Baldur’s Gate Enhanced Edition (iPad) – coming in December 2012

As a player of the original Baldur’s Gate – and its superior sequel – on PC, back when those games were first released, I’m very interested in the forthcoming enhanced edition of Baldur’s Gate that is due for release on multiple platforms (PC, Mac & iPad) – the iPad release is now rescheduled for December 2012. I don’t intend replaying Baldur’s Gate on the PC, but the iPad version is an intriguing prospect that I’m definitely looking forward to playing and reviewing for Arcadelife.

Update – The game will cost $9.99 on the iPad – I think that’s around £7 based on current app store prices. Apparently the game (on iPad) will also include additional content that can be bought using IAPs (in-app purchases).

All the images in this news item are from the original PC version, unless otherwise specified

The official webpage for the iPad version is here. It has been updated since I first published this post so I have updated the link (the old one led to a fairly uninformative page).

This isn’t the PC version, obviously

I sent an email to Overhaul / Beamdog with a few quick questions; Cameron Tofer from Beamdog was kind enough to reply:

Arcadelife: iPad compatibility – Will BG Enhanced run on all versions of the device, including 1^st generation iPads?
Cameron Tofer: Yes.  It will run on all iPads.
Personally, that’s really good news as it means I can hang on to my 1st gen device  for a while longer. 

Arcadelife: Any clues about the new party member – human or … something else?
Cameron Tofer: Sorry, not yet.
Oh well, it was worth asking! 

Since then, I have found out that there are three of them: Neera, a “half-elf wild mage slowly coming to terms with her enormous magical potential.” Rasaad yn Bashir, a “Calishite Monk demonstrating his monastic arts to the people of Nashkel.” Dorn Il-Khan, a half-Orc Blackguard, “whose otherworldly patron grants him terrible powers in the form of his black sword and unholy spells.” They can all be recruited, although probably not at the same time if their alignments match their descriptions.

There’s also a new arena zone called The Black Pits where your party can spend up to six additional hours fighting through 15 levels of the arena.

Arcadelife: Will there be multiple save slots?
Cameron Tofer: There are multiple save slots, we will also support iCloud saves.
Again, that’s great news about the iCloud saves. 

If you have never played the original game, but you fancy getting the enhanced edition when it comes out, here are some facts and opinion about the original version of Baldur’s Gate. If you follow any of the links, please be advised that the information you find may be deemed a SPOILER if you haven’t previously played / completed Baldur’s Gate.

Baldur’s Gate uses Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (AD&D) rules, specifically the second edition rule set. Character creation and development follow these rules quite strictly and there is a lot of significance given to the alignment of a character, their charisma and morale, particularly the party leader – your main character.

As you progress through the game you recruit up to 5 additional NPCs to your group. If an NPC group member has a radically different alignment from your main character, or you choose to continually act in a manner with which they disagree, they will complain and may ultimately leave the group and become an enemy.

Minsc is probably the most well known of the party NPC characters

A full list of Baldur’s Gate characters can be found here on Wikipedia.

Baldur’s Gate (PC) has an overall Metacritic score of 91. The sequel, Shadows of Amn has a score of 95.

IGN reviewed Baldur’s Gate (PC) and awarded it 9.4 /10. “BioWare has not only done justice to the AD&D license, they’ve set the standard for what role-playing games should be.”

Gamespot reviewed Baldur’s Gate (PC) and awarded it 9.2 / 10. “Not only is Baldur’s Gate easily the best computer adaptation of AD&D ever, it also convincingly returns role-playing games to the forefront of computer gaming.”

If you’re not bothered about spoilers and you want to find out more, there are loads of reviews, images, character build guides, gameplay videos and wiki entries all over the place for Baldur’s Gate – it was (and still is) a very popular game.