Skybound Games - best-known in recent times for taking over the development of The Walking Dead video game series from Telltale - has announced it is teaming up with Beamdog to bring a selection classic role-playing computer games to the Switch and multiple other platforms later this year.
The publishing partnership between the two companies will see the release of Baldur’s Gate, Baldur’s Gate ll, Baldur’s Gate: Siege of Dragonspear, Icewind Dale, Planescape: Torment, and Neverwinter Nights. The enhanced versions of each of these titles will be sold in-store and online. The common connection between each one is the link to the Dungeons & Dragons series.
If you would like the chance to check these games out in person, the Skybound Games booth at PAX East in Boston - taking place from 28th to 31st March, will be displaying a number of them to coincide with its first anniversary.
Here's what Skybound Games CEO Ian Howe had to say:
“We’re excited to bring Beamdog’s incredible slate to new platforms for both the dedicated fan and those who will soon discover these adventures for the first time. As longtime fans of Baldur’s Gate and Dungeons & Dragons it’s fantastic to partner with Beamdog as the newest member of the Skybound family.”
More details will be revealed in the coming months, including more information about the physical release. These details will also be shared in time on Skybound's Twitter, Facebook and Instagram accounts.
Did you play any of these classic role-playing titles back in the day? Are you a fan of the D&D series? Tell us in the comments.
[source skybound.com]
Comments 73
to bad no Baldur's gate dark allegiance, Baldur's gate dark alliance 2, champions of norrath, or champions return to arms.
Baldur's Gate on Switch very exciting.
Was...not expecting this. Have these all on my phone, but I'd consider getting them for Switch depending on how the interface is handled.
I've played all of these at one time or another and will be getting them all over again this year! Can't wait!
Yes having the entire Baldur's Gate games on Switch would be spectacular. I remember playing the GBA version of BG: Dark Alliance and loving it so bring it on.
Wow - unexpected but pretty cool. Don't think I'll do Baldur's Gate on Switch, but Neverwinter might be neat.
My God this is amazing! Haven't played Baldur's Gate one or two since they originally released on PC all those years ago, fantastic news!
When I read D&D I thought "oh, those Capcom side-scrollers again.."
But Neverwinter, Icewind and Baldur's Gate are amazing games that I will gladly double dip on and play on Switch and I suggest everyone else to do so too!
If you want a great, mechanically deep western RPG on your Switch, these are your best bet. Not to mention in MY opinion no WRPG came close to these games in quality since their release. Few exceptions may be the Divinity series and the Obsidian-developed RPGs.
Quite surprised they got the rights to these games since some of them from memory were made by Bioware - same company that now works for EA.
Side note: Maybe they should also consider bringing Star Wars KOTOR games to Switch as well, as there is an odd abundance of anything Star Wars on a system where those games would sell millions.
Holy sith. Goodbye money 0_0
This is pretty huge, having these games on a Nintendo platform,but also being able to play 'em on the go? Very cool.
For a second I thought these were the beat em ups and I got excited.
@AxeltheBuizel How? Just... How?
Wow. That’s a pretty awesome lineup with several masterpieces. It will be great to play them portably
@Varkster i hardly doubt well see KOTOR on the switch wen EA is holding it hostage and keeps on cancelling star wars game projects left and right.
@Varkster Your personal review has convinced me to get these!
I only played the baldurs gate PS2 games. Are these anything like that?
Ah crap. Don't know whether to be happy or cry over my loss of social life coming up
@edgedino they talk only about this year. Maybe next year the others will follow, especially if these do well which I am sure they will.
I can't wait to have the Baldur's Gate games on the Switch. I've been wishing for it for over a year but, I never thought it would happen.
Omg omg omg!!! I can't wait!
As much as I love the Baldur’s Gate games, Planescape: Torment absolutely blows it out the water. It’s hands down the greatest WRPG of all time, challenged only by Divinity:OS2.
Interested to hear more about the control scheme. That will make or break the experience.
23 comments and nobody has typed - "This announcement means there's no Nintendo Direct incoming or this would have been in there." That's usually one of the first 5 posts at times like these.
I won't go as far as saying there wont' be a ND b/c of this, but I'm certainly getting irritated waiting for one and this news reminded me were due one.
Well, there goes my life.....again. played through most of these back in the nineties. Mostly looking forward to tackle planescape torment again, probably the hardest of the titles listed.
