You are burdened with a great power devouring you from within.
How far down the path of darkness will you let it take you?
The fate of Faerûn is on your party’s shoulders.
Will you carry it to salvation, or descend with it to hell?

Created in close collaboration with the Dungeons & Dragons team at Wizards of the Coast, Baldur’s Gate III is based off current D&D mechanics and spells and is the official new chapter in the legendary series.

Baldur’s Gate III will push the boundaries of the RPG genre and offer a rich narrative with unparalleled player freedom, high-stakes decisions, unique companion characters and memorable combat. It is Larian Studios’ biggest production ever and will be playable together with friends or as a single-player adventure.

Alone you may resist, but together you can overcome. Gather your party.

Forged with the new Divinity 4.0 engine and coming to early access later this year, Baldur’s Gate 3 gives you unprecedented freedom to explore, experiment, and interact with a world that truly reacts to your choices. A grand, cinematic narrative brings you closer to your characters than ever before as you venture through the Forgotten Realms of Dungeons & Dragons in Larian’s biggest adventure yet.

Larian Studios today announced the races, variations and classes that will be a part of Baldur’s Gate 3’s early access phase of development. Players will be able to select from 16 races/subraces, as well as six classes, from day one of early access.

At launch, players will be able to create humans, githyanki, elves, drow, half-elf, dwarves, halflings, and tieflings, including subraces of each race. The early access release of Baldur’s Gate 3 provides around 25 hours of content, designed for multiple playthroughs. Players can create their own characters in single-player, or as a party of up to four players in multiplayer, each with their own character.

Races more alien to the Sword coast -- like the Drow and Githyanki -- are so rare to the average NPC that you’ll find their interactions to be unique, as well. The world of Baldur’s Gate 3 is a highly reactive one, so this single choice will have huge ramifications across your play experience.

Baldur’s Gate 3’s character creation features photorealistic fantasy races based on 3D scans of actors and models (blemishes and all), selected because their features roughly resembled the direction for each race in the game, as well as, of course, for diversity and variety in the human-like races. Our team spent much of pre-production carefully selecting, scanning, and moulding these scans to become the base heads for character creation. Launching into early access is a total of 150 heads to pick from, across 16 races and subraces.

Alena Dubrovina, Lead Character Artist at Larian Studios, said, "When the cinematic dialogues were introduced for BG3, we realized that we needed to make a huge quality leap for the character art. We wanted to make characters look their best and put the bar very high. We had to be innovative to make such a large range of heads at the quality we wanted.

“We decided to use scanned faces in our production to create characters as realistic as possible. We scanned 40 people of different ages and ethnicity. While scouting for models we focused on features that would fit one of the fantasy races. We looked for faces that either had something unique about them or were very versatile to fit different characters. Eventually, we transformed that into approximately 150 unique heads of various races that you can see in-game now, and that number will keep growing. Some of the scanned heads kept their features, but others became a starting point for creating new faces. We also used scanned data as a learning resource because there is no better sculptor than nature.”

Here’s what you’ll have access to at the start of early access:

Human

The most common face to see in Faerûn, humans are known for their tenacity, creativity and endless capacity for growth. They live fully in the present -- making them well-suited to the adventuring life -- but also plan for the future, striving to leave a lasting legacy.

Githyanki

Githyanki are peerless warriors from the Astral Plane, known for their legendary silver blades and red dragon mounts. They seek the total destruction of mind flayers, whose ancient empire enslaved the githyanki for millennia.

Elf

• High Elf: Heirs of the mystical Feywild, high elves value magic in all its forms. Even those who do not study spellcraft can manipulate the Weave.
• Wood Elf: Wood elves spend their reclusive lives in Faerûn’s forests. Decades of training in archery and camouflage are enhanced by an otherworldly swiftness.

Drow

• Seldarine Drow: Drow are the result of an ancient schism between the elven deities Corellon Larethian and Lolth. The latter’s treachery drove the drow into the Underdark, where they splintered into warring factions. Seldarine drow can be found seeking allies from all over Faerûn, aiming to settle their conflict with Lolth -- and each other -- by any means necessary.
• Lolth-Sworn Drow: Raised by Lolth’s cult in the city of Menzoberranzan, these drow extol the virtues of their corrupt and merciless goddess. Lolth marks her followers with bright red eyes so the Underdark will learn to fear drow on sight.

