Hands down the best game I've played in 5 years. (Planescape - Torment (PC))

Member Name: Ruli

Product:	Planescape - Torment (PC)
Date:	24/08/00 (19 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Deeply engrossing story, Very well designed gameplay, Excellent voice acting

Disadvantages: Hardcore RPG-ers might feel its a bit too adventure-ish

I'm a veteran computer games player, and I have to say that its been a long time since a game managed to draw me in as much as Planescape Torment. In fact, aside from Half-Life, its the only CD-ROM-era game that I would rate up there with classics such as Elite and Ultima IV in terms of total immersion in a game's story world. Obviously, Planescape Torment benefits from drawing upon a pre-existing rich world, namely the Planescape AD&D setting.

Although this game is clearly marketed as and intended to be an RPG, in some respects it plays more like an adventure game. For instance, completing subquests that advance the plot often yields much more experience points than hacking your way through swarms of monsters. But this, in my opinion, is a good thing, as the storyline is *absolutely brilliant*. A hugely intricate, deep and involving dilemma of mortality, love, regret, sacrifice, torment... this is movie-quality stuff.

Combined with some of the best voice dialogue acting ever in a game (in particular, Sheena Easton as Annah!), this game really drew me into the Planescape universe and saw me 'disappear' from real life for 2 weeks.

Its obvious that the designers of this game have *really* done their job, namely: designing. Too often we've seen games that claim to "adapt to your interactions", where how you act in the game world has repercussions later on, and yet unfortunately you never really feel that a difference is being made.

Planescape Torment, however, truly gives you the sense that every decision you make is deciding the future plot and narrative, especially since the character alignment/class, a core concept of AD&D rules, plays an important role in this game.

Summary: