Josh Sawyer wants to make PoE3, but only if he gets a BG3 budget!

[Roguey]

IE games weren't even close to being the best selling PC-centric games, let alone best selling altogether:
For comparison, Diablo 2 sold 2 million copies in less than two months, and 4 million copies in its first year.
Morrowind did 4 million copies in about the same timespan as BG2.

Baldur's Gate did fantastically well for Interplay and Sawyer says the Icewind Dale games had an amazing ROI given their low budgets. Unfortunately Interplay was bleeding money with all their other projects. Black Isle was their most profitable division.

[rusty_shackleford]

5e/dnd name recognition/Baldur's gate IP had almost nothing to.do with its success, that I can guarantee. It's vastly overestimating how popular d&d is vs how well bg3 sold.
We can inter this just by how awful other d&d games do. We even had a direct comparison with the dark alliance 3 flop

[rusty_shackleford]

My guess is it's just a good product with excellent word of mouth advertising. I don't think much of anything can be learned from trying to understand it because it was lightning in a bottle that larian itself almost screwed up.
It launching when it did, along with being followed by starflop, is certainly part of its success. The bar was very low.

[Cedric]

The bear thing probably helped.

[Xenich]

Deadfire sold like **** because it has a terrible setting with bad factions. Almost the entire basis they try to sell the game on ('pirates!!') is just tacked on, the main focus of the story is some ******** finger wagging of colonialism and polynesians.

Marketing departments regularly rejected stupid gamedev ideas for a reason, because they're stupid people.

The pirate thing bugged the crap out of me with Risen 2. Risen 1 had some pirate stuff in it, but it felt natural in the story, not forced... then Risen 2 came out and it felt like they took "Pirates of the Caribbean" video game and threw Risen 2 as the title.

[Roguey]

The pirate thing bugged the crap out of me with Risen 2. Risen 1 had some pirate stuff in it, but it felt natural in the story, not forced... then Risen 2 came out and it felt like they took "Pirates of the Caribbean" video game and threw Risen 2 as the title.

I recall reading that someone from PB claimed that Deep Silver wanted a pirate game so they decided to turn Risen 2 into that, easy as.

[Demonic Fate]

Deadfire sold like **** because it has a terrible setting with bad factions. Almost the entire basis they try to sell the game on ('pirates!!') is just tacked on, the main focus of the story is some ******** finger wagging of colonialism and polynesians.

Marketing departments regularly rejected stupid gamedev ideas for a reason, because they're stupid people.

The pirate thing bugged the crap out of me with Risen 2. Risen 1 had some pirate stuff in it, but it felt natural in the story, not forced... then Risen 2 came out and it felt like they took "Pirates of the Caribbean" video game and threw Risen 2 as the title.

One of my favourite bands adopted the "Disney-safe pirates" gimmick... and in, like, 2022. Sigh.

[Tweed]

The bear thing probably helped.

Yes, the fact that it's a game for ******* helped a lot. As all of our resident **** will attest to.

[Cedric]

I don't think they will, nothing in that game is attractive to *******. The content is entirely aimed at portly middle-aged women.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

On MMO-C and in the discords I am in (high fantasy RPG fans who like MMOs and classic Final Fantasy and 3D Chinese gachas), the viral marketing of the character customization and then the movie cutscene presentation like Mass Effect put it on their radar. They had never played the old isometric grognard CRPGs. People are starved for high production value fantady RPGs. Besides WoW and GW2, we haven't had one in the West since Kingdoms of Amalur and Witcher 3 (disregarding Mass Effect and DAI), so these people hopped over to asian games.

[Rand]

I don't think they will, nothing in that game is attractive to *******. The content is entirely aimed at portly middle-aged women.

Remember Vergil... yeah, Astarion seems to work on certain guys too.

[rusty_shackleford]

On MMO-C and in the discords I am in (high fantasy RPG fans who like MMOs and classic Final Fantasy and 3D Chinese gachas), the viral marketing of the character customization and then the movie cutscene presentation like Mass Effect put it on their radar. They had never played the old isometric grognard CRPGs. People are starved for high production value fantady RPGs. Besides WoW and GW2, we haven't had one in the West since Kingdoms of Amalur and Witcher 3 (disregarding Mass Effect and DAI), so these people hopped over to asian games.

This is almost certainly it as far as I can tell, but obviously I can't say for certain. It feels more correct than any attempt to explain it by way of the game's mechanics or systems. That's how you win customers who are already part of your niche, not sell a blockbuster.

[Cipher]

Basically every analysis of why BG3 sold well is essentially this:


Soyer thinks it sold well because of turn-based combat because it confirms his biases. BG3 with action combat probably would have sold at least as many copies!
I'm not going to claim to know why BG3 sold so well, but I will say it probably has a lot to do with copying things that worked from when bioware games used to sell a ton of copies and combining it with what people liked about larian's prior titles.

