I'm really struggling to think of any other game that had the feel of Baldur's Gate. It's something I miss a lot. This earnest fantasy feel. Most fantasy RPGs I've seen either go pretty dark and more adult (like Pillars of Eternity, the Witcher and like) or full on bubblegum fantasy (like Divinity: Original Sin for example.) But I struggle to think of another game that actually went with the kind of eager, earnest fantasy feel Baldur's Gate 1&2 went. They're not trying to reinvent fantasy, they stick to it and do some pretty great things with it. BG2 especially. I think the closest to that is probably Dragon Age: Origins, which is pretty understandable since it's by Bioware of 2009. But even then, it goes in a different direction and for a different kind of feel. Man, I just want another game that feels like Baldur's Gate. I've played through the saga so many times that it always feels kinda silly to go back to them. Yet I can't find any game that would actually do the same earnest adventurer fantasy as well.

BG2 has a giant space hamster.

Minsk & Boo those are truly epic and memorable characters! Go for the eyes Boo!!!!!

BG 1+2+tob had a special feeling in every second of them. Everything has a personality of it's own. AND, yes, it was a perfect manifestation of ad%d, that's what we wanted back in the day: We didn't have any good d&d games. Played poe, can't care for a half of it. From bg every place is memorable and every npc is a work of art.

PoE takes it easily on gameplay, while story-wise and in terms of sheer scope, BG2 wins. I think the companions in both are very good. I was surprised by how unique and weel-written PoE's companios were.

well elves couldnt be barbarian because of their ''culture'' was already stablished, i mean, you had gold , sun , and moon elves who were always in cities and wood elf could have being a barb but ranger makes more sense and the drow where of figthers, wizards or clerics(females), the dwarves also had their restrictions because of that.

I really dont even think a comparison of any type is fair, BG2 is THE masterpiece of masterpieces. Pillars is great, a leap of faith for everyone wanting to see this types of games come back to mainstream. Also it is a slap in the face of the big producers that probably snorted and snickered when any sort of proposal of this type came up in the last 10 years or so. So Pillars hands down 10/10 for nowadays, great accomplishment.. But, Pillars feels like a simple act of BG2...so really not anything in the new game even comes close to BG2, encounters, side quests, companion quests, item quests...BG2 has so much of everything that it is almost a chore to have so much fun doing it (if that is possible at all lol). Also Character creation Race x Class is based on the rules of AD&D, the very best ruleset for the dungeons and dragons settings of all (imo)...Sure its harder, sure it has lots more details to consider... but it is the best nonetheless. So yeah.. go home crying to momma when you cant make a Half Orc, dual class Paladin/Mage... Now what would really knock off everyones panties would be a new BG game.. huge, beautiful, well written...with updated functionalities (like controller support, ai scripting for companions like ff12 and DAO had, isometric camera that allows for rotation of the map, and so many other neat things that make our wrist joints/eyes suffer a little less) Pillars is but a start.

Both are excellent but BG2 does have the upper hand. Why? World building and behavior of the world you play in. POE has a "game" style rules and thus the exploration and combat mechanics are completely separate from one another which detach you from the world in a manner of speaking. In BG2 you go into a tavern, you summon some wild animals and the beats go feral over the residents and as a consequence the guards barge in to solve the issue. Same with other magic, in BG2 you can pre-cast protective spells or use other means to overcome a problem but in POE you can never use your skills outside combat in a meaningful manner. Of course the last (but not least) trump card that BG2 has over POE is of course the bad guys. These are simply stunning in BG2, each and every last one of them.

1:34 Why can't you be a Dwarf Monk or an Elven Barbarian??? Because Dwarves aren't Monks and Elves aren't big and muscular. However, the fact that Elves can't be Druids doesn't seem to make sense. That has been debated on several forums. But if there were no race/class restrictions, then no one would play Human or Half-Elf. That could be a reason.

I think getting invested in the story and characters is what really did it for me in dragon age origins, baldur's gate 2 and neverwinter nights 1 and 2. I enjoyed pillars, but it just fell too short in too many places for me. If they make a pillars 2, I hope they can really focus on fleshing out the characters and getting you invested in them.

