I do remember hating the city my first few playthroughs. It's dense, you get a bunch of quests, you feel claustrophobic after running free in the wilderness for so long, they're still throwing new companions at you... It's a lot to take in. I now have a systematic route through the city.. as well as in BGII. I don't really deviate from those paths so the city bits can feel a bit tedious.
For me reaching Baldur's Gate is when the story kicks into gear. Don't get me wrong I absolutely love wandering the wilderness and gradually getting more powerful whilst collecting magic items and picking away at the big conspiracy, but the story only takes center stage once you reach the city. My favourite part of the game is the Baldur's Gate -> Candlekeep arc - and those Doppelganger sections. The part I can't stand is Cloakwood/Firewine Ruins/Ulcaster School always happy to be done with those sections.
I just finished the game for the first time a couple of days ago and thought about coming here to make this exact same post. Chapter Five was a massive stumbling block for me and almost put me off the game entirely. It started off well because I decided to try the Tales of the Sword Coast side quests first. I was trekking north to Baldur's Gate, why not make a stop by Ulgoth's Beard?
Durlag's Tower was so good and so absorbing that Baldur's Gate felt like a brick wall by comparison. The story floats away into a series of side quests that eventually feel redundant. It cuts the drama off in favor of giving the player more choices, which doesn't make a lot of sense structurally. I had explored every part of the map I could up to that point and was suffering from exploration exhaustion. I wanted to pick up what I thought might be important items in Baldur's Gate, so I dutifully sought out every interesting character and every interesting bit of dialogue. After performing so many open-ended tasks, the idea of performing even more was irritating. True, I could have skipped most of it and went straight for the Seven Suns and the Iron Throne, but would I miss anything important by doing so? Was there some information about the storyline that might enrich the plot hidden away in the SE corner of the city? Who knew?! So I slogged about hoping something would pique my interest in the meantime.
Then Chapter Six is quick and combat heavy and the drama leads right back to Baldur's Gate. Awesome! Only... you can be arrested in Baldur's Gate now, so walking around the city is even more of a chore than usual, and there are a TON of plot points you could miss by going to the right place too quickly.
These are things that I think could have been fixed. The problem was not knowing if you would miss anything essential to the plot. And you can, which stinks. That kind of info should come naturally by moving through the game, not by accident. Because the Flaming Fist are so obnoxious in Chapter Seven, I found myself speeding through areas that contained important dialog. I was ready to go to the palace before I even knew the details of Duke Eltan's illness! I used a walkthrough to figure out what I had ran by and then ran routes through the city that avoided the guards. Glad that I did, because it made Sarevok's rise and fall more devious.
I just bought a copy of Icewind Dale because I've heard it's a touch more linear and combat focused. At this point, that sounds more exciting to me than exploring new cities and digging plot information out of characters you could easily miss. I will eventually play through BG2 because I've always wanted to complete the entire saga, but I have to say that the Baldur's Gate portion of Baldur's Gate is disappointing, and is responsible for slowing down what had been, up to that point, a very interesting and absorbing dramatic climb.
Its worth noting that Durlag's Tower and Ulgoth's Beard were part of the expansion. So the encounters you see in Baldur's Gate (the city) by-in-large would have been designed around a character that hadn't gone through these areas (and when the level cap was lower). Thats why fetch quests for instance in
Werewolf island
see you getting 3000-4000xp for completing one quest.
For me, I love playing singleton (sadly I have to cheat to do it) but I can't seem to get my character just right ever. Like since I max my gold, I want to make sure I have the best armor and weapons. I also want to be immune to as many magics as I can be, because when I get hit with some certain ones it renders me unable to control my character (yes I'm guilty of using CTRL-R (restores character) and CTRL-Y (kills character under cursor) when a battle gets really tricky.) I don't understand why some weapons break so much and have to be replaced. I've been doing my best in learning and immersing myself into the game as much as I can but I can't get very far without feeling frustrated. The farthest I've gotten is only chapter two.
