Larian Studios Made a Staggering Amount of Money on Baldur's Gate 3

Exactly, make games that gamers love and u will never be disappointed.... That's the Mantra......

in other news the earth is mostly water

I'm no finance guy but how can they be in Belgium but use Ireland's tax laws?

This game does representation and diversity right. These things are just a facet of a character, not their entire personality like other games make the mistake of doing. They don't beat you over the head with lectures and lessons either. The characters are what they are and that's it. Deal with it or don't. Play and engage with it however you want, the world is effectively your sandbox.

@Paramahansa headquarters location I'm assuming

Been a fan since D:OS1, they've become masters of their trade. Well deserved success for sure. I'm not a blind-faith-day-one-purchase kind of guy, but it's pretty damn close with this studio. 🥳

@Paramahansa it's like how Apple gets out of paying taxes in the United States by saying there located in the jersey islands on some bs stuff 😅

@Paramahansa I'm guessing here but Dublin didn't leave Europe so maybe it's more a case of European tax laws?

@beltmenot "in other news the earth is mostly water." After the weekend most of great Britain and England are mostly bloody water...

So... I think it's a little silly talking about 2023 profits... when it's the the expenditure over the previous xx years of development that you need to compare against (case in point, they were at a loss in 2022... because BG3 hadn't been released yet... and I assume much the same the year before). The cost of production is not in the final year, so it's hard to say how successful they really were - but I think we can safely say it was 'not a bad year'.

@LifeGirl sure, sure.

I love how the definition changes based on the game's/movie's/tvshow's success.

@MeanBeanEgg I'm not sure if comments like these are intentionally reductive or not, but it's not hard to understand.

Different people respond differently to different content. Some folks didn't like the fan service in Stellar Blade, many don't like blatant identity politics in their escapism. The prominence, execution and influence on gameplay that these elements have dictate how much of a negative they're perceived as. People weigh negatives against positives when deciding how they feel about a game.

Baldur's Gate 3 is an exceptionally well made game. Unsurprisingly it sells well, despite how a subset of its playerbase might feel about some of its content.

@Weez So they should just criticise the writing and execution. Simple. The woke lists that mention BG3 definitively do not do so, they mention the content itself.

@LifeGirl if you make it mean whatever you want it to mean at the time, until it loses all meaning whatsoever.

@ShadowofSparta Why? People disagree with content. Execution can make it more or less egregious. A "woke list" is no different to all the press asides about Eve's sexualization - they indicate content.

I agree there's room for nuance, and it's up to every player to make an informed decision when buying a game, but I fail to see the issue with someone being informed of what's in it.

@naruball aka 'Moving the goalposts'
Doesn't change the fact that one of the best games of 2023 was woke. If the game was a financial failure the YouTube chuds would be laying into it.

@Anzac it's really funny. Before Barbie the movie came out, under every single article about the movie and its stars people were calling it woke for x, y and z and asserting it'll be a failure, because "go woke, go broke". Then it became a huge success and suddenly they were acting like it wasn't really woke.

Now the same thing is happening with the movie "Wicked" with most of the hate being directed towards the black female lead. After first week box office numbers, it magically stopped being woke

And like you said TBG3 was called woke and became a huge success. So, in order to cope they say that it's not woke because x, y, and z. Just a few days ago, Elon Musk was fuming over video games that offered gamers the option to choose gender. They will never, ever admit they're wrong no matter how many facts one presents to them.

@LifeGirl sure, buddy.

@LifeGirl "Radical left wing politics" - none of which are found I BG3.

@MrPeanutbutterz Which is why it isn't woke.

@naruball Ask a question but you do not like the answer. I'm not surprised tbh.

They made a fantastic game they deserve it.

@MrPeanutbutterz The anti woke crew the worst that ever came to gaming. For the people who don't like politics in games they seems to push their own personal politic views on everyone somehow.

@LifeGirl My definition of the antiwoke crew.

Team was struggling. They put everything they had and risked it all and WON BIG! Congrats.

@LifeGirl nor am I. Your definition is so vague that it can fit each and every case, so you can never be wrong.

Game was a failure? It's because of "the insertion of radical left wing politics where it is neither wanted by the majority of people nor needed".

