I know a lot of people absolutely adore Baldur's Gate 3, including a lot of queer people, and as a result I've been really anxious about posting this. I don't want to act like my opinions are objective, I personally hate it when people list their opinions as if they're facts so I'm really sorry if I end up doing that unintentionally. I also want to apologise if this ends up feeling vitriolic or hateful. A 7/10 is a positive score, and I definitely enjoyed my time with Baldur's Gate 3 overall, but I just had some flaws with it and its queer representation that I haven't really seen anyone talk about and I just wanted to write those down here. There might be a couple of minor spoilers here but nothing major.
I was very surprised when I saw that Baldur's Gate 3 had been nominated for multiple queer gaming awards, like the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Video Game or the Gayming Awards, because I found BG3's attempts at LGBTQ+ representation to be... condescending and frustrating, especially with its trans representation.
Firstly, every BG3 romanceable character is playersexual. This alone might not be a flaw. Other games I can think of like I Was a Teenage Exocolonist and Stardew Valley are able to have 'playersexual' love interests while still telling queer stories, and as a result the characters don't feel playersexual so much as they feel like bi/pan representation. BG3 does nothing of the sort. My character's relationship with Shadowheart never felt like it was a queer relationship, it didn't feel like a queer story, because ultimately my character could've been removed and replaced with a man and nothing would change. The only queer couple I can think of in the game are two side characters, Dame Aylin and Isobel, and while they're delightful they didn't really change that I never felt like the game was using my character's relationship as an opportunity for meaningful queer representation.
I've written before about how I dislike it when game devs include genital customisation and describe it as playing a trans character, it feels at best reductive and at worst objectifying. This is also a critique I had of Cyberpunk 2077, but that's able to somewhat mitigate it through the presence of Claire, an interesting and well-written trans character with her own questline and story arc. BG3 has... Nocturne. A character who shows up once and has at most a dozen lines of dialogue, all of which are about a cis character. Because trans people aren't people apart from how we relate to cis people I guess. Hell, it's mentioned that Shadowheart is the entire reason why she "found the strength" to transition in the first place, and she's introduced by her deadname long before you actually see her and learn her actual name. There's no reason to deadname her, Shadowheart knows her as an adult after she's transitioned and earlier games like Tell Me Why don't deadname their trans characters even in flashbacks to their pre-transition selves. Shadowheart is my favourite BG3 character, but it's so frustrating that the game's only trans character is entirely dedicated to making her look great and isn't a person beyond that.
This also extends to a problem with the character creator. While you do have the "nonbinary/other" option for your character's gender, it doesn't really change the fact that the character creator is incredibly binary. Naming them body types 1 and 2 doesn't really change the fact that one is very masculine and the other is very feminine, and this combined with the eight or so set face options for each body type mean that there's really not an option to play as a more androgynous character. Obviously, there's no one way to look nonbinary. But I thought that the lack of options to depict your character really felt like I was being pigeonholed into playing a certain character, both in terms of appearance and personality.
My problems with this game's LGBTQ+ representation weren't my only problems with it. I also had some problems with its combat balancing, story, (some of) the characters, and I never really felt like I was properly roleplaying my character at all. You can ask in the comments if you want me to go into more detail about those, but I felt like its LGBTQ+ representation was a flaw that I've never seen discussed. It feels like it was well intentioned but misguided, and I think it's important to critique it so that the developers can learn from their mistakes and improve next time.
I was very surprised when I saw that Baldur's Gate 3 had been nominated for multiple queer gaming awards, like the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Video Game or the Gayming Awards, because I found BG3's attempts at LGBTQ+ representation to be... condescending and frustrating, especially with its trans representation.
Firstly, every BG3 romanceable character is playersexual. This alone might not be a flaw. Other games I can think of like I Was a Teenage Exocolonist and Stardew Valley are able to have 'playersexual' love interests while still telling queer stories, and as a result the characters don't feel playersexual so much as they feel like bi/pan representation. BG3 does nothing of the sort. My character's relationship with Shadowheart never felt like it was a queer relationship, it didn't feel like a queer story, because ultimately my character could've been removed and replaced with a man and nothing would change. The only queer couple I can think of in the game are two side characters, Dame Aylin and Isobel, and while they're delightful they didn't really change that I never felt like the game was using my character's relationship as an opportunity for meaningful queer representation.
I've written before about how I dislike it when game devs include genital customisation and describe it as playing a trans character, it feels at best reductive and at worst objectifying. This is also a critique I had of Cyberpunk 2077, but that's able to somewhat mitigate it through the presence of Claire, an interesting and well-written trans character with her own questline and story arc. BG3 has... Nocturne. A character who shows up once and has at most a dozen lines of dialogue, all of which are about a cis character. Because trans people aren't people apart from how we relate to cis people I guess. Hell, it's mentioned that Shadowheart is the entire reason why she "found the strength" to transition in the first place, and she's introduced by her deadname long before you actually see her and learn her actual name. There's no reason to deadname her, Shadowheart knows her as an adult after she's transitioned and earlier games like Tell Me Why don't deadname their trans characters even in flashbacks to their pre-transition selves. Shadowheart is my favourite BG3 character, but it's so frustrating that the game's only trans character is entirely dedicated to making her look great and isn't a person beyond that.
This also extends to a problem with the character creator. While you do have the "nonbinary/other" option for your character's gender, it doesn't really change the fact that the character creator is incredibly binary. Naming them body types 1 and 2 doesn't really change the fact that one is very masculine and the other is very feminine, and this combined with the eight or so set face options for each body type mean that there's really not an option to play as a more androgynous character. Obviously, there's no one way to look nonbinary. But I thought that the lack of options to depict your character really felt like I was being pigeonholed into playing a certain character, both in terms of appearance and personality.
My problems with this game's LGBTQ+ representation weren't my only problems with it. I also had some problems with its combat balancing, story, (some of) the characters, and I never really felt like I was properly roleplaying my character at all. You can ask in the comments if you want me to go into more detail about those, but I felt like its LGBTQ+ representation was a flaw that I've never seen discussed. It feels like it was well intentioned but misguided, and I think it's important to critique it so that the developers can learn from their mistakes and improve next time.