
Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition for the iPad - adamwintle
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/baldurs-gate-enhanced-edition/id515114051?mt=8
======
cletus
I can understand not supporting iOS 4.x. Memory management got a whole lot
less annoying with ARC (automatic reference counting) in iOS 5.x.

But there are a lot of people, myself included, who won't upgrade our devices
to iOS 6 because we want a Maps product that works and, you know, has public
transit directions. Until that changes I'm staying on iOS 5.

It's a shame. I'd buy this in a heartbeat. I love to support actual games
(social "games" not being games by my definition), which seem to be becoming
increasingly rare.

~~~
cageface
For a game it's even more puzzling because the odds are high this was all done
in some C++ framework and barely uses Cocoa.

I know as a developer I'm not even _thinking_ about iOS 6-only releases until
the middle of next year. Which is a bitch because dealing with the iPhone 5
without autolayout is no fun at all.

~~~
msbarnett
> For a game it's even more puzzling because the odds are high this was all
> done in some C++ framework and barely uses Cocoa.

The iPad 1 has 256 megs of RAM. The iPad 2 has 512, The 3 & 4 a gig.

"Requires iOS 6" is the easiest way, as a dev, to get the store to enforce the
requirement that your app needs more than 256 Megs to run comfortably.

~~~
nchaimov
For comparison, the original version of Baldur's Gate required 16 MB of RAM
(32 MB recommended).

~~~
0x0
On the other hand, I think that ran in much lower resolution and in 8bit
color.

~~~
bitcartel
If you still have the original disks, you can recreate the magic with GemRB.

<http://www.gemrb.org/wiki/doku.php?id=start>

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nostromo
I'm such a geek for these old isometric games. If you are too, I'd recommend
checking out Project Eternity
([http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/obsidian/project-
eternit...](http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/obsidian/project-eternity))
and Wasteland 2 (<http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/inxile/wasteland-2>) on
KickStarter.

Both were very successful in raising funds, so I'm hoping we see a renaissance
of the genre and some new IP.

~~~
jaaron
If you like these, you should check out the RPGs by Spiderweb Software.
They're available for iPad as well as Mac and PC:

<http://www.spiderwebsoftware.com/products.html>

~~~
wiradikusuma
dont forget Fallout 1 and 2.

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shawn-butler
I wonder how much effort had to go into reworking the orginal codebase to make
this performant. The Infinity Engine that was used for BG didn't use OpenGL
acceleration until BG2 and IcewindDale. I bet this was a fun project to work
on.

I doubt they are using the GemRB open source implementation [0] since it is
GPLv2.

[0]: <http://www.gemrb.org/wiki/doku.php?id=start>

------
CliveW
Baldur's Gate is one of my favorite games of all time, and I'm generally
behind the Enhanced Edition - I hope a new generation of gamers will be
inspired by the world of BG, as I was 14 years ago.

Having said that, playing BG:EE on PC for the past week I've been disappointed
by the lack of polish, and the number of bugs still present. GameBanshee -
probably the most respected site about computer RPGs - published a pretty
critical review (of the PC version):

[http://gamebanshee.com/reviews/110209-baldurs-gate-
enhanced-...](http://gamebanshee.com/reviews/110209-baldurs-gate-enhanced-
edition-review.html)

I hope the iPad version benefited from an extra week of polish. An earlier
build was rejected, implying the have done some bug-squishing:

<https://twitter.com/TrentOster/status/275743862507589632>

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timdoug
It looks like it requires iOS 6, so I won't be able to play it on my 1st gen
iPad. Sad times!

~~~
jaaron
The developers were seeing out of memory issues on the iPad 1, thus the
requirement for iOS 6. I believe there is still some hope they can get it to
run, but ultimately, that didn't hold up the release:

<https://twitter.com/TrentOster/status/276748438882902016>

~~~
jcromartie
Yeah, the original iPad is the most memory-constrained ARMv7 (i.e. iOS
5-capable) iOS device out there.

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erickhill
I for one think it's nice that this story hasn't been flagged. It's a Friday,
and this was welcome news for me. Thank you, @adamwintle, for the post.

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ndrake
Anyone know how the save system works? Can you hit the home button at anytime
and come back in to the game later right were you left off?

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swombat
Finally! There's one game I've been waiting for on the iPad for _ages_. The
burning question: is it a literal port or did they speed up some of the
awfully slow "go fetch a broomstick from the other side of the map at walking
speed" quests that are so common at the beginning of the game?

~~~
CliveW
More-or-less a direct port. They added a stand-alone 'arena mode', and a few
new NPC companions, 2 of whom have an associated quest/new area.

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smegel
I was going to get this on PC, but 20 bucks for a game a still have sitting on
my shelf is a bit much.

OTOH i will jump on it when it comes to Android, not only a much more
reasonable 10 dollars but i think the touchscreen experience might add value
in its own right.

~~~
unsigner
The total price is the same, the PC version includes several DLCs, while on
iOS you buy them separately.

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chrmaury
I would love to see a gameplay video on the iPad. The controls could be very
tough...

~~~
jaaron
Here's the first half of the tutorial:

    
    
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=pOqwUoJniPQ
    

I feel like the controls are pretty decent. It's pretty much a straight port
from the PC, so the menus are the same, etc. The hitbox for small items can be
a bit of an issue, but that's my only complaint so far.

You may want to browse through the TouchArcade forums for more feedback and
videos:

<http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?t=169358>

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hellrich
Hm, did I time it wrong or why did no one see my earlier submission?
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4887373>

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ramsey2314
In app purchases DO NOT work on iPad version. I paid 3 bucks and the new
character is nowhere to be found with ZERO EXPLANATION as to what to do after
they took my money.

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JonnieCache
This is the first thing that's made me want an ipad for anything more than
marking up web development work.

~~~
aw3c2
On Android you could play it (and Icewind Dale, etc) with the FOSS
[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.sourceforg...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.sourceforge.gemrb)

