special effects, audio, and graphics from the first game. David Simkins reviewed the PC version of the game for Next Generation, rating it five stars out of five, and stated that "make no mistake – Baldur's Gate II raises the bar for PC RPGs, elevating the genre to a new level". GameSpot later called Baldur's Gate II "a towering achievement in the history of role-playing games". In a 2007 Gamasutra article on the "Platinum and Modern Ages" of computer role-playing games (CRPGs), Matt Barton noted contemporary reviewers' universal praise for the game, and said: "I consider it the finest CRPG ever designed". According to GameSpy, "this is easily one of the finest CRPGs ever made and an experience that no RPG fan should miss". Awards Baldur's Gate II has been honored many times. GameSpot, GameSpy, and IGN awarded it their "Role-Playing Game of the Year" awards in 2000, and it won GameSpot's Readers' Choice Game of the Year award for that year. It received three "Gaming Globe" awards from Eurogamer in 2001: Best Game, Best Art Direction, and Best Male Supporting Character (for Minsc). The game won the "Character or Story Development" award at the 2001 Interactive Achievement Awards, and was also nominated for "Game of the Year", "Game Play Engineering", "PC Game of the Year", and "PC Role-Playing". IGN placed it at No. 25 on their 2005 "Top 100 Games of All Time" list. In 2006, though not ranking in the top five games, it earned an "honorable mention" in Gamasutra's Quantum Leap Awards. Baldur's Gate II was inducted into GameSpot's "Greatest Games of All Time" list. In 2009, Game Informer placed Baldur's Gate II at No. 88 on their list of "The Top 200 Games of All Time", calling it "the best Dungeons & Dragons game ever made". This is up one place from their top 100 list in 2001. Empire ranked it No. 19 on their list of the 100 Greatest Games. At the end of 2009, Baldur's Gate II, though not quite making the Top 12 list, received an honorable mention in Gamasutra's Game of the Decade, where readers voted for their best game of the 2000s. In 2010, on IGN's Top 25 Modern PC Games, Baldur's Gate II clocked in at No. 2. In 2013, it was placed at No. 46 on GamingBolt's "Top 100 greatest video games ever made". IGN ranked Baldur's Gate II