@Reignmaker yes, absolutely right! If I think back how important the mouse input was on any of these games bach then... Touch will work well, but how about docked mode then?
Interesting. Never played these, but old school western RPGs always intrigue me. I believe I'll be checking these out.
@mazzel Pointer controls could be a solution? With it being a multiplatform release, I doubt they'll be in there though.
@OorWullie Hmm if I remember the interface, you need to open the inventory for changing weapons, at least in NWN, with pointer this would be awfully slow...
P.s.: or do you mean use the joy con as a pointer?
@rjejr i think there is a lot of “disturbence” at Nintendo at the moment. Q3 results being ok but having to lower their own sales forcast with 15% AND MP4 fail maybe was a bigger surprise for themselves than we may know. I guess they are re-alligning their release strategy for FY19 and double checking all their current projects. This maybe why they said during the investors meetings they do not expect any further delays for their upcomming games but did not provide any dates. But still, a new SSBU dlc fighter should get announced at some point this month and up to Yoshi release nothing has been confirmed for their Q4 release. All in all not the best start of the calender year for nintendo game fans (or the new presidents for that matter). Let’s hope we get some information soon.
@mazzel Yeah, using the Joy-con as a pointer for Wii style controls could work. Not enough games make use of pointer controls on Switch despite World of Goo showing the Joy-con gyro can replicate them very well.
@Dirty0814 ya but lucky for me I have them still irl
Baldurs Gate is a masterpiece, great atmosphere with the narration and music. Truly glad that I bought a Switch. It's literally like having a magic box that contains all of your childhood.
@OorWullie yeah I also thought that already. Maybe it's because then they have to think about 2 equally convenient inputs for docked and undocked (which should be pointer and touch). Maybe it's more complex then I think?
Amazing news !!!
Played these way back in the day and have Baldurs gate on my iPad Pro - which is very good.
Great games - will all be down to the control scheme though how good they are
In saying that I will be buying all these anyway.
Love me some D&D
Where’s Dark Alliance?
updates journal
Holy wow! So glad I held off buying these on GOG a little while back. Almost every game here is totally worth replaying.
wonder though will they be a complete collection or sold seperately.
@PrincessBowsette Was about to ask the same.
Wow. Very cool news. All fantastic games. It just makes me wonder why Nintendo hasn't had a Direct yet. It seems like this would have been the kind of anouncement best saved for a Direct.
Just what the hell are they up to at Nintendo???
Looks like I’m going to have to do the triple dip with a few of these titles.
Minsc for Smash?
Another load of games I never really got into, but good on them for expanding to the switch.
Hope these will get released in collections - e.g. all the Baldur's Gate games together on one cart.
Not gonna happen, but it should.
@Varkster @PrincessBowsette I don't think Disney is very keen on Kotor either as they made almost everything Lucas arts did non-canon
A string of iconic, timeless pillars of the genre.
I never thought I'd see these games on Switch. I've been using my GPD Win 2 for the Planescape Torment, Neverwinter Nights and Baldurs Gate. Super small text though being the PC version. This will be a must own. All of them
"Ah, we are all heroes, you and Boo and I, hamsters and rangers everywhere, rejoice!" "squee SQUEE squeek!"
@Kisame83 Yeah, everyone in Baldurs Gate walks so slow. They need to fix that or allow an instant skip-to-spot option, or some other speed up
@Flowerlark Had no idea there was a GBA port. How does it compare to the PC
Blimey, did not see that coming. Some all time great CRPGs there.
People have been telling me to play these almost my whole adult life. Maybe now I actually will?
The only one I would be looking forward to playing would be IWD2, which doesn't seem to be on the list. I must've sunk hundreds upon hundreds of hours into this game, played through it at least 5-6 times.
I wonder how 'enhanced' these will be, they need some serious QOL improvements to make me consider playing them. Played BG1 and loved it, couldn't get into BG2 no matter how hard I tried (by the time I played that one, ADD 2.0 rule-set was very dated and limiting). Probably why I loved IWD2 so much as it used the 3rd edition.
@rjejr No offense to these games, but they are better drummed up in words than screenshots and videos. These are turn-based western RPG games that are excellent, but would probably be a blip in a Nintendo Direct at best.
