Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming

The Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition Website announces Overhaul Games' upcoming Baldur’s Gate overhauls will be coming to OS X this summer (thanks The Patches Scrolls). They say the Mac version will "include a variety of Mac OS X specific features, including widescreen and iCloud support." No, we didn't know widescreen support was an OS X specific feature either. Technically a PC edition of the game has not been announced, but it is mentioned in this tweet from Trent Oster revealing they plan to support cross-platform multiplayer play:
Yes, it will be compatible multi-player cross-platform. We had a Mac, iPad and PC joined into a game together.
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72 Replies. 4 pages. Viewing page 1.
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Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 31, 2012, 16:07
Dev
72.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 31, 2012, 16:07
Mar 31, 2012, 16:07
Dev
 
Cram wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 23:52:
Techie714 © wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 11:10:
  • Upgraded sound

How do you upgrade perfection?
This is beamdog. See MDK HD for examples of what they've done in an attempt to get market share for their digital distribution platform.

So think of the minimum that can be done to get each of those bullet points and you probably won't be far from what happens.

For instance, they can claim "better sound" if they enable the engine to output 48khz sound, even if the original sound was recorded at 44khz, if the sound is "upscaled." In other words, the original sound could be the same, it could just be saved at a higher rate. Like saving a 320x240 picture as a 640x480 picture, it doesn't increase the detail, it just takes up more space.
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Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 31, 2012, 03:31
Prez
 
71.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 31, 2012, 03:31
Mar 31, 2012, 03:31
 Prez
 
Maybe the "enhanced" part is that you get to kill annoying Imoen.
“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.”
- Mahatma Gandhi
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Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 31, 2012, 01:20
70.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 31, 2012, 01:20
Mar 31, 2012, 01:20
 
panbient wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 18:35:
Scottish Martial Arts wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 18:20:
Just because it's a tile based engine doesn't mean those tiles are not textured.

The Infinity Engine is NOT tile-based. Each area is a fixed-resolution continuous 2D bitmap. As such, "upgrading the textures" would mean each area would need to be redrawn by hand. It's not feasible.

If the backgrounds were originally drawn or painted by hand then those original pieces of art still exist somewhere and could be digitized at a much higher resolution than whatever was available in 1998.

You are wrongly assuming that the art for the map is the only thing part of a map, there many different layers, movement, triggers, AI.

All would have to be redone by hand if you scale up (ie, increase) the map resolution
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Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 31, 2012, 01:15
nin
69.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 31, 2012, 01:15
Mar 31, 2012, 01:15
nin
 
The voice acting is perfect.

I can't speak for anything else, but one tweet specifically mentioned that voices for classic (IE non new) characters would not be changed. So thankfully, they won't fuck with Minsc. And that's what is important here.

http://youtu.be/Ozv1RcQJAHA

68.
 
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 23:52
68.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 23:52
Mar 30, 2012, 23:52
 
Techie714 © wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 11:10:
  • Upgraded sound

How do you upgrade perfection? Hoenig and Zur's music is perfect. You can't improve on it. The voice acting is perfect. The sound effects, how do you improve on them? How do you make a sword clashing with another sword better than it was in that saga?

The other points you mentioned Techie714, I agree with. I couldn't get BG1 to run in the BG2 engine with the mods, I tried many times so BG1 at 1920x1080 would be sweet. Textures and Graphics, well that'd be awesome but we'd be literally dealing with a "complete remake" over an "enhanced" version of the game if they pulled that off.

This comment was edited on Mar 31, 2012, 00:07.
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Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 22:29
Prez
 
67.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 22:29
Mar 30, 2012, 22:29
 Prez
 
Dev wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 19:39:
Reading the fine print, you can see Beamdog is doing it, which means its going to be another beamdog exclusive like the MDK HD one. I know they are trying to do it to get market share, but they'd make FAR more money putting it on platforms like steam.

And the rest of the fine print still confirms my theory (at least to me), that they bought some of this stuff CHEAP from interplay since the CAEN bros are still trying to milk the corpse.

