Larian Studios’ Baldur’s Gate 3 is the best RPG of the generation. Obviously inspired by its Bioware predecessors, BG3 marks a glorious return for CRPGs as a whole, showing the industry that the genre can succeed with a AAA budget.
Bioware, the studio behind the original Baldur’s Gate game, obviously went onto create Mass Effect, of which BG3 is heavily inspired. Alongside Larian’s push for cinematic storytelling, which wasn’t really present in the studio’s prior games, BG3’s take on the original games’ companion quests are more similar to Bioware’s loyalty quests.
In an interview with All Out Gaming, Baldur’s Gate 3’s Astarion actor Neil Newbon explained that Baldur’s Gate 3 wouldn’t really exist in its current form without Bioware’s work on Mass Effect. Newbon explained that “Mass Effect was the de facto benchmark of great RPGs” which Newbon believes has only recently been supplanted by Larian’s release.
“Mass Effect walked so that Baldur’s Gate could run, do you know what I mean?” the voice actor said. When Newbon thinks of “great RPGs”, he thinks of Mass Effect and his experience with Bioware’s games, to this day thinking about the game’s relationships and romances.
Honestly, it’s quite undeniable that Mass Effect’s, and perhaps Dragon Age’s, popularity inspired many to check out Baldur’s Gate 3. Bioware introduced the more console-focused crowd to what a great RPG could be and, as modern RPGs wilted, Larian delivered an absolute beast of one.
Newbon has great memories of playing Mass Effect himself. The actor explained that, in his playthrough, he would absolutely save scum to protect a relationship. “For example, my bromance with Garrus was worth more than the humility of having to roll back,” he said. “So I was like, ‘you know what I don’t care if I’m save scumming”. Of course, not every choice worked out: “Actually, when I played Mass Effect 2, everybody died,” he said.
Obviously, for fans who have played both, Baldur’s Gate 3 is a much denser RPG than Mass Effect, and even denser than most Dragon Age games. Newbon explained that Larian would write alongside the actors, tailoring choices and lines towards performances, adding more options than if a writer was simply working completely detached from their cast. (Just like how a film director will often add lines when working with a star on a film.)
Newbon explained that it created “an amazingly beautiful, symbiotic relationship” that serviced the genre in a way that most other RPG studios have never tried. “I think it’s absolutely appropriate of how you should approach these long-term RPGs with a lot of texture and a lot of depth. It’s great that people do that together.”
As it stands, Larian has seemingly supplanted modern Bioware as the present rulers of the CRPG genre. At the time of writing, Larian is working on a brand-new game in the Divinity series, which has been described as “Larian Unleashed”. Concurrently, Bioware is working on its long-awaited Mass Effect 4, a return to the Commander Shepard timeline last seen in 2012’s Mass Effect 3.
While Larian is seemingly doubling-down on its heavy CRPG routes, it’s currently unknown what the hell Mass Effect 4 even is. Hopefully, whatever it ends up being, it will be good. I’m hoping for the return of my beloved Mako.
