying. 'What is everyone complaining about? What bugs? But then they go on and say things like this....
I am painfully close to beginning to click the "agree" button on most of these negative posts. Painfully, excruciatingly close.
I won't stop my support of the idea and the dream, though. I may criticize this project a thousand times and in a thousand ways, but I won't abandon it. It's like having a family member who drives you crazy with all their faults, but you keep trying to have a good relationship with them, because you ultimately love them.
If nothing else, this project is generating renewed attention and activity around my favorite game. I love the devs for that. I'm sure there are many, many reasons why things don't seem to be working out as they had hoped.
I'm not angry, or even close to being angry. I'm just very, very sad that the current state of things would seem to indicate that they bit off more than they could chew, and tried to shoot for the stars, and, not only did not reach the moon, or a jet plane, but maybe only a low-flying helicopter.
Well, I can't find any references, and don't have time to try, but maybe I'm wrong, I was sure I've heart it in old jazz and blues songs before 1992 and the movie, but I can't remember.
No matter, I understand you concerns, but I would still only take the line as a little wink from the developer back then, but I know what you mean,
There might be. I was born in '83, so there very well could have been. Army of Darkness is just the only reference I know of, and I should probably consider myself lucky my parents even let me watch it at that age.
You know, I actually just ran across another pop reference while reading about some of the companions. Apparently Xzar will say that he "ate someone's liver with a nice chianti and fava beans". Don't remember that line in the game...
I won't stop my support of the idea and the dream, though. I may criticize this project a thousand times and in a thousand ways, but I won't abandon it.
I'm not angry, or even close to being angry. I'm just very, very sad that the current state of things would seem to indicate that they bit off more than they could chew, and tried to shoot for the stars, and, not only did not reach the moon, or a jet plane, but maybe only a low-flying helicopter.
Most people think that if one writes something negative it's out of hatred. We loved the original, we want the best for it. And then we got (really) disappointed of what was done, maybe we expected too much. We still want the best for the game and pointing out what we think is lacking is to help ofc that gets us labeled as haters or trolls.
been playing bg and iwd series since release of all , if you do not notice any enhanced editions to this game you prob havent played enough of the original , load up the original without mods and re comment,
been playing bg and iwd series since release of all , if you do not notice any enhanced editions to this game you prob havent played enough of the original , load up the original without mods and re comment,
I'm comparing it against BGT with Widescreen. As I own both BG1 & BG2 (they are also available together for the same price as BGEE and quite often it's possible to get them cheaper) and adding BGT + Widescreen is hardy a difficult process.
My own perspective on the condition of BG:EE is ultimately simple: the game experience, in overall aesthetic terms, is inferior to both my original experience playing the game in 1998, and a more recent experience with Tutu.
The game has been stable for me and loads lightning fast, which is an unalloyed good. The new 2D videos are more timeless and visually acceptable in 2012 than the crude CGI of 1998. This is also good. Installing the whole game as a single package, with no fuss necessary, is another good.
However, when I actually get into the game, my experience is inferior. I am not upset at the relative lack of new content, nor the fact that the game isn't fully rendered in 3D, nor any such nonsense as that. In fact, I originally expected that Beamdog and Overhaul would make as FEW changes to the original game as possible, and allow me my nostalgia. However, many of the changes--such as the new font on journal and item description text, and the the appallingly ugly spellbooks--are not just "not updated", they are visually jarring and aesthetically inferior to the original fonts and icons. Not to mention all the new bugs, of which I gathered a long list from just an hour or two with the game. Why can I play BGTutu in widescreen where everything looks as it should (by which I mean, exactly as I remember it from 1998), but this professional redesign has all the hallmarks of reckless amateur part-time mod?
