Things You Don’t *KNOW* About Planescape Torment... || 25th Anniversary Retrospective

[@Rikard2k]

You all better subscribe to this guy! Having 70 subs with this level quality video is a crime. Edit: He also has a video about (in his words) the true spiritual successor of Planescape Torment you might not know about give that a watch too, i know I will!

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

@@Rikard2k Wow. You're too kind. Thank you from the bottom of my heart!

[@FallDamage312]

I am pretty sure the birth concept for the alley is still present in the game, somewhere within dialogue. I disctinctively remember naming one of my Torment LP videos: "What do you mean, pregnant?" And if you want obscure things nodoby knows - the character Norochj is based on Jacques Choron, a philosopher and an author who studied death and self‐destructive phenomena. I did my own investigation into it and later found that nobody on the internet ever wrote anything about it.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Yes, I think Annah had such a comment. I just thought the original vision was more literal, that's why I mentioned it. And the name of the sound sample (and the cutscene in the game files) was also pretty literal. Also, your discovery is quite interesting. The reason nobody mentioned it, though, is probably the fact that not everyone knows every author and philosoper and/or digs that deep. Could be, it's not based on anyone, either. Still, interesting find!

[@FallDamage312]

@@Bottomless_Inventory I am *pretty* sure he is based on that man, his grammar is a bit backwards and Norochj backwards spells J Choron... and he literally paraphrases his quotes.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

I might actually look this guy up. Nice catch!

[@AathielVaDaath]

It is unfortunate that the Nameless One could never return Ana's feelings... The one true love of his life.. lives... Will always be his Journal

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Well, theoretically he can return the feelings of Deionarra, Annah, and Grace. It's just that he cannot really do anything about it. Although... it is strongly implied by Grace that they will meet again if he keeps thinking of her.

[@TheMichaellathrop]

Honestly the ruthless evaluation of everything that wasn't basically done or plot critical may very well have contributed to the overall quality as the stuff that was basically done was probably someone pet quest.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Of course! I mean, that's basically my point: do it right or don't do it at all. It seems they had realistic plans for the most part and these cuts didn't take away from the plot. Moreover, they made sure all the loose ends were tied. Games that have such cuts done often leave a lot of questions unaswered and you can tell that something is missing. That's basically Obsidian and inXile. I mean, not only publishers are evil -- bad management and/or unrealistic ideas are just as bad. When combined, it's an overkill but Obsidian and inXile folks are ex-Interplay/Black Isle to a large extent and had been in business for a while so they should know how these things work. Meanwhile, KotOR 2 and NWN2 really suffered because of clearly being overscoped, which had to end in cuts before Christmas release (who could have known the publisher would want that, right?). TToN, on the other hand, lacked that publisher oversight that forces you to stick to any sort of deadline. In the end, they included lots of half-baked shit, walls of text being for an editorial pass (or multiple ones), and still managed to not deliver many promised features. All in all, you can do cuts the right way or the bad way. Too little is bad and too much is bad, as well.

[@quint3ssent1a]

I'd say, the fact that TNO can't become a cleric in Planescape feels kinda organic. With game's metaphysics telling us about intricate relationships with Powers, probably it's fitting that the one and only cleric we get is an agnostic cleric who serves no gods.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

I mean, yeah, it makes perfect sense. Though, we can actually worship Aoskar, the dead god of portals, but that gets us instantly mazed if I remember correctly. I'd say the biggest challenge would be to introduce the cleric class. With mage or thief it's like "teach me, berk". With cleric? That would require A LOT more explaining, and this is assuming the old-fashioned way where you worship a deity. You would have to implement a lot of them for it to make sense, too. And then, being a cleric requires actual devotion (although I'd have to research how it works exactly in Planescape). So yeah, I can see why they restricted TNO from this class. In the end, they made the right call. Cleric would have bitten them in the ass big time way down the line.

[@blazej799]

I still remeber the quote that there are races in the planes that consider deamons as a form of snack. Gods would not fit in there, they would feel petty.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Well, depends on the rank of a demon. The weakest ones can be destroyed easily by adventurers. As for gods, I dunno. Look at the stats of 2e FR gods. Some of them are pretty powerful. Lesser deities maybe not so much.