(And yes this is directly related to soyer still melting down over BG3 years later)

It sold well because it was, to the normgroid mind, it's just Lord of the Rings, but with 'romance' in it.

It might also help you understand when you realise normgroids also consider Skyrim and the Witcher 3 to be Lord of the Rings.

It's a few things:

1st: Fans of Baldur's Gate. The name alone has a lot of clout.
2nd: Fans of D&D. This was the 5e game you can play on your own. 5e is extremely popular, like all editions of D&D have been.
3rd: Fans of Larian/Original Sin 2. OS2 was a breakout hit with both normiecattle and hardcore cRPG fans alike.

Then, combine it with it being a media darling for the woke **** and that turns into all kinds of normiecattle wanting to be in with the new 'it' game to avoid FOMO and be part of the conversation. These are the redditors that were saying that BG3 is an 'experience' and 'the best RPG of the decade that changed the gaming industry'.

[rusty_shackleford]

1st: Fans of Baldur's Gate. The name alone has a lot of clout.
2nd: Fans of D&D. This was the 5e game you can play on your own. 5e is extremely popular, like all editions of D&D have been.
3rd: Fans of Larian/Original Sin 2. OS2 was a breakout hit with both normiecattle and hardcore cRPG fans alike.

Only one of these had any impact, and it was the last one. D&D was a completely dead brand wrt video games.

1st: Fans of Baldur's Gate. The name alone has a lot of clout.

It doesn't. Most of the people who played the first game when it released have children and don't even play video games now.

5e is extremely popular,

D&D was more profitable under Gary than it is right now. D&D has since the early 80s had a far out-sized brand recognition versus its actual market size. It's a product circling the drain.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance is what happens when you create a product that attempts to sell based upon D&D branding. You can't even buy it anymore, it sold so poorly it was delisted from Steam.
To be clear, the game postdates the BG3 early access release!

[GhostCow]

I'm not going to claim to know why BG3 sold so well, but I will say it probably has a lot to do with copying things that worked from when bioware games used to sell a ton of copies and combining it with what people liked about larian's prior titles.

Honestly I think it was mostly the bear sex meme and horny women buying the game at way higher rates than other games

[rusty_shackleford]

I'm not going to claim to know why BG3 sold so well, but I will say it probably has a lot to do with copying things that worked from when bioware games used to sell a ton of copies and combining it with what people liked about larian's prior titles.

Honestly I think it was mostly the bear sex meme and horny women buying the game at way higher rates than other games

We can infer foids were an overwhelming minority based upon romance data released by Larian. Shadowheart by herself made up a simple majority of all romances, and that was with including the 'none' choice.

[rusty_shackleford]

We can infer foids were an overwhelming minority based upon romance data released by Larian. Shadowheart by herself made up a simple majority of all romances, and that was with including the 'none' choice.

Female companions took all 3 top spots, I remember it because reddit was melting down claiming it was because of lesbians

[rusty_shackleford]

If there's someone out there making a multi-hundred million dollar RPG and wants to hit BG3 numbers, I'm available for hire as an expert on marketing for the male gaze!

[Xenich]

The pirate thing bugged the crap out of me with Risen 2. Risen 1 had some pirate stuff in it, but it felt natural in the story, not forced... then Risen 2 came out and it felt like they took "Pirates of the Caribbean" video game and threw Risen 2 as the title.

I recall reading that someone from PB claimed that Deep Silver wanted a pirate game so they decided to turn Risen 2 into that, easy as.

And had nothing to do with the fact that there was a push by Hollywood for the Pirates of Caribbean franchise, which mysteriously numerous game studios were putting out similarly themed concepts. It was all a coincidence!

BTW, I don't have a problem with pirate themed content, but this game wreaked of mainstream stereotypical focus.

[Rand]

If there's someone out there making a multi-hundred million dollar RPG and wants to hit BG3 numbers, I'm available for hire as an expert on marketing for the male gaze!

And not the male gays? You ******* bigot sandwich!

[Cipher]

1st: Fans of Baldur's Gate. The name alone has a lot of clout.
2nd: Fans of D&D. This was the 5e game you can play on your own. 5e is extremely popular, like all editions of D&D have been.
3rd: Fans of Larian/Original Sin 2. OS2 was a breakout hit with both normiecattle and hardcore cRPG fans alike.

Only one of these had any impact, and it was the last one. D&D was a completely dead brand wrt video games.

1st: Fans of Baldur's Gate. The name alone has a lot of clout.

It doesn't. Most of the people who played the first game when it released have children and don't even play video games now.

