Forgotten Realms is a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game. Commonly referred to by players and game designers as "The Realms", it was created by game designer Ed Greenwood around 1967 as a setting for his childhood stories. Several years later, it was published for the D&D game as a series of magazine articles, and the first Realms game products were released in 1987. Role-playing game products have been produced for the setting ever since, in addition to novels, role-playing video game adaptations, comic books, and the film Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.
Baldur's Gate is a series of role-playing video games set in the Forgotten Realms Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting. The game has spawned two series, known as the Bhaalspawn Saga and the Dark Alliance, both taking place mostly within the Western Heartlands, but the Bhaalspawn Saga extends to Amn and Tethyr. The Dark Alliance series was released for consoles and was critically and commercially successful. The Bhaalspawn Saga was critically acclaimed for using pausable realtime gameplay, which is credited with revitalizing the computer role-playing game (CRPG) genre.
Drizzt Do'Urden is a fictional character appearing in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game. Drizzt was created by author R. A. Salvatore as a supporting character in the Icewind Dale Trilogy. Salvatore created him on a whim when his publisher needed him to replace one of the characters in an early version of the first book, The Crystal Shard. Drizzt has since become a popular heroic character of the Forgotten Realms setting, and has been featured as the main character of a long series of books, starting chronologically with The Dark Elf Trilogy. As an atypical drow, Drizzt has forsaken both the evil ways of his people and their home in the Underdark, in the drow city of Menzoberranzan.
Faerûn is a fictional continent and the primary setting of the Dungeons & Dragons world of Forgotten Realms. It is described in detail in several editions of the Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting with the most recent being the 5th edition from Wizards of the Coast, and various locales and aspects are described in more depth in separate campaign setting books. Around a hundred novels, several computer and video games and a film use Faerûn as the setting.
Volothamp "Volo" Geddarm, created by Jeff Grubb, is a fictional character of the Forgotten Realms campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy role-playing game.
Abeir-Toril is the fictional planet that makes up the Forgotten RealmsDungeons & Dragons campaign setting, as well as the Al-Qadim and Maztica campaign settings, and the 1st edition version of the Oriental Adventures campaign setting.
Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn is a role-playing video game developed by BioWare and published by Interplay Entertainment. It is the sequel to Baldur's Gate (1998) and was released for Microsoft Windows in September 2000. Like Baldur's Gate, the game takes place in the Forgotten Realms—a fantasy campaign setting—and is based on the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 2nd edition rules. Powered by BioWare's Infinity Engine, Baldur's Gate II uses an isometric perspective and pausable real-time gameplay. The player controls a party of up to six characters, one of whom is the player-created protagonist, while the others are certain characters recruited from the game world.
Minsc is a fictional character in the Baldur's Gate series of Dungeons & Dragons role-playing video games developed by BioWare. He originated from the pen-and-paper Dungeons & Dragons sessions held by the lead designer of Baldur's Gate, James Ohlen, and was expanded upon by the game's lead writer, Lukas Kristjanson. His video game debut was in Baldur's Gate as a companion character who can join the player's party. He also appears in the sequel, Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn, the expansion, Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal, the 2015 game Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear, the 2023 game Baldur's Gate III, as well as in promotions relating to the titles. Minsc is voiced by Jim Cummings in his original video game appearances, and by Matt Mercer in Baldur's Gate 3.
Icewind Dale is a role-playing video game series developed by Black Isle Studios. It is set in the Forgotten Realms Icewind Dale region, but takes place decades before the events described in R. A. Salvatore's books which made the area a part of Faerûn.
Baldur's Gate is a fantasy role-playing video game that was developed by BioWare and published in 1998 by Interplay Entertainment. It is the first game in the Baldur's Gate series and takes place in the Forgotten Realms, a high fantasy campaign setting, using a modified version of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (AD&D) 2nd edition rules. It was the first game to use the Infinity Engine for its graphics, with Interplay using the engine for other Forgotten Realms-licensed games, including the Icewind Dale series and Planescape: Torment. The game's story focuses on a player-made character who travels across the Sword Coast alongside a party of companions.
Drew Karpyshyn is a Canadian video game scenario writer, scriptwriter and novelist. He served as a senior writer for BioWare's Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and lead writer for the first two Mass Effect video games. He left BioWare in 2012 to focus on his Chaos Born novels, and returned to it three years later in 2015. On March 9, 2018, he announced he was leaving BioWare once again to pursue his independent work.
The Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game has been adapted into many related products, including magazines, films and video games.
Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance is a 2001 action role-playing video game developed by Snowblind Studios and published by Interplay Entertainment subsidiary Black Rock Studios for the PlayStation 2 and the Xbox consoles, with High Voltage Software handling the GameCube port, and Magic Pockets developing the Game Boy Advance version. CD Projekt was developing a version for Microsoft Windows, but was ultimately cancelled. In 2021, a 4K port of the game was released for the Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch and PC.
Baldur's Gate III: The Black Hound was a cancelled role-playing video game developed by Black Isle Studios for the Microsoft Windows platform. Announced in 2002 under the codenames FR6 and Project Jefferson, it was planned to be the third main entry in the Baldur's Gate series, utilizing the Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition ruleset. The game was set to use a 3D graphics engine developed for the game, rather than the Infinity Engine used for the developer's previous games.
Dungeons & Dragons is a series of comic books published by IDW Publishing, under the license from Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast, based on the Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) fantasy role-playing game. Since 2010, IDW Publishing has released two Dungeons & Dragons ongoing series, twelve Dungeons & Dragons limited series, three crossover series and an annual.
The Sundering refers to two events that occurred in the fictional timeline of the Forgotten Realms campaign setting of the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game. It is also the title of both a series of novels published by Wizards of the Coast and a multimedia project Wizards of the Coast used to transition Dungeons & Dragons from 4th Edition to 5th Edition. This project explored the Second Sundering story and included the aforementioned book series, the free-to-play mobile game Arena of War developed by DeNA and an adventure series for the 4th Edition D&D Encounters program.
Baldr, Baldur or Balder is a Norse god.
Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear is an expansion pack for the role-playing video game Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition developed and published by Beamdog. The expansion is the first new original content to the Baldur's Gate series released after more than 10 years, and its plot takes place between the events of Baldur's Gate and Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn. Gameplay remained similar to Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition, although a class, companions and areas have been added. Siege of Dragonspear received mixed to positive reviews by video game publications who appreciated the return to the franchise after a long hiatus. It received backlash from some consumers who criticized the general quality of the writing and the introduction of a transgender non-playable character.
Baldur's Gate 3 is a 2023 role-playing video game developed and published by Larian Studios. The game is the third main installment in the Baldur's Gate series, based on the tabletop role-playing system of Dungeons & Dragons. A partial version of the game was released in early access format for macOS and Windows on 6 October 2020. It remained in early access until its full release for Windows on 3 August 2023. The PlayStation 5 version was released on 6 September 2023, with the macOS version released shortly thereafter on 22 September. The Xbox Series X/S version is planned for release in December 2023.
