Baldur’s Gate 3 Review

With thanks to the folks at Larian Studios we’re bringing you our full Baldur’s Gate 3 video review, and our extended written review as well. Importantly, our look into the digital Dungeons and Dragons also includes our common-sense parent’s guide. If you’re looking to know if Baldur’s Gate 3 is any good, or if it’s safe for kids, we’ve got all you need right here.

Watch the video, or scroll down for our extended written review. If you’re feeling like a quicker look is up your alley, our review-in-under-a-minute is live on TikTok right now. If turn-based or real-time strategy is your thing, don’t forget to check out Chaosgate – Daemonhunters, Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew or Stranded: Alien Dawn.

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The Basics – What is Baldur’s Gate 3 About?

Available on: PC (Steam), Xbox, PS5.
Price: £57.99 / $69.99
Type: TTRPG Adaptation
Download: 125GB (PC)

This is Larian Studio’s third foray into the digital RPG world with the Baldur’s Gate franchise. Since 2012 the series has come along in leaps and bounds to provide an exemplary digital Dungeons and Dragons experience.

Players will create a new level one character (or select one of the pre-built options available), and lead an adventure along the Sword Coast. After making your primary character you’ll be joined by a host of other characters, controlling these in and outside of turn-based battle. It’s also possible to work together in multiplayer, with each player controlling a character within the narrative.

As in its pen and paper counterpart, you’ll level up characters, make narrative choices and choose your own adventure throughout the title. As you weave your way to the city of Baldur’s Gate, you’ll rely on automated and manual dice-rolling checks to decide whether or not your choices work.

There’s a good selection of standard D&D races and classes to choose from, and in-depth customisation (even, slightly strangely, down to the shape and type of genitals). In addition, the narrative choices available do mean that each player can have a wildly different experience, bringing the spirit of the community-based tabletop experience into digital format once again.

Xbox Series S|X Console Optimisation

As well as spending some time with the title over on PC, we’ve been lucky enough to check out Baldur’s Gate 3 on Xbox. We’ve put some hours into the console counterpart now, and have found that (for the most part) performance has been largely comparable with the PC version.

This is certainly true in terms of visuals. Even up close, things are looking pretty great over here on Xbox Series X. We still get the odd awkward animation (as we did on PC) but overall things perform pretty well. There aren’t any major frame rate drops unless we’re in larger battles, and sailing has been pretty smooth through the digital sword coast.

After setting up a Larian account, we’ve also found cross-platform progress sharing has worked really well. Save games uploaded to the Larian cloud are processed pretty quickly, and available for other platforms within moments. Because of this, we’ve been able to continue our progress in the office as well as at home, which has been especially welcome over the holiday period.

The largest change when moving over to console has of course been the controls. We’ve been a little disappointed to find no mouse and keyboard support over on Xbox, which is a shame as other strategy titles have leveraged this well. Controller optimisation hasn’t been awful, and certainly for moving characters this does work well. The action wheels are a great option for putting the large number of available actions in one place.

I would definitely have liked to see faster and more effective action wheel customisation here, as it does feel a little clunky when editing. In addition, movement of the console’s mouse cursor can be a little tricky to pick out objects on floors above or below. Apart from this, however, I’ve been really happy with the console port here on Xbox. Things are working smoothly, it looks good and still manages to bring the TTRPG feel into our home.

Is Baldur’s Gate 3 Safe for Children?

Rating: Adults Only.

Baldur’s Gate 3 is rated by PEGI at 18 and above, and by the ESRB at a Mature 17+. This is based on a wide array of different adult themes. Combat of course includes blood, but there is also gore in various areas including piles of bodies, beheadings and all sorts. This is backed by ominous characters and a variety of demons, creepy crawlies and hybrids which will be incredibly scary for younger ages.

There is also full frontal nudity in the title, and fairly in-depth sex scenes with characters. This can also includes opportunities to pursue romance while in animal form, for certain classes.

Overall, this is certainly not one for younger eyes and we are rating it as firmly Adults Only. Don’t forget you can check out the Family Gaming Database entry for more information.

The Run Down – Our Five-Point Rating for Baldur’s Gate 3

Gameplay – 5: Baldur’s Gate 3 really captures the spirit of the tabletop adventure. Mechanics do lean heavily on the pen and paper predecessor, to great effect, while providing guidance for inexperienced players. This is an incredibly solid build, and contains a great balance of character choice, and a good blend of automatic and manual dice rolling.

Visuals – 4: Environment visuals are wonderful here, and it’s clear that a lot of work has gone into them. Sadly character animations, camera angles and some effects do feel rather dated, but overall it definitely comes out on the good side of average.

Audio – 4: Voice acting in Baldur’s Gate 3 is outstanding, and effects are nicely implemented as well. Background chatter can get repetitive as you walk around the map, but with thousands of vocal lines recorded this has been a gargantuan effort from the team at Larian.

Narrative – 5: We’ll have to caveat this and say that it of course depends on players’ choices, but there are a huge number of brilliant narrative threads that the player can follow. It’s entirely possible for players to mess this up for themselves, but that’s just the beauty of dungeons and dragons in a nutshell.

Replay – 5: Baldur’s gate has near infinite replay value. As well as each new character offering the potential for new play styles, these can and will have a direct effect on the narrative around you as you replay the game. Add to this the multiplayer options, twitch integration and other aspects, and it’s a game which not only accepts but generously rewards multiple playthroughs.

The Verdict – Is Baldur’s Gate 3 Worth It?

Overall, the Pixel Bandits’ Roll a Performance Check for me, Please level for our Baldur’s Gate 3 review is an Outstanding 9 / 10.. While it’s not quite a Nat 20 critical success, Baldur’s Gate 3 provides an incredible, varied and entertaining video game adaptation for D&D fans. The camera angles and audio repetition can get a little frustrating at times, but it is all more than won over with an incredibly expansive and immersive world.

Gamers may have to approach this with a slight mindset shift, as it’s completely possible to fail at tasks within the title and carry on playing, just like when you’re sat around a table. Failing a check and having to take a different road might be strange, but it perfectly reflects the real world game so accurately it hurts.

Baldur’s Gate 3 also manages to really capture the silliness you can find around a TTRPG table, as well as the heroism and Rule of Cool moments. There isn’t a Dungeon Master to protect you from making awful decisions, but living with those decisions makes the game what it is.

It might not be one for our micro-bandits, but it’s definitely one you should add to your collection as soon as you possibly can.

As ever, to provide this review and common-sense parent’s guide, we received a free copy of Baldur’s Gate 3 from the folks at Larian.