Do I hate it? No not at all. The challenge is good for me. However, it's really frustrating when I can't get very far
For me, I love playing singleton (sadly I have to cheat to do it) but I can't seem to get my character just right ever. Like since I max my gold, I want to make sure I have the best armor and weapons. I also want to be immune to as many magics as I can be, because when I get hit with some certain ones it renders me unable to control my character (yes I'm guilty of using CTRL-R (restores character) and CTRL-Y (kills character under cursor) when a battle gets really tricky.) I don't understand why some weapons break so much and have to be replaced. I've been doing my best in learning and immersing myself into the game as much as I can but I can't get very far without feeling frustrated. The farthest I've gotten is only chapter two.
Do I hate it? No not at all. The challenge is good for me. However, it's really frustrating when I can't get very far
It makes sense to start off the game with proficiency in scimitars for combat classes. You can buy a ninjato for 17gc which is as strong as a (more expensive) longsword and swings faster! If you really want the best weapons, scimitars stay great because you can kill Drizzt for some pretty broken scimitars.
For a Katana, you can steal a gem worth 1,000gc in the prologue upstairs in Winthrop's inn. For this, you either need to be a half-orc barbarian (S19, +4 from raging = 23. Enough to force open the lock), or a thief with maxed open locks. The best katana you can get in the game is only a +1 though...still, it's like having a greatsword in one hand, so its still pretty good.
(2) Controlling Character
Consider playing a berserker or barbarian. Their rages make you immune to most of the effects which would render your character out of your control. You can eventually do it multiple times per day. This will be the best protection you can get against enemy casters.
Otherwise invest in potions of clarity. You can steal one in Candlekeep in the prologue by going upstairs in Winthrop's inn.
Otherwise, make use of summoning monsters to soak up enemy mages' spells. There are a few wands of monster summoning. You can recharge it by selling it and rebuying it. Send in waves of summoned monsters until the enemies are no longer able to make your day one needing a reload. This works on everyone except sirens, whom you need to use a potion of clarity, a berserker or barbarian to nullify.
Back in Baldur's Gate and the city has kinda killed the game for me, It's really poorly designed, who puts a wall through the middle of a city, really now come on. I'm thinking of giving everybody boots of speed, then spamming haste on them, just to get it done faster.
It's really poorly designed, who puts a wall through the middle of a city, really now come on.
Lol! Obviously you don't live in Europe!
Here there are plenty of old towns which had city walls, then grew beyond the walls, and in some cases still have the walls in the middle.
Even in more recent times, anyone from Berlin could tell you about a wall built through the middle of a city.
Damn don't use logic on me
Yes that does make complete sense, but for a game having to access the same district from different districts just to get to the side of it you want to be in is annoying.
@Grum thanks for the info. There's so much to learn and remember, I can't keep it all straight. I just try to buy the most expensive weapon possible or spawn all the weapons I need
I don't hate Baldurs Gate. But understand your point. once I have explored all the areas and done the side quests. I get a little burnt out by the time I reach Baldurs Gate
What I like most about BG1 is being level 1. I know that sounds nuts but I like being low level and progressing to level 9 or 12. It's more manageable and being really weak (when the bad guy are also weak) makes for fun combat IMO
most of all low level is really nostalgic for me. Playing D and D all night long with my friends when I was 11 years old was all about low level campaigns cause we were disorganized kids. Our adventures never got passed level 9-12. I still roll the same characters sometimes.
What I like most about BG1 is being level 1. I know that sounds nuts but I like being low level and progressing to level 9 or 12. It's more manageable and being really weak (when the bad guy are also weak) makes for fun combat IMO
most of all low level is really nostalgic for me. Playing D and D all night long with my friends when I was 11 years old was all about low level campaigns cause we were disorganized kids. Our adventures never got passed level 9-12. I still roll the same characters sometimes.
I've played (tabletop) D&D starting from around 9 years old (late 70s) to my mid-30s even (though I haven't in about 10 years or so).
