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Divinity: Original Sin II nearly killed Baldur’s Gate 3 in its infancy.
Yet it almost robbed the studio of its opportunity to ascend to the mainstream.
Nonetheless, they knew they had to pull something out of the Bag Of Holding.
“We need to write something, guys,” Vincke said at the time.
“Or we’re going to lose this deal.”
“It was really bad,” he says.
Wizards then sent it back with the corporate equivalent of, ‘This is really shit’.
Give us an extension'.
Luckily they understood, and so we got another chance."
Why was Larian pushing so hard to secure a venerable, ancient videogame licence for itself?
“So it would be great for attracting other people to the studio.”
This feature originally appeared inEdge magazine.
“There was not a lot to choose from.”
Beneath all this strategy, however, was a personal connection.
“We knew about them,” Vincke says, “and were watching what they were doing.”
“That was a real pity.”
Taking on the lead writing gig for its followup was, as you might imagine, daunting.
“It was the dream job,” Smith says.
“But with the huge dose of reality that it would really suck if it sucked.”
“And then there’s the anxiety about that.
How will it change?
Will it lose its identity?
Will it transform into something different?
All of that runs through your head.
You think, ‘Did I arrive at the right time or the wrong time?
“And it’s because we had a story that we felt was good and fit that world.”
“So we could turn things when we needed them to turn.”
Larian became comfortable with pulling on tiny existing threads of lore and spinning them out into grand new tapestries.
Even those scant details proved malleable.
“We could do whatever we wanted with it,” Vincke says.
“It did say in those two phrases that it was two towers.
For a long time, the second tower was actually there in the level.
But at some point we said, ‘We just need one tower’.”
A changed setting wasn’t Larian’s biggest new obstacle, however.
“‘If any of that is necessary, then we don’t do it.'”
It was intimidating.”
At times, Smith became aware of just how fragile an experience they were assembling.
“Because we’re putting all these systems in play,” he says.
With the addition of cinematics, the expense of catering to that player whim became much higher.
“It’s not just editing a line,” Smith says.
“The time cost of everything is more.
But we pretty quickly got into a groove with it.
That was great, because that’s one of the things you could compromise on.
You could say, ‘OK, it’s good enough’.”
With cinematics, you’re free to zoom in on an eyeball and see all the details."
“It’s been a very hard struggle to get it balanced.”
“In reality, not really,” fellow art director Alena Dubrovina says.
That to me always felt very Baldur’s Gate."
She’s back travelling with a Bhaalspawn again, and the last time this happened her husband died."
It becomes easy once you do.
“Raphael is a theatre kid with too much power,” Smith says.
“The worst thing in the world.”
But for Vincke, their inclusion was worth every difficulty.
“So the decision was instant: we can’t stay there.
Rather than wait for colleagues to be drafted into the military, Larian set about facilitating their exit.
“I’m super-proud of them for doing that.”
Over 90 per cent of the St Petersburg team was relocated to other Larian studios.
“That meant that we started fighting with embassies and consulates,” Vincke says.
“It was really complicated.”
Colleagues set about welcoming the refugees to new countries, helping them to adapt to their suddenly changed circumstances.
And, understandably, work fell by the wayside.
“Because things that were supposed to be done are not being done.
It’s not that they didn’t try, but it was really, really hard.
You could see the ripple effect of that lasting all through the end of development.”
The delays meant compromises and cuts to Baldur’s Gate 3.
“The award season is still going on, which is really weird,” Smith says.
“It’s incredible.
Seeing them go up, after decades, was a lot.
I was dressed in my little bear onesie, crying.
That was really moving, because it did mean a hell of a lot to them.”
Vincke now understands why rock stars get so tired.
“Because it’s too much,” he says.
He emphasises again that Larian is incredibly grateful.
“But it is surprisingly draining on the soul.
I certainly didn’t expect that.
I think we’ve all been more emotional because we can’t get closure.
And you want to have closure at the end of a project.”
Characteristically, Vincke has started to formulate a strategic approach.
“We sent rotating teams,” he says.
“So different people went to different award shows.
It affects development there’s a lot of them.”
He laughs, but he’s serious.
“This has been a real problem.”
Like the companions at camp, the studio has plenty to process.
Looking for what to play next?
Take a look at our list of thebest RPG games!
