Baldur's Gate 3 to Launch on Xbox Series X|S This Year, No Split-Screen on Series S - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 01 September 2023 / 6,147 Views
Larian Studios founder and CEO Swen Vincke via Twitter announced he had a talk with Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer and revealed the team will be able to launch Baldur’s Gate 3 later this year on Xbox Series X|S consoles.
The game on the Xbox Series X will have split-screen co-operative play, while the feature will not be available on the Xbox Series S. The game will support cross-save progression between Xbox Series X|S and PC via Steam.
"Super happy to confirm that after meeting [Phil Spencer] yesterday, we've found a solution that allows us to bring Baldur's Gate 3 to Xbox players this year still, something we've been working towards for quite some time.
"All improvements will be there, with split-screen coop on Series X. Series S will not feature split-screen coop, but will also include cross-save progression between Steam and Xbox Series."
All improvements will be there, with split-screen coop on Series X. Series S will not feature split-screen coop, but will also include cross-save progression between Steam and Xbox Series.
— Swen Vincke @where? (@LarAtLarian) August 24, 2023
Baldur's Gate 3 released on PC via Steam and GOG on August 3. It will also launch for the PlayStation 5 on September 6.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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Starfield, Cyberpunk 2.0 + Phantom Liberty, and BG3 to close out the year. RPG fans eatin good!
Exceptions to the parity clause were the right idea. Does make me wonder how many further exceptions they will have.
And if Xbox S users will feel like "lesser" customers.
It depends what feature is missing between the two consoles. There were already some differences like resolution, fps, ray-tracing in most games. Split-screen isn't as popular as it once was, so I see that being a feature that is only available on Series X for some games. I do wonder if we will see split-screen finally come to Halo Infinite on at least the Series X (and maybe even Series S) and just not available on Xbox One.
GT7 still have split-screen from what I remember.
Raytracing isn't a feature on parity clause I would say.
Quite different to the story Phil has been telling in all those gamescom interviews. Exceptions will keep happening then.
So they could not fix memory issues on Series S after all (regarding split screen)
Phil had an interview yesterday where he alluded that feature parity wasn't a requirement (?) so we'll see if this now sets a precedent where games will come to Series X and S, but what features are there may be at developer discretion. Hopefully policy will just be splitscreen on Series S is optional so owners of the console don't feel too left out.
I wonder if Swen saw that interview and immediately called Phil up xD who knows though. Minimum PC requirements for BG3 are 8GB of memory and splitscreen runs fine. Not great, but fine.
PC memory is not as efficient as everything that enters the VRAM has to first go through normal RAM. But yeah the S memory obviously still wasn’t enough.
False. Not everything on a PC's drive has to go through system Ram to the GPU.
It's called "Direct Storage" for a reason and has existed for years.
https://developer.nvidia.com/blog/gpudirect-storage/
Keep in mind that a PC with 8GB of ram will have upwards of 2GB used for the OS... The Series S has 10GB of Ram with 2GB for the OS.
On PC if the GPU runs out of Ram, it starts using System Ram as well.
And if you have integrated graphics and only 8GB of Ram, well. You get the idea... It's possible if you leverage FSR, but it will look like garbage.
They weren't able to download virtual RAM for the system =p
A precedent has been set.
I wonder if they will patch split screen later on for the Series S. Considering it wont be a much used featured, i cant see them wasting their time.
I would bet heavily against it. It's obviously very difficult for them to do. So why expend that effort on a feature that few people are going to use, that only impacts 50% of one of the platforms that the game exists on?
Cross-saves between Xbox and games on PC Game Pass/Microsoft Store is common. But cross-saves between Xbox and Steam is not nearly as common. There may be other examples, but I can't think of any right off the top of my head. So that's cool. So long as it's not at the whim of the developer, and something that relies on them keeping a server up (as opposed to Microsoft's solution, that still works all the way back to Xbox 360 titles being run on modern Xbox systems, and doesn't seem likely to get turned off anytime soon).
So people accusing Larian Studios of lying, that they had an exclusivity deal with Sony and were covering it with blaming Series S for their shortcomings will retract?
Of course they won't
And those bragging that BG3 was a PS5 exclusive, like a certain user on this site (not you) and even a mod, will retract as well? Let's not pretend this is a one way street. The important thing is that even more gamers will get to experience this masterpiece a lot sooner than expected.
