Whew. Yesterday I finally finished Baldur’s Gate II: Throne of Bhaal, and it only took, um, a little over two years. Not playing continuously, of course. A little thing called EQ kept butting in and shoving BG2 onto the back burner…
It’s definitely a *long* game, though. Even with a walkthrough, to accelerate it and get it over and done with, it still took a few weeks.
Overall I liked it a fair bit. Although the main plot was linear, there were tons of little side quests to pursue at your own pace. The kits and new class types added a lot of flexibility in character generation and new tactics — I played a sorceror, and having to carefully choose which spells you want requires some serious thought about how you want to play, for example. There were a lot of nice little subtleties too, like intra-party chatter, some NPCs responding differently based on obscure little conditions, strongholds, both good and evil paths in a lot of places, multiple solutions to quests dependent on things like your wisdom or charisma, etc.
It definitely wasn’t as open-ended as something like Daggerfall, but it’s probably about as close as you can get and still keep a strong plot line and keep the quests from being too generic.
There was one thing that bugged me, though… (Spoilers:)
The outcome of the main plot in SoA was a huge letdown. Irenicus was presented as being a mysterious, inscrutable villain with some devious plan in store. One that required ripping a portion of your very soul from you, demonstrating his enormous power and involving you personally, so it must be some convoluted scheme on a grand scale, right? Most of the way along, the story cultivates the feeling that Irenicus is such a danger that he must be stopped at all costs. Is the very world itself in peril?
Well, no. Turns out it’s a simple revenge plot — the elves kicked Irenicus out, so he wants to go back and kick their butts in return. That’s it. The freaking treehuggers just want to be saved from him. I was hoping for something just a bit more complex…
The plot and ending of the expansion was a bit better, at least. There was actually some deception, surprises, motivation, and relevance to your character directly in that one.
Now the question is, will I get to play my new role as a god in BG3? Muhahaha…..