Given the surprisingly huge success of Baldur's Gate III, it seemed only logical that Larian Studios would develop a major story DLC or Baldur's Gate IV. There has now been an official update in this regard.
The role-playing epic Baldur's Gate III celebrated an extremely good start last year and subsequently enjoyed immense success – not only in terms of excellent reviews, but also commercially. Hardly anyone thought it was possible in this form beforehand, perhaps not even Larian Studios itself. Now that it is like that, one thing actually seemed logical and logical: The developers would certainly bring a big story DLC or even a sequel in the form of Baldur's Gate IV onto the market, right?
Unfortunately, the development studio has now released a rather disappointing update for fans of Baldur's Gate: There will be neither an expansion to the current RPG epic nor a successor in the form of Baldur's Gate IV. Background: Larian Studios is completely turning its back on the D&D franchise and reorienting itself.
At the Game Developers Conference, studio founder Swen Vincke spoke about the topic as part of a panel on Thursday. Unfortunately, his statements leave little room for interpretation, so fans of Baldur's Gate have to be accordingly strong. Specifically he said:
“Baldur's Gate III will always have a heart and a warm place in our hearts. We will forever be proud of it, but we will not continue it. We will not make new expansions, as everyone expects of us. We will not be Baldur's Gate 4 will do what everyone expects of us. We'll move on, we'll say goodbye to D&D and we'll start making a whole new thing.”
Had a lot of time to reflect on this incredible adventure as everyone has, and I can’t explain how excited I am for the next. Hope you join us for that! Shoutout to the hungry legend that is Mr Vincke. A wonderful man who wants to go, go, go. Let’s go! https://t.co/pNZoZXG0tw
— Very AFK (@Cromwelp) March 21, 2024
Subsequently, Michael Douse, Director of Publishing at Larian, also confirmed in a post on X that there will no longer be a sequel to Baldur's Gate III in any form.
Vincke himself went into more detail about the decision with his colleagues at Gamespot. In an interview there, he explained that the original plan was different: they actually wanted to continue Baldur's Gate, but after careful consideration they came to the conclusion that that wasn't what Larian Studios was actually intended for were made. “That's not what we're made for. It's literally the opposite of what Larian is about. We want to do big, new things. We don't want to rehash the stuff we've already done.”
Larian Studios is breaking new ground – to the chagrin of Baldur's Gate fans. After all, further work on improving Baldur's Gate III is not yet over – just last month, cross-platform mod support for the game was promised, which is still to come, as well as other general improvements.
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