I've played with a lot of people too: childhood & neighborhood friends as a kid, friends & stoners (but I repeat myself) in high school, friends & barracks mates in the army, college buddies, and finally adulthood friends I still keep in touch with, and I have never, ever, ever had a campaign (as DM or player) that got above 14th level. Long running campaigns usually peter out around "name" level. Most campaigns die out way before then due to total party kills, or outside disruptions.
So I think your games ending around levels 9-12 is very normal, and not because you were young and disorganised.
I actually think those levels are kind of the sweet spot for the (A)D&D rules.
I have had characters advance into the teens of levels in PNP (twice) and 20s (once). But those are from very long running campaigns. It is certainly not "normal".
I feel the opposite to the OP. I love all of BG1 and much prefer the city of Baldur's gate to Anhkhatla where you can't complete one quest without initiating three others and it all becomes overwhelming. Whne I first enter the city it always reminds me of the first time I did it. I felt a great sense of achievement in finally unlocking it (after several failed attempts) and then crossing the bridge thinking "this is HUGE - and there's still so much to do". The one criticism I do think is valid is that on subsequent playthroughs the complexity of navigation around the city can be irritating. I do see why they made it like that: your first visit in your character's life to a large, complex city they are bound to get lost a few times, but it can be frustrating when it's not your first visit. Still, personally I much prefer it to Ankhatla.
As with Blucher, we never got much past the low teens in our 1st Edition AD&D games back in the day. I still fondly remember my 13th level fighter (early 80s) and then years later my 13th level wizard (mid/late '80s). My rogues never tended to make it that far as traps tended to take them out early and one DM was a bit of a sadist with those traps...
A lot of posters seem to be misunderstanding the topic of this thread. The OP is asking if anyone else hates Baldur's Gate City, not the game of BG1.
I sympathize with him. I also find the BG City portion of the game to be rather tedious, after all the fun I had with the rest of the maps getting there. Once I get to BG City, I'm usually just in a rush to hurry up and get to Sarevok so I can move my character on to BG2. I know I won't be having any more fun with that run.
The battles at the top of the Iron Throne building (both of them), the battle at the Ducal Palace, and the final battle with Sarevok, are just very anxiety-inducing to me, and not very much fun. They're just things I have to get through so I can finish the game.
Being accused of murder and then escaping through the Candlekeep Catacombs is pure tedium to me. As is having to sneak around and avoid the Flaming Fist trying to get back to the Ducal Palace battle.
The sidequests in the city, and getting around in the city, are also pure, irritating boredom to me.
So, why do I even still like BG1 when I obviously don't think much of the final act? Well, it's because of the 90% of the game that comes before that. I love being levels 1-7, and exploring the wide open wilderness. I've never been a huge fan of city adventures.
I'm really not crazy about adventuring in Athkatla, either. I enjoy BG2 the most when doing the maps outside the city - De'Arnise Keep, Tradesmeet, and Windspear Hills.
Well, I've only been to BG City once, and I stopped playing, not because it was boring, but because it was a bit confusing to get around with all of those quest givers everywhere. That, and I was playing on my dad's computer, which he was getting rid of, so I couldn't muddle through it some more.
The city of Baldur's Gate is where the men are separated from the boys. For the first part of the game, you're mostly exploring a vast open world, hacking at monsters and gaining loot. Suddenly, the game switches gears, focusing on unraveling a political power scandal through investigation that, just as often as not, focuses on dialogue rather than combat.
This is both its strength and its weakness. The game really has two distinct feels to it and can put someone off who thought this was more of a hack-n-slash affair when they suddenly hit the brick wall at the city. On the other hand, the two feels make this game remarkable and highly unique.
I bought Baldur's Gate at launch, and for years, when I was younger, could never get past that part of the game. It bored me to tears. But now, as an older adult, this is my favorite part of the game.
What I love about this story is how cleverly narcissistic Sarevok is and how this is exactly the way dictators in the real world have come to power: Create a crisis and swoop in to fix it, fooling everyone that you're the benevolent savior that just wants to help people. Most RPGs have an unrealistic, inch-deep, villain that gains power through brute force. It's another testament to the developers to have crafted such a deep tale and avoided a cliche villain (which they could have easily done AND gotten away with from the casual fan).
