xzar_monty

I'm not sure what you can tell from that, though. It's not as if we know much about figures.

Why not take it as a good learning experience? If English is not your first language, I don't think there's much room to complain here. The writing is decent and not particularly difficult in any way. Try Gene Wolfe if you want to know what challenging English is like.

No, people must fight. Only one opinion can rise to the top and transcend into the ultimate truth that we shall all abide by. They both are good. And we're talking.

Also, when it comes to sheer brilliance in BG2, I think it's reasonable *not* to consider ToB. ToB was essentially nothing but railroading -- and taking the player for a fool. I mean, I suppose most everyone understands who the baddie is pretty early on, but the game offers you absolutely no way to show this before the final fight. (ToB also sucks partly because it's simply a lot more difficult to come with anything challenging and/or reasonable for a group of characters nearing the power of demi-gods or something. This, in turn, partly explains why it's precisely BG2 that is so good: for much of BG1, you're living in the insta-death levels and meeting monsters who can be undone with a Sleep spell, whereas in ToB you're too strong. For most of BG2, however, you're playing the absolute best levels where there's plenty of challenge but you won't die if someone sneezes too close to you.)

Could you name me one BG2 encounter that requires metaknowledge? I don't think there are any. But then, our definition of metaknowledge might differ. When I first played the game, Kangaxx gave me the most trouble, and indeed I couldn't beat him until I remember those two Protection From Magic scrolls on sale at the Adventurers' Mart. I have subsequently come up with other strategies. Kangaxx is a good example. I think extremely few players beat him on their first try. Losing a fight does not mean it requires meta knowledge. That is called difficulty. You don't lose to Kangaxx because of difficulty, though. You lose because he has enormously specific instant death abilities that you need to know about before he casts them which can only be countered with very specific things. It's not actually hard to cast Protection from Abjuration and Death Ward or Berserk and Death Ward and hit him with a +4 weapon, you just have no reasonable way of knowing you need to do that unless you've died to it or you've read a wallkthrough. That is meta knowledge. I agree that this can be seen as a problem. But it's not as if PoE doesn't have the same kind of things, at least to a certain extent. For example, my first encounter with the Alpine Dragon (which turned out to be by far the most difficult enemy for me) left me extremely disappointed with the makers of the game. We met. We talked. I tried to persuade him to let things progress peacefully but failed (I have subsequently learned that it is also possible to succeed in this). So, a fight began. And that's when the game suddenly cheated, big time. A moment earlier, I was in a cave with a dragon. But all of a sudden, the place was also full of various spirits. Who summoned them? Not the dragon. How did they end up there? How could they know when to arrive? There's no rationale to any of this, it was just blatant cheating from the game makers, and I was disappointed.

Could you name me one BG2 encounter that requires metaknowledge? I don't think there are any. But then, our definition of metaknowledge might differ. When I first played the game, Kangaxx gave me the most trouble, and indeed I couldn't beat him until I remember those two Protection From Magic scrolls on sale at the Adventurers' Mart. I have subsequently come up with other strategies. Kangaxx is a good example. I think extremely few players beat him on their first try. But it's not an example at all. Kangaxx is supposed to be bloody difficult, we're talking about a demi-lich after all. In realistic (ha!) terms, there are not that many things in the Forgotten Realms that are more difficult than a demi-lich. And in a classic table-top RPG, if the GM is doing his job properly, essentially nobody is ever going to beat a demi-lich (especially in DD 3.0 and onwards, I'm not so sure about AD&D 2.0). If by metaknowledge you mean that you have had to lose to the baddie first before you can think of a way of beating it, you do have an argument. However, I think that's more interesting than what happens in PoE1, for instance. I walked into the lair of Cail the Silent, the red dragon I mean, fairly low on resources, and I just hacked him to death. There was no need for any thinking on my part. I really liked the fact that Firkraag was difficult in BG2 and I had to retreat and level up before taking him on.

Could you name me one BG2 encounter that requires metaknowledge? I don't think there are any. But then, our definition of metaknowledge might differ. When I first played the game, Kangaxx gave me the most trouble, and indeed I couldn't beat him until I remember those two Protection From Magic scrolls on sale at the Adventurers' Mart. I have subsequently come up with other strategies.

