Baldur’s Gate 3 Will Have You Making Love To A Bear

If you haven’t had a buffed-up bear partner in-game before, let Baldur’s Gate 3 open new doors for you on that front. The Panel From Hell: Release Showcase that went live on YouTube from the developer’s—Larian Studios—official channel has dived deep into some of the major mechanics of the upcoming action RPG. Somewhere along the live stream, particularly at the 5:35:30 mark, an atypical choice of romance is exhibited by the player. 

The two fellows in question are Astarion and Halsin, with the latter belonging to the Druid class. For the uninitiated, Druids can shapeshift, or as the game likes to coin it, “wildshape” into other animals, according to the original regulations of Dungeons and Dragons. During the romantic interaction between Astario and Halsin, things get too warmed up for our Druid here, leading him to lose control and transform into a massive bear.  

So Baldur's Gate 3 is a 10/10… this is the proper D&D experience. #baldursgate3 pic.twitter.com/HEi2PJRLLu

— Vaughan (@vaughandavies97) July 7, 2023

What happens then, is anyone’s guess, as the camera pans off-focus and instead puts an adorable squirrel in the spotlight, who apparently drops his walnut at the sight of this huge deal. The live stream went swimmingly on YouTube, but TikTok found the sequences a little too saucy to let the showcase continue. The panel was taken offline, to which Larian Studio’s publishing director replied with the following. 

Tiktok canceled our stream because it was too artistic and they don’t understand

— Very AFK (@Cromwelp) July 7, 2023

Fans and critics are currently divided over what they’ve seen, questioning this bizarre romance choice from an ethical perspective. On the other hand, though, Larian Studios’ founder Swen Vincke has told IGN that he found this particular encounter “hilarious” and, “Every single person who’s seen it is like, ‘oh my god.’ But it’s funny.” Fairly speaking, the whole scenario is, indeed, a bit ridiculously humorous. 

Furthermore, if you look at the big picture here, Baldur’s Gate 3 is going to be exceptionally flexible with its NPC encounters and their particular questlines. A fan who has experienced Baldur’s Gate 3 in early access is of the following opinion regarding the scale of the RPG. 

I’ve played a bunch of early access and the freedom is very good. There are so many little secrets and things that change depending on your actions. I’m really looking forward to the full game.” 

In addition, before we got to see Astarion taking on Halsin under the night sky, the developers showed another, relatively normal interaction between two characters on a date. Aside from the player using the Dragonborn class, the other person is Kalach, who is apparently a sought-after romance option in Baldur’s Gate 3. The pair go on a normal date before the developers end that sequence and move on to the more grizzlier option. 

In other news, Larian Studios has confirmed that it will take about 200 hours for players to fully complete Baldur’s Gate 3. A standard playthrough will take about 75-100 hours though, but these are appreciable figures nonetheless for an RPG. “It has an enormous amount of replay because there are so many ways to do things. I think people will re-roll a lot. We have this insane amount of classes, sub-classes, races, sub-races. This is not a small game you’re going to be done within a month,” said the studio’s boss in an interview. 

Baldur’s Gate 3 is scheduled to release on PC via Steam, Epic Games Store, and Nvidia GeForce Now—a cloud gaming service—next month on August 3. The PlayStation 5 version of the game is coming at a later period, around September, and those on the Xbox Series X|S will have to wait indefinitely until there’s more word from the developers. Larian Studios has yet to declare the release date of Baldur’s Gate 3 on the Xbox platform.