Here's what the PC Gamer forum is getting heated about this week

This week on the PC Gamer forums, there's been lots of chat about Larian Studio's Baldur's Gate 3, a thread listing the best magical spells, discussions about the best year for PC gaming, the worst tabletops ever played, and a really really difficult movie quiz. 

If you've not joined the PC Gamer forum yet, you should! It's a great place to chat with others about anything PC gaming related. We've got discussions ranging from shooters, RPGs, and real-time strategy games to threads about industry news, PC build guides, and game walkthroughs. 

Here's what's been going on in the forums this week:

Baldur's Gate 3 

The biggest news of the week is, of course, Baldur's Gate 3. Larian Studio's D&D-based series is returning to our PCs and, even if the screenshot leaks did take the power out of the announcement's punch, we've finally had a close look at its turn-based combat system, how it's visual rehaul makes everything look great even when everything is going wrong, and we even chatted with the game's senior designer about how Larian is keeping the series weird. 

Over on our RPG forum, there's a whole thread dedicated to the buzz around Baldur's Gate 3. There's a chat in the thread about if Lardian has taken too much inspiration for BG3 from the graphics of Divinity: Original Sin. Do you think Baldur's Gate 3 looks too much like a Divinity game? Make sure to join the conversation. 

"I was actually hoping for more continuation of their Divinity series with a Divinity 2 follow-up. The game was more action'y and was pretty fun, IMHO. (Plus it had more Bellegar.) Then I saw the spaceship right at the end of the teaser video. OMG! Are they doing some Spelljammer in this game!? That one little flash cranked my hype level way up!" —Zloth

"I'm actually not excited about a major RPG coming to Early Access, but only because I know my infernal, desperate greed will make me play it day one, in its unfinished state. Then who will I have to blame for its various bugs?! ;P" —Mr.Vic20

Here's the thread.

Your Favourite Spell 

A fun thread started by Zloth this week asked the community to comment with their favourite video game spell. A few honorable mentions are celestial host from Planescape Torment, Sephiroth's Supernova spell, and, to quote user Mazer, "Fireball, It's always fireball. What's the point of having magic if you won't instantly use it to become a heartless force of supreme elemental destruction." Can't argue with you there. There's also blowing characters into oblivion with Skyrim's Fus Ro Dah, just one of the game's truly powerful spells. 

"I tend to like different types of ice spells as they open up for good crowd control and for kiting single targets. In vanilla WoW I used to play as an AoE frost mage for CCing big groups. One of the most useful spells was the blizzard spell that rained ice shards on the enemies damaging and slowing them down." —Frindis

"The Chicken Claw spell from Divinity: Original Sin 2, both funny and powerful, also a great way to cure world hunger." —IndecentLouie

Here's a link to the thread.

Nobel Chair Competition Winner

User Hveðrungr was the winner in our recent PC Gamer Forums competition graciously posted a photo of their prize, a black edition nobelchair from the Epic range—very plush. Here's the thread.

What was the best year for PC gaming?

This week the results were for our mid-week question: What was the best year for PC gaming? There is a range of results from as early as 1982's Apple home computers days to a year as recent as 2015 for The Witcher 3. This was one of the first times we included answers from our forum posts on the website, more reason to get in the conversation. 

"Oh man, 1998 has Halflife, Starcraft, Baldurs Gate, Fallout 2, Thief Dark Project, Commandos and Grim Fandango. Games of that era had so much influence on future games. Looking back over the last 25 odd years though, it seems every year has an argument. Good times!" —Kaamos_Llama

"I personally have a fondness for 2002, as I think that was a notable turning point for 3D games, which prior to that were mostly really hard to look at (again, in my opinion.) We started to see textures that almost lived up to the detailed 2D backdrops of past games, but with realtime 3D rendering." —Krud

You can see the thread here.

What is the most hilariously bad tabletop RPG you have played and why?

We don't only cover games on the PCG forums but we also have discussions about movies, TV, and tabletop games. This thread delves into the weird and wonderfully bad experiences community members have had with tabletop RPGs. Oh the joys of creating a character only to realise you're only on step 5 out of 22, that's what it's like playing The World of Synnibarr according to user MaddMann. 

"The character creation... took about 2 1/2 hours for the 5 of us. There is a simple 22 step process you just have to follow! I will not regale you with all the steps, needless to say my one time getting waterboarded was bringing back fond memories in comparison. We only got to around step 13 before one of our players was in a drunken stupor and the rest of us were really thinking about joining him." —MaddMann

Here's the thread.

Name that Movie

Frindis' movie quiz is continuing to stump everything with super obscure movies screenshot snippets. The idea is to post a small section of an image from a film and you have to guess what films it's from. No cheating through google image reverse! You can see the thread here.

The Weekend Question: What was the last game you refunded, if any?

Jody's weekend question asks if you've ever refunded a game and why. Maybe a game's puzzles were too obtuse or you decided that cooking simulators were not your thing? Let us know the reasons behind your refunds and your answer could be showcased on the website. 

"I think it was Ace Combat 7. I had great memories from F22 Interceptor on the Mega Drive but it didn't hit the mark for me and rekindle that nostalgia." —Alm

"Kingdoms & Castles, about a year and a half ago. Played it, was absolutely underwhelmed by its simplicity and refunded. I then proceeded to buy it again on a whim one year later. It is now one of my favourite city builders, precisely because it's actually quite charming simplicity, better yet, elegance." —Mangraz

Here's the thread.

Top Trending Threads

Last, but not least, here is a quick list of the forum's top threads:

What was the first video game you remember playing?
Can real-time strategy come back from the brink of death?
Help, I can't finish RPGs anymore
Weekend Question: Which RTS series deserves a comeback?
What was the specs of your very first gaming PC?
What's your favourite cRPG?