In strictly mathematical terms, probability-wise, the fact is that if something has already been around for a number of years, it is very likely indeed that it will continue to be around. Conversely, the chances that anything new will make more than a splash are infinitesimally small. To illustrate: practically every canonical literary classic from, say, the 19th century, will maintain its status for the next 100 years, while very little from the past 50 years will be remembered, and absolutely everything from the year 2018 will almost certainly be forgotten. (So if you're interested in good stories, start from the Greeks and the Romans and work your way up to the Renaissance, after which you might, if so inclined, check out some newer stuff.) Since you brought up films, that's a lost industry. There's practically nothing there anymore, particularly in mainstream. Incidentally, one somewhat amusing thing that most North Americans don't realize (and I'm not saying they should) is that they are no longer the target audience for North American movies. The Far East is: the market is simply so much bigger there. So if you've ever felt that mainstream films are less subtle (ha!) than they used to be, there's a very clear cultural reason for that.

Fair enough. I don't think it's like that, but we'll just agree to disagree on this.

Also (and I could be completely wrong with this), you cannot really escape from combat in PoE. Once combat starts, you can't run away. (Again, I haven't played PoE2 that much and I certainly haven't tried this.) I was also completely baffled by the fact that there are things you can do either in combat or outside combat, but not both. Very strange. Add to this the fact that you can pick up absolutely everything into your infinite stash (but you cannot actually drop anything, ever!) and your suspension of disbelief if severely tested, especially because you can only carry two or four camping supplies. Like... wtf? I think the enchanting system does away with most of the uniqueness of the unique items in PoE. It's a shame.

Ok, there's nothing wrong with that. But, can you tell me in which way is the writing and characterization in PoE better? I'd really like some concrete examples. Personally, I don't think it is, but I'm always happy to be proven wrong. If we take Mazzy from BG2, just as an example, we can quite easily compare her to Sagani, and I don't think there's much difference in the quality of writing between the two. Sagani has more material, quantitatively, so in that she's more "whole" than Mazzy, but as characters they're quite close (there's a bit more ambiguity in Sagani).

If someone really annoys you that much, chances are the character is well written. (But obviously it's not necessarily so. Minsc is annoying because he's so poorly written.) To me, Edwin is so annoying that I would not have him in my party, but that's definitely good writing, although a bit one-dimensional. But, given his nature, Edwin is one-dimensional as a person.

Minsc - He's mentally handicapped and has a hamster. That is his entire characterization, the sole extent of his dialog, and his connection to the story Korgon - Chaotic Evil, likes murder. That's it Aerie - Complains about wings. If romanced, she complains about it more Keldorn - Cliched Lawful Good Paladin. That's it Mazzy - Same as above, but a hobbit Cernd - Damn dirty hippie (on the rare chance someone actually uses him) Jan - Grobnar 1.0 I actually like BG2's characters, and they do sometimes get a little development in personal quests, but they are usually one-note and static. IMO, even poor characters in PoE, like Sagani, are better developed. To say nothing of great ones like Durance. Honestly, NWN2's cast are all better than those in BG2, except for Grobnar. All of the character romances are cringeworthy as such things nearly always are, but all of the characters show substantial character growth - Anomen perhaps more than anyone else. Jaheira's is the only one that doesn't make much sense to me, and that's only because I feel like it'd take a long time to get over seeing your husband having been flayed alive and tortured to death (well past the point that Raise Dead could help, although I'm pretty sure Resurrection would've worked fine, or maybe Wish) and while I don't see anything wrong with her relying on Gorion's ward for emotional support, the fact that she's rather receptive to CHARNAME blatantly hitting on her (by buying a necklace for her, for example) in a matter of in-universe days is kind of disturbing, especially when Jaheira and Khalid were kind of like adoptive parents to CHARNAME. Yeah, this is the suspicious part. There should have been a timer of let's say at least a week on the Jaheira romance. It's not realistic the way it appears now. It doesn't even work as a rebound kind of thing. And if it was a question "oh god I'm bereaved and I can't stand my loneliness I've got to find someone instantly", then Jaheira's dialogues should look much more desperate, which they don't. I agree the romances are cringeworthy, but the fact is, much of lovetalk is cringeworthy to someone who isn't emotionally involved (i.e. all outsiders), and I seriously hope no gamer is seriously involved in the lovetalk of a game. Anomen is a very good character in the end, really well written. The way he comes across as a complete oaf that really gets on your nerves is great, especially when you consider how things change. I must also give special mention to the Aerie -- CHARNAME -- Haer'dalis love triangle, which is really nice. There's the cynical Haer'dalis, then there's the overtly naive and traumatized Aerie, and then there's you, what are you going to do?

