I've seen a lot of people prefer the second over the first, and i don't mind playing a lesser version after a superior one.
Do the people around here think it's stupid to play the second game before the first?

If you plan on eventually playing BG1, play that one first. The opening video of BG2 reveals all the main plot points of BG1, including most of the late-game surprises. In fact, towards the end of BG2 a major character from BG1 makes a reappearance, and it won't make sense at all if you haven't played through BG1. As someone who played BG2 first, I wish I would have played the original first. And this is coming from someone who prefers BG2 to BG1.

If you are talking about the originals play the first one, then the second. Not only for spoilers, but also for mechanics. If you do 2 before 1, you'll expect the game to pause when managing inventory and highlighting loot on the ground. There are other things too, but BG1 doesn't do them. Doing 2 before 1 would throw you off more than playing 1 before 2.

If you are playing the Enhanced Editions, the only difference would be spoilint the BG1 story. The games are roughly neck and neck when it comes to functions.

Edit: typo

It is not stupid but I would highly recommend playing the first one first. Actually, I am one of the few who love BG1 over BG2. I finished BG1 5 times while I could never finish BG2 because I got bored. I think the major differences between two games are game engines, BG1 is low level (1 to 7) while BG2 is higher levels ( starts at 7 depending on your character)., BG1 has more open world exploration on area maps while BG2 is more linear.

BG1 being low level means low health and thus mages may have a hard time. Some enemies can kill you with 1 hit. Most people dont like BG1 because of that reason so be warned.

I also recommend playing BG1 versus BG2. If you play BG2 before BG1 than you will pretty much know all the plot, and that will spoil much of the fun of BG1.

The two strong points of BG1:
1. Discovering what the hell is going on in the world and how does it affect you as the character.
2. Exploration.
if you play BG2 first then the first point will not apply.

Not to mention, that from role-playing perspective, having played BG1 makes BG2 much more interesting as certain characters from BG! reappear in BG2 and you will understand why you should care or not care about them.


Finally, I would suggest playing BG1 classic. Just apply widescreen mode and off you go.

I wouldn't listen to these ppl. Many are just newbies who started with the 2nd.

Yeap. There are many people who prefer BG1 to BG2. Including myself.

BG1 is the game (together with Fallout 1 and PS:T) that I keep going back and replaying over and over again.

Picture starting watching the LOTR movies for the first time and watching the second movie first. It is kind of like that.

I'm one of the few who prefer BG1 over BG2 as I felt BG1 had much stronger atmosphere, narrrative and wasn't focused on loot. While I do like BG2, the low level BG1 campaign had a kind of charm that BG2 didn't quite reach. I strongly recommend you start with BG1.

TOB on the otherhand was ......just......bleh........ Easily the worst IE game

I agree with the consensus that BG2 is better, but BG1 is still excellent and you should definitely play it first.

I started with BG2 first since there was a lot of hype back in the day, did not even play Bg1 until much later.

Playing the second game first has the advantage that you can think about the optimal BG1 character and experience independently of what might happen in the second game since you have finished it already.

BG1 is very charming in how simple its story is. And it is long too, which may sound like a turn off. But if you really enjoy RPGs and think you might be able to make the time I highly recommend playing the first one.

To this day I still never played BG 1. Back in the day I picked up BG II on a whim and several hundred hours later I still never got around to playing the first.

You'll miss mostly a lot of character backstor but otherwise it covers itself fairly well, especially with ToB.

I'm not sure I'd say it's stupid to play the second before the first, though
it doesn't seem very sensible.

The two go together so well it seems like an illogical thing to do. Like even being able to take you/your character from BG1 into BG2 is a great example and says a lot about why one should play them in order. Here the sequel is pretty much a direct continuation, even expansion like in a sense.

Also with things like the BGT mod which basically allows you to play BG1 and BG2 as if it were one big game, all in the BG2 engine, makes it seem very odd that any would deliberately skip BG1 and jump blindly into BG2.