Baldur's Gate 3 anniversary statistics cement the popularity of Astarion, kissing, and being turned into a cheese wheel
Baldur's Gate 3 released about this time last year, and even though Larian's gearing up for what's next the studio is still monitoring what people do and don't do in the hit RPG. Much like it did a couple times late last year, Larian has compiled some strange and interesting bits of data about how you all managed to get surprisingly weird in a game that's surprising and weird even when you don't go out of your way to get turned into cheese—which 1.9 million people did.
Seriously, people: When something says it's an immortal being with incredible wishing powers, why do you choose to antagonize it? (Chaotic Neutral players do not answer.)
Other stats noted how few people have actually beaten Honour Mode, the extra-hard ironman challenge Larian added after launch: A mere 141,660 of you. That's compared to a whopping 1.2 million defeats, 76% of which then deleted their save.
As was a surprise to Larian at launch the vast majority of people—93%—chose to play as a custom character. What is interesting to note is that Astarion has just barely pushed past Gale as the most-played origin character, which is honestly kind of surprising! Turns out the power of babygirl and acting and meme status can, indeed, push past sort-of-adorable-yet-painfully-over-earnest protagonist (with a flying cat) appeal.
One cool graphic highlights the divide of what class was most-chosen with which race. Dwarves are unsurprisingly pigeonholed as melee fighters like paladins, barbarians, and fighters, but there are a few surprises in here. Notably that one of the top classes for a halfling is monk—not nearly as many as bards and rogues, mind you, but there's a sizable minority of people who like the idea of a suplexing short king. The most-played class, paladin, doesn't appear as a top class for the most-played race, elf.
I'm not going to comment on how more people got down and dirty with the mind flayer than the nice bear man.
…but I am going to comment on how you did all pet the animals which is good and just and righteous and forgives whatever weird kinky sins you got up to in the bedroom.
Finally, Larian released a few sets of statistics on the ending of the game. We learned stuff like how many people hugged Gale's apotheosizing god-form, and how some 3.3 million people managed to kill the Netherbrain—with 200,000 of those having Gale blow himself up to do it. That's kind of low, to be honest, and I honestly thought it would be higher. I guess people don't like to use the easy-out button.
Anyway, if you're still enamored with Baldur's Gate 3 then check out PC Gamer's feature on Larian one year after BG3, where we spoke with them about both development and what they're doing in the future: "I call it chaos at scale," said CEO Swen Vincke.