To be honest, I never really got into the whole AD&D thing. IÂ’ve always felt there are much better RPG systems out there, for both PC and pen & paper. That changed when Bioware came into the scene. Their Infinity engine used in BaulderÂ’s Gate captured the feel of AD&D without players having to put up with the crazy and illogical role-playing system. For once players could concentrate on the story and the setting rather than dungeon crawling or lowering their THACO and AC. Black Isle has taken the Infinity Engine and the AD&D universe to the next step with Planescape: Torment. To be honest, this is one of the best RPGÂ’s I have ever played.

To me, there are two types of RPG’s. There’s the “real” RPG, that tries to create a whole world, and plunks you down in the middle and gives you a story to follow. The Ultima and Elder Scrolls series’ are examples of this. Then there’s the “light” RPG, which isn’t so much about immersion as it is about cinematics and plot. They are fairly linear, and usually much faster paced. Almost every RPG made by Squaresoft falls into this category. Torment leans towards the “real” RPG, but has a few twists in it that make for an interesting mix of the two types.

The folks at Black Isle have taken the conventional world of AD&D and added a few very interesting twists. For example, your character cannot die. If he does, he just wakes up a little bit later feeling like crap, but no worse for the wear. In fact, you start the game dead and have to work your way back and figure out what happened to you. Sometimes you have to die to further the plot, which makes for a very different pace. Another interesting change is how rarely you fight. All in all, you probably only get about 20% of your experience points from fighting monsters. The rest is gained from completing quests and just by talking to people, mostly the later. When everything is said and done, Torment has over one million words of text in game. ThatÂ’s dialogue, flavor text, and your journal. That is a LOT of reading. Fortunately, itÂ’s all very well written, and you find yourself initiating conversation just to find out what everyone has to say. Even more interesting is that at any time you can stop and talk to your party members and hold long, intricate conversations with them as well. Gone are the days of old, where party members were merely an extra sword or damage sink, these NPCs are living, breathing people with their own motivations and attitudes.. ItÂ’s quite possible to make some of your party members so angry that they will attack you, or conversely, have to split up a fight between two of your companions, because they donÂ’t see eye to eye.

With all the talking you have to do, suddenly statistics that used to not matter in an RPG are really important. When I started the game, I dumped all my points into Dex, Str, and Con, because thatÂ’s usually all that REALLY matters in a PC RPG, unless you are going to be a Mage or Cleric, which I never am. Boy, was that a mistake! Your Int, Wis, and Char statistics all directly affect your dialoge options when you talk to people. In most games, this isnÂ’t really a big deal, but it makes a difference in Torment. I watched a friend play through the first part of the game, he sweet talked his way right out of the first dungeon and got a ton of experience for it to boot. When ever my character would talk to someone, all my dialogue options were basically thinly veiled threats. The difference was amazing! I ended up fighting tooth an nail all the way through, and not getting as much experience for it. IÂ’m going to go through the game a second time, only this time max out my Int, Wis, and Char, just to see how big of a difference it makes.

This kind of dynamic play style makes for a lot of replay value, I found myself talking to my friends to see how they got past certain parts and it was always different from how I did it. It's possible to get through the whole game alone without any additional party members, or you can opt to recruit everyone who wants to join. Any situation can be resolved through battle, sneakiness, or even clever dialogue. This is one of the most versatile story driven RPGs IÂ’ve ever seen.

I found myself keeping my party members, mainly because I liked them so much. Annah and Morte were far and away my favorite. Although Annah is pretty useless as far as party members go, she is always nice to have around, her comments and voice acting were great and damn sexy! Every character is well thought out and very believable, although none are particularly useful in a fight. The main character, The Nameless One, is pretty badass, and does most of the work in any fight. If there is one serious flaw in Torment, itÂ’s the lack of choice in party members. ThereÂ’s only one mage, one cleric, one thief. It would have been nice to have a bit more variety.

Other than that, this is a great game. The music is good, sound effects cool, awesome spell effects, and great plot. I found myself totally absorbed and spending hours and hours completing the dozens of sub quests and talking to the people of Sigil, completely immersed.