Baldur’s Gate 3’s Collective Dialogue Has Triple the Word Count of the Lord of the Rings, Larian Reveals

Larian Studios founder Swen Vincke dropped the bombshell today that the developer doesn’t plan on releasing any Baldur’s Gate 3 expansions or DLC, nor a Baldur’s Gate 4, but he also made the point that there’s already a lot of content in their Game of the Year-winning RPG.

He revealed at a Game Developers Conference (GDC) panel today, when taking together all the various dialogue and narration options, Baldur’s Gate 3 has triple the word count of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings books. Total cutscene runtime, meanwhile, is twice as long as HBO’s Game of Thrones series. We already knew Larian’s latest was one of the most ambitious titles to come out in the last decade, but his comments truly put everything into perspective.

Both The Lord of the Rings and Game of Thrones stand as two of the lengthiest stories in fantasy history. Tolkien’s legendary trilogy – The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King – contains 455,125 words. You can watch all eight seasons of George R.R. Martin’s Game of Thrones show, meanwhile, in around 70 hours.

Vincke didn’t give specific stats, but his comments mean that Baldur’s Gate 3 features somewhere around 1,365,000 words and more than 140 hours of cutscenes to watch. It’s…a lot, and more than enough to keep players entertained for years to come as they uncover every secret and moment Larian’s characters have to offer.

Elsewhere during the panel, Vincke also gave us a look at a Tiefling version of Astarion that existed as part of an early version of the game.

For more on Baldur’s Gate 3, be sure to read up on our 10/10 review, where we said, called Baldur’s Gate 3 “the new high-water mark for CRPGs.”

Michael Cripe is a freelance contributor with IGN. He started writing in the industry in 2017 and is best known for his work at outlets such as The Pitch, The Escapist, OnlySP, and Gameranx.

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