D&D 5E Dragon Age lead says Baldur’s Gate 3 and Clair Obscur prove publishers wrong as games can crush market trends is they’re “given time to cook”

[CleverNickName]

That's quite the ordering. Personally, I've thought each game was worse than the one before, regardless of polish.

I dunno about polish, they all seemed just as polished as any other AAA game releases of their respective years. (I'm not an expert, though.) I was ranking them by how much fun I had playing them: I thought Inquisition was the most enjoyable game of the franchise.

 

[CleverNickName]

Anyway, like Sonic says

Absolutely. According to Steam, I have 83 hours in Skyrim and 95 hours in Dragon Age: Inquisition, but I have 2,988 hours in Stardew Valley and 552 hours in Hollow Knight.

What can I say? I love AAA games, but I love indie games more. Way more. Like, orders of magnitude more.

 

[FrozenNorth]

And, of course, it released in 2025, when every video game that dares to feature pronouns or women not designed specifically for the sexual gratification of young white men gets decried as causing the downfall of Western civilization. So that didn’t really help its reception.

I agree with everything you’ve said. It’s interesting though: « woke leads to failure » is only trotted out as an argument if the game is already failing for other reasons.

Baldur’s gate 3 came out in 2023. It has tons of LGBTQ+ characters, including a trans character voiced by a trans actor. Character creation is pretty open if you want to choose your primary and secondary sexual characteristics. And it is an incredible and incredibly popular game.

 

[Charlaquin]

I agree with everything you’ve said. It’s interesting though: « woke leads to failure » is only trotted out as an argument if the game is already failing for other reasons.

Baldur’s gate 3 came out in 2023. It has tons of LGBTQ+ characters, including a trans character voiced by a trans actor. Character creation is pretty open if you want to choose your primary and secondary sexual characteristics. And it is an incredible and incredibly popular game.

That’s because “get woke, go broke” isn’t an observation of an actual pattern; it’s an incantation. It gets chanted with the intent that by repeating it, they will make it true. The neo-gamergate hate mill starts grinding a game as soon as there’s a cinematic trailer for it, as long as said trailer features at least one prominent character who isn’t a white cisgender man, and the reactionaries convince themselves to hate it in advance. If the game succeeds (like BG3 did), they sweep their advance-criticism under the rug, and prop their enjoyment of the game up as evidence that they don’t hate women and people of color, they only hate “forced diversity” or “DEI” or whatever the dog whistle du juour is at the time. Games only become “diversity done right” retroactively, after their success would otherwise dispel the incantation.

 

[CleverNickName]

That’s because “get woke, go broke” isn’t an observation of an actual pattern; it’s an incantation. It gets chanted with the intent to make it true. The neo-gamergate hate mill starts grinding a game as soon as the first cinematic trailer for it, as long as said trailer features at least one prominent character who isn’t a white cisgender man, and the reactionaries convince themselves to hate it in advance. If the game succeeds (like BG3 did), they sweep their advance-criticism under the rug, and prop their enjoyment of the game up as evidence that they don’t hate women and people of color, they only hate “forced diversity” or “DEI” or whatever the dog whistle du juour is at the time. Games only become “diversity done right” retroactively, after their success would otherwise dispel the incantation.

This might be the best summary of this phenomenon that I've ever read.

 

[Pedantic]

Incidentally, if I don’t generally like JRPGs, will I enjoy Clair Obscur? I know it’s a French game, but it seems JRPG-esque. My main objection to JRPGs is the player’s general lack of meaningful choices/agency/ability to affect the story.

It's very much still a story you experience instead of one you drive, though the writing is excellent. The gameplay is very satisfying though, very much building on the Paper Mario action command structure with a much bigger set of build choices.

 

[Charlaquin]

This might be the best summary of this phenomenon that I've ever read.

Thank you! I can’t take full credit for it. The phrasing is mine, but I got the idea of “get woke, go broke” as an incantation from a video by the excellent YouTuber Chariot. She does very good media analysis and dissections of the YouTube reactionary grift phenomenon.

 

[pukunui]

I haven't played BG3 or Veilguard yet. Both are still too expensive for me.

I have, however, played the first three DA games. I was never that into the tactical nature of the gameplay. I love the story being told and the truth of the mythology that is revealed over the course of the series (like the truth about the elven gods and the archdemons and such).

DAO has a great story that is marred by the fact that you can run back and forth across Ferelden doing all manner of pointless little side quests while the Blight patiently waits for you to unlock its next advancement point. Awakening is fantastic.

DA2 has a fantastic story marred by the corner-cutting. The repetitive maps and sparsely detailed terrain drove me crazy, but I loved just about everything else about it. Agreed that this game has some of the best storytelling. I loved my sarcastic Hawke. Had to go rogue so I could keep Bethany alive. She's much better than Carver.

DAI has a great story marred by too much grinding. I played as a female elf the first time because I wanted to romance Solas, but I messed it up. After watching the Netflix cartoon, I tried replaying the game as a female tiefling Qunari mage but just couldn't get far because of all the grinding! Ugh! (This game also suffers from the fact that you can travel back and forth across vast distances while the bad guys patiently wait for you to unlock the next plot advancement point.)


There's so much awesome stuff in the Dragon Age world, but it's the elves and the unfolding story about their past and their gods and whatnot that really captivates me the most. You get the setup in Origins, then you get a few more clues in DA2 if you befriend Merrill, who is trying to repair a broken magic mirror. Then in DAI you get to experience functional magic mirrors and you can explore the magical world that the elves of old created! You also get clues that what the elves believe about their gods isn't the truth. Finally, in Veilguard, the truth is revealed! (I have yet to experience this for myself, but I have read about it. I don't mind spoilers.)

 

[Henadic Theologian]

I agree with everything you’ve said. It’s interesting though: « woke leads to failure » is only trotted out as an argument if the game is already failing for other reasons.

Baldur’s gate 3 came out in 2023. It has tons of LGBTQ+ characters, including a trans character voiced by a trans actor. Character creation is pretty open if you want to choose your primary and secondary sexual characteristics. And it is an incredible and incredibly popular game.

Woke is such a hugely subjective term it's not particularly useful, but diversity is only a problem if it's put before every other consideration.

BG3 put story and setting and characters first and weaved the diversity in organically in a way. Other games put diversity first and it came off inauthentic.

 

[pukunui]

Woke is such a hugely subjective term it's not particularly useful, but diversity is only a problem if it's put before every other consideration.

BG3 put story and setting and characters first and weaved the diversity in organically in a way. Other games put diversity first and it came off inauthentic.

Again, I haven't played Veilguard yet so can't speak to its priorities, but I did appreciate that they put in a toggle for people with arachnophobia. That was a nice touch. IIRC Jedi: Fallen Order has that as well. I'm not arachnophobic so have never tried it but I appreciate that it's there.