Minsc - He's mentally handicapped and has a hamster. That is his entire characterization, the sole extent of his dialog, and his connection to the story Korgon - Chaotic Evil, likes murder. That's it Aerie - Complains about wings. If romanced, she complains about it more Keldorn - Cliched Lawful Good Paladin. That's it Mazzy - Same as above, but a hobbit Cernd - Damn dirty hippie (on the rare chance someone actually uses him) Jan - Grobnar 1.0 I've said all along that Minsc is terrible. Keldorn and Cernd have a reasonable story arc that shows how pretty good character depth which is definitely not restricted to what you just said there. Keldorn's family problems make him anything but a cliche. Having Korgan and (I think) Mazzy in the party shows some pretty good non-cliched character interaction. Aerie is severely traumatized and works pretty well (which is not to say that I like that kind of behaviour, mind you). If I were to resort to that kind of characterizations, I would say that only Eder really shines in PoE. Durance, the Devil of Caroc and the Grieving Mother are particularly poor (the Grieving Mother hints at superb stuff but doesn't deliver). I can't say about PoE2 yet. Character interaction in PoE was also a bit strange, because Eder, in particular, appeared to have a long-lasting dislike to Durance from the moment the two met. Eder commented as if there was a backstory, although there was none. There was never any "I wonder what kind of guy you are, but you sure seem suspicious" from Eder, it was instantly into "bloody hell priest, I hate you". That was a bit WTF, in terms of writing.

I would really like to hear concrete examples of BG2's "silly/comical NPCs, extreme/one-dimensional companions", particularly in contrast to the PoE franchise, where the writing is supposedly superior. (And I only mean BG2. BG1 writing is bad.)

This is an age-old discussion, and if you get more deeply into it, you'll realize that it's not like you said. Besides, we're not talking about ranking everything here. We're talking about two important titles in a niche genre, and I think it's a perfectly valid discussion. Or, if it doesn't seem valid for you, it's very simple to stay out of it. There's an argument to be made for the idea that "everything is just opinion and that's it", but then, if somebody really tried to claim that The Shaggs is better than The Beatles, or that James Patterson is better than Hemingway, or that Plan 9 From Outer Space is better than The Shining, I'm pretty sure that essentially everybody sane would question their capacity for reasonable judgement. So when you get down to it, it's not just opinions -- there are reasonable arguments to be made for why something is or isn't good. In my book, both PoE and BG2 are definitely good, even very good. It's just that BG2 is a couple of notches better, for reasons I've described above.

A PoE 2 non-spellcasting character has several abilities they can use other than just attacking by level 5, and keeps gaining them. A BG1/2 one only gets some by Throne of Bhaal, in most cases. That you choose to ignore a factor doesn't make it not exist. I am not ignoring it, I'm simply saying it's not significant. There is no question that a PoE fighter, for instance, has a lot more options than a BG2 fighter, but to me that's not significant enough to make this aspect a major difference between the games.

When it comes to "auto-attacking" and/or using skills, I don't think there's a significant difference between the two games. So that's not a deciding factor, for me anyway. BG2 still wins hands down.

I think this is an astonishing comment. I always keep the party AI off, so nobody ever auto-attacks or auto-does anything in my party. And frankly, I find it kind of strange that someone would use the party AI and allow their characters to auto-attack. I mean, sure, it's a way to play the game, but I can't see why you'd want to do that. Why not watch a movie instead?

Not a lot of musicians actually think that nobody has surpassed the Beatles. Sure, there are many people who do have that view, but it's nowhere near as clear-cut as you make it sound, and I think the Beatles analogy is really quite poor. I agree that the Beatles did do a few things for the first time (although there a lot fewer of those things that you might imagine), but they have been surpassed by an awful lot of bands. All talk about "best ever" is just utterly meaningless in music: there are too many intangibles and far too few tangibles to make reasonable comparisons. With computer games, the tangibles are much more evident, although obviously it does come down to opinion in the end.

