“Hey everyone,” says Baldur’s Gate 3 developer Larian in a breezy update on Steam, “We come bringing news of Patch 7!” But it’s more than a pile of bug-fixes: the headline here is the forthcoming official release of what they call “an officially sanctioned toolkit” that’ll allow fully supported modding of the 2023 role-playing mega-hit.
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Because we live in a wild future where there simply are no rules, you may not have to wait until September to get your hands on this update to the game. Larian has a habit of releasing its games unfinished into the hands of its community, and it’ll be doing the same for Patch 7. At first this will be a “closed beta,” where a hand-picked group of the finest vintage of mod creators will be given access, with the intention that these amateur experts will help them iron out major issues and test the tech to see how it works with unofficial mods they’ve already built.
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That all starts today, June 3, with more modders being let behind the secret door as the month goes on. But come July, the crack in the door widens slightly, and 1,000 members of the hoi polloi who register will be allowed through. Over the next couple of months, Larian and this motley crew of unpaid laborers will get things shipshape and hopefully released for the masses in September.
It’s a studio that certainly seems to understand why a community wants to be able to mod. The recent update states,
More usefully, the mod tools will allow people to create new classes and subclasses, weapons and armor, spells and skins, and thus craft entire new approaches to the game. It’s a long-running tradition of D&D games, especially those made by BioWare—and most especially Neverwinter Nights—to let the community then create their own stories within (and without) the Forgotten Realms, so it’s great to see it being supported this time too.
Larian is at pains to say that this doesn’t close down options for the unofficial modding scene that’s already established around Baldur’s Gate 3, which they fully intend to endorse. This will also provide a way for mods that won’t get approval from the license owners to still be possible to create and share. The game will still recognize them and run them, but obviously they won’t be supported.
Larian certainly are saying all the right words here. Mods and modding will be launched first for PC via software called Mod.io, with Mac and consoles to follow at an unspecified time. However, mod creation will require a PC.
The update includes no new information regarding the forthcoming new endings we know are coming to the game, with Larian referring players back to April’s last Community Update.
