Larian Studios made changes to two romance options in Baldur's Gate 3's full launch, in order to avoid their excessive ex talk.
Speaking in a recent interview with Inverse about nailing down the romance in the turn-based RPG, the lead designer for the companion and romance quests, Baudelaire Welch, along with principal narrative designer Lawrence Schick, revealed that Larian made significant alterations to Wyll and Gale's romances following player feedback during the game's early access period.
"Early access is an extraordinarily effective way to engage with your players and community,” Schick said. "But it's not the right thing for everybody. What is the right thing for every game is to find those ways to engage with your players and bring them in and have a dialogue."
It was found that players in early access thought Wyll and Gale, two companions with a complicated history with two powerful beings - Mystra and Mizora - talked too much about their exes, especially during romance segments.
Larian originally intended for these scenes to provide exposition and history, but eventually decided to make adjustments for the full launch of the game so romance scenes weren't all about ex talk.
“You may have noticed that, previously, Gale and Wyll talked quite a bit about their ex-partners in the middle of their romance scenes,” Welch said. "That was something that players definitely pointed out.”
In addition, Welch explained that from the early access period, Larian decided to tweak the relationship system to allow players to romance characters during the big Act One party, but also go on to flirt with other companions to spice things up in the camp.
"It used to be set up so that the only way that romances could begin was this one night in the party, where you could only pick one character,” Welch said. “And then basically, that character would end up being your love interest for the whole rest of the game.”
After sweeping at The Game Awards 2023, even snagging its coveted Game of the Year award, Baldur's Gate 3 has now received the awards for Game of the Year and Outstanding Story-Rich Game at the 2023 Steam Awards.
For more, check out our own Game of the Year 2023 list, along with every upcoming game to look forward to in 2024.
