• Overhaul Games (Beamdog's development arm) is heading up the projects, with the support of both Atari and Wizards of the Coast.
• The new Beamdog newsletter states a Summer 2012 release date, at least for Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition (no release date for Baldur's Gate II: Enhanced Edition yet).
• Tales of the Sword Coast will be included in the Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition and Throne of Bhaal will be included in the Baldur's Gate II: Enhanced Edition.
• There will be "new content for the game you love, made by some of the original team members".
• The team is doing their best to provide support for mods, old and new.
• Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition will be exclusive to Beamdog (on PC), though other platforms will be announced next week at the very same time. The very first screenshots will debut then, too.
• The BG:EE will utilize the 2nd Edition D&D ruleset, just as the original games did. Beamdog's motto: "Don't break the fun."
• The "Infinity Enhanced" engine that powers both Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition and Baldur's Gate II: Enhanced Edition will be "based off the latest Throne of Bhaal code base". That means we can use class kits and wild mages in the original Baldur's Gate!
• The team is making it a point to support as many languages as they can.
• No new-fangled 3D-rendered graphics, here. They're going "2D isometric all the way", just the way we like it.
• The team is going to stick with the original BG model of limited voiceovers because it "allows for more in-depth writing." Good call.
• As of right now, our old BG1 and BG2 save games should work in the Enhanced Editions. The team hasn't had to change the save game formats... yet, anyway.
• There will be all-new characters for us to meet and recruit into our party in the Enhanced Editions. Voiced by all-new actors, no less.
• The Enhanced Editions will likely only be released digitally, so your old Baldur's Gate boxed copies will have to continue taking up your prized shelf space for now.
• The interface will see some revising, specifically to increase the size of the font (and hopefully the characters) at high resolutions. Elaborating further, Trent states that they have the original source code and are attempting to rework the UI and rendering.
• Once you're finished with the Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition, you will be able to import your character into the Baldur's Gate II: Enhanced Edition, just as we could with the original games.
• The team is "looking for new ways" to attach Baldur's Gate + Tales of the Sword Coast and Baldur's Gate II + Throne of Bhaal into one cohesive title. And, yes, that would be nothing short of awesome.
• The outdated DirectPlay network interface used by Baldur's Gate and Baldur's Gate II has been "macheted" to make room for something that is "better". Here's to hoping co-op multiplayer will be vastly improved! |