As it happens, I agree with the OP. Some of the reasons are somewhat intangible, i.e. I believe the general "feel" of the game is a lot better in BG2 than it is in the PoE franchise. And mind you, I definitely mean only BG2 -- the original Baldur's Gate is quite poor, in my opinion, because the story is all over the place, the dialogue options are often dreadful and there's way too much aimless walking around on mostly empty maps. Some of the more tangible reasons why BG2, in my view, trumps the PoE franchise, would include: -- PoE allows you to reach level cap far too early, and this is a huge minus for the game. I want to have at least the option of being able to develop. (Mind you, not all of the demigodly powers you eventually get in BG2 are that great, but it's a lot better than simply stopping to develop two thirds into the story.) -- BG2 has better music, which leads to better overall tone in the game. (I mean, better music for the game. Neither has a particularly refined score, but BG2's achieves its aim a lot better.) -- Thanks to the enchantment system, nearly all items in PoE are disposable, and there's basically nothing in the shops that you'd want to buy. Persistence and Tidefall are among the very few items you really care for, whereas BG2 has a lot of stuff you treasure. It also has a lot of stuff that you want to save your cash for. Money is almost completely meaningless in PoE. -- The spell system is BG2 is simply a lot better than that of PoE. The grimoire stuff doesn't work at all, whereas learning (and possibly failing to learn) spells from scrolls is a good idea. -- Having a bottomless inventory (and being unable to drop things!) while at the same only having room for 2 or 4 camping supplies in PoE is something that really irks me. It's a minor thing, but it's very wrong anyway. -- BG2 has Yoshimo, which was a very good twist in the story the first time you saw it. I have not played PoE2 all the way through, so I don't know what to expect in that sense, but PoE1, at least, had nothing of the sort. And no, I don't mean to imply that it should have had a Yoshimo, but *something* surprising in the story would have been nice. -- Two twofold nature of the early main quest in BG2 is really good, i.e. you want to get Imoen back and you want to find Irenicus. They amount to the same in the end, but it's a device that works well. I enjoyed the Watcher storyline early on, particularly when I encountered that woman in the tree, but after a while I sort of ceased to care. -- I don't believe the PoE characters are significantly better written than those of BG2. I agree that Minsc is dreadful, simply some very poor comic relief, but Viconia, Jan, Valygar, Keldorn and Anomen are good. I don't mean that I like them all, as characters in my party, but they work quite well, and their interplay is also nice. In PoE, only Eder was of the same quality. -- The play with language in PoE doesn't really work. You know, gul, fampyr, duc, all that. It's too clever by 'alf, as an English villager might point out. I think BG2 simply managed some things in a way that no other games have managed -- and obviously this is just my opinion. But to compare: BG1 is very poor, NWN is rubbish (the 3D gets old in an instant, none of the NPCs are good, the story is poor, every quest is FedEx), IWD is shallow (hack & slash). I managed about 15 minutes of Dragon Age: Origins before forgetting about it, about 30 minutes of Divinity: Original Sin and about 45 minutes of Tyranny. None of them had it. PoE does have it, definitely, simply not to the same extent as BG2.

I'm not sure if laborious descent into subterranean despair is the main factor, although I agree that as a device it's getting pretty cliched (in this genre), so it really takes some doing to make it work. The main factor is the story element: what's the reason for that descent, what happens during that descent and whether the rewards for and/or results of that descent are such that it makes it feel worthwhile. I think that as a concept, the Endless Paths was really good: you've got your stronghold, but there's something evil lurking underneath, and you have a pretty strong motive for checking it out. Too bad that at least half of the dungeon was rubbish. (I think it remains reasonably interesting until you resolve Kana's quest, after which it's utter rubbish until the final guardian before you get to the dragon.) Incidentally, I believe Obsidian made a huge, huge error on the dragon level, when it comes to visuals vs. content. I mean, there are piles and piles of coins in there, you can plainly see it. But when you actually loot it, you get like 1,000 cp or whatever. One of the biggest WTF moments in the game.

PizzaSHARK is really gaining reputation as a reasonable person, calling people dumb and swearing like a frustrated adolescent. Way to go, mate. Dungeons are difficult. Endless Paths was a serious victim of "too much size, too little content", whereas Watcher's Keep in BG2 got it just about right.

Where, exactly, did I presume?

Well, that was poor, I have to say! For example, you write: "Add to that, in a game with quicksave, ****ing NO ONE is going to do random encounters. They will just quicksave compulsively and revert to a save every time a random encounter comes up." This may be what you do. But please, don't presume that you know what others do.