[@manatheros]

Awesome retrospective, thank you! My favorite game of all time -- still run Planescape D&D campaigns since I was so inspired. The players inevitably fall in love with the setting.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

It's an awesome setting but definitely a bizarre one. This, combined with Chris Avellone's mission to destroy every trope and cliche, made Torment less appealing to the mainstream audience. The game struggled to make a profit because of that. I mean, I can see why. I also wondered where the hell do I get some armor in this game, for example. But if you don't mind reading and give Torment a chance to immerse you in its world, THEN you're in for an adventure of your life. :-)

[@5AETH]

Didn't know half of those and PT is is my all-time favorite game. Thank you very much for the analysis!

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

@@5AETH I'm glad it was interesting. I definitely enjoy researching my favorite games so come by more often. I think I might also do another one about Torment but focused on easily missed or forgotten stuff that's actually in the game. We'll see! 😊

[@YouSoSpice]

Great work here Also was pleasantly surprised at Unfinished Business Reloaded mod still updated to this day, gotta replay PST again

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

I'm not sure if they update anything content-wise. I think it's more language/technical updates but I could be wrong. Still, I'd say it's a must have if you want to replay the game.

[@blazej799]

Great video 👍 I recall discovering Torment cinematic trailer few years ago and I was really impressed. You can actually fear charge of those horse-like monsters and being spotted by this white giant.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Yeah, aside from several fragments, the trailer looked really good for 1997! And Lustmord's music was really cool too. Too bad all of it was cut from the game.

[@kaabak]

Very interesting video! Sometimes I wish there would be another chance to see these characters, but it is probably for the best that they have stayed put.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Yeah, especially Grace and her journal. On one hand, I'm curious. On the other hand, "a lady must have her secrets". It could be anything, and we'll never know. And maybe it's for the best.

[@kaabak]

@@Bottomless_Inventory Exactly, I remember wishing for a new Fallout game before Fallout 3 was announced. Now I feel the lore has been diluted with all the new games - it doesn't have the same mystery around it anymore.

[@xXxEINER]

What a great analysis of Planescape Torment cut content, congrats on this!

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Thanks! I've always liked to explore cut content in games and think about what might have been. In Torment's case, these are a mix. Some are for the better, some are for the worse. Still a terrific game. I'm actually thinking about doing a video on what's actually in the game but what is easy to miss.

[@KimHarderFog]

Great retrospective of a brilliant game!

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Thanks!

[@wrathu13s]

Thank you very much for mentioning Blizzard in Baator! It's still in the works and looks promising. Both Polish and English dialogues are written simultaneously and we've got writers with formal education in translation. Thankfully, new people became interested in helping us after we had revealed some update to the local game media a few weeks ago.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

I hope my skepticism wasn't too harsh. I wish you all the best and I'll gladly play Blizzard in Baator when it's done. It's just that ambitious mods are often abandoned or take forever to complete. I wouldn't want to be one of those people who thought Dzieje Khorinis would ever come out. ;-) I don't know if Planescape: Damnation was even real, but I believe Grimuar Sferowca when they say you guys are actually making things happen. If I can ever be of assistance, especially if this channel (hopefully) grows, I'll gladly help. PS Angielski, żeby nie alienować ludzi w komentarzach. Powodzenia z modem!

[@Meph1k]

Thanks for uploading this. I love this game and have player it numerous times.

[@Arashmickey]

Headcanon: Matafleur is a thread of Ravel.

[@kamilaregel6895]

Man, I'd still love to play those sequels (but only if Chris Avellone and/or Colin McComb were on the writing team). :) Additional content with more planes and factions would have been great too. I wish we could visit Limbo in the game.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Honestly, I think Torment was totally okay content-wise. The game can drag on for too long in my opinion. Torment is pretty slow and I don't think it could afford being longer without being too long. Black Isle avoided the trap of being too ambitious with these cuts. That's the trap that Obsidian and inXile definitely fell into multiple times. KotOR 2, NWN2, Tides of Numenera... The last one was a terrible shitshow in terms of content and the biggest disappointment of my gaming life. The walls of text that is just a chore to wade through. Half-assed locations in the form of a "gamebook". A lot of those people come from Interplay/Black Isle and I can definitely tell that they struggled with management. That's why I don't blame evil publishers. I think it's more about bad project management and overambitious plans that can't be delivered within realistic deadlines. I mean, how many times can you make the same mistake? So yeah, I'll definitely take a smaller project that is nicely fleshed out and has all the loose ends tied. Like Torment did (or Mask of the Betrayer, which I love just as much). I hate the feeling that there is something missing and I won't ever find out what it is.

