The elusive Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance II could get a re-release too, according to the original studio

This game is expensive on the secondhand market

The whole process of re-releasing Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance is fascinating: especially when you account for the fact that it arrived on modern systems with basically zero fanfare or warning.

It’s even more bizarre when you consider the history of Black Isle Studios (which remained dormant for many years), who published the original Dark Alliance and developed the improved-upon sequel. And when you start to dive into the story behind Champions of Norrath (which utilized the Dark Alliance engine) and the rights issues involved there, it gets really messy. So many of the studios involved in those games simply don’t exist anymore!

Alas, someone worked out something, as Dark Alliance 1 is out and you can buy it. But what about the sequel? Apparently it’s “on the table.”

Responding to a fan on Twitter, the account for Black Isle Studios notes: “PC release [of the first Dark Alliance] is in the works right now. Hoping to have it on Steam this year. And the sequel is on the table. Stay tuned!”

While nothing is for certain, this seems like an implicit confirmation. And at the very least, Black Isle Studios has access to the sequel from multiple angles. So there’s a chance. And I’ll take it! Especially since the original game can go for upwards of $150 used on the secondhand market: I was lucky enough to get a copy on the cheap around a decade ago.

Game preservation is a drum I beat often, and a lot of these old forgotten hack and slash titles need a revival because they withstand the test of time and deserve to be remembered.

Black Isle Studios [Twitter]