Planescape: Torment Interview

Following yesterday’s interview with lead designer Chris Avellone, we tracked down lead programmer Dan Spitzley to run the same questions past him and get an entirely different viewpoint on the game’s development. Once again, our questions and his answers to follow:

GB: Tell us a bit about your previous work at Black Isle Studios and your role during the development of Planescape: Torment.

Dan: I started at Interplay prior to Black Isle’s inception in 1995. The first project I worked on was a computer version of TSR’s Dragon Dice collectible dice game. That was finally released in 1997, if I recall, after a pretty difficult development cycle. Despite being a pretty accurate simulation of the game, it suffered from an art style that was all over the map, and was, I think, just not very fun even in its dice-based form.

After that, I became lead programmer on Planescape: Torment. I’ve always considered the title a bit misleading since I was the only programmer on the project at the time, so I was sort of lead by default. Most of the work I did on Torment was pure feature implementation, which for a lead is pretty unusual, at least these days. I’m pretty sure I was the first programmer at Black Isle to really get his hands dirty in the Infinity Engine. Baldur’s Gate hadn’t even shipped at that point, so it was still undergoing some pretty major changes. It was very educational trying to add new features like floating text, map notes, and a bestiary while integrating updated builds from Bioware every couple of months.

Incidentally, during development, I was pulled off for about two months each for Fallout 1 and 2 to do scripting work on areas like the Hub, Vault City, and Broken Hills. At the time, I was concerned how that would affect Torment’s development, but now I feel incredibly lucky to have been involved with the Fallout series.

GB: What was your initial reaction when you first heard that Black Isle Studios would be developing an RPG based in the Planescape campaign setting? Did you immediately realize the potential such a unique setting could have?

Dan: Initially, I wasn’t familiar with Planescape. When I started on the project, however, I did a bit of research, and it was immediately obvious that we could do things that wouldn’t make sense in standard fantasy RPGs. Even back then, RPGs were chock full of dwarf/elf/Foozle-style content, and it was nice to know we would have some freedom to try different things. I was especially excited to see how the architecture of the Planescape universe, Sigil specifically, would turn out, since implementing that properly would immediately set us apart from other RPGs in a big way.

GB: Before starting on Torment, how familiar were you with the Planescape setting? Did you have to do a lot of reading and other research before becoming involved with the game?

Dan: I have never really been a pen-and-paper gamer. I grew up with CRPGs and Infocom games on the Apple II. I was pretty familiar with D&D since my brother was (and is) heavily into pen-and-paper gaming. Planescape, though, was new to me when Torment started. Since I wasn’t a designer, the basic Planescape handbooks were enough to give me a good idea of what direction the game would take.

GB: What was it like to be a part of the Planescape: Torment development team on a day-to-day basis and what was the general “mood” of the development team as the game progressed? Any fond memories you can share with us?

Dan: We were a pretty close-knit team. For a good period of time myself, Tim Donley (Lead Artist), Chris Avellone (Lead Designer), and alternately Aaron Brown and Aaron Meyers (Artists) all sat in a single office (aka The Love Nest). This was great for communication in the early stages of the game, and I think it helped keep us on the same page.

The mood of the team fluctuated over the course of the project, as it does on any project. I think having significant portions of the team pulled off for Fallout 1 and 2 really hurt morale a bit, but we always managed to bounce back. I think we were all in a pretty good mood after a big press event we had at the office where about half a dozen editors crammed into The Love Nest and we let them spend some time playing the game. That was quite early on, but we were already getting the idea that people were impressed with what we were doing.

I’ve got a number of fond memories:

– The first spell we got into the game was Ice Knife, IIRC. Tim Donley spent most of the day running through the Hive, killing innocent civilians with it and laughing maniacally. He declared Torment (the greatest game in the world) on that day.

– Aaron Meyers constantly canceling Christmas. (Oh my God! I’ve had enough! Cancel Christmas!) I’m pretty sure we kept track of how many got cancelled. I think I may actually get some presents this year.

– Eric Campanella had just finished rendering out the new Nameless One. Before we let him see it in the game, we replaced its head with that of Jack from the Jack in the Box commercials. A good laugh was had by all.

– Trying to come up with a name for the Black Isle division during its inception. My favorites were Colostomy Bag Food Fight and Raining Dumptrucks.

GB: Which CRPGs would you consider your favorites and how did such titles influence or inspire you during the development of Torment?

Dan: The Ultima series was always a favorite, as was the Might and Magic series. I spent too many hours playing through those from middle school through college. They gave me something to shoot for with regards to quality control. I don’t recall ever running into serious bugs with any game in either of those series (no, I didn’t play Ultima IX). I know Torment could hardly be called bug-free, but I think considering how complex it was, we shipped with a reasonably low bug count.

Dan: I wish I could say I came up with the characters, but I’m just a programmer. I did, however, come up with the Midget Treasure Hunter and some other Broken Hills characters in Fallout 2.

GB: Was there any content you would have liked to see implemented into Torment that didn’t make it into the game?

Dan: I seem to recall having grander plans for the Modron Maze. I wanted the randomized dungeon to be a little less predictable with regards to its layout. In the end, we just didn’t have enough time. In retrospect, though, I think a cubic dungeon is actually pretty appropriate for the Modrons.

An ultra-ultra early idea for an ending that I thought would be cool (but admittedly completely stupid) was to have the whole game actually be the make-believe world of a child playing in his backyard with action figures. His mom would call him in for dinner, and he’d drop his Nameless One and Nordom figures into the sandbox and run off. Speaking of which, why couldn’t we get freakin’ action figures for this game? Space Channel 5 got action figures, damn it!

GB: Planescape: Torment continues to be an all-time favorite RPG for many people and is the only Infinity Engine title that has snatched a place on GameSpot’s “Greatest Games of All Time” list. What do you attribute this lasting success to?

Dan: I think Torment was just very unique, and it can stand out even after time passes whereas traditional high-fantasy RPGs may blend together over time. It had an art style that nobody had seen before, or since for that matter. The writing was excellent and the characters actually mattered. It was a full-featured RPG that got more things right than it did wrong, and it was polished enough to leave a good impression on the people that make the Best Of lists. Good word of mouth doesn’t hurt, either.

GB: Why do you think the Infinity Engine worked so well for Planescape: Torment (and four other highly successful RPGs), yet many developers are straying away from the party-based isometric style that was so critical to the engine’s success?

Dan: I think it mostly has to do with the decrease in situational awareness necessary to play most modern games. Games that do require it, like RTSs and console strategy RPGs, will still often use isometric views just because it gives the player a good feel of the situation on the battlefield. In most major games these days, though, the player’s character is the only one that really matters. Since there is no need to divide the player’s attention amongst multiple controllable characters, it may be seen as wasteful to use an isometric view, whereas a first-person or over-the-shoulder view brings the player closer to the one important character they are controlling.

GB: If Obsidian Entertainment obtained the rights to develop another Planescape title, would you be receptive to creating another RPG using the setting? If so, where would you personally like to take the next game?

Dan: I’ll make any game that seems like it could be fun to play. I don’t have any particular preferences on direction, but I like me some Modrons, so I’d want to see more o’ them.

Thanks for your time, Dan! More Modrons sounds good to us, too.