Baldur's Gate II Design Expose
With all the details that go into creating a CRPG, there seems to be an air of a "magic" selection process on how we choose some of the features that are put into
the game. Some of the decisions are based of gaming experience, some of them are based on common sense and a few of them are even based on arbitrary or
"gut" feelings. What I want to show today is some specific features and some of the reasoning behind them.
Written by Ben Smedstad, Producer of Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn.
800 x 600 resolution and 3D support
One of the criticisms that the original Baldur's Gate received was that "hey I have the hardware, why can't I get more (higher resolution, new options and
features)?". On the message boards, we saw this one pop up quite a few times, and after the release many of the reviews said it looked great, even though it was in
only 640 x 480. After putting our heads together and figuring out how we could implement this feature, it was a no-brainer; this feature had to go in. We had
encountered a problem however. In resolutions beyond 800 x 600 the GUI (Graphical User Interface) does not scale well, and therefore does not look good. We would
have to make several versions of the GUI in order to support 1024 x 768 resolution (and up) which is just not feasible resource-wise. At 800 x 600, the game looks
crisper, you can see more of the area and the performance hit is negligible with a 4 MB card. It is by far the best way to play BG2. Although it is not official
(hence supported), BG2 currently supports whatever resolution your video card can display. You can see most of a 8 x 8 (a outdoor terrain section that is 8 screens
by 8 screens in size) in 1600 x 1200 and is pretty neat, but the GUI is sacrificed.
3D card support was another topic that was hot on the message boards during the development of BG. We had a version of the executable that used 3D when
working on the mission pack Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast, but we did not include it in the final release as it was slow, and really didn't add much. We
didn't want to just add another bullet point to our ads, we wanted to do it right, add effects that take advantage of the cards. But when design for Baldur's Gate II:
Shadows of Amn started, we knew that this was our chance to finally implement this feature properly. The next discussion was OpenGL, Direct3D, Glide, etc. We
have chosen OpenGL because of our experience with it, the ease of implementation and it is not card specific.
MDK2 and Neverwinter Nights both use OpenGL and our programmers have played with the API for years now. We were confident we could get the performance,
the features, and deliver it on time if we started with OpenGL. This is not to say we may do other API support, but that Direct3D is not in yet, and may not make it
in if the schedule does not allow for it. 2
New Classes, Races and Kits
In BG2, there are over 20 new kits, a new race, and a host of new skills, proficiencies and abilities that the player has access to. Most of these were gleaned from
the literally thousands of good suggestions on the message boards that the fans posted. The half-orc is a perfect example. Kits were chosen from all the AD&D
source books. We took this HUGE list, and cut all the ones we could not implement due to technical issues. Then we cut some that were, in our opinion,
unbalanced. Lastly we cut some to even out the numbers of kits per class (we didn't want 50 warrior kits and 4 thief ones). So the process was part technical, part
experience and part arbitrary. Because some of them were cut arbitrarily, we have a list of "standby" kits that may still make it into the game due to fan requests
or if we find easier ways to implement them. There is also a kit I know was added because, well, I really wanted it in. The original Xan (not the wussy enchanter
found in BG) was my pen and paper character and he was a Kensai [ed. did the real one have all 18s like in the screenshot?]. I played him in James' campaign for many years and he is one of my favorite pen and paper characters I
have ever had. Hey, if you were a RPG fanatic and had this opportunity you would do the same.
New Monsters
In the AD&D universe, there are literally thousands of monsters and creatures to choose from. In BG2, the party is actually starting to get pretty powerful, and a
standard bullywug isn't going to cut it. The first monster list was compiled from the design documents that outlined the game. The design department had a huge
list of monsters that were required because of the story, locations and events. To this list we added some great monsters that were dropped in the original BG
because the party was too low level and would be as we like to put it "slaughtered in two seconds." Everything from vampires, illithid, beholders and mephits have
been added to the game. We are more than doubling the number of monsters that were available to the player in BG and the game will be a very varied (and
dangerous) place for the hearty adventurer. The number one restriction we had on creating new monsters was animation time. Actually creating the monster and
placing it in the game is minor compared to the time required to model, texture, bone, animate and render the creature.
There are a few monsters we have not talked about yet because we want to save a few as a surprise for when the player gets to them in the actual game. One
monster that we dropped was the orc. Reasoning was, everybody has orcs. From RTS to fantasy, everyone uses the orc, so we decided to put in something else,
the gibberling. Balancing the creatures that do get into the game is actually not that hard. Since we use the AD&D rules to the letter (or as close as we possibly
can), there is already a "balance" created. There are tweaks all the time due to engine limitations, certain powers or abilities are changed slightly etc. For the most
part, you can open any AD&D Monsterous Compendium, look up the statistics of a monster and that will be what you see in BG2. Some monsters are more
powerful than you would expect when initially put into the game. The beholder is a tough creature, we all knew that, but when my party actually faced one in the
game and was annihilated in 2 seconds, it was time to tweak things. We made it so he used his stone to flesh eyestalk less and slowed how often he used his
other eyes. He is still amazingly tough, but it is possible to defeat him if you play smart and prepare.
Summary
From this small sampling you can begin to see the complexity and amount of thought that goes into creating a CRPG. I left out describing the long arguments,
debates and brainstorming that goes with having so many talented and creative people working on a project like this everyday. No decision is final, no detail written
in stone. Play testing and feedback from fans and people that play the game influence the game immeasurably and the final judgment is made by the gamers out
there.
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