Baldur's Gate Expansion: Tales of the Sword Coast

by Black Isle Studios

Product Details

• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S. and to APO/FPO addresses. For APO/FPO shipments, please check with the manufacturer regarding warranty and support issues.
• ASIN: B00001QEQ9
• Media: CD-ROM
• Release Date: May 11, 1999
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #23,082 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Platform: PC

Amazon.com Review

Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast delivers what we've all been screaming for--more Baldur's Gate. Although it does not significantly extend the story line, it does provide enough new goodies to augment an already great game.

Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast provides four new areas for you to explore, all of which share the richness that made Baldur's Gate a groundbreaking masterpiece. Players are given the opportunity to explore a few new islands, visit a suburb of Baldur's Gate, and engage in a good old-fashioned dungeon crawl beneath Durlag's Tower. Players can also embark on a quest that will take them back into the city of Baldur's Gate itself. These new quests tend to be even more involved and challenging than those found in the initial game, as they gravitate more toward puzzle solving than pure combat.

The additional areas are at least as satisfying as any found in the original, featuring three new types of monsters as well as new magic items, enemies, and spells, all of which are woven seamlessly into the game play. Those who are already deeply involved in a campaign or have already completed the game need not start over to take advantage of the expansion. Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast raises the character experience cap by at least one level and can be integrated at any time during your campaign, easily providing an additional 20 hours of game play.

For a Baldur's Gate enthusiast, the four new areas alone make this expansion worth having. An added treat is the included software utility that allows players to speak to each other online via microphone, giving multiplayer games a live role-playing feel. Baldur's Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast may tend to give you more of the same, but in this case, you wouldn't have it any other way. --Joshua B. Coombs

Pros:

• New areas just as good as first ones
• Powerful new magic items and increased experience cap
• Enables your BG characters to get tougher, ready for Baldur's Gate 2
• Free online speech software

Cons:

• Doesn't significantly extend the story line

Product Description

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Tales of the Sword Coast is fun, but lacks depth., July 15, 2000

By 

Jason Moll - See all my reviews

This review is from: Baldur's Gate Expansion: Tales of the Sword Coast (CD-ROM)

In Tales of the Sword Coast, you are taken back to the land of Baldur's gate prior to the end of the game. You are placed in the city called Ulgoth's Beard.

Once in this city, you are immediately sent on a quest to an ice island. This scenario is realitively easy to complete. Following this completion, you can be sent on two more major missions. The first one sends you in search of Balduran's ship and a forgotten island. This scenario is intriguing due to the new enemies that are werewolves. The climax of this part of the game can be difficult, but has some nice game play.

After completing this scenario, you go for the last scenario that sends you down to Durlag's tower. There are numerous levels found in the tower, in which a few levels can be quite confusing. There is excellent images on the one level in which a skeleton of a greater wyvern surrounds the floor. In order to complete the tower, the party must defeat a demonknight, which is not too simple.

Following the completion of the tower, the party must complete one or two minor scenarios before the final task of facing Sarovek.

Overall, this game is just a mere minor extension of Baldur's Gate. Yes the play can be fulfilling, but there is not enough depth the game in order to justify the price. In my opinion even though it is adequate, there is no real need or desire to play this game.

20 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good could of been Better, August 28, 2000

By 

Michael Castilla (New York USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Baldur's Gate Expansion: Tales of the Sword Coast (CD-ROM)

In this expansion pack you basically get three main subquests, two of which are long and difficult. You get to raise your characters to level 9, and 10 for your thief(You will need a thief to disarm traps and pick locks so make sure you keep a thief for this expansion set). My main dislike of this game is how poorly it ties in with the orginal Balder's gate. The story lines do not connect at all. If you imported your character from the main balder's gate the expansion pack drops you off in a new town just before the epic battle with Saverok. But in the subquests you do come across many different villains, puzzles, and creatures to kill. Plus you will be able to equip your party members with fancy armor and powerful weapons. If your number one reason in liking the orginal Balder's gate was to follow the storyline than I do not recommend Tales of the Sword Coast. However, if you loved killing exotic monsters and boosting the strength of your character's than this is the perfect set for you. Your characters will become much stronger and gain more spells, and weapons. Interplay did a great job in creating a chance for players to boost up their characters, however the storyline is weak and doesn't connect too well (or not at all) with the orginal Game.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Decent Gameplay, August 1, 2001

By 

Hapworth (Palma de Mallorca, Spain) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Baldur's Gate Expansion: Tales of the Sword Coast (CD-ROM)

I'm surprised at the number of reviewers who found this game disappointing. I found it to be a challenging expansion pack that significantly raises the difficulty level over that of the original. No, Tales of the Sword Coast doesn't extend the story line of BG, and, no, the story line doesn't even FIT comfortably within the original BG plot. And yes, Tales IS basically an add-on that simply allows your characters to increase their experience points and find new items in the process.

Still, I think it is a fault to criticize the game too much (as many customer reviewers have) on issues of story line. If you want a great, involved story, well, buy Planescape: Torment (my vote for greatest RPG title ever). Even though Tales of the Sword Coast's game objectives may seem completely out of whack with the BG main plot, think back to BG and I think you'll recall LOTS of areas that didn't have anything to do with the iron shortage or Saverok For instance, did the Firewine Dungeon "really" play a crucial role in terms of story line? Did helping Drizzt fight off those hordes of baddies really advance the plot? How about all the random quests?

In other words, I think one should evaluate TOSC using one simple maxim as a guide: namely, are the new areas fun to play? In my opinion, the new areas in TOSC are both challenging and enjoyable. One of the levels (***BEWARE, SPOILERS HERE***), the ice island is a throwaway, but the other two, Werewolf Island and Durlag's Tower, are impressive. Werewolf Island does have a captivating plot, and although it's size in terms of area isn't large, the battles are numerous and semi-difficult. Durlag's Tower provides players with something that BG kind of lacked: a decent dungeon crawl. I found Durlag's Tower very involving and moderately difficult. Unlike the ridiculous monster count and borderline unplayability (in terms of difficulty) of Icewind Dale's dungeons, Durlag's Tower strikes a nice balance between being difficult but not too difficult; it knows how to challenge players without forcing them to die, reload, die, reolad, die reload, ad infinitum.

Lastly, I found this game a decent value in terms of length. TOSC is now a bargain bin purchase, and although some customers here like to brag (lie???) about how the game only took them 10 hours to complete, Tales took me betwen 1 and 2 weeks to finish. I admit that I may not be a master AD&D player, yet I did successfully complete BG and felt that my party was very much up to the challenge of the expansion pack.

This game does get docked a notch, however, for some small problems: 1) Pathfinding is still troublesome. 2) Inventory juggling is still a nightmare. I truly believe that about 50% of Baldur's Gate (and this expansion) is spent juggling inventory items. 3) The puzzle element introduced in Durlag's Tower is more annoying than fun. 4) The next-to-final battle against a monster summoned with Durlag's Blade is insanely difficult and convoluted. But basically, if you enjoyed the original you should probably enjoy this expansion.

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