The music in Baldur’s Gate 3 deserves its own section, and in fact, the soundtrack throughout and at pivotal moments in the game’s story is what took the game to a bonafide 5 out of 5 for me. And I’m looking forward to experiencing them again in more detail when the game comes to Xbox later this year. It's a testament to the game's art direction that, despite it not being graphically perfect on my Steam Deck, I’ve still been able to enjoy all the carefully crafted environments. One of the many reasons I’ve found it hard to complete this game is the overwhelming urge to just look at everything. The forboding scenery in the opening Act sets the mood perfectly (Image credit: Larian Studios)īy Act 3, the detail in some areas became even more astounding. Your story choices can take you through the mountain roads or underground to the luminescent Underdark inhabited by Myconids, an area I spent a lot of time in just gazing in awe at the luminescent beings (it also had me wondering if I could romance a mushroom).

The variety and stark contrasts are a pleasure to experience, like journeying through an art gallery. Act 1 takes place primarily in lush wilderness, full of greenery and woodland creatures, but hiding fierce enemies to encounter, but Act 2 flips the mood entirely on its head, taking you into dank crypts and cursed swamps. Each area has its own distinct style and inhabitants. The backgrounds seem to get more opulent as you work through the acts. Each area you encounter has winding paths to explore and new things to discover. At this point, I could tell it would be easy to get sidetracked in this game. Should you escape this situation, you’ll be flung into a complete change of scenery and onto the Sword Coast. From the start of Baldur's Gate 3, you find yourself a prisoner aboard a Mind Flayer ship, the Nautiloid. The ark and oppressive ship have bio-mechanical engineered set pieces that wouldn’t be out of place in body-horror games like Scorn.

Let’s talk more about art direction, though. While it sounded like my Steam Deck was about to blast off into space during some cut scenes, I’ve had no freezes or crashes that have led me to reload.

Time to complete: Main story: 75-100 hours Everything: 100-150+ hoursĪll that being said, the game has never crashed on me. Players: Single-player, Multi-player co-op Launch date: August 3 (PC) September 6 (Playstation) Platforms: Windows PC, Playstation, with Xbox coming soon This is my experience I’ve seen some amazing shots and footage from friends and colleagues playing the game on better systems. Still, it’s well-known that some systems will struggle with the visuals on the lower end of the scale without drastically turning down some settings. This isn't exactly a high-tech review of Baldur's Gate 3, given the setup available to me. The game was perfect for me here, as I had the benefit of streaming from a much more powerful setup.

I enlisted the help of NVIDIA Geforce Now to that end. I completely realize that the Steam Deck isn't the ideal place to play this modern game. Turning it off ultimately was my only solution. The characters were pixelated close up and blurred beyond recognition from a distance. The recommendations are to run the game on Steam Deck with FSR on Balanced, but I found it unplayable with this setting. I played the game mainly on Steam Deck, and despite tinkering with settings as per different recommendations from other players on Reddit, I still had some cut scenes in the game with odd textures and an almost granular effect over my character. Excuse me Sir, which way is the bathroom? (Image credit: Jennifer Young - Windows Central)īaldur’s Gate 3 is a beautiful game, with painstakingly detailed backdrops and each new area a feast for the eyes, but it is graphically demanding.

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