This is funny, because I hate not having access to Baldurs Gate sooner AND I feel its epic precisely because you can kind of get lost in the place because theres so much to do. Like uh... exactly how I get lost downtown IRL. It feels like a city.
BG2's major city might be better designed gameplay-wise but BG1's major city felt incredibly epic since the first time I walked in there. After countless hours of roaming the countryside and being amushed by wild dogs, it changed the entire game.
For me ( And many others apparently ) that is EXACTLY what was lacking in BG2. The cities lost a lot of that size and freedom they had in Baldur's Gate. The city is massive and you're free to do what you see fit in it. I wait until nightfall and then rob everything not bolted down by Helm himself and have found some wonderful trinkets hidden away behind paintings and on the heads of angry men whos butler I may have killed.
BG2 lost some of that epicness in exchange for more steamlined and focused gameplay with less exploration and a little more focus on your main objective, which is both good and bad. For me I love to be left in a world with just my wits and my party to do what I want to but that doesn't always drive the narrative forward so it's understandable some people may loose focus as the open world isn't for everyone.
The first part of BG is a complete and utter joy, the love the developers felt for the game comes out nowhere more strongly. The detail is extraordinary, the inventiveness beats anything that was around at the time.
That's carried into the city to a large extent but, I feel at some point they had to think, "this can't go on, we have to sell this and make some money".
I think as a player you can't help but feel that the story is coming to an end (once you've played through a few times) and there is inevitably a sadness(?) that there aren't going to be any more areas covered in black for you to explore, any more corners to turn and be ambushed, anymore NPCs to meet.
When I was younger I took the BG orginal game and I just had to stop at the city. I simply got lost in the side quests and all the NPC’s around. It was simply too complicated for me. Maybe my language knowledge wasn’t that good and maybe I was simply too young to put pieces of the game together. However, when the EE came out, I decided to give the game another try. And here I have to agree with @GaelicVigil. And actually the city was the place where I really got into the game. I really liked how the game revealed the hidden agendas, Saverok’s plan, your role in the world, different political parties and powers. It was really an experience to talk to every individual and somehow put the peaces of puzzle all together. I understood that something smells fishy when I went down in Nashkel mines. I started to realize that iron shortage, civil unrest and my part was somehow connected. But yeah in the city I really started to feel as a citizen of the D&D universe, that there is some decisive power in my hands.
I actually find the mindless running around the area, sword coast or woods, completing side quests and clearing areas more boring, since there it does not give any consistency to the story.
Actually I was a bit disappointed by the expansion pack. I didn’t find it fun to kill the big bad wolf who is really only vulnerable to 3-4 weapons in the game or disarming countless traps in a dwarven tower just to bring a lost son back to a depressed mother… phh.. Until this day I don’t understand how the two additional areas are connected to each other or to the whole game.
It's my favourite bit of the whole trilogy. Just something about it does it for me. The first game's plot is, for me, the finest of the three and really starts to pick up there. The atmosphere of BG city also tops anything I felt in Athkat or Amketh.
All the maps line up, giving the impression of a single environment even when you cross edges. I found it rather straight forward. It's basically a two-level step with a touch of the grid layout. You could enter and exit at multiple points on the map edges, and you entered the next on the same street you were on before.
Except for the sewers. To hell with the sewers. Almost figured them out on my first playthrough, but you just don't need to visit them much to practice or solidify that knowledge. So it doesn't stick. On my second playthrough I didn't even bother. All you need to be familiar with is one particular passageway.
The entrance to the inner walls is the only part of the city that makes you go 'the long way' to get somewhere.
