Baldur's Gate 3 Developers Thought About Major DLC or Sequel, Didn't Have the Heart For It
Swen Vincke revealed a little more about the reasons for abandoning further development of the Baldur's Gate brand. The developers were thinking about an add-on or even a sequel, but all Larian was to breathe a sigh of relief after abandoning those plans.
Swen Vincke's words from yesterday came as a bit of a surprise to Larian studio fans. However, the developers of Baldur's Gate 3 themselves weren't disappointed with the studio's resignation from further development of the brand, even in the form of a large DLC for the third installment. Quite the contrary.
In an interview with IGN, the CEO of Larian Studios mentioned a bit about the reasons for this decision, which surprised some players. It's not surprising, as after the success of Baldur's Gate 3, many publishers or developers would make an effort to release at least one major expansion.
The devs from Larian studio had such plans and even started working on the DLC. A continuation was also considered. However, the team didn't feel the need to further develop the brand. Building on the success of BG 3 appeared to be a given, but no one in the studio "was passionate about these projects" (and Larian, as its founders describe it, "is a studio that puts its entire heart into game development"), which had an impact on the mood in the company.
Because of all the success the obvious thing would have been to do a DLC, so we started on one. We started even thinking about BG4. But we hadn't really had closure on BG3 yet and just to jump forward on something new felt wrong. We had also spent a whole bunch of time converting the [Dungeons & Dragons] system into a video game and we wanted to do new things. There are a lot of constraints on making D&D, and 5th [D&D handbook] Edition is not an easy system to put into a video game. We had all these ideas of new combat we wanted to try out and they were not compatible.
So the decision was ultimately made to drop Baldur's Gate in favor of "elevating" the entire Larian studio. Now they can focus on the future, including two completely new games, one of which is expected to surpass BG 3 and all other studio projects (via Gamespot). The thing is, the team is currently lacking the "technology," although Vincke has high hopes for the next generation of consoles.
The CEO of Larian Studios realizes that his words could have greatly disappointed the fans. Nevertheless, he stated that he has never been more sure about the "change of strategy" and is convinced that it is the correct decision. Vincke emphasized that Baldur's Gate 3 is "aa story with a beginning, a middle, and an end."
So it looks like this is the final end of Baldur's Gate 3 -- if you don't count the updates that the developers are still working on. They haven't disclosed the release date for the next major patch yet.
