I just finished Baldurs Gate 1 for the first time and really enjoyed it. That's why I want to share my thoughts on. I'm acutally kina fond of the genre and love games like Pillars, KOTOR, Tyranny and already tried BG1 a couple of years ago, but I gave up after some hours (more on that later). In the meantime I finished BG3 twice, played through Owlcat's Pathfinder games and now I wanted to give BG1 another go.
Story: I kinda like it, but it's definitely not on the same level as games like KOTOR 2, Disco Elysium or Tyranny. It's just some plain and simple "someone killed your foster father, now it's time to seek revenge". Actually it is not like really like that, because on your way to revenge you kinda solve the mystery of some evil plot, but at the end it all ties together so you can seek revenge. Overall the story just serves the purpose to let other aspects of the game shine. Talking about those...
Exploration: This is where the game shines the most. The story gives you a really clear path and early on even some urgency to that by introducing two companions that kinda set you on a timer. At least that's what they tell you. AFAIK know there is actually no timer. And that's what kinda set me off the first time I played the game. I was rushing through the story which leads to being underleveld, missing out on XP and some fun side quest. During this try I ignored the "timer" and took my time. I did some side quests, explored some low-level regions I haven't seen in my first attempt and had a lot of fun. And especially with those extra XP the game felt better balanced. I didn't overdid it as I just visited some low-level areas much later in the game, but it felt kinda nice that the game just gives you this much freedom over the whole playthrough. But what even is a big explorable map without some faces to punch...
Combat: Combat can be seen as some mixed bag. In the early game your party is frail as f. It really feels cheesy, how you fight in the beginning. You just kite enemies and kill them with bows and slings and throwing daggers, you enter buildings with a single party member to lure single enemies out of them, Sleep is op end ends whole fights single handedly. But in my opinion, that is another strength about this game. Not because this part of the gameplay is so good. But because the game evolves. Whereas in Wrath Of The Righteous early game and end game fights feel the same (at least for me) and mostly differ by the amount of pre-buffing and high-level spells mostly replacing low-level, in BG 1 the combat evolves over time. Sleep gets useless against stronger enemies. You encounter more and more mages over time, meaning that you can't kite so much and have to react quickly to interrupt them. You gain more spells that you need figure out. Pre-buffs are getting more and more important, but not to the ridiculous levels of Wrath Of The Righteous. All of this might turn people off but I was actually really surprised by the amount of variety the combat offers.
I'd like to mention a particular fight that I remember: I was exploring the red canyon early on and there is that one cleric who fights you with a giant army of undeads. I failed that fight a couple of times, because the normal kiting tactic did not really work. He was using magic, some of the undead were archers und undead are immune to Sleep. So I wondered if I should give up and come back later after some leveling or if iI can find a tactic to beat him. My plan doesn't sound that amazing, but I feld kinda genius at that moment: What if I don't fight this battle fair and square and just beat the cleric, loot him and leave. Because my PC was a fighter/cleric himself and I also had a paladin with me. And both have the Turn Undead ability. So I managed to just scare his army of summons, interrupted his casting with the good ol' Magic Missiles and finished him off with a rain ob arrows. I looted the body and just got the f outta there, because I really didn't want to deal with the horde of undead at this time. Great moment. His loot was really worth it.
After all that praise, I want to get so some "negatives". And those have mainly to do with the game's age. The thing is: BG1 really laid the foundation of modern (C)RPGs. It contains a lot of things that we take for granted these days. But there are also things, the we take for granted, that did not really exist back in the day.
QOL: This is where the game feels kinda dated. I don't know on how many things the Enhanced Edition improved the game, but there are some things, that are really not on today's standards:
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There is no way to see your currently equipped items while you are trading with a merchant. You always have leave the dialogue, switch to your inventory, remember the stats, speak with the merchant and compare. This is really weird.
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The quick bar is really flimsy and not really fun to use for spellcasters.
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The menu controls are terrible. "Load Savegame" kicks you out of the game session. Only click it when you are really certain you want to reload or do a quicksave before. Also: You can exit the inventory or character sheet by pressing Escape. But not the journal. Too many times I went into the pause menu when I did not want to.
Companions: Modern (C)RPGs really put a lot of emphasis on those. BG1 does not. There is an entire army of potential companions (in case you let them die) which leads to them not having long quest lines around them. You really have to use your imagination to bond with them. I actually did not dislike that, because it also took the urge to complete quests for companions I acutally don't care about and just want to complete. But people who start the game with different expectations might dislike that.
Conclusion: If you made it this far, you probably only read this text because BG1 is you favorite game anyways. So yes, it was (probably) groundbraking back in the days, still holds up to this day (in most parts) and is rightfully considered one of the greatest RPGs of all time. I personally am looking forward to play Siege of Dragonspear next and continue with BG2 afterwards. I might even try Icewind Dale. Or Neverwinter Nights. They were all in some Humble Bundle with Wrath Of The Righteous .