Athkatla, on the other hand, makes you take long routes on every single darn exit. So it feels to me, anyway. I find Athkatla pointlessly broken up and burdened with lengthy travel times, despite it's refined grandeur. For me it's got the worst of both worlds: disjointedness from the instantaneous moves between [i]very different[/i] districts, and excessively long walks on winding pathways or elevated bridges to the map edges or the corners of the map always farthest away from the consistent entry point. Despite it's bigger and grander atmosphere, it is actually quite constricting. It acyually felt smaller than BG to me. The Bridge District runs northeast-southwest, and you always enter at the top even if you want to visit Ms. Cragmoon or the temple of helm, and this gives you only one axis of movement. Same with the Government district. Always enter at the top. The Temple district? Same. The Druid Grove? Don't even get me started on that one. Who the hell designs a map as a one-way 'S'? Okay, so that's neither Athkat or BG, but I couldn't resist. What I'm trying to say is that, for me, travelling in Athkatla was 'samey' and, more important, pre-determined for you. I felt like a delivery boy making my pizza runs, wondering which way through the docks would save me the most amount of time.
In BG, I just [i]went[/i].
I thought Baldur's Gate felt just like the wilderness. You could always enter and exit at multiple points along the edges. Felt pretty free and open to me. It's Larswood, but made of stone. Most of all, it was continuous. From the entrance to the Hall of Wonders it just kept going. Temples, Palaces, estates and low-class housing gradually gave way to each other depending on where you went. It wasn't "This section is for temples, and this one is for slums". BG was organic. It was ONE map divided into nine, and that was really cool and helped make the city feel like the grand old dame that she is.
In BG, you just kept going down the street you were already on... and where ever you wanted to go, there you were.
Totally agree with @sluckers on the area design in both games. My main problem with BG2 area design is the decision to make them more fit for gameplay than just make the immersive world.
Some other things that bother me about BG2 design: The wall going through the middle of the Baldur's Gate city has a reason to be there, not a gameplay one, but because of the history of the city. The division shows the orignal size of the city, with the northern part being the first incarnation of it. There are the buildings like: the Duchal Palace, the Hall of Wonders, Entar Silvershield's estate, temple of Tymora and Helm etc.
Athkatla has some inner walls as well, but I have no idea about their purpose or history and they look quite silly, just a straight block of concrete and way too big.
Looking through some of BG2 maps I noticed an interesting pattern. The designers *really* like circles and straight lines. I don't know, if there were complains about Baldur's Gate design being too chaotic, but some of these examples look very intriguing:
1) The Planar Sphere Circles connected with mostly straight corridors
2) The Docks It's more subtle here, but just follow the district edge/wall
3) City of Caverns Every path is a straight line with with 90 degrees turns, very rectangular
4) Ust Natha Again circles with straight lines between them
5) Suldanessellar Oh, come on
There are more examples of this, especially the dungeons, but you can expect many corridors and circular rooms, so I only listed the locations that are not designed as a dungeon. There seems to be a some sort of fascination with circles in this game, many buildings are cricular, I even think that 90% of the locations in BG2 have some sort of circles in them.
he he, good point about the circles. But then again, if you think about the environment and physics around the place it kind of makes sense. For instance, Suldanessellar is build on the top of the forest, which would require some kind of circular platforms on top of one cylindrical foundation due to balance. Same thing applies for the Drow city as it is build on stalagmites and around stalactites - also cylindrical foundations. And temples, well temples are pretty much always round, especially in older religions. At least they have round ceiling and everything. I guess the round shape is an universal way of building sturdy and divine structures.
Circular rooms are an important part of defensive architecture in the forgotten realms.
Most buildings are designed by the wizardly professionals, whom, wanting to have control of the non-arcane masses, ensure that circular rooms are used as the norm.
This way a wizard need only on worrying that his/her fireball spell hits the centre of a room. This way you get to clear a room of bad guys with one spell.
Comments
Durlag's Tower was so good and so absorbing that Baldur's Gate felt like a brick wall by comparison. The story floats away into a series of side quests that eventually feel redundant. It cuts the drama off in favor of giving the player more choices, which doesn't make a lot of sense structurally. I had explored every part of the map I could up to that point and was suffering from exploration exhaustion. I wanted to pick up what I thought might be important items in Baldur's Gate, so I dutifully sought out every interesting character and every interesting bit of dialogue. After performing so many open-ended tasks, the idea of performing even more was irritating. True, I could have skipped most of it and went straight for the Seven Suns and the Iron Throne, but would I miss anything important by doing so? Was there some information about the storyline that might enrich the plot hidden away in the SE corner of the city? Who knew?! So I slogged about hoping something would pique my interest in the meantime.
