How Long Is Baldur’s Gate 3?
Baldur’s Gate is a huge, sprawling, epic RPG. There’s no doubt that it’s likely to go down as one of the best roleplaying games of all time. The sheer amount of choice, diversity and depth that’s gone into this is pretty staggering. But how long is this behemoth?
Answering that question is difficult because of the vastly different playthroughs that each player is likely to have. Quests can be competed in a variety of different ways, with different dialogue choices and sub-paths, while the amount of combat you face along the way (along with your tactics in battle), all likely to make a big difference to your play-time.
Play-through Times
For a straight-forward, standard Baldur’s Gate 3 playthrough, you can expect to spend roughly 75-100 hours getting through the main campaign. That includes a normal amount of combat, a bit of exploration off the beaten path and following one set story decision all the way through to its conclusion.
Those looking to rush through the game and skip most of the cutscenes and dialogue will probably see that total closer to around 30-45 hours. Of course, this also depends on how adept you are at playing previous Baldur’s Gate games, or if you’re a complete newbie to the franchise. Thankfully, this title caters to both!
So what about for the completionists? Well, Baldur’s Gate features a lot of exploration, secret areas full of valuable loot, and numerous different paths you can take through the main quest. To put that into perspective, the first mission features SIX different ways of completing it! With that in mind, you can expect to sink in about 200+ hours if you want to see as much as you can with this one.
According to sources, the Baldur’s Gate 3 script is also 2 million words long. For context, that’s more words than the entire A Song of Ice and Fire series that George R.R. Martin has written! (because let’s face it, we’re never getting another book in that series.)
The game also has 174 hours of cinematics too, but give those will be split across different playthroughs, with different companion interactions and choices made across the campaign, it’s easy to see how this can add up to an expansive and staggering amount of playtime.
In Summary
So to summarize you can expect the following when playing through Baldur’s Gate 3:
Rushed Playthrough: 30-45 hours
Standard Playthrough: 75-100 hours
Completionist: 200 hours+
As more people play through this one, it’s definitely worth keeping an eye on HowLongToBeat for more accurate figures. It’s fair to say though that this is a huge, sprawling game.
There’s a lot to see and do in Baldur’s Gate 3 and this RPG delivers an incredible achievement, not just from the devs over at Larian Studios, but for the RPG genre as a whole.
Are you playing through Baldur’s Gate 3 right now? Thinking about diving in? Let us know in the comments below!