Rating: 
Summary: Best AD&D RPG Ever!
Review: This game is great. From the way the system runs to the Exact replicas of AD&D rules. I loved Baldur's Gate and would recommend it to Anyone! Character development is excellent, story is wonderful, and gameplay is just outstanding!
Rating: 
Summary: Too easy to die in the beginning
Review: Baldur's Gate is the best AD&D game to come around in a while, but it drove me absolutely insane for the first few hours. Why? Because in the beginning, there are quite a few people who want you dead...including a few powerful (at least at THAT point) wizards. At low levels, a guy can walk up to you, say "Okay, I'm going to kill you now," and quite suddenly knock you out in 1-2 hits. After a while though, you'll get into it. Man, you have to watch yourself in this game, because there is are deceptive people in *every town!* Lots of characters walk up to you asking for help, and end up being villains! To wrap it up, it's a keeper. (especially the bundled version w/the expansion pack) but don't get discouraged at the beginning, because that's the hardest part. Once you get by that, you'll have a good game with lots of side quests and longitivity.
Rating:
Summary: Must have for RPG fans
Review: The best fantasy CRPG I've played since I got Realmz for the Macintosh (from Fantasoft- check it out, all Mac fans) It had a few annoying bugs but this probably had more to do with my cobbled-together $300 PC than the Software. Great game.
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding!
Review: This is what I always hoped every other RPG I ever bought in my life would be like. Great characters, great storyline, great progression rate, great spells, great action, great side quests (if you choose to follow them). The best part of this game are the dungeons. Each one is more eery than the last. The battles get very intense especially when you're trying to make it back to the surface for some much needed rest. The ending is very disappointing considering all the effort it takes just to get there. Despite that the journey itself is very rewarding. Each area you liberate gives you a feeling of accomplishment. The main drawback is changing the disc for each area. They did this sensibly, but it gets annoying; like if you go the wrong way before you realize you've done so. This game is excellent. I'm afraid to buy another RPG because it probably won't match up. I never thought a video game would spoil me this way.
Rating:
Summary: Strap on your belt pouch and get born again.
Review: In today's CRPG world, the gaming experience of pure fantasy may be going the way of the dinosaur. You'll be hard-pressed to find an role-playing adventure tried and true to the style of those David Eddings and Terry Brooks fantasy novels that you cut your teeth on growing up. In rather self-conscientious awareness of its own hero-for-the-kingdom banality, the CRPG field has survived, much like today's rock and pop acts, by breeding with other gaming genres (Daggerfall/Diablo---Action, Warcraft/Heroes of Might and Magic---RTS), mixing in some sci-fi, cyberpunk, or dystopian elements (Final Fantasy, King's Quest, Fallout), or going for the whole "virtual world" shtick (Ultima Online, Meridian 59, Everquest). Even the paper-and-pencil AD&D system created a dizzying array of other-worldly campaign settings the original Tolkein-based dungeon-crawlin' ruleset had no real business mingling with in the first place. Well, you can't really blame the gaming companies for this, as the few straight-forward fantasy games that have been released in recent years have epitomized the mediocrity that RPG hybrids seek to avoid. I still have dismal memories of "Betrayal at Antara," and even Interplay's virginal gateway AD&D product "Descent at Undermountain" is a disaster best forgotten. Luckily, Baldur's Gate arrives to save the CRPG AD&D franchise from the claws of history and inject some vitamins into the ailing modern vein of fantasy role-playing to boot. There is good reason that this game was universally lauded by professional gaming critics and on the top of just about everyone's RPG nomination list. Baldur's Gate resurrects the role-playing heroics and old-school antics of avenging wrongs, party camaraderie, and exploring new lands of SSI gold-box adventures of yore, while updating it for today's graphical sensibilities. Baldur's Gate is as much a celebration of the fantasy role-playing experience as one in its own right. The descriptive prose is thorough and appropriate for the medieval milieu without being hackneyed. Humor in dialogue brings a welcoming relief from the burden of playing the hero without bordering on self-parody. The story is engrossing and interconnected in a chapter system of revelations (reminiscent of Betrayal at Krondor) without being contrived. Your main protagonist, a sheltered but well-tutored young man/woman, who is no one's fool and has talent to burn, has ubiquitous appeal without being cardboard. His/her destiny awaits in your hands, as well as how you choose to shape his reputation, profession, and preferences for friends and enemies. All of this on the backdrop of a 1st-rate CRPG implementation of the 2nd Edition AD&D rules, beautiful pre-rendered backgrounds, character portraits, and a stream-lined interface for ease of use. Who would have thought it would be this much fun reprising the role of the fantasy savior and hitting the road with your motley crew of fellow do-gooders? It's all about the presentation, my friend. The most valid criticism of Baldur's Gate from the nay-sayers (amid a plethora of inane ones) is the combat-happy nature of the game. This is a foible more of the fault, among others, of the AD&D system itself and its representation in a computer game. In particular, early TSR pen-and-paper modules were very predisposed to combat (after all, it was the experience marker of choice), and after 20 years, a major revision, and a second one the under way, the AD&D ruleset has some baggage and some imbalances to its name. This might have been a problem, had not the combat system of Baldur's Gate been so darn fun. It takes a myriad of obscure combat and initiative rules and stream-lines them in a visceral, adrenaline charged real-time combat engine, which was how combat was REALLY supposed to feel like, not bogged down in a litany of tedious die-rolling and methodical turn-taking. I never tired of my senses piqued to the war-cry of an oncoming band of humanoids, the raspy squall of a flesh-hungry ghoul, or the sing-song incantations of an enemy spell-caster preparing certain doom for my party, or the haste in which I paused the action and brooded over what action to take. The only real criticisms I have of Baldur's Gate is the empty ending (the journey is the real reward) and some hardship starting on the right foot with your rookie character, as in survival (I recommended creating a pure or multi-classed fighter; I'm afraid you'll have to stow those fantasies of being that ubermench mage gliding through the realm in a shimmering ball of mana, I know I did). The world won't be dealt to you on a silver platter---but where's the fun in that! Baldur's Gate is a no-brainer for the AD&D crowd. For the uninitiated, Interplay softens the transition with a user-friendly integrated tutorial at the beginning of the game and excellent documentation, basically an abridged version of the Player's Handbook. Interplay has the role-player's interest at heart; if "Fallout" didn't settle the matter, Baldur's Gate will. However, if you're a self-appointed CRPG pundit who has his OWN paradigm of what a CRPG is, and in your metaphorical solar system of the experience Neptune happens to be the center of everything, i.e. These negative reader reviews which concentrate on one aspect of gameplay that doesn't jibe with them and proceed to denounce the whole game, then chances are you'll find reason not to enjoy Baldur's Gate. However, if you accept it on its own terms, which are by no means shabby, I invite you to partake in a rarely rewarding role-playing experience, both nostalgic and novel, and richly deserving of its place as a modern CRPG classic.
