Updated: 9/21/2023, 2:40 p.m. ET: In a statement to Kotaku, a Larian representative said Newbon’s comments were in reference to a quest line at the Roysmorn Monastery that hadn’t been found at the time of the autograph stream the clip originates from. The quest nets you a powerful weapon in the Blood of Lathander, and can result in you blowing up Astarion and other party members. That’s not behavior becoming of a good leader, but at least reactions like Astarion’s (once you’ve revived them) are extremely funny.
So, while that’s one mystery solved, the thought that there might still be more secrets to uncover is still exciting.
Larian’s full statement reads as follows:
Neil’s comments were from a signing he did closer to the launch of the game, and he was being secretive in order to avoid spoilers. Players have since found the quest and the lines of dialogue he was talking about. Spoilers ahead!
There’s a quest off the beaten path at the Rosymorn Monastery that rewards you with a nice mace called the Blood of Lathander. If you’re not careful or you try to steal the mace, you may activate a terrifying solar weapon.
If you (intentionally or unintentionally) kill Astarion with this solar weapon and then revive him once you’re back at camp, he… will have some choice words for you. Here’s a clip of Astarion’s reaction:
The original story follows below.
Baldur’s Gate 3 is a huge game, full of secrets big and small. But according to the voice actor behind the sassy, roguish vampire Astarion, there’s a secret section somewhere in Larian Studios’ RPG that no one’s found yet. I’m now tempted to boot up my save and start pushing against walls until something gives way.
Neil Newbon—who voices Astarion and has been streaming the game on his personal Twitch channel—spoke about a hidden two-hour section of the game no one has found yet (thanks GamesRadar). This was during an autograph signing stream on August 31, and from the looks of the comment section, fans still haven’t found it.
“There’s even something I know about that you can’t get to unless you do which I don’t think anybody’s gonna work out,” Newbon said on the stream. “I was told this in confidence, and I think I’m one of the few people that knows about it. Quite fucking crazy. But at some point, somebody will find it.”
Newbon declined to talk any specifics about what this mysterious two-hour chunk entails. He wouldn’t even say if it involved Astarion, but given that he had to be told about it, rather than it coming up in his own recording sessions, there’s reason to believe it’s not directly tied to his character. We’ve reached out to Larian Studios and Newbon to see if this two-hour section has been discovered, and will update the story if we hear back.
On its surface, Baldur’s Gate 3 is a tactical, choice-driven RPG, but it manages to hide a lot of reactive outcomes and secrets in its systems. You have so many spells and other tools at your disposal that it’s possible to approach situations in multiple ways, and the game puts in a lot of effort to accommodate even the most off-the-wall solutions. But that reactivity means there are entire scenes you can miss just by approaching a situation one particular way. So it makes sense that sections of the game might be near impossible to stumble upon naturally.
Even with a month of playtime, Baldur’s Gate 3 fans are still discovering new hidden secrets all the time. PlayStation 5 players have had even less time to find new stuff, launching about a month later than on PC. While the console version is a little rougher around the edges, it’s definitely a comparable experience to PC, as long as you’re not married to using a mouse and keyboard.