5e is extremely popular,

D&D was more profitable under Gary than it is right now. D&D has since the early 80s had a far out-sized brand recognition versus its actual market size. It's a product circling the drain.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance is what happens when you create a product that attempts to sell based upon D&D branding. You can't even buy it anymore, it sold so poorly it was delisted from Steam.
To be clear, the game postdates the BG3 early access release!

D&D was still very popular and Critical Roll was at the height of its popularity.

Incorrect on the BG people not buying. All the buzz that I saw around EA was people, such as myself, who bought in because they were fans of the originals.

Profitable =/= popular. 5E is still the most popular TTRPG around, you can confirm this by looking for open tables in online sites like Roll20, the most popular one. It's 90% 5E. And sure, that's cancer and I am not saying you should, but claiming 5E somehow was not the most popular and played TTRPG of its time, like all editions of D&D have been, is just lying to yourself.

D&D is too big to fail. 80% of normies understand "TTRPGs" as "D&D" without understanding or caring to know that its just one game amongst an entire medium, just like videogame consoles were "a Nintendo" back in the day.

The fact that D&D is losing money just goes to show how incompetent WotC is and has ever been but specially in more recent times due to woketard hiring.

Dark Alliance was terrible. Not even the shills went to bat for it. And it didn't had the back up of the media because you couldn't **** bears. Even IGN gave it a 4 rating with a "Bad" grade. Kotaku called it a "tragic mess". So that's the thing. If even the most blatant shills won't go to bat for your game, the normies will not buy into the hype.

Larian had momentum after the breakout hit of OS2, combined with being a D&D 5e game that "plays" like the tabletop and the Baldur's Gate brand that had a LOT of street credit amongst any videogame site. Top that with the media shilling it because you can **** bears and that's how you get a perfect storm. Remember than more than half players never passed Act 1. Only 40% of ALL the players on steam even passed Act 2. And only 23% of all players on Steam even finished the game.

[rusty_shackleford]

1st: Fans of Baldur's Gate. The name alone has a lot of clout.
2nd: Fans of D&D. This was the 5e game you can play on your own. 5e is extremely popular, like all editions of D&D have been.
3rd: Fans of Larian/Original Sin 2. OS2 was a breakout hit with both normiecattle and hardcore cRPG fans alike.

Only one of these had any impact, and it was the last one. D&D was a completely dead brand wrt video games.

1st: Fans of Baldur's Gate. The name alone has a lot of clout.

It doesn't. Most of the people who played the first game when it released have children and don't even play video games now.

5e is extremely popular,

D&D was more profitable under Gary than it is right now. D&D has since the early 80s had a far out-sized brand recognition versus its actual market size. It's a product circling the drain.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance is what happens when you create a product that attempts to sell based upon D&D branding. You can't even buy it anymore, it sold so poorly it was delisted from Steam.
To be clear, the game postdates the BG3 early access release!

D&D was still very popular and Critical Roll was at the height of its popularity.

Incorrect on the BG people not buying. All the buzz that I saw around EA was people, such as myself, who bought in because they were fans of the originals.

Profitable =/= popular. 5E is still the most popular TTRPG around, you can confirm this by looking for open tables in online sites like Roll20, the most popular one. It's 90% 5E. And sure, that's cancer and I am not saying you should, but claiming 5E somehow was not the most popular and played TTRPG of its time, like all editions of D&D have been, is just lying to yourself.

D&D is too big to fail. 80% of normies understand "TTRPGs" as "D&D" without understanding or caring to know that its just one game amongst an entire medium, just like videogame consoles were "a Nintendo" back in the day.

The fact that D&D is losing money just goes to show how incompetent WotC is and has ever been but specially in more recent times due to woketard hiring.

Dark Alliance was terrible. Not even the shills went to bat for it. And it didn't had the back up of the media because you couldn't **** bears. Even IGN gave it a 4 rating with a "Bad" grade. Kotaku called it a "tragic mess". So that's the thing. If even the most blatant shills won't go to bat for your game, the normies will not buy into the hype.

Larian had momentum after the breakout hit of OS2, combined with being a D&D 5e game that "plays" like the tabletop and the Baldur's Gate brand that had a LOT of street credit amongst any videogame site. Top that with the media shilling it because you can **** bears and that's how you get a perfect storm. Remember than more than half players never passed Act 1. Only 40% of ALL the players on steam even passed Act 2. And only 23% of all players on Steam even finished the game.

You really, really overestimate the tabletop RPG audience size.

Selection_012.webp

BG3 probably made more money in one year than D&D has this century total.

[rusty_shackleford]

As I said prior, this is almost certainly why there was no 'definitive' edition or extra content: WotC probably tried to renegotiate the license and Larian wasn't having it.
Would be really funny if the D&D license was acquired with a flat fee instead of as a % of revenue!

[J1M]

@rusty_shackleford I think you are underestimating the pent up demand by people for a D&D product that did not involve giving Wizards their money.

