Surprising absolutely no one that’s been keeping up with the gaming industry over the past couple of months; Larian Studios’ Baldur’s Gate 3 is dominating both the zeitgeist and the review charts, now having become 2023’s best-reviewed game.
Indeed, even though 2023 has already had a surprisingly rich roster of top-tier titles, like Nintendo’s very own The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Baldur’s Gate 3 has successfully mopped the floor with all of its considerable competition. According to Metacritic, Larian has ostensibly created the best game of the year, handily beating Resident Evil 4, Street Fighter 6, and the Dead Space remake – just to list a few additional examples of well-reviewed video games in 2023.
Baldur’s Gate 3 is the Best Game of 2023?
The fact that Baldur’s Gate 3 is an impressive CRPG hasn’t come out of nowhere, naturally. Larian Studios initially launched the title via Steam Early Access in October 2020, only to take the next couple of years to produce a truly staggering amount of content and a roster of Dungeons & Dragons-inspired features and gameplay systems to match. The end result is predictably high-quality, but the unpredictable bit comes from the game’s popularity, surprising even the developer itself.
It is a perfect storm for something like this to happen. Baldur’s Gate 3 ticks a few key boxes that stand in direct opposition to some of the most commonly critiqued industry trends. The game is an immense role-playing experience with no live-service elements or microtransactions, and its Early Access tenure means that it launched in a fairly polished state. Baldur’s Gate 3 also commands remarkably widespread appeal, what with being a D&D-based continuation of an old classic, now having been blown wide open for anyone and everyone to enjoy.
Though there’s no denying the immensity of what Larian Studios has accomplished here, some caveats yet remain. Firstly, the Tears of the Kingdom may yet overtake it, as many Baldur’s Gate 3 reviews still haven’t been fully wrapped up. Secondly, Bethesda Game Studios’ long-awaited Starfield is due to launch early in September, meaning that Larian is up against some of the most competent games seen in years. If Starfield doesn’t end up falling flat on its face, that is.