Minsk and Boo got attention with just one or two dialogues. but, Durance needs a lot.

Khelgar Ironfist, now that hit me right in the childhood.. time play NWN2 again.

Fascinating analysis. Honestly yeah. I agree. Right down to your contrast and analogy to what authors best fit them. I was always trying to pinpoint what I distinctly liked from both of the games individually so to not confuse what concepts they strived for in comparison and review of one over the other. I think a lot of people fall down this route. It's like comparing frogs to the way birds fly at times with how different Obsidian/Black Isle crafts their broad reaching stories compared to the rich characterization focus of Bioware.

The major difference I notice is not only the game mechanics, but the storyline itself. I will switch to BGII/Planescape Torment now, as playing those titles was like reading a decent fantasy book thankfully to their storylines and game mechanic itself (today games miss that feeling unfortunatelly), with Planescape even more I think. The magical world that creators gave you were absolutely amazing, multidimensional with vast amount of spells and characters/creatures that you could interact with. It was great experience to play them. On the other hand, BGII+ToB with standard difficulty lvl is hell of a lot longer to play in comparision with anything i played so far out of classic RPGs. So the game actually give you weeks of playing (choosing only one road and meeting few classes), playing as a "evil character" is even more difficultI did contributed to PoE in creation phase through kickstarter and I was expecting this depth of gameplay as in 2 titles stated above. Obviously i didn't get that, tho i did enjoyed playing it, as I missed something (in BGII style) so badly. But won't bother to play it again. Did BGII wih priest, paladin, sorcerer, druid, priest/thief, sorcerer/thief, kensai warrior. Did PoE just with druid, and that's about it. Don't feel sorry for money spent on the title, hopefully if they will make another one, they put more work into it, for now:1.PT2.BGII3.NVN

It's always worth bearing in mind that we're comparing a game that came out in 2000 to one that came out in 2015. I find it a remarkable fact that many people still prefer BG2, considering PoE had 15 years worth of exponential technological advancement to draw upon. That's not to diss PoE in any way, since I love it, but to point out what a remarkable achievement BG2 was - it's a handcrafted masterpiece.

New cRPG player here. (I'm 24 too.) I played the hell out of Pillars and beat it. Now I'm playing Planescape: Torment. If I beat it before Tyranny or Torment: Tides of Numenara come out, I'll be starting BG 1. (I also played Divinity: Original Sin, but it didn't ignite this fire in me for more cRPG story and depth.) RPGs are the best game genre hands down. Witcher 3 was awesome, but most AAA RPGs these days are so weak as far as story and writing go.

The major dissapointment I had with PoE was the magic and magic item system. Very simple, standard magical tropes like 'invisiblity' are absent. Replaced by; spell increases x by y for z seconds, really dull. 'Maybe next level will have something like that - nope. Same as before.' Never finished the game, have no desire to. P.S. Before the fan boys jump in; I did try a barbarian a few times, but the opaque attributes system meant death shortly after creation with confused rage at the characters wildly differing stats having no baring on any of the encounters. BG 1 and 2 on the other hand I am still playing to this day. Every class, solo and full party.

I am not a hardcore gamer, just an occasional player looking for something similar to Heroes of Might and Magic that I can play on my new Mac. Baldur's Gate has a reputation for being fairly un-intuitive and difficult to figure out. Is POE simpler in these respects? Which would be a better choice for a newbie to RPG's? Thanks!

Black Isle only published BG games, not actual develop.

I personally would not compare the two since it really isn't fair. A huge part of Pillars of Eternity is taken from Baldur's Gate. So Pillars of Eternity has an advantage. Though if I ever did compare the two, I would pick Baldur's Gate. The graphics may not be as good as the ones in Pillars of Eternity but the story, variety of spells, types of enemies and ways to beat the game is a huge plus. Also the story of Baldur's gate 2 is unique and it is my favorite video game story so far. If today a new Baldur's Gate was made I believe that it would be far bigger than Pillars of Eternity because a lot of people are hungry for the continuation of the story and they are also familiar with the uniqueness of Baldur's Gate games. Baldur's Gate with each of its sequels has managed to bring something new to the table where Pillars of Eternity is mostly copied ideas from Baldur's Gate. Though at least they copied from a legendary game and thus made a great game themselves.

