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| 11/2/99 - All Souls (feast of the faithful departed awaiting entry into heaven) |
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This is not an exit.” -Bret Easton Ellis Hello Everyone, What makes a great computer game? Is it whiz-bang-wowie graphics? Appendages that sever accurately when targeted by the player? Spells that seem to resemble a dream I once had about the apocalypse? All these and more are bullet points for selling the latest and greatest to the legions of gamers out there, yet when you take a glance at PC Data’s sales figures for the year to date in June 1999, you’ll see something interesting. With the exception of a couple of titles in the top ten, the big sellers aren’t necessarily ones that bring your 3D accelerator to its knees: SimCity 3000, Baldur’s Gate, StarCraft:Brood War, Alpha Centuari, Half-Life (well, okay, Half-Life DOES look very, very nice, but the appeal of the game goes far beyond just being pretty). Now, some will argue that one of the main reasons they sell better is because they don’t require the latest and beefiest technology, but I think ultimately there’s a much more prevailing reason for the numbers: Gamers aren’t dumb. You can throw the latest and greatest technology at them, stock your E3 booth with babes, and load the soundtrack with hip techno tracks, but the fact is what we really want is good gameplay. All of those titles listed above emphasize gameplay over bulletpoints, and that’s why they’re the top sellers and most critically acclaimed titles in their genres. Sid Meier has built a career out of delivering just that. Half-Life is important to single out because not only does it provide a fascinating and totally entertaining experience, it manages to wrap it up in stunning world that is as amazing to look at as it is to work your way through. Never does it accomplish this task at the expense of gameplay, however, and that is what separates it from every FPS before and, at this point in time, after it. They (and of course Looking Glass with System Shock) delivered something to answer the question that ultimately pops up when a genre looks like it has run its course: “Isn’t there something MORE?” This is what drew me to Planescape, and why I am so proud of the nearly complete result. I honestly believe we have provided something to answer that question for role playing games. A truly imaginative and original world dreamt up by Chris & Colin, brought to life by all the amazing people we have working in our little block of Black Isle. Hundreds of characters that are stories within themselves, with detail that threatens to surpass Encarta in the verbosity department. Beautiful and surrealistic settings that could only be possible once the rulebook for designing “<insert title> epic rpg!”was thrown to the wayside. Torment was created by gamers who desire more out of their role playing experience, and I hope that you will agree that it provides just that.
Scott Warner |
| Planescape: Torment & Design: © 1998 Interplay Productions. All Rights Reserved. © 1998 TSR, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Planescape, the Planescape logo, Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, Torment, the AD&D logo, and the TSR logo are trademarks of TSR, Inc. and are used by Interplay under license. TSR, Inc. is a subsidiary of Wizards of the Coast, Inc. Interplay, the Interplay logo, Black Isle Studios and the Black Isle Studios logo are trademarks of Interplay Productions. Exclusively licensed and distributed by Interplay Productions. All other trademarks and copyrights are property of their respective owners. |