Baldur's Gate 3 | A Bittersweet Critique

Hi guys. Thank you so much for watching! There were so many memorable moments in this game. Some really dark stuff too. What was your favourite one?

I have to agree Arcane Tower is one of the most memorable side quests, although I didn't realize the "person" she was waiting for was a dog and that the automaton was programmed to kill her if she becomes depressed. Even without those details you could feel the loneliness in that place, great piece of writing nonetheless. Awesome video by the way! "THAC0" cracked me up really well! 🤣

Ai pus muzica pe privat??? 😢 Le aveam inca in playlist acu putin timp (1-2 sapt) si acum nu le mai pot asculta. 😢 aveam 2 piese preferate, cea cu Jaina si Fractals. pretty pleeeeeease bring them back, they were good! ❤

While I agree that Gortash should be a more mature character, what his mother said in his family's shoe shop in Baldur's Gate and the diary in the room upstairs helped me complete his story on my own. After all, he was sold to a warlock as a child and later did the same to Karlach. I think he acted out of an instinct to be strong and not be under anyone's control again.

Its not true with Shadowheart ...
What she chooses depends on all your previous conversations and choices you picked ... its masked really well, but there is no way to let companions choose anything for themselves, they allways reflect us. :(

I mostly agree with your points, the game is fantastic but not perfect. I fully think Act 3 is not remotely as fun as the rest of the game, I vastly prefer the first 2 acts and found Moonrise Towers a very effective pseudo end point for many of my runs. Gortash is nonsensical and ineffective as a villain, and Orin could have been used better, even though she's my favorite of the villains. Ketheric's motivations make tragic sense, The best moments are often not in the cutscenes, but the wonderful environmental storytelling. Being able to track animals based on their marks in the dirt made me feel like a true ranger, speaking to animals along the way adds so much, there's so many beautiful moments to find.
I disagree that the NPCs are unlikeable, but we can't all have the same taste. I am very charmed by Karlach, Minthara, and Astarion. I think the game's focus on responses to trauma and the masks we wear is very good, deception within the party nearly always makes sense and the character growth through interactions is satisfying, for the most part. What I don't enjoy is there are some moments that it would be nice to get unique dialogue for that there is nothing.

I dunno... A friend tried to lure me in to coop BG3 ... Being fan of BG1, I agreed. But boy, I havene seen more atrocious story than in BG3, inane gameplay, bland graphics... Where are all the 10/10 coming from?

It must be akin to crowd-bombing unpopular developer, only in inverse.

Not power — authority 😁. Versus autonomy.

The subtitles are confusing, as “Shaar” is a place in Faerûn, whereas Shar is the goddess involved in the game’s plot. A “Shaarian” would be someone from the Shaar, not a servant of Shar. 😂

As far as I know, Shadowheart will only make the choice to save the Nightsong if you have high approval and/or a sufficient number of Nightsong points. If you don’t, trusting her may lead to her slaying the Nightsong.

I have to laugh so much since you got to the not so sweet stuff because you are so right with it. My first character decided not to end the game at all because it could get worse and it wont if you don´t force it to. Of course I ended the game another time with another character but I really don´t like the main story. Nonetheless I love the game dearly. ❤

The most rememorable moment for me was killing Cazador and with him dead I lost the meaning in ending the game, because if I don´t ckfront the Brain it will wait for me until the end of time. Even Karlach will not die so it seems very perfect...

Just a tip for future videos: maybe don't jokingly insult half your audience based on the endings they choose in their video games.

No game can ever be perfect. And Orin is overrated. The only reason people like her is because they think she is hot--even though she smells like the worst toilet on earth. Always Durge > Orin. I would never give up a Durge playable character so Orin can take center stage in the story. Orin can stay in the toilet where all the other turds belong.

You missed Gortash's back story. It's all available in game. You meet his parents, the "warlock" he was sold to was actually Raphael, he usurped the Emperor, and he hired Helsik to open the portal to Hell so he and Durge could steal the Crown of Karsus. I like Gortash. He has more of personality than some rank incest baby like Orin whose entire personality is murder (yawn).

You have stints pegged wrong. Facial cues are important in Cyberpunk. He complied and let his piggy cronies beat you until the corpo is out of earshot and then, because he fucking HATES being ordered around by corps so much he let's you go without so much as a citation when he originally planned on booking you to meet a quota.

