Baldur’s Gate III is coming to Xbox this year after all, but no split-screen co-op on Xbox Series S

After all, Baldur’s Gate III will be coming to Xbox consoles this year. In a tweet, Larian Studios CEO Swen Vincke confirmed that he and Xbox head Phil Spencer had found a solution to bring the critically acclaimed CRPG to current-gen Microsoft consoles. There is one problem, however: the game won’t support split-screen co-op on the cheaper Xbox Series S, a feature the developer has struggled to enable for months now, due to the technical limitations of the console. In fact, to maintain feature parity between Baldur’s Gate 3 on the Xbox Series S and X, Microsoft even sent engineers on their side to help Larian.

“Very happy to confirm that after meeting with (Spencer) yesterday, we have found a solution that allows us to bring Baldur’s Gate 3 to Xbox players again this year, something we have been working on for some time,” it reads in Vincke’s tweet. . The aforementioned change does not affect the usual online co-op, in which you can invite friends to help you in your campaign. However, running multiple characters on the same (low-end) system is the cause of the problem for Larian – especially when all party members run away in four directions, start casting spells, and stress the console. That’s a lot of on-screen activity on a single screen and, in Vincke’s words in a recent interview, “It requires memory.”

This lack of memory is because Microsoft is making the Xbox Series S more affordable, which naturally comes with a caveat of reduced performance. Larian confirmed earlier this month that the lack of an Xbox release date for Baldur’s Gate 3 was not due to an exclusivity deal with PlayStation, but rather the fact that they were struggling to maintain parity between the two consoles of the green team. Microsoft’s policy mandates gaming feature parity between the Xbox Series S and X, so that gamers with the low-end console aren’t left out. It remains to be seen whether Microsoft makes an exception for Baldur’s Gate 3 or lifts the rule entirely for future games of the generation.

Speaking to IGN, Spencer claimed that he doesn’t see a world where his team abandons the Xbox Series S anytime soon, but added that Microsoft will learn from the situation. “I don’t think you heard from us or from Larian that it was about parity. I think it’s more the community talking about it,” he said, adding that parity between systems is more of a developer decision. “It’s a game that I want to see on the platform, and we have resources that have allowed us to make sure that it will be available… I think they said it would be available by end of the year.” In the tweet, Vincke also confirmed that the Xbox version will have cross-progression between Steam and Xbox Series S/X, so you can move between platforms and continue where you left off.

Larian Studios also released the first promised patch for Baldur’s Gate 3, which fixes over 1,000 bugs and balancing issues, in addition to fixing kissing contact for shorter races. Earlier, the animation made it look like your little character, who couldn’t reach his romantic interest, was simply leaning over and kissing his chest. Now, if you’re not tall enough, your partner will kneel down to make contact. You can check the full list of changes on the official website. Meanwhile, the studio will continue working on a second patch, which will include “significant performance improvements” (for Act 3 content, I assume).

Baldur’s Gate 3 is now available on PC. The PS5 version will be released on September 6, while the Xbox Series S/X version is expected to release this year.