Following hot on the heels of the short-person smooching update, Larian is already hard at work on the next patch for Baldur’s Gate 3. Among the usual bug fixes, tweaks, and performance boosts, Larian says this “begins our journey incorporating feedback into Origin Character epilogues.”
I have about another 300 hours before I know what the heck they’re talking about, but apparently, some people have beef with the way Larian ended the character arcs for certain beloved party members in Baldur’s Gate 3. Anecdotally, the one I’ve seen the most was for Karlach, which is brought up specifically by Larian.
Patch 2 is around the corner. It features major performance improvements, many new tweaks & changes, and begins our journey incorporating feedback into Origin Character epilogues, among other major things. Details coming soon.
— Larian Studios (@larianstudios) August 29, 2023
Larian followed the Tweet up with a news post over on Steam outlining their intentions in the patch. It’s a lot. They say that they’re looking into ways to strengthen the last act of the game to make for a better conclusion to the experience. How they will do so is not entirely clear, but they do say one place is specifically with Karlach’s final act.
“Perhaps more notably, we’re adding better closure to the story’s final act in the form of a more fleshed-out ending for Karlach – something many of you have been asking for.”
Beyond that, they are looking into features like the ability to change your character’s appearance throughout the game. However, with that in mind, they also bring up the fact that players are pointing out “cut content” through datamining. The news post points out that the content wasn’t cut because of time constraints but rather that they felt it detracted from the overall experience.
“What’s been datamined is not really cut content but content that we didn’t want to release because we didn’t think it worked. We’re pretty strict with ourselves and our ideas. If it isn’t good – if it isn’t fun to play – it doesn’t make it into the game. One of the reasons why we trimmed the epilogue is because we were afraid the ending cinematics were becoming too long and would detract from the epicness of the experience. But clearly, not everyone agrees with us! So we’re going to do something about it. ”
The art of endings
Ending things is hard. Effective writing means piling a whole bunch of hardships on a character and having them claw their way out beneath. Sometimes, a happy ending doesn’t make sense or would cheapen their struggle, so it can be about finding a nice balance. When it comes to an interactive medium like video games, many players won’t accept anything but the happiest outcome. More often than not, people want to feel in control, and having battled so hard to have a character that they care about not have all their problems fixed can break the feeling of empowerment.
Of course, I don’t know if that’s what’s going on here. I’m very slowly poking away at Baldur’s Gate 3, and I don’t want to ruin anything for myself. I mean, more than I already have by knowing which characters are getting complained about.
If you know exactly what kind of feedback Larian is referring to, then maybe feel comfort in the fact that they’ve heard you and are looking to set things straight. More details on the next Baldur’s Gate 3 patch are coming soon.