Half-Elf

• High Half-Elf: A touch of the Feywild remains in half-elves with this bloodline. Even those untrained in magic possess a hint of wild power.
• Wood Half-Elf: Like their wood elf parents, these half-elves have a quickened stride and eye for stealth. Yet many break away from isolation in Faerûn’s forests to explore the rest of the Realms.
• Drow Half-Elf: Most half-drow result from liaisons between Seldarine drow and surfacers. While half-drow inherit a few magical gifts, they aren’t usually raised in the Underdark.

Dwarf

• Gold: Gold dwarves are known for their confidence and keen intuition. The culture of their Deep Kingdom values family, ritual and fine craftsmanship.
• Shield: Shield dwarves survived a long fall from grace, surrendering many of their ancient kingdoms in wars with goblins and orcs. These losses have led to a cynical mindset, yet shield dwarves will endure anything to restore their ancestral homelands.

Hafling

• Lightfoot Halfling: Lightfoot halflings are stealthy but social, travelling all over Faeûn to make names for themselves.
• Strongheart Halfling: Legends say dwarven blood gave stronghearts their hardiness. Resistant to poison and wellsprings of endurance, these halflings easily hold their own.

Tiefling

• Asmodeus Tiefling: Bound to Nessus, the deepest layer of the Hells, these tieflings inherit the ability to wield fire and darkness from the archdevil Asmodeus’ infernal bloodline.
• Mephistopheles Tiefling: Descended from the archdevil Mephistopheles, these tieflings are gifted with a particular affinity for arcane magic.
• Zariel Tiefling: Tieflings from Zariel’s bloodline are empowered with martial strength and can channel searing flame to punish their enemies.

The Sword Coast attracts adventurers from across all of Faerûn. The nearly 600 NPCs you can meet in Act 1 are drawn from across the Forgotten Realms. Character creation includes hundreds of options to ensure that each character is unique, and the world reacts to you in ways that help ensure you and your choices are unique, too.

In early access, you’ll have six classes to choose from -- Cleric, Fighter, Ranger, Rogue, Warlock and Wizard -- each with at least two subclasses available. Will you be a beast-taming, mage-breaking, charlatan halfling ranger with a toxic frog as a familiar, or a noble githyanki eldritch knight who let herself be seduced by the Absolute, with the ability to psionically drag her enemies towards her? Or will you go for a more traditional tiefling warlock who made a pact with the devil? The choices are endless!

Gather your party for a tale of fellowship and betrayal, sacrifice and survival, and the lure of absolute power. Abducted, infected, lost... You are turning into a monster, drawn from a Mind Flayer parasite planted in your brain, but as the corruption inside you grows, so too does your power. That power may help you to survive, but there will be a price to pay. More than any ability, the bonds of trust that you build within your party could be your greatest strength. Caught in a conflict between devils, deities, and sinister otherworldly forces, you will determine the fate of the Forgotten Realms together. Resist and turn darkness against itself — or embrace corruption and become the ultimate evil.

Choose from a wide selection of D&D races and classes, or play as an origin character with a hand-crafted background. Play alone, selecting your companions carefully, or as a party of up to four in online multiplayer.

No two adventures will ever be the same. The Forgotten Realms are a vast, detailed and diverse world, and there are secrets to be discovered all around you -- even verticality is a vital part of exploration. Adventure, loot, battle, romance… how you survive, and the mark you leave on the world, is up to you.

Key Features

• Online multiplayer for up to four players allows you to combine your forces in combat and split your party to follow your own quests and agendas. Devise the perfect plan together… or introduce an element of chaos when your friends least expect it.
• Origin characters offer a hand-crafted experience, each with their own unique traits, agenda, and outlook on the world. Their stories intersect with the wider narrative, and your choices will determine whether those stories end in redemption, salvation, domination or other outcomes.
• Evolved turn-based combat based on the D&D 5E ruleset. Team-based initiative, advantage and disadvantage, and roll modifiers join combat cameras, expanded environmental interactions, and a new fluidity in combat that rewards strategy and foresight.
• Define the future of the Forgotten Realms through your choices and the roll of the dice. No matter who you play or what you roll, the world and its inhabitants will react to your story.
• Player-initiated turn-based mode allows you to pause the world around you at any time even outside of combat. See an opportunity for a tactical advantage before combat begins? Want to pull off a heist with pin-point precision? Need to escape a fiendish trap? Split your party, prepare ambushes, sneak in the darkness — and create your own luck!

Larian Studios is developing and publishing Baldur’s Gate III on PC and Google Stadia.