Crazy difficult

[Stun]

I don't recall dying at the beginning of BG1 (the game gives Imoen a wand of missiles. If you can't kill that wolf outside of Candlekeep with a magic missile or two then it's not the game's fault, it's yours), but I do recall losing half my party in East Haven in Icewind Dale 1. Near the exit of town you face that pack of goblins and 2 of them are archers, and the way the narrow path snakes around, those 2 archers inevitably have a perfect, direct line of sight to your squishy mage and druid in the back. And of course, level 1 mages have, at most, 6hp, so a single arrow will usually kill them. And you can't rush them either and kill them before they attack because, again, the way the path winds around.

Edited March 26, 2014 by Stun

[Sarex]

I don't recall dying at the beginning of BG1 (the game gives Imoen a wand of missiles. If you can't kill that wolf outside of Candlekeep with a magic missile or two then it's not the game's fault, it's yours), but I do recall losing half my party in East Haven in Icewind Dale 1. Near the exit of town you face that pack of goblins and 2 of them are archers, and the way the narrow path snakes around, those 2 archers inevitably have a perfect, direct line of sight to your squishy mage and druid in the back. And of course, level 1 mages have, at most, 6hp, so a single arrow will usually kill them. And you can't rush them either and kill them before they attack because, again, the way the path winds around.

 

The Ice Golems in IWD2 were a nightmare for me the first time around. I dreaded seeing them.

[Lephys]

I'm late to this debate, but I have to say  - having played every IE game going, modded and unmodded, there's no stretch of gameplay in any of them that's more difficult than the first few hours of Baldur's Gate 1. The game world was incredibly unforgiving on normal difficulty - I think I died by being struck by lightning on one occasion - and that's just when I was unlucky. Those early bounty-hunters will make mincemeat of a less-than-optimised starting party; it's a wonder that any of my first-level mages ever survived at all.

I died, as a beginning Wizard, to that guy that attacks you in the barracks (or the building beside the barracks?) in Candlekeep. This was on BG:EE (I say that because I'm not sure of all the specific differences)

 

My character missed with his quarterstaff attack about 13 times in a row, and the foe easily dispatched my 4HP in that time.

 

I don't really count that as difficulty, as much as just lameness.

[J.E. Sawyer]

After having watched some of these very same Obsidian devs play the old classics like Icewind Dale 2 (Adam) and Arcanum (Avellone), and get their asses kicked in easy encounters. this statement from Sawyer does not have quite the awe inspiring impact it he probably meant it to have.

Besides, Gamers have always been 10000 times better at Games than the devs who created them. We're the ones who discover loopholes, exploits and cheese tactics.

 

I think you have a skewed understanding of gamer and dev capabilities.  I didn't intend that statement to be awe-inspiring; many devs are not particularly great at playing games.  On the other hand, there are literally millions of players who are also average to bad at playing games.  Some devs are much better than the average player, but there are certainly a lot of players who are better than we are.  Players outnumber devs by an enormous ratio and eventually many of them wind up putting much more time into playing the finished game.

 

I also didn't go straight into being a dev.  Before I started at Black Isle I had been playing AD&D and other C/RPGs for 14 years (going on 28 now), often in min-max-friendly campaigns.  Devs aren't always the best players but that doesn't mean we're all clowns.

[ManifestedISO]

And ... that is how ninjas unhitch a jackwagon. 

[600lbpanther]

What it is...is basically the "what it is" that you see in the majority of forums on here:

 

People who do not work for the gaming industry who explain, in detail, how the gaming industry works.

A lot of them are students.  Hey, no problem with a student but, get a paycheck before you start explaining on how Obsidian works.

 

In the meantime, I want my thin crust pizza with extra sauce, light cheese, Chicken, Green Pepper, Onion, and Banana pepper well done.  It's not a slam but just dont screw my Grandpa's pizza up!  He's 86 ffs!

[hollowcrown]

 

I'm late to this debate, but I have to say  - having played every IE game going, modded and unmodded, there's no stretch of gameplay in any of them that's more difficult than the first few hours of Baldur's Gate 1. The game world was incredibly unforgiving on normal difficulty - I think I died by being struck by lightning on one occasion - and that's just when I was unlucky. Those early bounty-hunters will make mincemeat of a less-than-optimised starting party; it's a wonder that any of my first-level mages ever survived at all.

I died, as a beginning Wizard, to that guy that attacks you in the barracks (or the building beside the barracks?) in Candlekeep. This was on BG:EE (I say that because I'm not sure of all the specific differences)

 

My character missed with his quarterstaff attack about 13 times in a row, and the foe easily dispatched my 4HP in that time.

 

I don't really count that as difficulty, as much as just lameness.

 

I think BG1 was the perfect example of bad difficulty. Everyone had so few health and AD&D 2nd Ed was set up in a way that one hit could instagib a character and lose them forever. There were also no special abilities so it was literally just roll and hope for the best

 

However when you got to BG2 you had more at your disposal so it was generally a lot better. If only BG1 was like that level - still challenging but not entirely down to luck.

 

The systems in KOTOR and DA were also good - low levels were interesting because you had abilities to use if you weren't a spellcaster, and things could be challenging without being unfair and relying on luck. However the mage battles were less indepth. A combination between BG2 for late levels and early levels like DA and KOTOR would be perfect for me.