[@kamilaregel6895]

@@Bottomless_Inventory Well, that's a whole different issue! I played Tides of Numenera years ago, but I still remember it fondly, even if it was overly ambitious. I didn't mind the walls of text either, I think the biggest problems were the lack of focus and the protagonist that wasn't as memorable as The Nameless One. But if extra content was strongly tied to the main storyline (or the companions' story arcs), it could be a great addition to the game. Anyway, I agree about Mask of the Betrayer being the perfect spiritual successor to Torment, along with Disco Elysium.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

It took me two months, give or take, to finish Tides of Numenera back when it launched, and I really felt like I was just playing a bad rip-off. Like it tried hard to be Torment, I could feel the writers sweating while writing lots and lots of unnecessary, excessive text. Mask of the Betrayer does it amazingly well, on the other hand. Like, you know you've seen this all before in some way, but it's still well-written and feels original. A few years back, I had a completionist mindset so I played TToN and did a complete run. Had it not been for that, I would have just uninstalled. BUT! I might actually give it a second chance some day. I think the rage has worn off and I'm ready for that. Don't get me wrong, there were moments when I had fun but I can't really say what exactly they were. I don't remember that much from the game. Torment, on the other hand, just burns itself in your memory!

[@kamilaregel6895]

@@Bottomless_Inventory That's fine, your criticism of Tides of Numenera is perfectly valid! I guess I'll just always appreciate a bold and outlandish idea, even if the result sometimes falls short of expectations. :)

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

That's the thing. I think both Tides of Numenera and Pillars of Eternity tried too hard. Like, I could feel they were trying hard to be different, even if the result was just weird. In Torment, it just felt right. Maybe iit's because all this talk about spiritual succession, glorifying Infinity Engine, and such.

[@lux2625]

The good ending does not make the slightest sense. Being immortal is what makes you miserable and every time you die, someone dies for you. The only way it makes sense is if you manage to merge with all your reincarnations, leaving you as a level 25 character in all d&d classes and subclasses, convincing your mortality that you are so powerful that you will never die again from now on and you both get away with it. Mortality should not suffer sharing existence with the Nameless One and this one does not go to blood war.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Well, yes and no. I think the point of that ending would be to be that 25th level character with all memories intact. Besides, at the start of the game, TNO no longer loses memory so maybe we could find a way to keep it that way. Also, if I recall correctly, the shadows that hunted TNO were controlled by TTO, and their purpose was to kill TNO so that he would keep forgetting himself and not get to the Fortress of Regrets. Still, you're probably right that others would still die in TNO's place, but it's obviously a good ending for a selfish character. So the moral ending would be to break the cycle, which we do in the final game and I absolutely love it this way.

[@needycatproductions6830]

I'm happy KZbin recommended me this video. Very nice job. Would be nice if you included a link to the "vision statement" pdf you quoted a few times. I did manage to find it by myself but still, it would be helpful.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

I'm happy this video is being recommended, too! Do come by more often! I'll probably do similar videos for other games I like. As for the Vision Statement, you can find it on RPGWatch. Just try to search "rpgwatch torment vision statement". I wasn't able to link it because I couldn't post external links at the time of posting the video. I'll see if I can do it now later.

[@KnjazNazrath]

Like because I *know* the 2nd Planescape game would've been boring for me as much as I *know* the third would've been precisely what I would've wanted during my "research Daoism as much as possible when you can't read Chinese" phase of life.

[@Rick_Dixon]

Such a shame the game never got a sequel

[@saldownik]

Imagine - Torment properly remade today. I wonder if it would go the way of non-binary Nameless One.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Maybe they would do it like Tides of Numenera. Although... imagine TNO waking up in the Mortuary, More is greeting him and all, and TNO is like "soooo... I'm non-binary". I could totally see BioWare doing that and saying the game was updated for "modern audiences".

