Larian Studio CEO Swen Vincke pushes back on Baldur's Gate III being "standard" for games

07.09.2023 - 17:25 / gamedeveloper.com / Xalavier Nelson-Junior / Swen Vincke / Josh Sawyer

Larian Studios' Baldur's Gate 3 became a massive hit following its full launch in early August. With over 5 million downloads, the long-awaited sequel to BioWare's classic Dungeons & Dragons-inspired CRPG has achieved crossover success, putting the sub-genre into the spotlight for its open-ended approach to storytelling and player choice.

There's been plenty of discussion regarding the game's approach to gameplay ideals, depth of content, and whether this will set new expectations for role-playing games. So much so that developers, games media, and players alike engaged in a lively, viral debate on where RPGs go from here following Baldur's Gate 3's release.

In an interview with Larian Studios CEO and creative director Swen Vincke just ahead of the PS5 release, he reflected on the success and lessons learned from the game's 1.0 launch following years in early access and spoke about the recent online discourse surrounding the game.

To recap, the larger discussion began when independent developer and writer Xalavier Nelson Jr. posted comments on social media praising Larian Studios' game while also expressing that it should not be the new standard for games moving forward. These comments came in response to Nelson Jr. seeing commentary from others online who were "taking that excitement and using it to apply criticism or a "raised standard" to RPGs going forward."

In his thread, he explained further that Baldur's Gate 3's success with a multi-year early access period, a known IP, and a clear vision resulted in the game we have today—which is not always possible for other developers. Other creatives, such as Josh Sawyer from Obsidian Entertainment, who previously worked on CRPGs such as the Icewind Dale series and the Pillars of Eternity games, also agreed with Nelson Jr.'s assessment. However, there was significant pushback from the player community, which then led to a much-watched op-ed video from IGN that took the discourse to a new level.

That went viral, with some content creators misrepresenting key points and stating that developers were "afraid" of Baldur's Gate 3. Suffice it to say, some of the nuance of the initial discussion was lost on readers, especially if they only caught on after the op-ed video sparked the next round.

Vincke touched on some of the discourse when we spoke just after the game's launch, agreeing with Nelson Jr.'s thoughts but also taking time to disagree in some areas.

"Obviously you shouldn't try to make a game like Baldur's Gate 3 if you don't have the resources to do so, but there's other developers there who have more resources than we have," said the Larian Studios CEO and creative director. "So I am sure that they will be making games after BG3 that will be bigger and