The seminal RPG Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance was ported to modern gaming systems recently, but the Switch version was left out of the initial wave. Now, fans of the near-20-year-old RPG can finally download the game on the Nintendo Switch eShop for on-the-go play. The new release is technically a remastered version of the original 2001 hit, but it changes nothing about the gameplay and very little about the graphics, making for a true 2001 gaming experience.
Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance is considered to be a classic hack-and-slash style RPG of the early 2000s, initially having been released on the PlayStation 2, Xbox, and Gamecube (as well as a Game Boy Advance version). It’s not a game for those who are prone to giving up – classic RPGs tend to be extremely difficult. While Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance starts out easily enough, players will find that the game is far less forgiving than most modern RPGs as they progress through the story.
The rerelease of Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance in Spring 2021 came as a surprise, as it was only announced on May 6, 2021, and then released for most consoles the following day. The Nintendo Switch version took a little longer, though, but was eventually released on the Nintendo Switch eShop on May 20, 2021. According to Black Isle Studios, the games company behind the remaster, the delay was due to an unforeseen issue with the Nintendo Switch store. Black Isle Studios developed the sequel to Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance in 2004 and published the original in 2001.
The graphical improvements in the Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance re-release include the ability to display in 4k resolution as other small improvements to the game’s overall graphical fidelity. Surprisingly to some, it even runs perfectly on the Switch at a high resolution – the fact that it’s a 20-year-old game that was essentially optimized for modern systems perhaps means it isn’t too taxing on the Switch. Black Isle Studios is planning a mobile and PC port too, and it is officially considering a port of Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance 2 in years to come.
Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance is an iconic, nostalgic game for many gamers who grew up in the 2000s. The original two Baldur’s Gate games, Baldur’s Gate and Baldur’s Gate 2, were re-released paired together on the Nintendo Switch in 2019, but Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance has aged a bit better – for starters, the graphics are actually 3D and not isometric 2D. While there is no physical release for the game yet, it can be downloaded on the Nintendo Switch eShop for $29.99, requiring about 4GB of free space.
Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance is available on the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S.
Source: Black Isle Studios, Nintendo eShop
