A few weeks ago Beamdog attended PAX East to showcase our console demo of Baldur’s Gate: Enhanced Edition at the Skybound Games booth.

Beamdog teamed up with Skybound to bring the Enhanced Editions of Baldur’s Gate, Baldur's Gate II, Icewind Dale, Planescape: Torment, and Neverwinter Nights, as well as Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear to console. Check out the full announcement by Skybound Games here.

Today we’re publishing answers from Beamdog Producer Luke Rideout to the community questions about these upcoming console releases.

Q & A with Luke Rideout, Beamdog Producer

1. What will be the price of each game? How DLC, such as premium modules for NWN:EE and SoD for BG:EE, will be handled in terms of price and availability?

LUKE: The price point and bundling method haven’t been officially announced yet, but stay tuned for Skybound’s upcoming announcements!

2. Which platforms and console types exactly will the games be playable at?

LUKE: The Baldur’s Gate Series, Icewind Dale, Planescape: Torment, and Neverwinter Nights will all be coming to the Playstation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch.

3. How/where will it be possible to buy the games? Will they be available via subscription-based services? What will physical box versions include?

LUKE: There will be both physical and digital releases of the games. Stay tuned for future announcements from Skybound about more details in the upcoming months.

4. Are there any graphical improvements in the console versions if compared to the PC/mobile ports? What exactly is changed? What improvements does the new renderer in NWN:EE bring?

LUKE: The Infinity Engine games will look the same on the console version as they do to the PC versions. NWN:EE’s new renderer, aside from improving performance, improves lighting and shadows, transparency, textures, and adds support for a much larger set of advanced shaders that we couldn’t previously make use of.

5. Are there any additional bug fixes in the console versions if compared to the PC/mobile ports (eg. better pathfinding)?

LUKE: There have been lots of additional bug fixes, including a significant amount of work on pathfinding, which was an absolute necessity for the implementation of analog party control.

6. Will mods work for the console versions (mods for the Infinity Engine Enhanced Editions, modules, custom content, community fixes and haks for NWN)? If they will, for which consoles in particular?

LUKE: We haven’t announced anything about this yet, so I’m afraid I can’t answer this, but stay tuned!

7. Will playing the console ports in multiplayer be possible? Will MP be cross-platform: PC & consoles, mobile versions & consoles, different consoles with each other? Will NWN:EE persistent worlds be available for console players?

LUKE: We’re currently investigating what we can do. We recognize Multiplayer is a huge and important component of these games, and we want to bring you the best experience that we can offer within the limitations of the consoles.

8. Will there be any cloud saving? So that one save is being continued from multiple devices: consoles, PC, mobile?

LUKE: There will be cloud save functionality tied to your console account, but we don’t currently have a way to transfer saves across different platforms from the console versions.

9. Will UI be simplified? Can you explain the control scheme for one of the IE games and NWN:EE? How will you overcome clunkiness considering the games weren’t designed for consoles?

LUKE: The main control difference for the IE games is that we have implemented an analog control mode that allows you to directly control the movement of your party in formation. To compliment this, we have improved highlighting of interactable objects in-game, and have a system that snaps the cursor to important objects, characters, and transition points, which can be interacted with using the interaction button on the controller. The player can switch between this analog drive mode and a virtual mouse “tactics mode” for fine targeting of spells. Most of the HUD buttons have been consolidated into radials, and party management is achieved by cycling through with the shoulder buttons, and through a party radial, that allows for creating custom party member groups, much like control groups in RTSes.
Neverwinter Nights, though it has never been on console before, already has a very controller-friendly control scheme, so NWN’s UI is very similar to the PC version of the game. The most notable change is that we have adapted the hotbar to work as a radial menu as well, as opposed to a bar on the HUD. Character movement, of course, will also use the analog controller. If you’ve played modern 3D third-person RPGs, it should feel fairly familiar to you.

10. Won’t the framerate drop if there’s a heavy magic fight going on with lots of multiple graphics effects presented (fireballs, web spells, lightning, etc)? Are there any loading screens in the console versions?

LUKE: Modern consoles are fairly robust, and certainly capable of handling the on-screen effects that we use in these games. And there are loading screens in Neverwinter Nights, as you may already be familiar, but the IE areas load quickly enough that you shouldn’t be seeing any load screens.

11. Are there any plans for additional consoles support (other than these 3)?

LUKE: Not at the moment

12. Will improvements developed while working on the console ports be ported back onto the PC/mobile versions? What about PC controllers/TV and a controller?

LUKE: There are certainly updates and code fixes that have been done for the console versions that we would like to see on the other versions, but as a small team, that’s something we’d have to look at after we finish work on the Console versions.

13. Did you consult with Chris Avellone before porting PST:EE to consoles?

LUKE: We did!

14. When do you plan to release the console versions? Will all the games be available at the same time?

LUKE: Specific release dates haven’t been announced yet, but you will see them this year!

15. Will you be able to import characters/parties from one game to another (BG1, BG2, IWD) on consoles?

LUKE: You will be able to import across games in the Baldur’s Gate saga, but not IWD.

16. What languages will the console versions be in?

LUKE: That’s currently TBD.

17. How long have the console ports been in development?

LUKE: Since early 2018.

18. Will there be any console-specific DLC/content?

LUKE: No announcements have been made yet on that side. Stay tuned!

19. Will there be differences between UI (or any other differences) on Xbox, PS4 and Switch?

LUKE: Aside from console-specific things like buttons and user account management, the UI will be effectively identical.

20. Do you have plans for (improving/enhancing) Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance and Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance II?

LUKE: No plans for the Dark Alliance series, I’m afraid.

If you have a question for Beamdog, don’t hesitate to ask us on our forums.