Yeah, what started out as quite an exciting development has turned out to be pretty much a non-starter, at least so far. I've basically lost interest.
“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.”
- Mahatma Gandhi
Avatar 17185
66.
 
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 19:50
Dev
66.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 19:50
Mar 30, 2012, 19:50
Dev
 
HorrorScope wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 15:07:
Last time I checked they weren't doing this for free. So we can expect a professional job at updating the game. Otherwise we can still play it today as-is w or w/o mods. So if asking for better GFX is too hard and too much, too bad. It's not like there isn't a market to make money here if justice is done.

Several games have had additional content added for free to them as well. So if it's just more quests and that be it... nothing too exciting for me. It needs to be like a Monkey Island update, a Tempest 2000 update imo.
Yeah, except have you looked at what beamdog has done? Look at MDK HD and you can see exactly what they've done.
Here's a sample from a review:

"Developer Overhaul has made MDK 2 look much prettier than it was, but it appears that they did nothing to fix the game’s various problems, including graphics errors and the above-mentioned auto-save difficulty. In fact, there’s one section that was made tougher by the visual upgrade; a key item blends into the background so well that you can’t see it, which cost me numerous reloads and some mild frustration. "

Does that sound like a "professional job at updating" to you? They basically are doing little work on things like this to try and draw customers to the beamdog download service. The enhancements/added content? They are probably taking the info from the mods that re-enable unfinished content in the game.

This comment was edited on Mar 30, 2012, 21:52.
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Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 19:43
Dev
65.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 19:43
Mar 30, 2012, 19:43
Dev
 
eRe4s3r wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 11:50:
Also who the heck uses 1920x1080p on PC ?
Me, and about 26% of the average PC gaming audience, in fact its the most common single resolution for PC gamers.

http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurvey

Edit:
Doh, ninjaed by nin. Maybe I should have finished reading the thread before I replied :)
Krovven wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 14:18:
LOL, $3 "Extended Download Service" charge. WTF?
Looks like atari is taking a page from EA's old download service where they used to do that.

This comment was edited on Mar 30, 2012, 20:42.
64.
 
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 19:39
Dev
64.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 19:39
Mar 30, 2012, 19:39
Dev
 
Reading the fine print, you can see Beamdog is doing it, which means its going to be another beamdog exclusive like the MDK HD one. I know they are trying to do it to get market share, but they'd make FAR more money putting it on platforms like steam.

And the rest of the fine print still confirms my theory (at least to me), that they bought some of this stuff CHEAP from interplay since the CAEN bros are still trying to milk the corpse.
63.
 
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 19:31
63.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 19:31
Mar 30, 2012, 19:31
 
panbient wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 18:33:
nin wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 18:04:
If you don't like that sort of gameplay, fine. But don't insist BG should change so it's more like some other game that wasn't BG.

Have you not tried The Temple of Elemental Evil? You're really missing out if you haven't. Imagine that kind of combat in Baldur's Gate. It's the kind of awesome too good to ever happen. I think your ignorance of the rules of old school D&D are another reason why you think the current style of combat is acceptable. While it's good enough, it's hardly great.

Heck here's a link to a demo - ToEE Demo on File Planet

Anyone who thinks the spacebar pause style was the best way to handle D&D combat in a video game should *really* try that demo.

Even better, try Darksun: Shattered Lands. I spent so many hours in that game playing and re-playing with the same characters. The sequel was a mess, but then Fallout 1 came out a few years later and life was complete.

TOEE has great combat, but that's all it has. The graphics are very nice, too. However the story is just shit.
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62.
 
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 18:35
62.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 18:35
Mar 30, 2012, 18:35
 
Scottish Martial Arts wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 18:20:
Just because it's a tile based engine doesn't mean those tiles are not textured.

The Infinity Engine is NOT tile-based. Each area is a fixed-resolution continuous 2D bitmap. As such, "upgrading the textures" would mean each area would need to be redrawn by hand. It's not feasible.

If the backgrounds were originally drawn or painted by hand then those original pieces of art still exist somewhere and could be digitized at a much higher resolution than whatever was available in 1998.
61.
 