Beamdog and Overhaul deserve the benefit of the doubt for now; the challenges in revamping a 14-year-old game without any of the original assets were made clear at the outset. However, that doesn't quite answer why amateurs can produce a better "enhanced" edition than paid professionals selling their work as a product on the market. One would expect it to go the other way around. The people responsible for BG:EE deserve an opportunity to correct their mistakes, as all men do--and if they do, we should let bygones be bygones--but unless and until that happens, there is little to recommend enthusiasm for BG2:EE or BG3.
For everyone says that the BG:EE doesn't give you anything the BGT didn't give you...
Yousa crazy!
Auto-scaling UI that actually works at a modern resolution? The ability to even ENTER the multiplayer screen? (BGT consistently crashed when I tried that, making a 'custom party' impossible) Take a look at the actual UI -- they've spent some time cleaning it up and tidying up after themselves. I'm not 100% certain what every single item there is, but I'm sure I'll figure out a few of the new items given time. A hassle free install. Better performance -- much less time spent flickering around, waiting for things to wait for things to load, etc etc.
- First. Why do you call it auto-scaling? I play the game with my wife, and that's what we see: She has an older '17 monitor, I have a 2yrs old 1680x1050 monitor. We see the same picture, except I have two empty grey panels at the two sides of the screen. + Second, yep, I agree with that: I bought this game in hope to play it with my wife. We had all the vanilla CDs, but the game (or we) couldn't connect win7+XP. Even with Hamachi and GameRanger we couldn't connect. And now we can play. +- Third. GUI. There is too much unused space, even there is a hole in it, an empty window. They could rearrange the panel to put item information or something in the empty window. Then the numbers for stacked items are too small. It is hard to read for me. Why are all texts different sized in the GUI pages? (The bigger name boxes at the main game screen are good.) The numbers adjacent to stacked spells are too small I think. But the overall feel is better, gameplay informations gathered, etc. I love the new quicksave icon. But the spellbook and tome, the spell icons are too small and blur. Last. Until the characters don't do what you ordered them, until you have to give them orders twice, until they go close to enemies even if they have bows or slings or throwing items.. it is harder to play as it was in the vanilla version. Until this major bugs fixed it is not too "Enhanced". - And I just miss the old movies. Intro: I miss Nietsche from the start. I miss the left out phrase being not alone ("there are others"). I miss the horror, the last moment of hope, before the scene of kill. I don't say they should throw away the new ones, but seriously a lot is missing, and with that missing they are causing heavy bugs: to not be able to sleep in Inns and in the Mine in multiplayer sessions, etc. They could add the old ones too, it is not hard to make. They could unlock them in the Movies section in game Menu as they unlock the new ones. (And link the old movies to the game until replaced by the new ones.) Thanks for reading my wall of text.
I am painfully close to beginning to click the "agree" button on most of these negative posts. Painfully, excruciatingly close.
I won't stop my support of the idea and the dream, though. I may criticize this project a thousand times and in a thousand ways, but I won't abandon it. It's like having a family member who drives you crazy with all their faults, but you keep trying to have a good relationship with them, because you ultimately love them.
If nothing else, this project is generating renewed attention and activity around my favorite game. I love the devs for that. I'm sure there are many, many reasons why things don't seem to be working out as they had hoped.
I'm not angry, or even close to being angry. I'm just very, very sad that the current state of things would seem to indicate that they bit off more than they could chew, and tried to shoot for the stars, and, not only did not reach the moon, or a jet plane, but maybe only a low-flying helicopter.
start small, finish big. They need the $ to do something special for baldurs gate 2 and starting to enhance things like this is hard to get off the ground initially. I reckon there will be updates to add on new stuff anyway.
The only massive let-down I found was the lack of portraits and sounds for my character added into the game. I would of really liked a lot more class-orientated sound sets added into the game.
I also would of liked to see an alchemist class added into the game (make potions though skills including missile potions), blackguard is great but it was already added through the Darkest day mod for baldurs gate 2.
I am painfully close to beginning to click the "agree" button on most of these negative posts. Painfully, excruciatingly close.
