 So, Baldur's Gate 3 is Larian's translation of D&D 5th edition into video game form, and as such, needs to try to translate all of its systems as well, including the character creation. Keep in mind that this game is early access, so options, graphics, and maybe even entire menu systems are subject to change. I'll definitely be doing another CCC once this game comes out fully released, whenever that'll be. Submitting my feedback to the Larian forums, as should you if any of you also own the game and have feedback for the development of Baldur's Gate 3. I'll link the forums in the top right up here, if YouTube allows, as well as in the description. I'll also try to be sure that my criticisms and praises are in the context of what this game does, and not something that's good or bad because of D&D itself, if that makes sense. For example, I won't praise the wizard for being incredibly customizable with how many spells you get, because that's not because of Baldur's Gate 3, that's because of the wizard in D&D. So without further ado, let me just get a clean pair of pants and pour out my massive jug of fanboy tears over this game and try to mitigate the bias, shall we? So when you first start making your character, there is a short intro cut scene that you can thankfully skip, even if you're having your first time playing through. Then you are brought to this screen, where there's a brief overview of your character from basic characteristics to their stats and spells and features and whatever else comes with it. The first option is choosing your origin, very similar to Dividity Original Sin 2. These are pre-existing and handwritten characters with already established personality traits, backstories, goals, all that stuff. And we'll even have unique dialogue options that a custom origin character will not. Otherwise, whoever you don't pick will be a recruitable companion later in the game. For now, at the time of this video, October 7th, 2020, you cannot play as any of the origin characters. Perhaps in the future, with an update or when the game eventually gets fully released, you can. You can also name yourself and pick a background. This includes all of the backgrounds from the 5e player handbook, and the appropriate bonuses for them as well. Next option, if you go with a custom origin, is your character race. In the early access version, there are 8 and can either be male or female. There's no word yet on how many race options will be available in the full game, but I'm anticipating at least the player handbook one. That includes gnomes, half orcs, and dragonborn. But unless it is said directly from Larian, that is only speculation on my part. If anyone in the comment section can find confirmation from the devs themselves, I will be sure to pin that comment. Each race also has about 2 or more subraces, like reflavorings of the chosen race, except for human and Githyanki, that is. Each of these races and subsequent subraces have different bonuses and abilities and whatever other features that are unique to them, just like 5e. And the game actually takes into account, for example, it'll display a unique menu appropriate for each system, like the half elf having two additional points to spend on any of their ability scores. Then on the appearance tab, you have your voice, which nicely enough, you can have a feminine voice for a masculine character and vice versa, if you so want. You then have head and skin options. Hair styles, eye color, hair color, facial hair, which funnily enough can be on the female characters as well. And a few other options unique based on which race you pick, like tiefling horns. What's interesting, though, is although you have a preset kind of palette of skin colors, there is this little option that you can checkmark to include all available colors, regardless of race. So if you want to be a green tiefling or some abomination like a pink kithyanki, you can. You monster. And that color option includes things like the hair and the eyes and the tattoos as well. You are not limited to the palette of your character's race. Then we have classes. The early access version has six of the 12 original D&D classes. And Larian Studios has said that they will include the rest by the game's release. This does, however, mean that there are no plans as of now to include the newly created artifice or class, so I wouldn't hold my breath for it. Each class has its own unique options like spells and features depending on the class, just like the tabletop game. And selecting each one will give you said options to pick from. Like if I pick a cleric, it will tell me to choose my cleric spells. If I pick a ranger, it will ask me what my favorite enemy and preferred terrain is. We then have skills, which lets you pick the various skills to be proficient with based on whichever class you pick. And then finally, you have ability scores, which are the various different attributes your character and their capabilities and all that good stuff. Each one aside from Constitution has a little drop down that shows which skill that ability is attributed to. Anyone familiar with fifth edition will notice that you use the point buy system, where you have a pool of points to distribute between all of your ability scores. Some people may prefer that if you could roll, you know, the usual 46 drop the lowest or do standard array, but I don't think the game is worse for going this route. And if you're new to D&D and don't know what stats you should have for what class, there isn't also a use recommended button, which will just distribute the stats in a fairly nice