Rating:
Summary: GREAT!
Review: Well, i bought this game in bundle with expansion pack and I may say that it's great! I has great grafics, super gameplay, and super duper sound! Buy it if your favorite games are RPGs. + gameplay, grafics, sound, 5 cd's (6) - none Bojan, Croatia
Rating:
Summary: A great game, and a must have for all AD&D fans
Review: This is a quality product by anyones standards. First lets review the good things. 1. A great portrayal of the original AD&D rule set complete with intiative and you can even turn on the dice roles to see exactly what the roles you are getting are. 2. A good story with numerous plot twists and an overall addictive game. 3. An amazing amount of detail and subplots was put in especially in the city of Baldur's Gate which is huge, and by far the biggest city I have ever seen in a PC AD&D game. 4. The amount of diversity of race and class make for a very attractice replayability. Let's Look at the bad. 1. A terrible multi-play engine that is virtually unplayable. 2. You walk to slow on the normal game screen and tends to draw out game play a little to much, which I think they have fixed in the upcoming Baldur's Gate II. 3. A very anoying experience cap is set at 89,000 for the game and 160,000 or so for the expansion. Over all I think the game was a big success, and to date the best AD&D game made for the PC console. I wait in anticipation of Baldurs Gate II.
Rating:
Summary: It Doesn't Get Better Than This
Review: This Game Is Spectacular!At First, I Was Amazed At All The Things You Could Do. I recieved So Many Side Quests In Beregost I Thought My Head Would Explode Trying To Remember it All. There Are Also Thousands Of Items and Hundreds Of Magical Spells. The City Baldur's Gate Is Huge. Once You get In the Gate, You won't know Which quest To Take First. There Must Be Hundreds Of Houses! This Game Has Everything You Need. Great Graphics, Music, sounds, and plot make this game a best buy
Rating: 
Summary: Reality Check
Review: Let's be serious. The idea of a good computer game from TSR is enough to make any D&D fan take notice, and they came SO close. But they failed in the most important part of it all. D&D is all about interacting with other players, and the multiplayer aspect of the game is simply terrible. It's impossible to do anything if you are not the main character, (the idea that there would even be a main character in a D&D game is insulting to all the players of the real game,) because whatever he does screws up whatever you are trying to do, even if you're not even on the same screen. It's not fun to follow someone else around the screen. Single player play is fair, but again, its all about playing with other people. Buyers beware.
Rating:
Summary: Horrid controls
Review: i don't know why others rate this so highly - the graphics are OK, i love the fact that you can play with friends (although in the end are different schedules ruined this) and i like importing my own pictures. But the controls for this game are absolutely frustrating! Some minor gripes: the manual doesn't have enough info, combat used to be a MAJOR pain until i stumbled over the pause commands (and had to play with them to figure out which ones to set), having the main character enter a store makes life frustrating for other LAN players, the plot doesn't seem multiplayer friendly (you lose all those NPCs which are important to the story - the party is so small), the maps don't make a ton of sense, group movement can be really annoying and my number one complaint: you can't use arrow keys to move your character! i know, it sounds minor, but the view screen is only large enough to show a few tiles, so you have to scroll the screen, click a destination point, by which time your guy has already walked there so you scroll some more, repeat - it gets so that you never actually see your character because you're so busy setting way points for him to walk. At a minimum, if you have to play this carpal-tunnel torture of moving your characters leg by leg, you should at least be able to make the screen center on the character - the little guy just walks off the screen and you don't know where he went. At a minimum, let me see more of the map at one time - i have a 19" monitor and prefer looking at what's happening rather than the large pretty pictures some artist drew. The plot's OK, the D&D system is pretty sophisticated, there's some real polish in places and we've needed a good RPG for a while (i LOVED Fallout, which had lousy, but still vastly superior, map and movement controls), so i got the game the very first day it was released (xmas eve), and my roommates and i played it for 2 weeks, but eventually i got so sick of the control scheme that i just erased the frustrating thing
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