Larian's been cookin' hard with this title, as within the first playthrough, I already knew this game would be my #1, there is a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of reasons why, and I'm gonna try and list them all as accurately and honestly, as possible.

---

I would say I'm a person who really loves RPGs, with no prior DnD experience ( although I always wanted to try it lol ), I played titles such as The Witcher 3, Skyrim, Elden Ring, Kingdom Come : Deliverance, RDR2 and many other titles.

---

The part, where the game already outshines most of the games. You are able to do ABSOLUTELY (no pun intended) everything, from ♥♥♥♥♥♥' a PEGI 18 version of Squidward with sociopathic tendencies, to slaughterin' whole cities, the game puts no boundaries whatsoever on your psycho decisions. Then again, you can also be a 'good guy' and get to heal a hot deranged vampire, with all sorts of mental issues, make a revolution against the rich and guide your people against the forces of the evil, and those are only the story decisions. You are completely free in your free roaming journey aswell, getting creative pays off extremely well . Find out on your own, but in all honesty, I was very impressed by all the stuff you can do, how you can approach each situation, what new places and characters you find on a new playthrough, with each minor decision having a big consequence.

---

Another part, where the game is doing exceptionally well - THE ♥♥♥♥♥♥ REPLAYABILITY . I have around 245 hours as of now and I'm still far away from trying everything new, mind you, I also skipped some cutscenes and content intentionally in multiplayer honor run. Each playthrough just feels so different, with endless possibilities and unique situations, you are basically never running out of good content. The thing I love the most is trying out all the classes, so far I've tried Wizard, Paladin, Rogue and now I'm currently playing Bard, each one of these felt so different and I loved them all. (tbh, Wizard is my fav) I'm still looking forward to play some more, because I know there is more content to find in this masterpiece of a game.

---

I'm going to mix up the two of those together, because I want to cover the whole juicy part of the game. As mentioned before, I played ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of games, RPGs mostly, and I still have to say, this game features one of the best stories, audiovisuals, characters, and themes I've ever seen in videogames, maybe only contending with Witcher saga and RDR. Characters are believable, voice acting is top tier and even random NPC's feel alive. Story has the ideal pacing for anyone, because YOU are the one who creates the pacing of the game, as it is completely interactive . Anyways, that being said, there are also exceptions and I found some characters a bit weaker compared to the large majority of main characters, but still a 6/10 bare minimum, even the worst antagonist's motives, themes, personality and design are good enough to stand out above some other RPG games villains. I would like to go more into depth about each main character, but that would be spoiler heavy and way too tedious to write and compromise into a single piece of text.

---

Now for the controversial part, the infamous turn-based combat. Seriously tho, I wasn't the biggest fan at first, and I understand it might feel off-putting. However, I'm glad I gave it a chance because it felt surprisingly satisfying and grew up to me, at least in this game. Now, I consider this type of gameplay to be very enjoyable, if not superior to live action, each encounter plays out different, the whole world around you is interactive. In what game you can make your enemies slip on frozen pool of water, melting said frozen pool with fireball, making your enemies soaked in the melted water, just to electrocute their asses with chain lightning, all while having your bear-shapeshifted druid massacring them in the front line. Although occasionally the combat loses its pacing, especially when there are multiple characters or entities present in the fight, you still get to use your damn tactical genius and boy, it does feel good to win against superior numbers. After all, it is a DnD-based game, where everything happens in turns.

---

Amazing. Ignoring the little AI misperfections, it is truly amazing. Combine all the interactive behavior of the world around you with the unlimited ways to approach each different scenario, and you get this. There is a huge variety of builds, ways to prepare for fights, solve problems, and puzzles. You can loot just about anything, cast Fog Cloud on traders, making them confused while stealing all their stuff, make them fall asleep with Feign Death, or take the more radical approach. Necromancers can have their barbarian pick up all the corpses that stayed intact after a hard fight, stash em up in a camp chest, making them ready for their next usage. Your companions will have remarks about the stuff going around you, aswell as having little unique conversations among themselves. Their path tracing sucks ass though. Wish the character creation was better aswell, I know some people don't really bother with it, but the game features few premade skulls and voices, where you get to change skin color, eyes and the surface area only (yes, even your pp). Don't get me wrong, you still have so much space to create a unique character, but I just don't really like my barbarian half-orc sounding like an effeminate wizard twink. I would also like to mention multiplayer, which is another supreme aspect about this game, playing any games with friends is super fun, but I feel like this is a whole journey, where funny ♥♥♥♥ happens all the time, we were goofing around on honor mode, almost losing our run multiple times, but man, was it a ride, needless to say, Act III can be buggy, but about that in technical state category.

