I am sorry if this type of post isn't allowed here, but I can't really think of anywhere else to post it. I have tried searching google for the answer to my question and Nothing came up, and it has been irritating me for a couple of days now.

I recently started playing Baldur's Gate Enhanced Edition and came upon some pools that reminded me of a different game (I think). I cannot remember the game, nor anything really about it except one specific image.

This image is of an isometric game (pretty sure at least) where you can have a party (again pretty sure), and it is of 3-5 pools of water. The water is brilliant blue, and it is surrounded by red, yellow and oranges as if it is more sulfuric.

The pools are smallish and sort of in an X shape, with a largish pool in each 'corner' (N/E/W/S) and I don't remember whether there is a pool in the center or not.

I don't even remember why I was at those pools, I just remember it being sort of magical looking. I am also pretty sure that this is a fairly old game, as I think the graphics were about on par with Baldur's Gate, the original edition. For all I know it could BE baldur's gate.

I *think* that I may have came into this area from the south and there *may* have been something on the other side that I had to talk to or fight.

Any help would be appreciated, but I would really love it if someone could link me an image of that particular area (if you can just tell me the name of the game, I would love it, I just want to see that area again :P)

Thanks in advance for any help.

And it isn't Avernum 2? I'd open the game up and show you, but I don't have it installed and I'm not about to speedrun the first three chapters of the game over a guess.

Thanks, but no, I only recently got the Avernum series, (as in the last couple of years) and this was a lot longer ago than that. I don't blame you for not wanting to speedrun the game.

However, while I was trying to get my brain to shut down, and let me sleep, I suddenly was hit by an epiphany.

I started thinking about how the pools in Baldur's gate were sort of in a desert, and it started me thinking maybe these pools were as well, and that got me to think of Dark Sun: Shattered Lands.

However, I cannot find the specific area I am thinking of in that game images online, so it might not be that particular game. It does seem a bit cruder graphics than I remember, but then again I also have a habit of 'smoothing' out graphics in my head from the older games I have played.

Will edit here if I can find that particular scene.

Edit: managed to find an archive of all the DS: SL maps, and that isn't it. It has pools that *almost* look like I was thinking, but they aren't surrounded by the reds/oranges/yellows I remember, nor in the shape I remember. Oh well

Doesn't ring a bell; try looking it up in The CRPG Book Expanded Edition v3.6b
https://crpgbook.files.wordpress.com/2023/03/crpg-book-expanded-edition_3.6b.pdf

Not gonna lie:
this must be one of the most confusing descriptions of a game (or an image from a game) that I've read here (and there have been some confusing descriptions...).

Good luck with your search!

Yeah, that is what is so frustrating. I just get this one image, that tends to fade as I try to remember more about it, and I can't remember anything else about the game, or the screen.

Thanks though. Thanks for that link, it is interesting... I hadn't realized Ultima Underworld: Stygian Abyss came out that early... Spent many an hour listening to a cassette player while playing it...

Yeah, I was hoping that it might ring a bell with someone, but it might just be too vague of an image. I could also be confusing some of what I remember with other games (I know Red Dead Redemption 2 has an area with hot springs sort of like I am talking about, but that definitely isn't the game I am remembering).

I just wish I could remember *more*, like why I was at those springs, what the interface of the game looked like and so on...

My only guess is Pools of Radiance : Ruins of Myth Drannor
Or

Temple of Elemental Evil.

Only the last one is available on GOG.

I don't think it is pools of radiance. I believe that these pools might have been in the middle of a desert of some type, sort of an oasis.

I am also not sure I have ever played those two (pools of radiance is familiar, but not the maps I saw really).