Then Chapter Six is quick and combat heavy and the drama leads right back to Baldur's Gate. Awesome! Only... you can be arrested in Baldur's Gate now, so walking around the city is even more of a chore than usual, and there are a TON of plot points you could miss by going to the right place too quickly.
These are things that I think could have been fixed. The problem was not knowing if you would miss anything essential to the plot. And you can, which stinks. That kind of info should come naturally by moving through the game, not by accident. Because the Flaming Fist are so obnoxious in Chapter Seven, I found myself speeding through areas that contained important dialog. I was ready to go to the palace before I even knew the details of Duke Eltan's illness! I used a walkthrough to figure out what I had ran by and then ran routes through the city that avoided the guards. Glad that I did, because it made Sarevok's rise and fall more devious.
I just bought a copy of Icewind Dale because I've heard it's a touch more linear and combat focused. At this point, that sounds more exciting to me than exploring new cities and digging plot information out of characters you could easily miss. I will eventually play through BG2 because I've always wanted to complete the entire saga, but I have to say that the Baldur's Gate portion of Baldur's Gate is disappointing, and is responsible for slowing down what had been, up to that point, a very interesting and absorbing dramatic climb.
/contradict_self mode:off
see you getting 3000-4000xp for completing one quest.
Do I hate it? No not at all. The challenge is good for me. However, it's really frustrating when I can't get very far
All non-magic weapons can break...except:
(a) Clubs
(b) Staffs
(c) Katanas
(d) Wakazis
(e) Ninjatos
It makes sense to start off the game with proficiency in scimitars for combat classes. You can buy a ninjato for 17gc which is as strong as a (more expensive) longsword and swings faster! If you really want the best weapons, scimitars stay great because you can kill Drizzt for some pretty broken scimitars.
For a Katana, you can steal a gem worth 1,000gc in the prologue upstairs in Winthrop's inn. For this, you either need to be a half-orc barbarian (S19, +4 from raging = 23. Enough to force open the lock), or a thief with maxed open locks. The best katana you can get in the game is only a +1 though...still, it's like having a greatsword in one hand, so its still pretty good.
(2) Controlling Character
Consider playing a berserker or barbarian. Their rages make you immune to most of the effects which would render your character out of your control. You can eventually do it multiple times per day. This will be the best protection you can get against enemy casters.
Otherwise invest in potions of clarity. You can steal one in Candlekeep in the prologue by going upstairs in Winthrop's inn.
Otherwise, make use of summoning monsters to soak up enemy mages' spells. There are a few wands of monster summoning. You can recharge it by selling it and rebuying it. Send in waves of summoned monsters until the enemies are no longer able to make your day one needing a reload. This works on everyone except sirens, whom you need to use a potion of clarity, a berserker or barbarian to nullify.
I hope this helps!
Here there are plenty of old towns which had city walls, then grew beyond the walls, and in some cases still have the walls in the middle.
Even in more recent times, anyone from Berlin could tell you about a wall built through the middle of a city.
Yes that does make complete sense, but for a game having to access the same district from different districts just to get to the side of it you want to be in is annoying.
most of all low level is really nostalgic for me. Playing D and D all night long with my friends when I was 11 years old was all about low level campaigns cause we were disorganized kids. Our adventures never got passed level 9-12. I still roll the same characters sometimes.
I've played with a lot of people too: childhood & neighborhood friends as a kid, friends & stoners (but I repeat myself) in high school, friends & barracks mates in the army, college buddies, and finally adulthood friends I still keep in touch with, and I have never, ever, ever had a campaign (as DM or player) that got above 14th level. Long running campaigns usually peter out around "name" level. Most campaigns die out way before then due to total party kills, or outside disruptions.
So I think your games ending around levels 9-12 is very normal, and not because you were young and disorganised.
