The problem with other games is that they are not Baldur's Gate 3

This week, I've been busy fighting cyberpunks in Night City, managing FCs in St. James' Park, and engaging in battles... wherever that takes place. I haven't even had time to gaze at fields. The problem is, no matter what I'm currently doing, I'd much rather be playing Baldur's Gate. Baldur's Gate 3 is too good to think about anything else, and it's too lengthy to simply allocate some time for it (the curse of awaiting the console release). As we find ourselves in the busiest phase of game releases this generation has ever witnessed, this predicament is more likely to worsen than improve.

I do like the original Cyberpunk 2077 enough. While I had some major issues with the worldbuilding, the overall standpoint, and the obvious bugs, I still managed to enjoy it well enough through the interactions with the characters and immersing myself in the visual world through the photo mode. In Phantom Liberty, there is a much smaller cast of characters. Solomon Reed (Idris Elba) is present for the majority of the expansion, and while there is, of course, a fundamental level of quality associated with Elba's performance, I couldn't shake the feeling that I'd rather be talking to Astarion.

Phantom Liberty suffers the same fate as the two Horizon games - it's good, but it stands too close to a game that is outstanding (Zero Dawn and Forbidden West, both decent open-world games, released in close proximity to Breath of the Wild and Elden Ring). The depth of interactions in Baldur's Gate surpasses the limited conversations in Cyberpunk, where all roads lead to Rome, only with a slightly different attitude along the way.

I also took a gamer girl bath.

That's not really comparable to EA Sports FC. I'm not running along the sideline as Anthony Gordon and wishing for Karlach's sprint distance (although his stats are pretty poor for someone who has been our best player this season). It's more like, amidst all the games I have to play by the end of the year (either for professional coverage or just to stay in the loop), I constantly find myself thinking about Baldur's Gate 3. I don't want to rush it, but I know that no matter what else I play, I'll always be drawn back to Faerûn.

I have already given up on Starfield. It is just as extensive and time-consuming, and since I haven't been able to get into Bethesda's games so far, I'm glad to set it aside and possibly play it in the future. But I can't do that with Detective Pikachu Returns, Assassin's Creed Mirage, Spider-Man 2, Super Mario Bros. Wonder, Persona 5 Tactics, or Alan Wake 2. I have also planned to make some time for Fashion Dreamer, but I don't know where this time will come from. Probably from sleep.

Baldur's Gate 3 is a phenomenal experience, one of the few games that are so comprehensive that other titles vie for attention in its presence. I have to play through it, but I also want to enjoy it, and yet so many other games claim attention in the meantime.

It is a luxury that we should appreciate, no matter how stressful it may be in the moment. This has been a gigantic year for triple-A games, but a terrible year for the entire industry. This is an exception, not the rule, as the backlog caused by the pandemic has turned the past two years into a famine that is finally resulting in a feast. This rhythm will not continue into 2024, and we should enjoy it while we can – even if we can't really enjoy anything until we have finished playing Baldur's Gate 3.