Game was a success? There wasn't an "insertion of radical left wing politics; it was totally wanted and needed".

Heads I win. Tails you lose. I get all the internet cookies

I’m still one of those guys who hasn’t purchased BG3. I played the demo and was intrigued, so I will likely add a few dollars to Larian’s coffers once it gets the discount frequented by Divinity 2, which I own but haven’t played much.

@8bit4Life same here. Since it's heavy on text, I'll probably buy it on PC instead, if my poor laptop can run it.

@naruball I can run it at max on laptop RTX2500 and id 12450H. It can just about handle 1440p. That's a pretty bad GPU for modern games.

@mkr that's good to know. Cheers!

@Northern_munkey damn...😂

@naruball "Heads I win. Tails you lose. I get all the internet cookies 😉." Lmao..I love the hypocrisy demonstrated by both the "woke" and the "antiwoke" brigade. Neither side gets it right and it always ends up in verbal fisticuffs..

@Northern_munkey
" Lmao..I love the hypocrisy demonstrated by both the "woke" and the "antiwoke" brigade.

It is always good for an eye roll and a healthy snort, ha.

People are people, and we are all of us ridiculous, let's just play games eh

@CallMeDuraSouk👍

I put a lot of hours into my playthrough. I wish the game let you mulligan dice rolls every now and then, because my time played doing everything I can find was 106 hours… no way someone is gonna accept really terrible roles that ruin entire storylines because “I guess I will do it in the next 106 hour playthrough I will do sometime probably after 2050.”

By the end the amount of time reloading saves or simply accepting missed quests and rolling my eyes, it kinda had me irritated and disappointed with the finale. The entire Third Act in the city itself was just way way too prone to one bad dice roll cascading into you getting pissed off as it ruined a quest here and there (for those who don’t know, third act had more side quests than the rest of the game)

@LifeGirl woke is an illusive term that is relative to many. I find the term most useful for established IPs when they modify a beloved male character then replace them with some empowered character whom checks DEI points of the day. I’m simple I just don’t buy games that have a hint of things I don’t believe in. It’s very easy for me to detect the ethos of any entertainment product. No label required by the masses for me to make my own assessments.

@MeanBeanEgg people are disgruntled because the west has been feminized for decades. There has been a covert and overt narratives against the main culture groups in insert western country X. On the surface there is no problem with female leads or different ethnic groups for new IPs. Fans just don’t like to see established IPs be modified. I myself don’t like to see established IPs modified. As people should just make a new IP instead of giving handicap status or propping up the empowered groups whom are everyone but blokes with the snow texture package. In the west everyone has an opportunity to make some entertainment product.

No surprise. People are a big fan of dungeons and dragons. This is a popular IP to a large segment of gamers. I will never buy it. But it’s nice to see a gaming industry with a variety of genres.

@LifeGirl Nuanced thought process is not these people's strong suit, I wouldn't even bother.

@naruball BG3 is successful not because it's woke; it's successful because it's a great game first and it's not trying hard to push agendas at the expense of the product.

@puddinggirl I'm sorry, but you seem to be missing the point that people like myself are trying to make. We don't attribute a game's success to its wokeness, but argue that just because it is or is perceived as woke, it doesn't mean that it will fail financially (that's what "go woke, go broke" suggests). It may or may not.

A game's success or failure depends on various factors, including quality, brand recognition, marketing, advertising, promotions, hype, nostalgia, luck (e.g. a famous youtuber likes it) etc.

As for "trying to push agendas", it's so vague that it can apply to anything one doesn't like.

@Northern_munkey yup. Any extreme is wrong imo, including far right and far left people. The truth tends to lie somewhere in the middle.

This is a true success story for Larian Studios, showing how strategic thinking and risk-taking can lead to incredible results. Just a year ago, they were in the red, and now with a staggering €249 million profit for 2023, it’s not just a financial turnaround for the studio but a revolution for indie developers. It reminds me of my own experience with https://rwc2020.org/, where sometimes I make a bet in uncertain conditions, hoping for a big result, and occasionally, that choice brings a real win. Now, Larian can confidently plan for the future, without looking back at past failures.