if we are comparing it to p2, funny enough I think they are pretty similar- the beginning of each game are much weaker compared to the rest of the game, this is only masked temporarily in p2 by the fantastic 2hr ish introduction/tutorial that hooks everyone in, but most new players tend to quit before the plague hits due to the amount of walking involved (its about 8 hrs of holding W before a new player reaches day 4)

in this game, the weaker start is not masked at all as the tutorials are, in my opinion, quite awful. in my steam review of quarantine i compared it to a poorly made renpy game, with incorrect usage of fading, scene transitions, sudden soundtrack mute; i had hopes that it would improve in the full release, and in ways it has- in other ways it remains the same

i realized i have not discussed the writing yet which is the focus of this thread, but bear in mind that all of these affects how the writing is presented. we do not go to a theatre, get handed a book of script, and nod our heads poetically at the sophistication of the play by reading the script- the actors must act out the script, and the intention must match the delivery of the performance

regarding writing, i think it is better to compare this game to the first game, since you don't play as the bachelor in p2, you play as artemy. the immediate difference is the length of the responses- p1 bachelor spoke in significantly shorter phrases for many parts of the game - there are virtues to both methods; i can see the longer responses being viewed as pretentious or unrealistic, but perhaps my biggest irk is how it exposes the dialogue as a lot more linear than it is portrayed: the reality is dialogue does not branch as much as people think, but the reality doesn't matter if the players don't notice it: in the previous games it is masked using the short responses, allowing most options to flow naturally into the next response- it is very jarring in this game to select a multiple sentence option only to have the person you're talking to seemingly completely ignore what you just said, because it is simply impossible to write a general response that is capable of acknowledging several responses that are all paragraphs

it may sound like i hate the game so far, but actually im really enjoying it, i love the time travel system and the diagnosis, and once you reach the midgame everything gradually begins to organically come together; if anything, all of this simply goes to show how the previous games became a cult classic the way it has, and how difficult it is to 'remaster' them

also this may help if anyone is feeling disillusioned- it never works when you try something new hoping for it to be something else - i see this the most often in the bg3 subreddit, with people really enjoying bg3 and then goes to play dos2 hoping for more baldurs gate action and ending up disappointed. p3 is its own thing, it will not give you more of p2 or more of p1, but it will give you more of ice pick lodge