Baldur's Gate 3 is a qualified success on Xbox Series X and S

Baldur’s Gate 3 is one of the most critically acclaimed games of the year, an electronic version of a great D&D campaign without the scheduling challenges that also features an incredible amount of flexibility and an engaging player-driven story. This kind of game doesn’t always translate well to consoles, but its PS5 outing from September worked quite well, absent some quibbles with the gamepad controls and occasional performance issues. Now the long-awaited Xbox version has finally arrived on Series X and Series S, so how does it hold up against the patched PS5 version – especially on the entry-level Xbox Series S?

Before we delve into the Xbox Series machines then, I wanted to provide a quick refresher on the PS5 version. It’s been three months since we last looked at the PS5 code, and the game has seen a dozen updates since then. Initial impressions suggest limited visual changes, with slightly more diffuse and realistic shadows that could be the result of a change to shadow filtering, plus higher-res blood decals and water with more prominent specular effects.

Image clarity looks similar between the two patches, with a 1440p-like resolve and slight FSR 2 artefacts evident, but the actual resolutions are different in the latest patch as dynamic resolution scaling has been added. Performance mode now comes in at 1080p internally, up from a fixed 960p at launch, while quality mode remains at 1440p but drops below this are now possible in extremely demanding scenes.

Finally, frame-rates on PS5 have been much improved, especially in the CPU-heavy third act of the game, mirroring the advances we’ve seen on the PC version. Previously we saw frame-rates in the low twenties or upper teens in town areas with lots of NPCs, but now frame-rates are in the low 30s in performance mode (with some screen-tearing) and a nearly locked 30fps in quality mode. Considering this comes without any obvious settings downgrades, this is a clear result.

This leads onto our coverage of the Xbox versions. We know that PS5 and Series X tend to be quite evenly matched in multiplatform software, so how do they stack up in Baldur’s Gate 3?

Visually, there’s not a lot to separate them, but there are a few curious differences. The ground surface appears slightly higher on the Series X in my testing across many of the game’s environments. If you look closely at character feet, I think the ground on the Series machine is a closer match in many instances for foot placement. The actual ground geometry appears similar though across both machines though.

I also noticed a decrease in anisotropic filtering quality on Series X. The PS5 acquits itself pretty well here, while the Series X takes a noticeable hit to clarity. When the camera runs perpendicular to the scene, the difference can be quite significant, though in gameplay from isometric or overhead camera perspectives it’s a lot less noticeable. I also spotted some differences in the water, with the Xbox version retaining some of the hazy-looking water at a distance, which I think is an attempt to give the water an impression of more natural sky reflection. At close range, the water looks identical though.