by Elliott Chin

Planescape is an Advanced Dungeons and Dragons setting that TSR created around five years ago. Unlike TSR's previous settings, such as the Forgotten Realms (where Baldur's Gate took place) or the Dragonlance world, Planescape doesn't center on a single world. Instead, it uses the entire AD&D multiverse as its setting. Planescape is one of the more popular and unconventional AD&D settings. It takes place in the extradimensional planes that surround the traditional worlds of such settings as Dragonlance and Greyhawk. In Planescape, you can undertake an adventure to steal treasure from a god's home, and the very next day, take a jaunt to the hells to fight devils, before retiring to a picnic in the plane that embodies lawful goodness: The Seven Heavens.

Planescape: Torment offers new characters and settings that are far removed from those of Baldur's Gate.

See, in AD&D, the worlds that the Forgotten Realms or Dragonlance reside in are called Prime Material Planes. There are an infinite number of Prime Material Planes, each similar in style to a medieval Earth but also subtly different in many ways. What links these Prime Material Planes, though, are two things: beliefs in similar gods and adherence to similar alignments. All these worlds are engaged in struggles between good and evil. And all draw divine inspiration from the Outer Planes, which are the homes to the gods that all Prime Material Planes worship. There are the Upper Planes, where the forces of good dwell, and then there are the Lower Planes, where evil fiends fester and plot their schemes. And in the very middle of these planes is Sigil, the City of Doors, the grand metropolis that binds all the planes together. Here, demons and angels alike roam the city, engaging in its myriad pleasures and playing in its infinite games of intrigue. The city of Sigil is itself a vast realm, and it is here that the game, Planescape: Torment, takes place.

Torment takes place in Sigil. Despite its cosmopolitan nature, Sigil's slums, called the Hives, are infested with vermin and restless natives.

Planescape, especially Sigil, is a colorful setting, full of life and edgy personality that you don't often associate with the AD&D license. Will Interplay be able to do justice to this setting? And will it be able to top Baldur's Gate as a role-playing game? Read on, and find out.

Next: A little background