I guarantee you that now the dialog will change and they will make sure to point out how the Series S does not have split screen and how this is a game changer :)
I don't know anyone who accused Larian of any of this... lol
Just to clarify, I am not saying they do not exist, but you bringing them seem to imply that they are a lot and they are very vocal... I do not think so; not at all.
If ANYTHING I saw WAY more people bragging about how Baldur's Gate 3 is Play Station exclusive...
I only saw people accusing them of being lazy developers. The devs who have made what almost everyone considered to the GOTY with so many ways to approach the situations in their game are lazy because they couldn't get split screen working on the Series S.
So many PS fans claiming this was a PS5 exclusive, its literally all over Twitter/X
I wonder if they still care for the game now, knowing its coming to Xbox the same year.
This is good news for me. I'm not a huge fan of the genre, but I'm not one to miss out on mega hit games. So, I would likely buy this game once a price drop or two occur. I own a PS5, but I'd rather buy it on Xbox because I have a secondary Xbox in my bedroom, which gives me more options of where to play. So, I basically buy everything on Xbox that is not PlayStation exclusive.
I personally think this is fine. Ultimately, Series S will still play the game really well and that's all you should expect from the Series S.
A PC relatively low in memory won't be playing this game with split screen either.
And there goes Series S parity clause! Is this becoming a trend? Imho, serie S users should be pissed. MS promised parity and not inferior version with missing features!
It's split screen bro... not a deal breaker
Actually MS never promoted that Series S would be feature parity with the X. Also there were never a parity clause that Series S will have feature parity with Series X. You will find no statement from MS on features parity either official or non official. The only official statement from MS is that Series X and Series S will have the same games. That is something every developer has to do if they are bringing a game to the Xbox platform.
Larian said the parity clause was the reason for the game not releasing. It had to have the same features. This was reported on windows central.
With all due respect...
How can you defend this !?
They Promised buyers parity between consoles, now they screw them over like this!!
For real, Serie S still isn't a trap ATM, but there is a huge red flag here!
Because any promises of parity was always stupid. The sooner they get rid of it the better.
More important, its the same game. It just lacks the split screen option.
If you could actually find any statement from MS that promised features parity between S and X, I would agree but I actually looked into it and I couldn't find anything. Now assumptions does not equal facts but it seems that is exactly what is going on.
Quick glance I couldn't see anything, but perhaps some with a keen eye can shed more light: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/gaming/gdk/_content/gc/policies/console/certification-requirements
No, there is no parity clause in those requirements. I did a search myself and could not find a feature parity anywhere in MS documentation, official or non official statements. I am sure there is non because MS probably knew there would be no feature parity as the Series S just does not have the raw power to have every feature the Series X has. I believe people just believed there was such a requirement but in reality it would probably have put MS in a bind if they did have such a requirement when RT is not on Series S while it can be on X.
No one literally cares except opposition fanboys
I'm not in fanboy war, i'm expressing genuine concern for series S users that, likely, are going to star to get screwed by MS.
Also, It's not Just BG3. Look at this:
New Naruto X Boruto game has a setting to block Last-Gen & Xbox Series S https://www.resetera.com/threads/new-naruto-x-boruto-game-has-a-setting-to-block-last-gen-xbox-series-s-players-in-online-multiplayer-to-prevent-30fps-fights-on-ps5-xsx.756367/
There is a gigantic red flag on series S. Today It's an "ok" console, but It's getting more and more shit everyday...
You have 'concerns' for Series S users? :)
And not one game comes close to the totk, a very old tech system game. Start showing me amazing games that can't be made on the series s
Or alternatively those playing on a Series S who don't use split-screen will barely notice a difference.
An extreme take for sure lol. I'd hate to see what he refers to Switch owners who rarely get major third-party releases and when they do, it's either heavily compromised or a cloud version.
There's also budget PCs that make up the majority of PC gaming. Very few PC gamers are part of the "pc master race" Series S being budget friendly is fine. There's nothing wrong with someone wanting to get into gaming that can't afford a Series X or PS5.
And Archie Bunker was supposed to be an unflattering caricature of reactionaries who was quickly adopted by them as a folk hero.
