Baldur's Gate 3 is a relentlessly horny video game
Tick tock, it's RPG sex o'clock
Baldur's Gate 3, out of early access last week, is an officially licensed D&D RPG of many hours of turn-based combat, as you bring together a rag-tag group of misfit heroes to save the world from a mysterious cult. And also every single one of those misfit heroes wants to get at you. In many cases with zero prompting from you whatsoever. It doesn't end with your team companions either; by my loose estimations, any character who is in upwards of three cutscenes comes with a 70% chance of propositioning you. There's one romance option that I experienced effectively as a jump scare, entering a cutscene to see a character suddenly and casually-not-casually shirtless. It never ends. In hindsight, picking from a selection of genitals in character creation was probably a clue.
You may already have heard of BG3's infamous bear sex with a druid, so this might not come as a surprise to you. You don't have to romance anyone, and you can also turn off nudity so you don't get any sudden nipple. But if you are interested in that angle, then you can rest easy in the knowledge that romances aren't gated by gender, that some are only one night stands, that others are polyamorous, and yet more are staunch monogamists.
One of these latter is Gale, a wizz-ard with a secret (all the companions have a secret). I always end up romancing the character who sounds most like they're oversexed and publicly educated, and I always regret it. Gale is very uptight about you flirting with other people, which would be fine if he didn't spend a lot of time talking about his ex, a literal god. In any case, Gale's romance is also incredibly nerdy in a way I cannot fully explain, except that the sex can optionally take place in a holographic prog-rock void, and he says something like, "Given my propensity toward loquaciousness, it's surely not a surprise that I have skilled tongue." Okay, Gale. Sure. (He's actually quite sweet but also very full of himself.)
Other characters lay out their stall early, and with alarming intensity while wearing their weirdly sexy casual clothes - both things VidBud Liam highlighted in his BG3 video. Lae'zel, a warrior, get's all horned up from you slaughtering a load of goblins in the first area, and starts telling you she wants to taste your sweat. Get it, girl. There's also Karlach, a tiefling with a hell-machine for a heart who is literally too hot to handle when she gets excited, so you just sit around doing dirty talk for the first act of the game.
The jump scare romance I reference up top, on the other hand, doesn't happen for a while, and it's part of the reason it surprised me. I thought I was safe! But it is also, without question, the funniest sex scene in the game - in possibly any game, in fact - and the achievement for doing it is a filthy pun, so Larian knew exactly what they were doing.
This isn't bad, though. The amount of horniness is what creates an amount of choice, especially given that getting a campfire quickie is an oft' expected feature of RPGs. And, that being the case, why limit yourself? It's a fantasy world. A statistically significant amount of Baldur's Gate 3 sex happens when one or both participants are floating in mid air. Do the bear sex! Do the weird tantric wizard thing! The other day I got into an argument with a terrible detective who was also a tiny golden flying elephant. Why would the sex be the one thing in this world that's normal?
Disclosure: Former RPS deputy editor Adam Smith (RPS in peace) now works at Larian and is the lead writer for Baldur's Gate 3. Former contributor Emily Gera also works on it.