[@saldownik]

@@Bottomless_Inventory I think it could be done tactfully. With the different incarnations business it would be interesting for the player to craft their own incarnation however they would want it. Instead of simple 9 alignments there could be multidimensional personality system. It would be interesting if modern AI methods would be used to assist in creating multitude of versions of dialogues for different personalities.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

I think you really overestimate the ability of today's game creators. Especially those affiliated with big corpos. I honestly don't think there are a lot of people who could deliver anything as good as Torment today. Disco Elysium is the only thing that comes to mind.

[@saldownik]

@@Bottomless_Inventory I know it is a pipe dream at the moment, without mature tools, or technology demonstrators. The big gaming business just isn't too interested in risky innovation. Maybe next year :P

[@TheRavenShadowsWolf]

Chris Avellone: We intentionally distanced ourselves from the D&D gods... By setting Torment is a D&D based HELL REALM. Jesus Christ, man. It's not "distant" from the gods. Forgotten Realms is still PART. OF. D&D. The very mention of the Lady of Pain IS a direct tie to D&D (She is a concept that was come out with to give DM's the ability to fuck with idiots who wanted to ruin the game for the rest of the players at the table) They may not focus on divine aspects (because it's a fucking Hell Realm... so the only "Gods" therein are going to be EVIL) but they are not DISTANT. This. All of this, his views on Kriea and the fucking Fallout Bible are exactly why I don't think and cannot be convinced that Avellone was ever as good a writer as people say they think he is. He's attached to some very noteable titles and got a lot of accolades for it. I have a question: Other than being credited as "lead or head" writer = how much exactly, of any of that work (and any of the most beloved characters or concepts) was actually defineably HIS? * Yes he got screwed out of the industry. That's not what my beef is about. I just wish people would stop shoving smoke up his ass for convoluted concepts he DOES NOT in fact EVER allow the MC to actually argue against; and overly "layered" characters who are so contradictory for the sake of contradiction that they come off as halfway bipolar.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Forgotten Realms and Planescape aren't exactly the same setting, are they? I mean, it's theoretically the same universe but a different campaign setting. As for Avellone's work, according to Colin McComb, he did about 50% of work on Torment. Quote from "Tales of Torment" at RPGWatch: "I hate to say it again, but Chris did the major work on the game. I would estimate that although he had seven designers on his team, he did about 50% of the work on the project. Keep in mind that he did all this while he was working on Fallout 2 as well. The man is truly prolific."

[@Nutshellbound]

The Nameless as a cleric doesn't make sense. He's fundamentally some one who was his own god and likely aspired to godhood. Frankly it's amazing you start neutral, since he was clearly fundamentally chaotic EVilll. Well maybe neutral definitely EVIL. I haven't finished it. Is he lich? Or is he literally something worse. Cause he seems to have damaged reality, if I'm not mistaken.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

In his full power, maybe. Meaning once he is rejoined by the previous incarnations and his mortality. And this is assuming he ultimately becomes Fighter 25/Thief 25/Mage 25. But before this happens, he starts at like level 3 mechanically and doesn't remember anything. So, until he regains his full power, making him a cleric does make sense mechanically. It would just be a pain to implement story-wise.

[@Nutshellbound]

@Bottomless_Inventory I mean story wise. He is clearly a man of hubris. He is godless. Also it's reasonable to assume he was maxed out in his first incarnation. He achieved immortality but likely fell short of godhood. Unless he flat simply sought mortal immortality. Which is a whole different kind of hubris arguably. And possibly why he seems to have damaged reality. Unless he's just a lich. Don't know that much about DND. I mean at the point I've gotten to I'd say he is technically a lich. Correcte if I'm wrong but he did something even more unnatural with his phylactery? Cause that does seem to come into it.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

What do you mean? Each incarnation is a completely different person. Practical Incarnation or Paranoid Incarnation, yes, I don't see them as clerics? But the latest TNO could theoretically be just about anyone. Black Isle didn't cut cleric because it was impossible story-wise. They cut it because it would require dumping too much lore and extra story on the player and lots of extra development.

[@c0ldsh0w3r]

I don't know anything about planescape and I intend to keep it that way. Video disliked.

[@Bottomless_Inventory]

Whaaa XD