Edit: Also vastly misunderstanding the tadpole mechanic, its insidious as it should be. It FEELS TOO FREE and your character can express that and that's because you can straight make getting the better endings of the game harder on yourself by doing it.

Traveling to hell with Karlach is my favorite ending. But the most memorable part of the game was the first time I fought Rapheal, and that song started - it was awesome game moment. Borislav Slavov did an excellent job with the music. But I wills ay that Shadowheart doesn't always make the "right choice" when you trust her. It depends on your decisions prior to that. I trusted her one play through and she actually killed the night song (which I didn't want).

FYI the person that the owner of the Arcane Tower was waiting for is not a dog but a former lover. The dog was dead already.

The biggest problem I see with this Critique is the lack of understanding and also supposition that you make about some of the story elements. Otherwise some of what you are saying makes sense. One thing that I will point out is that the fact that Mind Flayers don't have souls is NOT irrelevant to the rest of the game. Gives a clue about why this whole situation came about. It's not about what the Dead Three wanted but what the Elder Brain wanted.

Great thoughtful video! thank you for this and I hope you keep up the great work!
One question about the backstory that I don’t think you mentioned: How/when did the Chosen Three discover the Elder Brain under Moonrise? is that ever stated in the game? I’d love to hear what you found out about that.


another plothole .. how did the Chosen get the crown onto the Mindflayer? That would be quite a feat since the brain can just fly away if under threat.

Thanks again for this!

Great thoughtful video! thank you for this and I hope you keep up the great work!
One question about the backstory that I don’t think you mentioned: How/when did the Chosen Three discover the Elder Brain under Moonrise? is that ever stated in the game? I’d love to hear what you found out about that.


another plothole .. how did the Chosen get the crown onto the Mindflayer? That would be quite a feat since the brain can just fly away if under threat.
By the way it is explained how the Dark Urge ends up in the nautiloid but it is still a very big stretch.

you are wrong about Gortash by the way .. he is a study in pathological response to trauma. Maybe you didn’t get to that content in the game.

Thanks again for this!

great video! loved your thoughts and explanations

It is hard not to pick the Nightsong becoming an Aasimar as my favorite scene. But my most memorable was watching Isabel get critically hit to death and the barrier falling, I was traumatized. Yes, I reloaded.

It's really annoying how people focus on "patriarchy" and no "central female villain" of this game when 90% of the characters in leadership or important roles here are women. It's funny no one ever addresses the blatant lack of any Asian, Latin, Indian, etc characters yet always women when there are SO many white lead female characters in this game. I really don't get it.

Very well put! It's been a while since I've played (update 6 I think?) but I did feel the drop off between acts 1 and 2, verses the beginning of act 3. I still need to play a Durge game, and I really hope that the most recent update will tie all of this together better.

Wait there’s an evil Druid??

Thank you for your work. I have loved the game and made a number of play throughs and I agree that it is hard to stay focused in Act 3. I find the “who becomes a mind flayer” part of the ending a real chore. Fair enough, have us be forced to make difficult decisions, but my first play through I romanced Lae’zel and hated all of my options. I wanted to free Orpheus, but I didn’t particularly feel I had been betrayed by the Emperor; I didn’t want to make the sacrifice or ask Orpheus to do it out of my love for Lae’zel, and as you say no way was I doing that to Karlach. Fine, I’ll blow up Gale. Orpheus said nice words and Lae’zel and I had a lovely ending but it still felt like a shady move.

BG3 is a good game, good music, gameplay, ambient etc .. the technical part have zero things to complain, none the less it's a fucking woke game . .

Regarding the "only 40% of players left act II" i think the steam achievments arent really accurate about that, if thats what youre basing this number on.
Theres games out there where supposedly a good chunk of players never left the tutorial.

Maybe the real villain are the friends we make on the way 😉

Wonderful review. one note about Shadowheart’s decision about the Nightsong. she has a secret score that determines what she SH does depending on how you relate to her and certain game events. i don’t think that she always saves the Nightsong if you let her decide. Another great feature from Larian to add reactivity and replayability.

very flawed game
honestly its over praise is alarming

I didn't expect this go get 300 views, lets alone 3000. There is a full reference list now in the description. Work of this magnitude is never done alone, and everyone deserves credit, even if it was a post on a forum. This video took me 6 months to make. Well... 8 if you count the times I just stared at the screen. I don't think one hour is enough to talk about BG3, but that was my limit as a first video essay. But you definitely encouraged me to make more videos in the future, so thank you for all the likes and kind comments!