---

This category, while close to flawless throughout the whole game, peaked out in Act II for me. Boris Slavov was cookin' hard with the soundtrack, fitting to every situation, like an ass to a pot. Raphael's Final Act, Bhaal's Legacy, I Want To Live, Shadows, Curse and Death are my personal favs, because of my experience with each of them. Stunning, goosebumps all over body, Witcher 3 had me feeling the same, and that's hell of a compliment. About the aesthetic, it's pretty much what you would imagine for a DnD world. From darker fantasy elements, to cozy camp vibes and lively crossroad taverns, all the way to huge city with bustling life, I've heard people say they were overloaded with all the stuff going around and while I don't share their experience, I can for sure understand WHY they felt that way, because the game is just that immersive. (Still don't like my twink half-orc, but hey, there's mods and possibly future update addresing this)

---

This one is probably the weakest point of the game, luckily though, it's still not that bad, and devs are giving the game love and care it deserves, listening to feedback. I haven't found any bug really, atleast not in my solo playthroughs, multiplayer kinda sucked in this aspect. The thing is, Act III is poorly optimised performance-wise. I run the game on RX 6800 and R5 5600, with AFMF and FSR enabled, and still get fps drops to around 40-50 in crowded areas. Can't feel nothing, but empathy for notebook/console players, who get FPS taxed badly.

---

Thanks for reading guys, overall the game is ~9.0/10, the best game I've ever played by a decent margin, loads of love to Larian, deserved GOTY!