I actually think those levels are kind of the sweet spot for the (A)D&D rules.
EDIT: tiny bit of humor
I sympathize with him. I also find the BG City portion of the game to be rather tedious, after all the fun I had with the rest of the maps getting there. Once I get to BG City, I'm usually just in a rush to hurry up and get to Sarevok so I can move my character on to BG2. I know I won't be having any more fun with that run.
The battles at the top of the Iron Throne building (both of them), the battle at the Ducal Palace, and the final battle with Sarevok, are just very anxiety-inducing to me, and not very much fun. They're just things I have to get through so I can finish the game.
Being accused of murder and then escaping through the Candlekeep Catacombs is pure tedium to me. As is having to sneak around and avoid the Flaming Fist trying to get back to the Ducal Palace battle.
The sidequests in the city, and getting around in the city, are also pure, irritating boredom to me.
So, why do I even still like BG1 when I obviously don't think much of the final act? Well, it's because of the 90% of the game that comes before that. I love being levels 1-7, and exploring the wide open wilderness. I've never been a huge fan of city adventures.
I'm really not crazy about adventuring in Athkatla, either. I enjoy BG2 the most when doing the maps outside the city - De'Arnise Keep, Tradesmeet, and Windspear Hills.
This is both its strength and its weakness. The game really has two distinct feels to it and can put someone off who thought this was more of a hack-n-slash affair when they suddenly hit the brick wall at the city. On the other hand, the two feels make this game remarkable and highly unique.
I bought Baldur's Gate at launch, and for years, when I was younger, could never get past that part of the game. It bored me to tears. But now, as an older adult, this is my favorite part of the game.
What I love about this story is how cleverly narcissistic Sarevok is and how this is exactly the way dictators in the real world have come to power: Create a crisis and swoop in to fix it, fooling everyone that you're the benevolent savior that just wants to help people. Most RPGs have an unrealistic, inch-deep, villain that gains power through brute force. It's another testament to the developers to have crafted such a deep tale and avoided a cliche villain (which they could have easily done AND gotten away with from the casual fan).
BG2's major city might be better designed gameplay-wise but BG1's major city felt incredibly epic since the first time I walked in there. After countless hours of roaming the countryside and being amushed by wild dogs, it changed the entire game.
BG2 lost some of that epicness in exchange for more steamlined and focused gameplay with less exploration and a little more focus on your main objective, which is both good and bad. For me I love to be left in a world with just my wits and my party to do what I want to but that doesn't always drive the narrative forward so it's understandable some people may loose focus as the open world isn't for everyone.
The detail is extraordinary, the inventiveness beats anything that was around at the time.
That's carried into the city to a large extent but, I feel at some point they had to think, "this can't go on, we have to sell this and make some money".
I think as a player you can't help but feel that the story is coming to an end (once you've played through a few times) and there is inevitably a sadness(?) that there aren't going to be any more areas covered in black for you to explore, any more corners to turn and be ambushed, anymore NPCs to meet.
However, when the EE came out, I decided to give the game another try. And here I have to agree with @GaelicVigil. And actually the city was the place where I really got into the game. I really liked how the game revealed the hidden agendas, Saverok’s plan, your role in the world, different political parties and powers. It was really an experience to talk to every individual and somehow put the peaces of puzzle all together. I understood that something smells fishy when I went down in Nashkel mines. I started to realize that iron shortage, civil unrest and my part was somehow connected. But yeah in the city I really started to feel as a citizen of the D&D universe, that there is some decisive power in my hands.
I actually find the mindless running around the area, sword coast or woods, completing side quests and clearing areas more boring, since there it does not give any consistency to the story.
Actually I was a bit disappointed by the expansion pack. I didn’t find it fun to kill the big bad wolf who is really only vulnerable to 3-4 weapons in the game or disarming countless traps in a dwarven tower just to bring a lost son back to a depressed mother… phh.. Until this day I don’t understand how the two additional areas are connected to each other or to the whole game.
Riderat
No.
I love the city.