Thank you for this comparison!

On one point, AD&D races/classes. "Why can't I be a dwarf monk or Elvin barbarian" because you are playing a game that is solely based on the AD&D 2.5 edition rule set. Even if Bioware had wanted to trash the whole AD&D system they would have been contractually unable to produce the game and I would bet real world money that a generic Baldur's Gate 1-2 would not have been as popular/successful as the AD&D franchise it is/was. In proper AD&D the classes/professions were put together in character creation for certain reasons I.E. dwarven and Elvin races are not nomadic thus are not associated with barbarian culture per the AD&D Forgotten realms setting (Though in P&P you could have been Wood Elf. Hell in the original AD&D being and elf WAS a class. I know some people dislike not being able to roll up that half-elf gelatinous cube cleric of Azuth but it's AD&D 2.5 and it is what it is...not meant to be mean spirited post but betwixt AD&D and any other character creation system your dealing with apples and oranges...Bioware did a fantastic job with AD&D system for a crpg...the real comparison would be how well does Pillars do with it's own system. In P&P AD&D the real customization came through game play and imagination...kind of hard to do with scripted encounters, no?

I love both the BG and PoE series, and I have huge nostalgia for the BG games, as they started me on RPGs back when the first one came out in the 90s. I still replay them once every few years. That said, I prefer PoE1/2 in most ways. Better character creation, mechanics, encounters, graphics and QoL features. To me both are equal in terms of NPCs, world building and writing (though if I'm honest, I'd want to give the worldbuilding to the PoE series, because BG massively benefits from Forgotten Realms lore). The BG series wins in terms of availability (I love playing on my phone!), random encounters and respawning enemies. Also, BG1 in particular has the most open design of all of them, which I love (but Deadfire comes in a very close second in terms of openness, and in some ways is more open). The main regressions of the PoE series are lack of random and/or respawning enemy encounters (other than ship-based encounters in Deadfire), and the modal nature of combat (your entire party is always engaged in combat, and most parties in most situations cannot withdraw from combat until it is resolved, lone characters cannot break off and restealth or interact with the environment while combat is going on, etc).

The Pillars games are amazing but I don't even think the Devs over at Obsidian think that PoE is better then Baldurs Gate 2. BG 2 is probably the greatest RPG ever created past, present and future. Pillars is amazing, Game of the Year, I thought it was better then DA:I and right up there with the best. I think BG 2 is being discussed 20 years later. Will people be talking about POE in 20 years. I think a few will but it isn't wont hold up the same as BG 2.

wow, i had forgotten about nwn2...Did anyone actually make Khelgar a monk? i never did.

Great video. Havent yet decided if i dare to play Pillars Of Eternity, in fear of being dissapointed. No other RPG like Baldurs Gate 1/2 (kindoff view them as the same game, with maybe a slow start) has managed to satisfy me since. I suppose i have to give Fallout 1 and 2 a try, just hope the combat will be cool

I want to HIGHLY recommend everyone who was disappointed with Pillars of Eternity to checkout what they are doing with Pillars of Eternit 2: Deadfire. They have heard the complaints and fixing them. Spells will be more powerful but take longer to cast, but you can retarget spells before they are cast to make up for the longer casting time. So your powerful spells are back. Not only that but instead of per rest stuff they are using "empowerment" where you can empower X number of spells or abilities per rest and it's up to you which ones and when to use the empowerment, making them much stronger. Also there will be custom grimories that change your magic. So a firestorm grimorie might make your firespells penetrate armor more or burn longer, etc. Engagement won't be something all characters and enemies have be default. Only a few characters and enemies will have engagement but engagement will be more powerful too. Basically you've got to check out the sequel because it's all the stuff you originally were hoping for. Seriously. www.fig.co/campaigns/deadfire

I enjoy playing both!

Well that's not completely true, Baldurs Gate 2 did have a reputation system and the reputation system in Baldurs Gate did have some limited effect on dialog, especially if you were of despised reputation.

planescape..........