way to fit the class you pick. And once you finish creating your character, the game has you create who you dream of or attracted to or something. I'm unsure as to what this entails, but I'm willing to guess it has something to do with the game's romance system or something. Either way, it's got a companion creator too, so that's pretty cool. One more thing I wanted to mention is that just about everything in this character creator has an accompanying tooltip associated with it, just in case you're not familiar with D&D systems and need to know what things do. It's just a hover away. And normally I would go into what's bad and then what's good, but because this is a unique scenario where I'm critiquing an early access game, one that comes from a source material with lots and lots of things that people really wanted to be included, I'm going to mention briefly some concerns that shouldn't be considered negatives that I do often see being thrown around a lot as negatives. Firstly, the lack of options. This is an early access game and things are bound to be missing or unfinished. Secondly, and this is the one that I see more often than not, and this will also extend to the final game once it releases as well. Something that you want or expect to be in the game, despite the fact that the developers never promised or said that they would include it and it not being there is not a valid form of criticism. I don't think it's really fair to criticize an entire orchestra as bad just because it doesn't have a trombone in it. This mostly extends to what the available races may be in the final game. When I was streaming this, someone mentioned that they would not buy the game if there were no Dragonborn option. And frankly, I hope this doesn't sound too harsh, but that seems a little bit closed-minded to me. I'm not trying to sell this game. I am biased towards this game. I like it a lot. But I'm not trying to say this to say, to try and deflect any criticisms. But I don't think criticism for what a game isn't is very good criticism. Nor is it useful. You can't say an FPS is bad because it doesn't have a baby making mechanic like The Sims. Yes, this is a legitimate thing that happened to a friend of mine once. And although this is a straw man, I think that extends to something simple like available races in a D&D game as well. I think it's a bit wishful thinking to be expecting many, if any of the exotic D&D races like Kobolds, Kanku, Fear Bowl, etc. because those are not a priority or necessarily what's usually expected to be a player race in fantasy properties. Notice I never criticized Final Fantasy XIV for not letting you play as, say, the bird people from Crystal Chronicles, for example. When criticizing media, we have to be reasonable and take into account what is there rather than grasping at straws that aren't. I say this completely aware of the irony of how I like to harp on about body options, but hey, we're all hypocrites about some stuff in some fashion, right? What's going to be reasonable critique that's relevant to the thing you're criticizing will always be subjective, I suppose. That was just my perspective on the situation I wanted to throw in my two cents, and I hope people can realize that mindset a little bit better and maybe not get too upset whenever they realize, wait, what do you mean you can't play Tortal in this game? Anyway, let's talk about the bad. Firstly, throughout the entire character creator, most of the selectable list options are using this arrow button system, and I am personally not a fan. In fact, that's probably my least favorite type of menu system in character creators, and would prefer either a drop-down list or selectable panels, kind of like the race buttons, just so I could see all my available options and look through them instead of having to click through each and every single one with no end of the options in sight. It gets especially frustrating with the hair options as there's a dozen of them, and it means you can't compare two on a whim if you want. If by chance, they're just really far apart. Next, the face options are basic, as in there are none. It's the same way DOS2 does faces as well as Destiny, where you only have a pre-made face and can't really edit anything about it. No nose adjustments, mouth adjustments, eye adjustments, or anything like that. Same with the body. There are no body, weight, or height adjustments to speak of. That said, I did wax lyrical about not critiquing something based on what it isn't, so I'll admit this is not the hugest of issues, more of a nitpick and a personal preference, but I still think it's worth mentioning. I like diversity in my character's physical traits. People come in all shapes and sizes without it impeding on their physical performance, and I think that should be reflected. Regarding the options you ARE given, though, there's very few. Though I can see this may just be because of the nature of early access, and they plan on adding more. Nevertheless, as the game is now, the amount of faces you have is incredibly small, as are some of the hairstyles for a few of the races and the voice options. I anticipate the latter will receive more as the game is updated, and I hope the former to perceive a few more as well, because as of now, me personally, 10 hairstyles for Tiefling Female is simply not enough, especially when a lot of them are not... I'm not a fan of them. This is incredibly subjective and sort of plays into the previous negative in that the design of the options you're given are not really my cup of tea. You can see here, I've been trying to make a