I'm not angry, or even close to being angry. I'm just very, very sad that the current state of things would seem to indicate that they bit off more than they could chew, and tried to shoot for the stars, and, not only did not reach the moon, or a jet plane, but maybe only a low-flying helicopter.
Exactly what i feel too. Some features are not Bad, Zoom, Higher resolution support. But taking new created Art Material from the lower resolution Tablet Version - Since i guess it will run on different tablets - of course not all will share a Ultra High resolution - and putting that into the pc version because there was no time/resources to create proper new artwork for the PC Version sucks Big Time!
Not anger, just disappointment. Maybe I just expected too much from them. That being said, I'm sure that they'll take what they've learned and apply it to BG2:EE and make it truly worthy of the moniker "Enhanced Edition", if only because I can't bear to imagine the alternative.
Sorry to say, it seems they lack the talent to do so, better some other studio make the BG II EE, they just don't have high enough quality standards.
Well, i think that goes too far to say they dont have the talent.
But Beamdog should SERIOUSLY consider to ask for help with the BG2:EE - Why not talking with Bioware or the new Created Black Isle Studio Guys for help?
There are so many talented people around, you just have to ask them.
But without help from some other external resource i would not think about making a BG2:EE at all if i would be in their position now after all what happened.
Beamdog can for example still make the creation of character/story content. But they should stay away from the technical/graphical part and instead give that into other, more capable hands
I wouldn't go so far. The issues are mostly results from a rushed product. BG2EE will be better because they have learned much from doing BGEE, and I'm sure they wont rush it like they have done with BGEE.
Hopefully they will have long term support for BGEE and improvements they continue to do for an BG2EE release shouldn't be hard to also patch into the BGEE client.
@Freche Ok, learning process... fine... But if they would at least hire some freelancers to support them.. mostly in graphical or technical terms, things would go more fluid.
Also do not forget, they already have enhanced a game in the past, they should already know the basic stuff what is a go and what's a no-go
Remember, that BG2 is much more complex, and if Beamdog already was not fully able to handle the situation with BG1:EE - it will be worse with the more complex Successor.
They simply need help in technical and graphical Questions. Either they have not the necessary knowledge/resources/time.
And not matter which of that 3 points is true, THIS does SCREAM for helping hands
Remember, that BG2 is much more complex, and if Beamdog already was not fully able to handle the situation with BG1:EE - it will be worse with the more complex Successor.
Given that they started out by porting the entire BG1 game to base it off the BG2 engine, I fail to see how BG2 is 'more complex' than BG1.
- First. Why do you call it auto-scaling? I play the game with my wife, and that's what we see: She has an older '17 monitor, I have a 2yrs old 1680x1050 monitor. We see the same picture, except I have two empty grey panels at the two sides of the screen. + Second, yep, I agree with that: I bought this game in hope to play it with my wife. We had all the vanilla CDs, but the game (or we) couldn't connect win7+XP. Even with Hamachi and GameRanger we couldn't connect. And now we can play. +- Third. GUI. There is too much unused space, even there is a hole in it, an empty window. They could rearrange the panel to put item information or something in the empty window. Then the numbers for stacked items are too small. It is hard to read for me. Why are all texts different sized in the GUI pages? (The bigger name boxes at the main game screen are good.) The numbers adjacent to stacked spells are too small I think. But the overall feel is better, gameplay informations gathered, etc. I love the new quicksave icon. But the spellbook and tome, the spell icons are too small and blur. Last. Until the characters don't do what you ordered them, until you have to give them orders twice, until they go close to enemies even if they have bows or slings or throwing items.. it is harder to play as it was in the vanilla version. Until this major bugs fixed it is not too "Enhanced". - And I just miss the old movies. Intro: I miss Nietsche from the start. I miss the left out phrase being not alone ("there are others"). I miss the horror, the last moment of hope, before the scene of kill. I don't say they should throw away the new ones, but seriously a lot is missing, and with that missing they are causing heavy bugs: to not be able to sleep in Inns and in the Mine in multiplayer sessions, etc. They could add the old ones too, it is not hard to make. They could unlock them in the Movies section in game Menu as they unlock the new ones. (And link the old movies to the game until replaced by the new ones.) Thanks for reading my wall of text.