Generally speaking, Baldur's Gate II is better than Pillars of Eternity. Pillars of Eternity II could be better than both of them. Baldur's Gate II significnatly improved the first game, so I would expect Obsidian to do the same. I haven't played enough video games to completely agree/disagree with your analysis. Games are extremely time consuming and that is why I only play a few.

I wish PoE only the best. Havent played it though. I cant get over the new world. I am fan of Forgotten realms. I liked Salvator´s Neverwinter nights trilogy books and I was so happily surprised when I met Buenor and Catti and Wulfgar and Regis in BG2 it was like meeting friends I ahvent seen for years. I´d wished to see BG3.

I liked the temple of the elemental evil.

BG2 enhanced edition with dragonspeare added has made my favorite game ever just better. Dual world my axe of unyielding and short sword of mask, switch to a throwing axe or bow, then to Ravager seamlessly? Fuck yeah! Pillars also has a great story. The assassin/cipher combo is epic. Having your own boat is amazing and im big on the eyepatch. My character having a legendary battleaxe or rapier or sword with half swording (a real technique ive trained with an ARma and fencing and pillars does a good job Becoming a mindhunter from assassin and cipher is just one of the nearest to a fandfc i wrote that is a generic vk

An elven barbarian???

Personally i prefer Baldur's Gate 2, but i won't devolve into the reasons, it would take too long. What i want to say is this: to me is MINDBLOWING that Bioware, before making the first Baldur's Gate, only had a little "mechwarrior" like game and nothing else as past experience...and yet somehow they managed to build what all proper Crpgs should at least see as a base to start. I mean, there are companies out there with games upon games of experience, millions of dollars of budget and years of developement that create complete crap. Seriously: Bioware, Troika, Black Isle & Obsidian..kings of Crpgs

Both great games and different. Bg2 was amazing and so was quakeworld for their time and our perspective back then

Another strange thing is that if you're a priest, even as a non-human you can be a priest for the human gods Lathander and Talos; I believe the lore for Helm was that he has the words for Duty in every language on his armbands so that is multi- cultural/race enough for me.

i was pissed at the end of POE coz i cudnt carry on the game with my characters

Spicy food was a mistake last night.

because Elves are not Barbarians.

Play both and have fun they are great no vs needed

Both of these writing strengths could exist in the same game, in theory.

Baldurs gate strickly stuck to the DnD2edition rules so some where not good I admit but the rules are the rules :D I think it was more of a balance thing overall from pen and paper plays.

Pillars and pathfinder are like sister company while original sins are cousin a very clpse relative. Hopefully you can review all of them and include narnia pleaseeee. No KZfaqr have ever done it.

Bg2 legendary, poe medium

baldur's gate 2 is the best game EVER !!!

Pillars of eternity is pure ecstasy. Pillars 2 will groundbreaking im sure

baldurs gate has a reputation system for different towns etc. which affects the gameplay. also PoE stat system is far inferior than BG's because the might attribute both affects melee and magic dmg so its mostly an all class are gonna max it stat which is boring. like u said, items and encounters are so far better in baldurs gate because the tactics are far complex.

Since PoE is the first game of a potential series I prefer to compare it to Baldur's Gate I and in my opinion it wins hands down. Even comparing it to BG II I feel that overall PoE has the edge. Compare it to Planescape?Torment? For me Planesceap/Torment was a stand alone game. No comparison possible.

Obsidian had 20 years of bioware's mistakes and hits to learn from, where as Bioware is one of the pioneers of this genre, so you can't really compare these two games.

The problem for me is that modern crpgs try too hard to be shades of grey and ambiguous. Half the fun in Baldurs Gate was that some groups were just evil. There were some moral choices (working with someone you knew was bad because you needed cash to fund operation What Are You Doing Step Bro), but a lot of the time the decisions were clear-cut. I absolutely despise the fact that so many games nowadays try to make every faction into a bunch of dingleberries and the only choice is who you want to short-change.