I looked through that book and got hit with nostalgia so bad... a lot of my childhood is in it :P

but yeah, I was hoping that looking at the images would help as well as the titles, and the closest I got was, ironically, the baldur's gate series. Sacred came close. Those two (along with Dark Sun) made me start going 'could it be?) and I started scouring for images, but didn't find anything else. Same with Dungeon Siege, all three titles. But I can't find any images of those pools, or anything like them (as I am probably misremembering details), and thinking a bit more, I am thinking the graphics might be a bit closer to Dark Sun Shattered Lands than Baldur's gate. (as in a more pixelated, more drab game, which is why the pools would stand out in my memory compared to the rest of the game) I just couldn't find a top down game that triggered anything. I, however, do know that there are a few titles that I have played that weren't in it (which is completely understandable) so it could be one of those, that I played around the time I got Dark Sun and played it. I know I got a huge collection of CDs with games like Dark Sun, but sadly don't know where it is anymore, nor what those other games might have been.

It also isn't any Final Fantasy, because I haven't played any of them, and I play exclusively on PC, so any titles that were exclusive to consoles (at least at the time) I haven't played.

Thanks for that book though, it was very interesting and I was hoping it would jog something else. I spent this morning going through up until like the 2009+ era. I also now want to play a lot of games over again.

Hello CatherineBr!

Could your memory be from "Icewind Dale"?

The first thing that came to my mind when reading your description were 'Kresselack's Tomb' from "Icewind Dale". (See the attached pictures from pools in the three different levels of 'Kresselack's Tomb'.)

It matches multiple of your criteria: party-based, isometric, on par with Baldur's Gate, was released shortly after Bladur's Gate (original), (etc.)
And I am wondering why no one mentioned "Icewind Dale" before, since it is also a very obvious possibility.
Just in case I further added a picture from a later dungeon, 'Lower Dorn's Deep', in "Icewind Dale" with lava which has less potential to be the scene you are looking for.

If it is not from "Icewind Dale" then I hope, you will find the corresponding game soon.

Kind regards,
foxgog

Thanks, but that isn't it. I am pretty sure these pools were an outside set of hot springs or something like that (not sure if they were just pools, or hot springs, but the colors said sulfuric to me, or hot springs)

I do remember those rooms though.

Ironically, I was browsing images trying to find this, and came across this: https://lh3.ggpht.com/-srFA5xuQcOE/URjgbzULBAI/AAAAAAAAkm0/30xzZnKGlL0/grand-prismatic-1%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800 (hopefully this link works, but if it doesn't, it is an image of a Yellowstone Hot spring with brilliant blue waters, a ring of yellow around it, and then red/orange trailing off around it)

This looks a lot like I remember the springs being, but about 3 to 5 of them.

I sitll haven't been able to figure out this game, but have been thinking about it.

I don't think that it is Never Winter Nights, but I know there are a couple of additional modules that add new areas and I was wondering if I could be remembering one of them.

I just cannot remember the names of the modules (and these were with the disc set of Neverwinter nights), so can't look up anything.

The one I remember best is where you start in a school and there is a paladin that is upet because she failed a test about goblin children and saving them. I think it started out in a snowy area? but you could also visit a more desert like area.

As said, I am pretty sure this isn't it, because NWN graphics doesn't seem to fit what I remember.

A couple more isometric games that were not mentioned yet and that have some desert/oasis/wasteland areas:

Al Qadim The Genie's Curse
Divine Divinity

This thread made me really really curious! I often have some recalls of older games and I like to search for them.
Unfortunatelly (in order to help) I hardly ever finish an RPG... (not my fav genre) Could it be Hexplore (available on GOG)?
During the last RPG sale I discovered it here. Then, I browsed the Mobygames page and I remember that it features oasis areas.
https://www.mobygames.com/game/3304/hexplore/screenshots/windows/620983/

I opened a text walkthrough and searched for oasis and pool with several mentions, including pools, buttons around and N/E/W/S arrows.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/69334-hexplore/faqs/51337

Maybe this is the area, hopefully... (it links to the 6th level).
https://youtu.be/apLCaZ-HbGo?t=395

No, I have never played it (neither have I bought it).

Best of luck. Please let us know if you ever find it!