Autoscaling: As far as I can tell, the GUI scales to the resolution of your monitor, intelligently upsizing various elements so that portraits and buttons don't become miniscule, unclickable things.
And while I will agree the GUI needs further work, it's still an improvement over the original -- it just needs mouseover texts on a few unclear values, like the one to the left of the 'to hit' box. (Mouseover on status effects in the profile page to get more info on them would also be nice...)
As for the movies, you have two separate comments that should be addressed as such. First I'll tackle the bug issue: and, quite simply, 'that's a bug'. The missing movies are just a bug that will be addressed. Second, while I'll agree that I miss the Nietsche quote, the new movies are probably designed to look decent in the 'modern' era while trying to reduce the amount of storage space the game takes up on your disk. Whether that's a good decision or not... I won't venture an opinion.
And while I will agree the GUI needs further work, it's still an improvement over the original -- it just needs mouseover texts on a few unclear values, like the one to the left of the 'to hit' box. (Mouseover on status effects in the profile page to get more info on them would also be nice...)
This... and it has to be replaced with a 1920x1080 version.. Because it is seriously unaccaptable that a 1024x768 windowed version just gets upscaled so far. Results in looking bad.
Comments
1) Quick transitions. I thought I'd miss the screens in between, but no. They're fast
2) Quick-Save in <1 second; quick-load just as fast
3) Buggy, but excellent record sheets and the like
4) Professional voice-work; I can swear I've heard more lines from Imoen (new ones)
I won't stop my support of the idea and the dream, though. I may criticize this project a thousand times and in a thousand ways, but I won't abandon it. It's like having a family member who drives you crazy with all their faults, but you keep trying to have a good relationship with them, because you ultimately love them.
If nothing else, this project is generating renewed attention and activity around my favorite game. I love the devs for that. I'm sure there are many, many reasons why things don't seem to be working out as they had hoped.
I'm not angry, or even close to being angry. I'm just very, very sad that the current state of things would seem to indicate that they bit off more than they could chew, and tried to shoot for the stars, and, not only did not reach the moon, or a jet plane, but maybe only a low-flying helicopter.
You must be.
We still want the best for the game and pointing out what we think is lacking is to help ofc that gets us labeled as haters or trolls.
My own perspective on the condition of BG:EE is ultimately simple: the game experience, in overall aesthetic terms, is inferior to both my original experience playing the game in 1998, and a more recent experience with Tutu.
The game has been stable for me and loads lightning fast, which is an unalloyed good. The new 2D videos are more timeless and visually acceptable in 2012 than the crude CGI of 1998. This is also good. Installing the whole game as a single package, with no fuss necessary, is another good.
However, when I actually get into the game, my experience is inferior. I am not upset at the relative lack of new content, nor the fact that the game isn't fully rendered in 3D, nor any such nonsense as that. In fact, I originally expected that Beamdog and Overhaul would make as FEW changes to the original game as possible, and allow me my nostalgia. However, many of the changes--such as the new font on journal and item description text, and the the appallingly ugly spellbooks--are not just "not updated", they are visually jarring and aesthetically inferior to the original fonts and icons. Not to mention all the new bugs, of which I gathered a long list from just an hour or two with the game. Why can I play BGTutu in widescreen where everything looks as it should (by which I mean, exactly as I remember it from 1998), but this professional redesign has all the hallmarks of reckless amateur part-time mod?
