Larian started working on Baldur's Gate 3 DLC, then canceled it: “The Studio Was Elated”

During a talk at GDC 2024, Baldur's Gate 3 director Soen Finke announced that Larian Studios will not be making any DLC, expansions or sequels for the prestigious RPG, which took home another Game of the Year award at the Game Developers Choice Awards on Wednesday. However, speaking with IGN, Vincke said that Larian began working on the DLC and considered the possibility of creating Baldur's Gate 4 before turning to other projects.

“Because of all the success, the obvious thing was to create a DLC, so we started on one. We even started thinking about BG4,” Finke says. “But we weren't really finished with BG3 yet, and just moving forward with something new felt wrong. We also spent a whole bunch of time converting the system into a video game and wanted to do new things. There are a lot of limitations to creating D&D, and 5th edition isn't An easy system to put into a video game. We had all these new fighting ideas that we wanted to try and they just weren't compatible.”

Vincke has previously spoken about the challenges of working with 5th Edition, especially when it comes to how powerful players will be when they reach level 12 and beyond. Shortly after the release, Larian Studios said the team wanted to make new content but didn't know what that would be yet. So far, Larian Studios has mostly focused on adding content that wasn't available at launch, such as a new epilogue and extra endings.

When it came time to create the DLC, Finke said Larian was going through those suggestions. “You could see that the team was doing it because everyone felt like we had to do it, but it wasn't really coming from the heart, and we're very much a studio from the heart. That's what got us into misery and it's also been the reasons for our success.”

“They were thrilled”

Venky says he took a vacation during the Christmas holidays, and when he came back he had made up his mind. '[I] I came back and told the team: “You know we're not going to do that.” We're going to change and we're going to start doing these other things that we talked about, that we planned to do before we started BG3.' Those were always the plans for next, we have a couple of games we want to make, and we have a lot of concepts. So let's wrap up BG3, it was great. We've done our job. It is a story with a beginning, middle, and end. So let's pass the torch to another studio to pick up this amazing legacy.”

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Asked about the studio's reaction, Finke said the team was “ecstatic.”

“I thought they were going to be mad at me because I couldn't muster the energy. I saw a lot of cheerful faces, which I didn't expect, and I could tell they shared the same emotions, so we were all in sync with each other. Many developers came to me after They said: “Praise be to God.”

“I'm always the one who starts with the initial idea and then I give it to the team and they start iterating on it and turning it into something much better. During BG3 I asked them what the next game was going to be…If I saw they were excited, I would say, 'Okay, let's do it.' If they weren't, So it would go back to the drawing board. So they were very excited about some of the things we were planning to do. Then it was expected to be the pivot to start doing BG3 DLC because what you do… We didn't have any animus against BG4 or DLC, but the heart wasn't “There. It was more of a chore than actually getting excited. Now we have excitement back in the room and that's something that's very important.”

Vincke says the next game won't be Divinity: Original Sin 3, and that it will be “different than you think” but “still familiar.” Elsewhere, Finke said that the new project will “Dwarf” Baldur's Gate 3 scopewhich would be impressive given the scope of that game.

Meanwhile, Vincke confirmed that Larian Studios is still working on more new content for Baldur's Gate 3, including cross-platform mod support. After that, the future of Astarion, Karlach, and the rest of the beloved characters now in Baldur's Gate 3 will be in the hands of Wizards of the Coast.

One way or another, Baldur's Gate 3 leaves behind an impressive legacy. We gave it a perfect 10 in our original review and it pretty much swept awards season. Even if you've finished it, there's still a lot to see, so be sure to check out the full walkthrough for Baldur's Gate 3. As for Finke, he thinks he's got the first chapter figured out in his next game. But if it's anything like the development of Baldur's Gate 3, which took six years to complete, it may be a while before we get to play it.

Kat Bailey is IGN's news director and co-host of Nintendo Voice Chat. Do you have any advice? Send her a direct message at @the_katbot.