Baldur’s Gate 3 is an expansive RPG: a game with a combined total of 600 spells and actions to experiment with, encouraging you to navigate your environment in new ways, to constantly interact with the world around you.
But how exactly does no-compromise RPG translate to controller without making you feel like eating a wet hot dog?
Fortunately, we have the answers. Baldur’s Gate 3 was built for PS5 from day one. Today let’s take a look at the fruit of our labor, the hot dog in question: its DualSense wireless controller, and all we’ve done to bring the intricacies of the game into just a few buttons and triggers.
A new generation of role-playing games
While we had experience bringing controller support to the Divinity: Original Sin series, Baldur’s Gate 3 is a much larger and more challenging game to port in comparison.
So we took its interface and streamlined it, turning our original user interface into radial menus that felt more intuitive to use with a controller. You can access your most essential tools with the push of a button, which opens up a large radial to access your map, journal, spellbook, character sheet, combat log, alchemy, short rests, long rests and your camp, as well as your level up screen and Illithid Powers skill tree.
Your actions, spells, cheats, and items (their total number can be in the thousands depending on how much armor, health potions, and wheels of cheese you’ve amassed on your journey) are turned into muscle memory, accessible through a series of customizable radial menus. . Arrange your spells however you see fit, change which items and actions are within your reach, add new radials to the list, or control and remove the ones you don’t need.
We’ve also made some features more accessible to you, like Dialogue History, which can be opened in the middle of a conversation for a quick reminder of what just happened, and Top-Down Tactical View, which it can be accessed simply by zooming out completely. your camera using the right stick. Jump and Examine are also mapped to your controller with regular use in mind, and both can be found right on your d-pad.
Coming to the DualSense controller technology
With our PlayStation 5 launch just around the corner, we’ve pushed the way we use controllers in-game even further, taking advantage of DualSense controller technology to make your experience feel more immersive in combat and while flicking through menus. .
In battles between magic wielders, the light bar will take on the color of your spell, matching the color of the damage type or the color of the intent of the spell you’re casting. During moments of increased pressure, its brightness will intensify, accompanied by haptic resonances.
When affected by a core state such as Paralyzed, Bleeding, or Haunted, your DualSense controller will light up with a matching color.
We also used the adaptive controller triggers and added actuation points and feedback for the left and right triggers, giving a sense of weight to the act of switching between menus. Lightly pulling the trigger will allow you to peek at the radial menus for a moment (a useful feature in the heat of combat), while pressing hard and past the hit point will lock the menu.
Freedom to explore as you like
Like any good D&D campaign, in Baldur’s Gate 3 it is the players who decide how they will explore the Forgotten Realms. BG3 is equally flexible when it comes to control schemes, allowing gamers to choose the configuration that best suits their style and preference.
Playing with a controller introduces a truly immersive way to explore Faerun: unrestrained as you control your character’s movements directly and in the moment, just like in a third-person game.
While for actions that can benefit from point-and-click specificity, there is Cursor Mode. This places a cursor on your screen, allowing you to control your character in the traditional point-and-click style.