An interesting analysis of the games. I have to disagree with you regarding background customization. I think Baldur's Gate II is superior in that regard as well. In Pillars your character is a blank slate that you can make more interesting with culture and background choices. It is a system where this kind of stuff makes sense - as opposed to Baldur's Gate where your characters history is predetermined by the story. So it would make no sense to introduce different backgrounds in this case. You play as Gorion's ward from Candlekeep - that is your background. But since we are comparing Pillars with the second game I can safely say that BG2 has better customization since it has Baldur's Gate I as your background. A whole game, which is more extensive than the options available to you in Pillars. I was a backer for Pillars, but in the end it turned out to be a disappointment, because of the following: - The retarded attribute system, that broke my immersion every time my wizard was portrayed as this muscular guy because the high Might stat... - The unnecessary turn based mechanics forced into a real time game system where a character can break physics using engagement. This kind of stuff has no place in a real time tactical rpg. It would have been better to model movement and combat looking at actual real time games instead, or go fully turn based like divinity. - The magic system is uninteresting and too balanced (also no pre-buffing, no counters, little to no summons and no save or die mechanics ... etc) - The soul based psionics they implemented is also terrible. This was a feature i was looking forward the most, since i loved psionics in D&D. - The encounter design forced me to use cheesy tactics, which won me every encounter easily but also quickly became a chore. - The game was too easy. As an experienced player this is now also true for BG2 as well, but it took me years to become an expert in that game, while it took me only one play-through in Pillars (for BG2 there are some mods to address this). - Pillars might have some instances in dialog that recognizes your background and choices, but in my case it failed terribly to make the game-play experience interesting/different. I have played through it twice, but could not play through it a 3rd time -- it got painfully boring... With the Baldur's Gate saga i didn't have this problem, since i am keep coming back to it every year (probably because the game mechanics are so much better).

Wait isn't combat just throwing cloudkills and entangles off-screen to kill enemies before they see you or is that just me.

Baldur's Gate 2 has no match. I tried Pillars of Eternity but it didnt captivate me like bg2 still does. play it once every year or other year and its awesome every time and never boring. Pillars of Eternity didnt have great writing, didnt have anybody as charismatic as many npcs or bosses or villains in bg2 + tob. I was never sucked into an amazing story and world. It was too....generic and I stopped after like 15 hours of playing cause it got boring. But its nice to see they go in that direction again so its good they try to bring back the golden age of rpgs.

Pillairs lack crpg romances though, and i must admit that I do miss that from Baldurs gate a lot. It's an important tool in immersion and replayability. And of course perhaps the most important one is which games gave more choices in story. The most important replay value in games next to different class playthroughs is how you can change story elements and how they play out. Pillairs had some of it, in many quests, yet i were hoping they would have much larger consequenses from your choices. The only thing wish they had in pillairs were more companions with different moral values. every one of them were goodie goodie 2 shoes and i really wish it would have had probably 3 more companions that would start to argue and actually fight against your companions in different situations to create more immersion, Like in Baldurs Gate. Maybe i'm thinking a bit to much on Baldurs gate but that's because the only things that i felt Pillars lacked to be true to the old school sucsess of older crpgs were companions with different morale values that reacted differently to your choices and some romance options. And Tim curry was the bad guy in Baldurs gate 2 which is quite hard to challenge.

Pillars has not only an advantage, it is also a lot smarter in some aspects. Fo example the cutscenes and writings are so technically simple but impressive that bg could have done this too, but it didnt. in addition to the better roleplay it has the better balance. BG is ruled and ruined by dual- and multiclassing as well as some overpowered items. Take only this 3 features away and the majority of players would dislike it, lol. Last but not least - bg is a tryhard pnp-adaption. I grew up with this game and i loved it - believe it or not. But even now as a studied mathematician i cant understand why they tried to adapt the rules so hard, even using a fucking d20- completely stupid. Pillars attackresolution in contrast is smart, it is simple, but still gives more complex results than the ThAC0-system. Actually all the mechanics in PoE are awesome, (except the attacktimer). The only thing at which BG-Series is really better in my point of view is the magnitude of the game. BG gave us 100eds of fine hours and Pillars is too short in this regard. But people claiming BG has the better roleplay or mechanics are weird people judging by nostalgia. I love both games, but io hope the pillar franchise will grow bigger and deliever us much more content.