It's my favourite bit of the whole trilogy. Just something about it does it for me. The first game's plot is, for me, the finest of the three and really starts to pick up there. The atmosphere of BG city also tops anything I felt in Athkat or Amketh.
All the maps line up, giving the impression of a single environment even when you cross edges. I found it rather straight forward. It's basically a two-level step with a touch of the grid layout. You could enter and exit at multiple points on the map edges, and you entered the next on the same street you were on before.
Except for the sewers. To hell with the sewers. Almost figured them out on my first playthrough, but you just don't need to visit them much to practice or solidify that knowledge. So it doesn't stick. On my second playthrough I didn't even bother. All you need to be familiar with is one particular passageway.
The entrance to the inner walls is the only part of the city that makes you go 'the long way' to get somewhere.
Athkatla, on the other hand, makes you take long routes on every single darn exit. So it feels to me, anyway. I find Athkatla pointlessly broken up and burdened with lengthy travel times, despite it's refined grandeur. For me it's got the worst of both worlds: disjointedness from the instantaneous moves between [i]very different[/i] districts, and excessively long walks on winding pathways or elevated bridges to the map edges or the corners of the map always farthest away from the consistent entry point. Despite it's bigger and grander atmosphere, it is actually quite constricting. It acyually felt smaller than BG to me. The Bridge District runs northeast-southwest, and you always enter at the top even if you want to visit Ms. Cragmoon or the temple of helm, and this gives you only one axis of movement. Same with the Government district. Always enter at the top. The Temple district? Same. The Druid Grove? Don't even get me started on that one. Who the hell designs a map as a one-way 'S'? Okay, so that's neither Athkat or BG, but I couldn't resist. What I'm trying to say is that, for me, travelling in Athkatla was 'samey' and, more important, pre-determined for you. I felt like a delivery boy making my pizza runs, wondering which way through the docks would save me the most amount of time.
In BG, I just [i]went[/i].
I thought Baldur's Gate felt just like the wilderness. You could always enter and exit at multiple points along the edges. Felt pretty free and open to me. It's Larswood, but made of stone. Most of all, it was continuous. From the entrance to the Hall of Wonders it just kept going. Temples, Palaces, estates and low-class housing gradually gave way to each other depending on where you went. It wasn't "This section is for temples, and this one is for slums". BG was organic. It was ONE map divided into nine, and that was really cool and helped make the city feel like the grand old dame that she is.
In BG, you just kept going down the street you were already on... and where ever you wanted to go, there you were.
Some other things that bother me about BG2 design:
The wall going through the middle of the Baldur's Gate city has a reason to be there, not a gameplay one, but because of the history of the city.
The division shows the orignal size of the city, with the northern part being the first incarnation of it. There are the buildings like: the Duchal Palace, the Hall of Wonders, Entar Silvershield's estate, temple of Tymora and Helm etc.
Athkatla has some inner walls as well, but I have no idea about their purpose or history and they look quite silly, just a straight block of concrete and way too big.
Looking through some of BG2 maps I noticed an interesting pattern. The designers *really* like circles and straight lines. I don't know, if there were complains about Baldur's Gate design being too chaotic, but some of these examples look very intriguing:
1) The Planar Sphere
Circles connected with mostly straight corridors
2) The Docks
It's more subtle here, but just follow the district edge/wall
3) City of Caverns
Every path is a straight line with with 90 degrees turns, very rectangular
4) Ust Natha
Again circles with straight lines between them
5) Suldanessellar
Oh, come on
There are more examples of this, especially the dungeons, but you can expect many corridors and circular rooms, so I only listed the locations that are not designed as a dungeon. There seems to be a some sort of fascination with circles in this game, many buildings are cricular, I even think that 90% of the locations in BG2 have some sort of circles in them.
Riderat
Most buildings are designed by the wizardly professionals, whom, wanting to have control of the non-arcane masses, ensure that circular rooms are used as the norm.
This way a wizard need only on worrying that his/her fireball spell hits the centre of a room. This way you get to clear a room of bad guys with one spell.
...
Plus circular beds are great.