I’m no stranger to D&D. Or RPGs. Or dungeon crawlers. Or PC gaming. But one of the quintessential gaming series that combines all of those? Yeah, that blew right past me.

Growing up, the Baldur’s Gate games were always in my periphery, especially since many of my school friends were into it and Diablo (which I also didn’t dip into until its third entry). So I was pretty keen to get my hands on the much-anticipated Baldur’s Gate 3, now available via Steam’s early access.

Baldur’s Gate 3 kicks off with a bombastic entry-point: your character is a prisoner on a Mind Flayer air ship and is infected with an Illithid tadpole. These tadpoles eventually transform their hosts into Mind Flayers; humanoid creatures with octopus-like heads and psychic abilities. The ship is eventually under attack which leads to your character breaking free and recruiting help from other prisoners to sabotage the vessel from the inside. When that’s achieved, the quest begins to seek aid from someone who can remove the parasite that threatens your character’s life.

The first thing to strike me upon starting the game was how great everything looks. Character models are incredibly detailed, as well as the environments. Being in early access means the game is still far from complete, and it definitely shows at times. Despite how great its visual presentation is, Baldur’s Gate 3 does have some performance issues. The expectation is that these bugs will be addressed over time, such as stuttering during some attacks, stiff conversation animations, and general UI blips. For the most part the game runs decently on my rig, which is equipped with a Ryzen 5 3600 and RTX 2060 Super.

I was really quite impressed with the amount of recorded dialogue - outside of the player character. Even some conversations with party members seem to have been motion captured, or at least well animated in tandem, with the dialogue as the characters perform realistically. Unfortunately this kind of detail is a little inconsistent, where it’s easy to tell when other conversations are given more generic movements (and some even have none at all--for now). Another shortcoming is that the protagonist currently does not have voiced dialogue. However, in a recent Reddit AMA, Larian Studios’ Creative Director, Swen Vincke, confirmed that the player character will be fully voiced eventually.

Speaking of dialogue, conversations in Baldur’s Gate 3 feel wonderfully organic. Rather than just being minutes-long spouts of exposition, conversations can branch off into various directions to the point where if you fail an ability check dependent on your character’s traits, it might end up in initiating a fight, or avoiding a fight, or even resulting in a character’s death. It feels as dynamic as playing IRL D&D, where a bad dice roll ends up in you accidentally burning down an orphanage. That said, the slight downside in my experience was that conversations sometimes went in a direction I didn’t want/intend them to, and would have to reload a previous save to reach a more favourable outcome. But that probably says more about me and the way I’m playing, rather than a knock against Larian Studios’ efforts here.

And in terms of the way I play, this game definitely has a steep learning curve, if D&D or other similarly-inspired games are new to you. There are some tutorial elements in the early game, but there are so many UI buttons and doodads on-screen that combat always felt overwhelming to me. Ten hours in, and I still don’t know how to use most of my characters’ abilities. Baldur’s Gate 3 has only just debuted in early access, so of course there will be improvements over time, and I’m sure more help will be available to newbies like me. Thankfully, Google searches have revealed a plethora of people also in the dark about ambiguous afflictions or missing quest items who are posting on Reddit and other forums, that I’ve usually been able to find solutions to most issues I’ve had.

That said, the battles are way too difficult and tedious. Again, with the amount of time I’ve spent, I am still mostly just scraping by in battles (I miss so many attacks it’s genuinely infuriating at times), but that’s usually after I’ve had to do the fight two or three times. There’s also no real way to judge whether or not my party is at the right level for a fight, so they’re just trial and error. And without much warning of a fight ahead (whether it’s the result of bad luck in a conversation, or stumbling into the wrong environment), the game’s autosaving is so unforgiving, that trying to reload back before the battle can throw you back 30-45 minutes ago. Until battles are hopefully balanced out a little better, I’d recommend getting real familiar with that quicksave button.

Despite some of the tediousness of the combat and jankiness of the animations, I’m still really enjoying my time in Baldur’s Gate 3. Mechanically, I love what Larian Studios is doing here, and I really hope they’re able to give the game a good polish and make it shine. There’s a lot to chew on here, and I’m sure over time Baldur’s Gate 3 will become a solid RPG that D&D fans will gleefully dive right into. At AUD$89.95 on early access, it’s difficult to recommend this early access title at that price. For that same amount, I’m sure you can find plenty of other hardcore RPGs that are much more stable and balanced. But if you love the series and can’t wait to start adventuring, and potentially will play through multiple character builds anyway, perhaps you’ll still get your money’s worth and have a great time. Despite that, I’m really looking forward to what the finished product