It does feel like a long time now for a ND, and I haven't been too closely watching lately. ( I'm enthralled with Stardew Valley (finally) and have some older games to finish so I'm not very "in the now" with Nintendo. )
Here I was expecting those 1980's Gold Box RPGs...
My wife might be interested. Baldur's Gate was one of her all time favorite RPGs.
I will probably buy BGII and Planescape Torment as long as they don't try to charge $30 a piece.
@aaronsullivan I think at this point I'm just bewildered by the lack of a ND. What do you think the comment ratio was for an ND in January? 80-20 for the likelihood of? If not higher. And then when it doesn't happen, well then I gotta ask myself why not. And keep asking myself why until I get an answer. I'm pretty much just an out of control junkie looking for a fix at this point. But it's not like I need a fix of ND, if Nintneod would come out and say - no ND until E3 - I'd be fine w/ that. I can wait. I can be patient. But not knowing kills me.
Has there ever been a Groundhog's Day type movie we're an 8 yr old brother and his 12 yr old sister keep waking and it's Christmas Eve every day and night when they go to bed, and they have to figure out what they need to do to get off of Santa's naughty list so Christmas will come? And no, not "It's a Wonderful Life", that's a man learning a lesson. I'm talking a horror movie for kids.
I'm living that movie this week. (Good thing I have American politics and twitter to distract me, you do your taxes yet? $2k kid credit saved us, as I knew it would. Most of twitter not so lucky.)
@Drussa "Let’s hope we get some information soon."
Well that's what we need the ND for.
I'm sure the MP4 news hurt, but they didn't just find out about Switch sales at the same time we did, they've had to know all along how they were selling, so that shouldn't have affected an ND at all which is probably an entirely different side of the company anyway. They still have Luigi's Mansion, FE, Yoshi, AC, plenty enough to make an ND w/o MP4. And all those unannounced games they keep talking about. And if you look back over the first 5-6 first weeks of the year you'll see info that could have helped pad out an ND, 3rd party games, the $35 eShop Switch bundle, Piranha Plant DLC.
As I said earlier today in several ND rants, the longer they wait, the more people expect, the more likely people are too be disappointed. That's human nature.
I'll buy if they are maybe $60 total for all six games in a pack (10 bucks a pop). But we all know it won't be. They'll probably charge $60 per title. Right now I think they are 13 a piece on steam.
@AG_Awesome The Dark Alliance games on PS2 play more like Diablo. These are closer to Dragon Age or Pillars of Eternity if you've played either of those. More like an RTS where you don't have direct control over your character. You give commands to a party and the characters carry them out.
Handheld mode might be impractical for these without a substantial UI change.
Diablo 1 & 2 should be next!
I will buy all of these
@finalstan regarding Icewind Dale 2 - they have lost the source code for it and therefore it cannot be enhanced !
@Punisher67 Every time I see these ports, I rue the loss of the Icewind Dale 2 source code.
@edgedino How does this not include that game? I still play it on my PS3 and Xbox360, great coop fun.
@evo_9 because they did not specify those games the ones they specified are a different style then the ones i mentioned.
No neverwinter nights 2 sad face
@Punisher67 Can't they just get any of the original game discs that originally released and extract the data from them?
@LaytonPuzzle27 alas apparently not. I remember reading that they simply could not do anything without that code.
Still - getting these 6 titles is superb. Must confess I am concerned with the controls but also how they will perform in handheld mode due to the screen size (text could be tiny as an example)
Can't wait to make the Nameless One play with his Modron action figure and win imaginary battles in Planescape: Torment on my Switch.
@rjejr Going backwards through old posts. This is super late, but I just had to say your Christmas movie idea is superb and should be made immediately!
@aaronsullivan I like my Christmas movie idea so much that I haven't started making it b/c I feel like while maybe not a movie, it must surely be an episode of some Disney show like "The Suite Life of Zak and Cody" or one of those. My movie version would be good though, I have most of the scenes pretty much played out in my head. McCauly Culkin has to play the dad.
@rjejr Don't forget to try and get Bill Murray to be the grandpa... get Emily Blunt in there too! (Groundhog Day, Edge of Tomorrow)
@aaronsullivan I'm thinking Bill Murray as the school custodian, a cross between his Caddy Shack role and the guy on The Simpsons. The kids will let loose a bunch of mice from the pet store in the storeroom that he'll have to get rid of. It will be one of the things they'll have to undue to make Christmas arrive.
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