Beamdog and Overhaul deserve the benefit of the doubt for now; the challenges in revamping a 14-year-old game without any of the original assets were made clear at the outset. However, that doesn't quite answer why amateurs can produce a better "enhanced" edition than paid professionals selling their work as a product on the market. One would expect it to go the other way around. The people responsible for BG:EE deserve an opportunity to correct their mistakes, as all men do--and if they do, we should let bygones be bygones--but unless and until that happens, there is little to recommend enthusiasm for BG2:EE or BG3.
I agree 100%.
+ Second, yep, I agree with that: I bought this game in hope to play it with my wife. We had all the vanilla CDs, but the game (or we) couldn't connect win7+XP. Even with Hamachi and GameRanger we couldn't connect. And now we can play.
+- Third. GUI. There is too much unused space, even there is a hole in it, an empty window. They could rearrange the panel to put item information or something in the empty window. Then the numbers for stacked items are too small. It is hard to read for me. Why are all texts different sized in the GUI pages? (The bigger name boxes at the main game screen are good.) The numbers adjacent to stacked spells are too small I think. But the overall feel is better, gameplay informations gathered, etc. I love the new quicksave icon. But the spellbook and tome, the spell icons are too small and blur.
Last. Until the characters don't do what you ordered them, until you have to give them orders twice, until they go close to enemies even if they have bows or slings or throwing items.. it is harder to play as it was in the vanilla version. Until this major bugs fixed it is not too "Enhanced".
- And I just miss the old movies. Intro: I miss Nietsche from the start. I miss the left out phrase being not alone ("there are others"). I miss the horror, the last moment of hope, before the scene of kill.
I don't say they should throw away the new ones, but seriously a lot is missing, and with that missing they are causing heavy bugs: to not be able to sleep in Inns and in the Mine in multiplayer sessions, etc. They could add the old ones too, it is not hard to make. They could unlock them in the Movies section in game Menu as they unlock the new ones. (And link the old movies to the game until replaced by the new ones.)
Thanks for reading my wall of text.
The only massive let-down I found was the lack of portraits and sounds for my character added into the game. I would of really liked a lot more class-orientated sound sets added into the game.
I also would of liked to see an alchemist class added into the game (make potions though skills including missile potions), blackguard is great but it was already added through the Darkest day mod for baldurs gate 2.
TDD was utter garbage, so not having to download that to be a Blackguard is welcome.
But Beamdog should SERIOUSLY consider to ask for help with the BG2:EE - Why not talking with Bioware or the new Created Black Isle Studio Guys for help?
There are so many talented people around, you just have to ask them.
But without help from some other external resource i would not think about making a BG2:EE at all if i would be in their position now after all what happened.
Beamdog can for example still make the creation of character/story content. But they should stay away from the technical/graphical part and instead give that into other, more capable hands
The issues are mostly results from a rushed product. BG2EE will be better because they have learned much from doing BGEE, and I'm sure they wont rush it like they have done with BGEE.
Hopefully they will have long term support for BGEE and improvements they continue to do for an BG2EE release shouldn't be hard to also patch into the BGEE client.
Also do not forget, they already have enhanced a game in the past, they should already know the basic stuff what is a go and what's a no-go
Remember, that BG2 is much more complex, and if Beamdog already was not fully able to handle the situation with BG1:EE - it will be worse with the more complex Successor.
They simply need help in technical and graphical Questions. Either they have not the necessary knowledge/resources/time.
And not matter which of that 3 points is true, THIS does SCREAM for helping hands
YES
And while I will agree the GUI needs further work, it's still an improvement over the original -- it just needs mouseover texts on a few unclear values, like the one to the left of the 'to hit' box. (Mouseover on status effects in the profile page to get more info on them would also be nice...)
As for the movies, you have two separate comments that should be addressed as such. First I'll tackle the bug issue: and, quite simply, 'that's a bug'. The missing movies are just a bug that will be addressed. Second, while I'll agree that I miss the Nietsche quote, the new movies are probably designed to look decent in the 'modern' era while trying to reduce the amount of storage space the game takes up on your disk. Whether that's a good decision or not... I won't venture an opinion.