Can't even compare these games. BG2 is a piece of art, PoE is a ball-breaking shit. Found myself playing 3-4 hours BG2 non-stop and can't play PoE for 15 mins without stopping cause I'M BORED LIKE HELL........

Baldur's Gate 2 is much better. Hell, Icewind Dale 1/2 are better, and so is BG1 and PS:T. This game was okay, but, honestly, Josh Sawyer should let someone else make them. He has already said he wouldn't be making a "class based" RPG if he had it his way, and that's showing in the final product. Now, with PoE 2 one of their core philosophies (a six member party) is being dumbed down to five. Why? Because the combat has become too busy, and the characters are too hard to micromanage. The loss of focus blows my mind.

You should probably be comparing it to Baldur's Gate, full stop, not Baldur's Gate 2. 'cause yah know, Pillars of Eternity 2 is coming. You also don't reach "epic" levels in PoE or BG, but you do in BG2. Nothing on the level of time stop, etc. is available purely because of power level, not necessarily the system. And tbh I really don't think BG1 would win this. On any count. Except number of NPCs. I don't think the writing in PoE was perfect (a lot of loose threads were left hanging with the ending, for example), but neither was BG's. At best they tie for writing, but I think PoE wins. Well, it wins if you ignore the bloody gold name plate NPCs. If those count, BG wins hands down. More is not always better. And as far as mechanics go... I made the mistake of finishing PoE before finishing BG2:ToB. Trying to manage 2nd ed. D&D combat with one HP bar, no per encounter abilities, and infinite resting, after experiencing PoE's mechanics, is just tedium.

The "spiritual successors" of BG2 are just too damn polished. BG2 was edgy, quirky and full of unbalances. That made it feel more real. PoE is a nice looking and well though-out game with a cool story and characters and a sensible combat system. But it is just so bland. I don't know what exactly it is and I don't know what to change to make the new games that are coming out more like BG2. Maybe it's just me, being dead inside or something.

You cant compare the two barely anything can compare to bg

No romance = epic fail.

Baldur's Gate along with TotSC was first cRPG i ever played (even might and magic and wizardry series came after) and it was great though i was not able to kill sarevok with my party. later there were icewind dale and pinnacle of storytelling - Planescape - the only ie game which i ended more than five times, just to see different choices change surrounding world. later there were bg2, neverwinter, iwd2 and others. After Planescape, BG2 seems a bit flat to me. of course it had great story, but having to romance with some companions just to avoid them leaving the party, and fact that stats did not change much was a bit forced. PoE had all of things that bg 2 hadn't for me. And at last it is first cRPG from very long time that has no romance in it - finally! So for me it is Planescape >PoE>BG>BG2.

Level cap ruins POE for me.

Comparison of PoE to BG2 is strange. The games were made 15 years apart! You might as well compare SSI's Gold Box series of games with Baldur's Gate - it makes just as much sense.

You lost me at the very first sentence :( I kickstarted Pillars but really disliked it and I don't think they did a good job. Aarklash Legacy or Divinity Original Sin is doing a good job.

Any game that forces you to use auto attack rather than skills because if you use a skill you have to camp AND the game limits how often you can camp is not a game I would recommend to anyone.

Sorry but PoE isn't even in the same category as BG2. Sure, it can compare to the original BG, or Icewind Dale but BG2 is basically the undisputed master of the old RPGs. I would posit that Witcher 3 has finally dethroned BG2. Torment is obviously at 2nd/3rd place depending on your personal preference. DO:Origins is up there, but the entire franchise went downhill quickly once the expansion came out and then the terrible sequel basically destroyed it. (And in some ways tarnished the original).

i didnt enjoy pillars of eternity

Pillards is a BG1 remastered. Quite disapointed, no surprises, scripts and battles are boring, companions feels like neverwinter team and lots to say. With the money and the time they've had i was hoping for something a lot better.

both games are boring novels for grandmas.

Dragn Age Origin a masterpiece? More like a snorefest with a booooring strory.

Poe sucked bad. Baldur's gate superior in almost every way.