[h1] Overview[/h1] Larian's been cookin' hard with this title, as within the first playthrough, I already knew this game would be my #1, there is a shitton of reasons why, and I'm gonna try and list them all as accurately and honestly, as possible. [hr][/hr] [h2] Who's rating ? [/h2] I would say I'm a person who really loves RPGs, with no prior DnD experience ([strike] although I always wanted to try it lol [/strike]), I played titles such as The Witcher 3, Skyrim, Elden Ring, Kingdom Come : Deliverance, RDR2 and many other titles. [hr][/hr] [h2] Player freedom [/h2] The part, where the game already outshines most of the games. You are able to do [b] ABSOLUTELY [/b] (no pun intended) everything, from fuckin' a PEGI 18 version of Squidward with sociopathic tendencies, to slaughterin' whole cities, the game puts no boundaries whatsoever on your psycho decisions. Then again, you can also be a 'good guy' and get to heal a hot deranged vampire, with all sorts of mental issues, make a revolution against the rich and guide your people against the forces of the evil, and those are only the story decisions. You are completely free in your free roaming journey aswell, getting creative pays off [b] extremely well [/b]. Find out on your own, but in all honesty, I was very impressed by all the stuff you can do, how you can approach each situation, what new places and characters you find on a new playthrough, with each minor decision having a big consequence. [hr][/hr] [h2] Replayability [/h2] Another part, where the game is doing exceptionally well - [b] THE FUCKIN REPLAYABILITY [/b]. I have around 245 hours as of now and I'm still far away from trying everything new, mind you, I also skipped some cutscenes and content intentionally in multiplayer honor run. Each playthrough just feels so different, with endless possibilities and unique situations, you are basically never running out of good content. The thing I love the most is trying out all the classes, so far I've tried Wizard, Paladin, Rogue and now I'm currently playing Bard, each one of these felt so different and I loved them all. (tbh, Wizard is my fav) I'm still looking forward to play some more, because I know there is more content to find in this masterpiece of a game. [hr][/hr] [h2] Story(telling) [/h2] I'm going to mix up the two of those together, because I want to cover the whole juicy part of the game. As mentioned before, I played shitton of games, RPGs mostly, and I still have to say, this game features one of the best stories, audiovisuals, characters, and themes I've ever seen in videogames, maybe only contending with Witcher saga and RDR. Characters are believable, voice acting is top tier and even random NPC's feel alive. Story has the ideal pacing for anyone, because YOU are the one who creates the pacing of the game, as it is [b] completely interactive [/b]. Anyways, that being said, there are also exceptions and I found some characters a bit weaker compared to the large majority of main characters, but still a 6/10 bare minimum, even the worst antagonist's motives, themes, personality and design are good enough to stand out above some other RPG games villains. I would like to go more into depth about each main character, but that would be spoiler heavy and way too tedious to write and compromise into a single piece of text. [hr][/hr] [h2] Combat [/h2] Now for the controversial part, the infamous turn-based combat. Seriously tho, I wasn't the biggest fan at first, and I understand it might feel off-putting. However, I'm glad I gave it a chance because it felt surprisingly satisfying and grew up to me, at least in this game. Now, I consider this type of gameplay to be very enjoyable, if not superior to live action, each encounter plays out different, the whole world around you is interactive. In what game you can make your enemies slip on frozen pool of water, melting said frozen pool with fireball, making your enemies soaked in the melted water, just to electrocute their asses with chain lightning, all while having your bear-shapeshifted druid massacring them in the front line. Although occasionally the combat loses its pacing, especially when there are multiple characters or entities present in the fight, you still get to use your damn tactical genius and boy, it does feel good to win against superior numbers. After all, it is a DnD-based game, where everything happens in turns. [hr][/hr] [h2] Gameplay [/h2] Amazing. Ignoring the little AI misperfections, it is truly amazing. Combine all the interactive behavior of the world around you with the unlimited ways to approach each different scenario, and you get this. There is a huge variety of builds, ways to prepare for fights, solve problems, and puzzles. You can loot just about anything, cast Fog Cloud on traders, making them confused while stealing all their stuff, make them fall asleep with Feign Death, or take the more radical approach. Necromancers can have their barbarian pick up all the corpses that stayed intact after a hard fight, stash em up in a camp chest, making them ready for their next usage. Your companions will have remarks about the stuff going around you, aswell as having little unique conversations among themselves. [strike] [i] Their path tracing sucks ass though. [/i] [/strike] Wish the character creation was better aswell, I know some people don't really bother with it, but the game features few premade skulls and voices, where you get to change skin color, eyes and the surface area only (yes, even your pp). Don't get me wrong, you still have so much space to create a unique character, but I just don't really like my barbarian half-orc sounding like an effeminate wizard twink. I would also like to mention multiplayer, which is another supreme aspect about this game, playing any games with friends is super fun, but I feel like this is a whole journey, where funny shit happens all the time, we were goofing around on honor mode, almost losing our run multiple times, but man, was it a ride, needless to say, Act III can be buggy, but about that in technical state category. [hr][/hr] [h2] Audiovisuals/Aesthetic [/h2] This category, while close to flawless throughout the whole game, peaked out in Act II for me. Boris Slavov was cookin' hard with the soundtrack, fitting to every situation, like an ass to a pot. Raphael's Final Act, Bhaal's Legacy, I Want To Live, Shadows, Curse and Death are my personal favs, because of my experience with each of them. Stunning, goosebumps all over body, Witcher 3 had me feeling the same, and that's hell of a compliment. About the aesthetic, it's pretty much what you would imagine for a DnD world. From darker fantasy elements, to cozy camp vibes and lively crossroad taverns, all the way to huge city with bustling life, I've heard people say they were overloaded with all the stuff going around and while I don't share their experience, I can for sure understand [b] WHY [/b] they felt that way, because the game is just that immersive. (Still don't like my twink half-orc, but hey, there's mods and possibly future update addresing this) [hr][/hr] [h2] Technical State [/h2] This one is probably the weakest point of the game, luckily though, it's still not that bad, and devs are giving the game love and care it deserves, listening to feedback. I haven't found any bug really, atleast not in my solo playthroughs, multiplayer kinda sucked in this aspect. The thing is, Act III is poorly optimised performance-wise. I run the game on RX 6800 and R5 5600, with AFMF and FSR enabled, and still get fps drops to around 40-50 in crowded areas. Can't feel nothing, but empathy for notebook/console players, who get FPS taxed badly. [hr][/hr] [i] Thanks for reading guys, overall the game is ~9.0/10, the best game I've ever played by a decent margin, loads of love to Larian, deserved GOTY! [/i]