A Sad Goodbye

In the world of sequel games, it is easy to get bored or unamused by future incantations of the same product. Some games, I wish, would just die. However, to be honest, in this series, I am actually sad to Baldur's gate go. I actually felt loss at the end of this game. This comes from a series of games whose original I found to be not awe-inspiring.

The key to this game's success is the character building. You are intrigued to know about the characters that surround you in the game. Now, some of them are annoying, childish or arrogant, but they all have distinct personalities and growth. So, you pick your five favorite ones and proceed down the path. Most games, believe it or not, do not do this. It seems that you really have the same character(s) that you start out with and are interested in the game play or plot.

In Baldur's Gate there is a continuing saga of your main character and your team. The team is the same as the second edition in the trilogy. You can pick and choose from those who survived. You may add one character but you don't even have to use him.

These characters you can intermix and exchange just like the former Baldur's Gate games. No real difference except that there seems to be less squabbling and actual fights in the group. However, you swap out this part of the game for the pleasure of finishing the legacy and being allowed to see what happens beyond the end of the game.

The game itself is very well handled. You get a quasi-linear plot. The plot allows for a nice structure in progression but does not seem like you are limited in going one direction the whole time. I found that the story and quest venturing were better than the second instillation (which was better than the first.) The villains even seemed better. I was intrigued by the plot the whole time.

The weakness to the plot might be that it was a little too short. This game was an add-on to the Shadows of Amn (the second of the trilogy), and had the length of an expansion pack. Well, not entirely true. Black Isle always gives you more for the buck, but Throne of Bhaal is much shorter than Shadows of Amn. With such a great story and a true ending to a trilogy, why not just make a full version that everyone can enjoy, not just the people who own Shadows of Amn. In that, it seems like a let down.

One thing that was not a let down was the audio and, for the most part, the graphics. The audio endeavors of this game appeared to be far reaching. You can hear a lot, down to even the insignificant. The sounds were all well thought out and made sense when you heard them. There also seemed to be a plethora of audio files and almost every character had a voice over (usually good.) This must have been time consuming, and I appreciate it. The graphics were just as good as the predecessors. The characters move a little too stiffly like before, but there are very good color effects especially when magic is being performed. These effects seemed even grander than in the Shadows of Amn.

There were a few frustrating arts of the game. The first was just that the game was very challenging, almost impossible in parts. The ending was a hair puller I wish never to repeat. I guess the makers felt that since this is an add-on they can assume that we are at the top of our game at the introduction and have the ability to become super men. Needless to say, multiple saves are in order.

The other faults seem to stem from personal preferences. To swap people in and out of your group can be hard. Most times, NPCs are "too busy" to talk to you. Now, in this game you leave all your possible group members in a cave that they can not escape on their own and have nothing to do. Why are they too busy to talk to me? Have they gone catatonic? Anyway, that and the fact that you can't visit any of the places in BGI or BGII seems odd, especially BGII. This is an expansion. We have the old game still on our PCs. Why not use the old cities and such?

All in all, this is a great game. This is probably my favorite sequel up until now. It also is my favorite expansion ever. That, combined with the fact that we should judge this by expansion standards, makes Throne of Bhaal one great game. Why did it have to end? (sob)