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 18:33
61.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 18:33
Mar 30, 2012, 18:33
 
nin wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 18:04:
If you don't like that sort of gameplay, fine. But don't insist BG should change so it's more like some other game that wasn't BG.

Have you not tried The Temple of Elemental Evil? You're really missing out if you haven't. Imagine that kind of combat in Baldur's Gate. It's the kind of awesome too good to ever happen. I think your ignorance of the rules of old school D&D are another reason why you think the current style of combat is acceptable. While it's good enough, it's hardly great.

Heck here's a link to a demo - ToEE Demo on File Planet

Anyone who thinks the spacebar pause style was the best way to handle D&D combat in a video game should *really* try that demo.
60.
 
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 18:27
60.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 18:27
Mar 30, 2012, 18:27
 
If you don't like that sort of gameplay, fine. But don't insist BG should change so it's more like some other game that wasn't BG.

The suggestion wasn't to make the combat system like Call of Duty, but to make it more like ToEE, i.e. a true turn-based game. The IE real-time with pause system was not at all suited to DnD, which was always designed to work as a turn-based system. Anyone that says otherwise has clearly never played a Gold Box game.
59.
 
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 18:20
59.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 18:20
Mar 30, 2012, 18:20
 
Just because it's a tile based engine doesn't mean those tiles are not textured.

The Infinity Engine is NOT tile-based. Each area is a fixed-resolution continuous 2D bitmap. As such, "upgrading the textures" would mean each area would need to be redrawn by hand. It's not feasible.

This comment was edited on Mar 30, 2012, 18:27.
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Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 18:15
58.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 18:15
Mar 30, 2012, 18:15
 
Krovven wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 12:16:
There are also options to pause the game after each turn to make it full turn-based.


That's not true turn-based though -- actions still occur simultaneously. I wouldn't necessarily describe IE combat as twitchy, but it was real-time and it was a mess in comparison to the Gold Box games or ToEE.
57.
 
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 18:04
nin
57.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 18:04
Mar 30, 2012, 18:04
nin
 
Mad Max RW wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 17:44:
nin wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 16:50:

Blasphemy! This isn't Call of Dooty.




Read my previous post, genius.


No thanks. I knew nothing about 2.5 going into the BG and IWD games, and I figured it out, and they worked just fine.

If you don't like that sort of gameplay, fine. But don't insist BG should change so it's more like some other game that wasn't BG.

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Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 17:44
56.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 17:44
Mar 30, 2012, 17:44
 
nin wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 16:50:

Blasphemy! This isn't Call of Dooty.




Read my previous post, genius.
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55.
 
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 17:41
55.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 17:41
Mar 30, 2012, 17:41
 
Mad Max RW wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 16:33:
Krovven wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 12:16:
Twitchy combat? What?

Spacebar = Pause. Assign your commands, press Spacebar again. There are also options to pause the game after each turn to make it full turn-based.

And that's precisely what's wrong with BG's combat system.

Agree. To this day.
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Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 17:38
54.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 17:38
Mar 30, 2012, 17:38
 
deqer wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 17:08:
nin wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 16:57:

Seriously, how old are you?

I just think it's sad that companies continue their business by selling patched versions of their previous titles, rather developing new titles. Anything that is considered a patch, is considered free.

Projects like this are often a way for companies to generate enough sales to justify publishers being involved in further projects using the existing IP. Since this is a licensed property, a publisher has to be involved.

From that perspective, it makes perfect sense to "test the waters" with a relatively low-cost, low-risk project before producing more expensive, higher-risk content.
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Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming
Mar 30, 2012, 17:08
53.
Re: Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition OS X Plans & Cross-Platform Gaming Mar 30, 2012, 17:08
Mar 30, 2012, 17:08
 
nin wrote on Mar 30, 2012, 16:57:

Seriously, how old are you?

I just think it's sad that companies continue their business by selling patched versions of their previous titles, rather developing new titles. Anything that is considered a patch, is considered free.
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