Although Baldur's Gate 3 is undeniably visually impressive, it isn't quite as graphics-forward as other big RPGs – but that was an intentional decision on Larian Studios' part, according to technical director Bert van Semmertier.
The lead reveals as much in a new issue of Edge, explaining that the developers "deliberately stay a bit behind the curve" with their in-house Divinity Engine – a toolset they've upgraded for Divinity now.
That's because, although Larian could try and outdo other visually stunning games with mind-boggling ray-tracing and the like, the studio opts not to so as to keep its own titles within the scope of its team's size.
After all, we're talking about a team that started with far fewer devs than most. "If the vision was to allow the simulation and rendering of hundreds of characters in a single location," though, "we would sit together with a part of the team and discuss requirements and potential solutions," van Semmertier admits.
"Having ownership over your engine allows you to do anything you want, basically." But, again, limitations just make sense sometimes.
In fact, Baldur's Gate 3 itself suffered quite a big technical restriction: "A longstanding limitation we had in multiplayer is that players could not cross acts individually. You always needed to transition together as a party, and this had an impact on how we built our world and how the story needed to be structured."
I never thought of it this way personally, as my pals and I tend to progress alongside one another regardless, but I get what he means.
Folks can't just dive into Act 2 if others don't agree to do so, too, which impacts the creation of mods as well. That's one of the reasons that custom campaigns – which were largely popular in Larian's past titles like Divinity: Original Sin 2 – are taking so long to come to fruition.
Sure, we've got projects like Return to Candlekeep underway, but it's been a long road, and limitations like the multiplayer restriction van Semmertier mentions haven't helped. Thankfully, however, the technical director says Divinity – Larian's exciting upcoming RPG – won't suffer the same problems.
"In the next iteration of our engine, this is a limitation we have completely removed," as he concludes. "There is no limitation anymore on how big an act can be." That's thrilling, but admittedly also a bit daunting. I've got well over 1,000 hours in Baldur's Gate 3, and I easily spend 60 hours exploring every nook and cranny of Act 1.
It does beg the question, just how massive will Divinity be? There's no telling, I suppose, but seeing as it boasts an "even better character creator" and more, I'm guessing huge.
