Baldur's Gate

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Baldur's Gate Original Saga with Tales of the Sword Coast Expansion Pack

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Platform: Windows 95 / 98 / Me

Baldur's Gate is a near-perfect adaptation of the classic tabletop, role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons. Six separate races and eight core character classes, from which the player can create a completely original character, are available. The game world is well painted, and players are free to explore this wonderfully textured game environment in any way they see fit, all against the backdrop of a thoughtfully conceived and versatile plot.

You begin the game as a young orphan living with your stepfather within the safe confines of a scholarly community. It is a happy and idyllic life until your stepfather is killed and it becomes clear that you are intended to be next. You, as the young protagonist, then set out to discover just what kind of a mess you're in. During the adventure, you recruit a number of personable allies, battle foes, delve into dungeons, trek across wilderness, solve puzzles, and complete a plethora of epic quests that are seamlessly sown into the fabric of the overall plot. The story line unfolds in response to your choices to reveal your character's true identity as well as the nature and motive of your enemies.

This 1998 Role-Playing Game of the Year is a masterpiece and the standard by which all such games will be judged for the foreseeable future. Groundbreaking 32-bit graphics, 3-D sound, multiplayer options, and a friendly real-time game engine are blended with a depth of plot in a way that redefines the genre. --Joshua B. Coombs

Pros:

Versatile and responsive plot
Entertaining character interaction
Huge game world
Friendly game engine

Cons:

Nonplayer characters exhibit little free will

[Amazon Review]

Baldur's Gate 2: Shadows of Amn

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Platform: Windows 95 / 98 / Me

In Baldur's Gate 2: Shadow of Amn, you face an uncertain future, with a lineage that tempts the unscrupulous to use you and the ignorant to fear you. You will face a foe that views you as no more than chattel and that toys with you at every turn; a villain whose goals go beyond a quest for power and who threatens to use a lost companion as a tool for unparalleled destruction. The choices to be made will not be easy, and you may have to align with the lesser of evils, even though all evils cannot help but seem equal. In the end you will have mourned lost loves, celebrated new ones, and had adventures that profoundly shaped the Realms. [Amazon Review]

Features:

An epic continuation of the plot that was started in Baldur's Gate
Over 300 spells like: time stop, finger of death, chain lightning, and more
Over 100 subplots in the game, some taking "real-time" days to complete
Play as different character races such as: human, elf, half-elf, dwarf, gnome, halfling and half-orc
Choose weapon styles including one-handed weapon, two-handed weapon, weapon and shield, brawling, and two-weapon