good-looking female Tiefling character, and none of the hairstyles are really my thing. Which is weird considering that there are NPCs that are Tieflings that have hairstyles that are not available to the player. And they're just random NPCs, too. They're not, like, important, significant characters that have a unique look. This opinion in particular is going to differ from person to person, but to me, a handful of the races have not had a single face or hairstyle that I like. Subjective, though. Like I said, as you may think that all of these faces are bangers, I personally don't, especially the male elf faces. That's where I think more subtle adjustment options to the facial features would be nice, or just more faces in general. And lastly, each time you change the face or hair, the character briefly has to reload, which can make the instantly comparing options even more difficult. And those split seconds of waiting can really add up over long character creation periods. It won't ruin your character creating, but it can make it feel like more of a chore since it's adding time and you've got to wait and you can't just flip through them and see what your options are because you're missing them and you've got to wait. Gosh, finally, I can talk about what's good so I don't feel as bad for picking on an early access game. Let's get this out of the way. The game looks great, right? It may not be the most graphically impressive, but it's definitely not wanting for detail. The character's faces look fantastic up close. The clothes look nice. Looks like people are finally catching up to the Eastern developers and they're truly amazingly floofy-looking anime hair. Subjective taste on the actual design of the character's faces and outfits aside, this character looks good. While we're on looks, this UI is clean. It looks visually sharp as heck and functions like a dream, aside from the little arrow buttons and the flashing character. I've watched a couple of people who don't know anything about D&D or CRPGs in general and try to make a character in this thing and not struggle an inch because of how user-friendly everything is. It's all clear and straightforward and all the tooltips are just a brief hover away and it doesn't bombard you with intimidating amounts of information of text like some people think D&D is like. There's a tooltip and just enough information for just about everything that needs it in this creator. A nugget of praise I think I should mention is that you can have a masculine or feminine voice no matter what gendered body you pick, as well as beards for everybody who allows it, regardless of gender as well. Except for the elves, sorry elves. And another minor nice thing, whenever you change races or even gender and edit your appearance and everything, your appearance for previously edited races is saved so that when you go back to it, it's still there. Like this pink Yankee is still here after I went in and started editing this elf person and this dwarf that I edited earlier in the character creator critique. Like he's still here in the same way just as I left him. One surprising innovation Baldur's Gate 3 does that I think more games should do in general is just how many gosh darn color options you have and how you can just mix and match options from other races. If you wanna be a dwarf that's got green skin because you wanna headcanon them as some sort of long descendant of goblins, you can do that. If you like the way the gifs look but hate all the warm greens and browns and just wanna be a cold violet instead, you can do that. This opens up a load of possibilities to make really unique characters despite the very limited face and hair options. Sure, there is a canon look for these races and they'll be depicted as such in the actual game but it won't stop you from completely breaking it if you want for whatever reason or no reason at all and I think that's wonderful. And one biased piece of praise I'd like to give to the game not as a great character creator itself but more of a great translation of fifth edition D&D rules. Aside from a few adjustments to some features and spells to better fit a video game, this is a near perfect recreation of making a character in fifth edition and I really mean it when I say you could use this as a legitimate 5E character creating tool. For the most part anyway, you don't have the luxury of all the expansion books and such but as far as starting out with the basic, this is practically a menu driven character creation section of the player's handbook and I think that's impressive and worth applauding. I might even seriously consider making characters for D&D in here myself, give or take a few options like when I need to give them a race that's not available because it's just so much easier and quicker than a regular pen and paper. Now of course I still need to translate that into an actual pen and paper but this is what role 20's character mansor wishes it was. Conclusion. It's visual customization, it's lacking a bit and some menus have the usual suspects of frustration but it's still a great looker and gives you just enough to help you set characters apart especially with the all race colors options and information is presented beautifully and painlessly. It's greatest accomplishment is how well it translates 5E in that it literally is 5E. This has been character creator critique. Remember to send your feedback to Larry in Studios' feedback forums linked in the description below if you would like to have a hand in Baldur's Gate 3's development. Thank you for watching and I will see you next time.