A lot of people across different generations are frustrated with Wizards for a variety of reasons (editions, OGL, pricing, etc). BG3 was like an olive branch that people were waiting for.

[J1M]

As I said prior, this is almost certainly why there was no 'definitive' edition or extra content: WotC probably tried to renegotiate the license and Larian wasn't having it.
Would be really funny if the D&D license was acquired with a flat fee instead of as a % of revenue!

AI summary tells me Wizards claims $90m revenue from BG3 so it has to be a percentage deal (plus whatever flat fee they paid up front).

[Cipher]

Only one of these had any impact, and it was the last one. D&D was a completely dead brand wrt video games.


It doesn't. Most of the people who played the first game when it released have children and don't even play video games now.


D&D was more profitable under Gary than it is right now. D&D has since the early 80s had a far out-sized brand recognition versus its actual market size. It's a product circling the drain.

Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance is what happens when you create a product that attempts to sell based upon D&D branding. You can't even buy it anymore, it sold so poorly it was delisted from Steam.
To be clear, the game postdates the BG3 early access release!

D&D was still very popular and Critical Roll was at the height of its popularity.

Incorrect on the BG people not buying. All the buzz that I saw around EA was people, such as myself, who bought in because they were fans of the originals.

Profitable =/= popular. 5E is still the most popular TTRPG around, you can confirm this by looking for open tables in online sites like Roll20, the most popular one. It's 90% 5E. And sure, that's cancer and I am not saying you should, but claiming 5E somehow was not the most popular and played TTRPG of its time, like all editions of D&D have been, is just lying to yourself.

D&D is too big to fail. 80% of normies understand "TTRPGs" as "D&D" without understanding or caring to know that its just one game amongst an entire medium, just like videogame consoles were "a Nintendo" back in the day.

The fact that D&D is losing money just goes to show how incompetent WotC is and has ever been but specially in more recent times due to woketard hiring.

Dark Alliance was terrible. Not even the shills went to bat for it. And it didn't had the back up of the media because you couldn't **** bears. Even IGN gave it a 4 rating with a "Bad" grade. Kotaku called it a "tragic mess". So that's the thing. If even the most blatant shills won't go to bat for your game, the normies will not buy into the hype.

Larian had momentum after the breakout hit of OS2, combined with being a D&D 5e game that "plays" like the tabletop and the Baldur's Gate brand that had a LOT of street credit amongst any videogame site. Top that with the media shilling it because you can **** bears and that's how you get a perfect storm. Remember than more than half players never passed Act 1. Only 40% of ALL the players on steam even passed Act 2. And only 23% of all players on Steam even finished the game.

You really, really overestimate the tabletop RPG audience size.
Selection_012.webp

BG3 probably made more money in one year than D&D has this century total.

What does that chart representing "D&D" means? Is that just how much the term is searched? Because after the peak the red bar goes right where the blue bar is and then it went BELOW the blue bar. I am genuinely asking, what does "interest over time" means here?

[Stack of Turtles]

BG3's popularity owes more to Dragon Age than to D&D.

[rusty_shackleford]

@rusty_shackleford I think you are underestimating the pent up demand by people for a D&D product that did not involve giving Wizards their money.

A lot of people across different generations are frustrated with Wizards for a variety of reasons (editions, OGL, pricing, etc). BG3 was like an olive branch that people were waiting for.

This is either an overestimation of the tabletop audience or an underestimation of how well BG3 sold.
5e PHB sold 1.6 million copies at big-box stores: https://www.enworld.org/threads/5e-life ... ed.698946/
Even if we double that to account for digital copies and said every person who ever bought a 5e PHB bought BG3, that's not even one fifth of the amount of copies BG3 sold as of last November.

[J1M]

@rusty_shackleford I think you are underestimating the pent up demand by people for a D&D product that did not involve giving Wizards their money.

A lot of people across different generations are frustrated with Wizards for a variety of reasons (editions, OGL, pricing, etc). BG3 was like an olive branch that people were waiting for.

This is either an overestimation of the tabletop audience or an underestimation of how well BG3 sold.
5e PHB sold 1.6 million copies at big-box stores: https://www.enworld.org/threads/5e-life ... ed.698946/
Even if we double that to account for digital copies and said every person who ever bought a 5e PHB bought BG3, that's not even one fifth of the amount of copies BG3 sold as of last November.

A few problems with that as a measuring stick. Someone who is unhappy with the direction of editions as they march on is not buying hardcover 5e books. Second, WotC wants digital sales, they make more money from them so they have incentivized those. Third, PDF piracy.

[rusty_shackleford]

. Someone who is unhappy with the direction of editions as they march on is not buying hardcover 5e books

3.5e sold dismally, people who played 2e are in nursing homes

Third, PDF piracy.

People who pirate the PDF are pirating the game too.
Source: It's me