Torment Beamdog's Planescape: Torment Enhanced Edition

[Junmarko]

I see a lot of people asking the question: "So if Beamdog didn't alter the story or the gameplay of Planescape: Torment, what did they work on for the EE?". A couple of notes in that regard.

First, PST used a very unique version of the Infinity Engine. Its codebase branched off even before BG1 was released, meaning that a lot of underlying systems were radically different from those present in BG2, IWD and by extension, our EE version of the engine. In particular, the PST spell system is nothing like the systems seen in the other IE games. It took us literally months of day and night effort just to get the spells to work properly in our version of the engine, especially given the fact that they were programmed solely for the 640x480 resolution. On top of all that, the PST spell system had a number of hardcoded features such as making specific spells function differently on certain planes (try casting Heal on Carceri or Baator and see how that turns out) so we had to painstakingly reconstruct them using the original source code and design documents.

Next, we had to rebuild the UI from scratch since it too was very different from what the other IE games used. Reconstructing all aspects of the UI for a native 4K resolution while retaining the original look and feel was a big challenge. We consulted Tim Donley (the original Lead Artist) and Eric Campanella (the original 3D modeler) to ensure that the style and tone of our UI remained faithful to the original game. In addition, we had Chris Avellone review and approve every single UI screen before it became final. The code for the PST UI was also very different from what the other IE games used (i.e. animated portraits that change as party members get hurt) so making that work required quite a bit of effort as well.

Lastly, the scripting language that PST used is fairly different from that of the other IE games. Meaning that we had to implement all of the PST-specific engine functionality related to NPC AI behavior into our engine and then test it thoroughly to ensure that nothing unintentionally broke due to the vast differences in the codebase. To make sure that everything went right, we had QA repeatedly test and re-test every single quest, item, spell and area in the game. In the end, I instructed QA to do side-by-side playthroughs comparing the original PST to PST:EE to ensure that no unintentional changes were made. There's a lot more that we did beyond what was mentioned here, but this should give you a rough idea of the PST:EE development process.

TL;DR
The codebase of the original PST was vastly different compared to the other IE games. We couldn't just take the story of PST and slap it into the SoD engine, it took us months and months of hard work to get everything working properly.

I remember Chris saying they trimmed lot towards the end of development, more than he would've liked.

What is it like working under the WotC license week-to-week? How much freedom do they give you in regards to further implementation of the Planescape Sourcebooks, if Chris/you wanted to do so?

 

[Lilura]

Hey, aVENGER, did you like my Siege of Dragonspear walkthrough? (see sig)

 

[Goral]

mod(ders)s will fix it

Informative.

Just leak materials you have and wait for the mind blowing results.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

All of that work for little to no improvement on the original.

A few pages back we had retarded redditors remarking on how the RPG Codex is yelling at clouds over PST:EE, first over the possibility that the mod might change the game, and now over the established fact that the EE won't change the game itself.

Now I'm seeing that the retards are right. Reading this thread is making my brain hurt as it's filled with people whose sole reason for being seems to be constantly upset...over a computer game! Damned if you do, damned if you don't. You hypocrites are making the SJWs look good by comparison.

(Note that the above only applies to issues regarding changing the game, I can understand those that are upset over Beamdog's business practices.)

EDIT: Typo.

 

[aVENGER]

Hey, aVENGER, did you like my Siege of Dragonspear walkthrough? (see sig)

Very well written. Looks like you found all of my infravision and random encounter zones but still missed a couple of the harder Spectacles of Spectacle fights.

BTW, you seem to be an experienced tactical player, so I was a bit surprised that you didn't play SoD on Insane with the extra damage modifiers turned off. That would have given you the hardest combat encounters and the best AI without granting enemies any unfair advantages. As an example, during the final battle:

Spoiler

Belhifet casts Dispel Magic on the party at the start, just like he does in IWD and has more powerful allies

 

[Sykar]

All of that work for little to no improvement on the original.

A few pages back we had retarded redditors remarking on how the RPG Codex is yelling at clouds over PST:EE, first over the possibility that the mod might change the game, and now over the established fact that the EE won't change the game itself.

Now I'm seeing that the retards are right. Reading this thread is making my brain hurt as it's filled with people whose sole reason for being seems to be constantly upset...over a computer game! Damned if you, damned if you don't. You hypocrites are making the SJWs look good by comparison.

(Note that the above only applies to issues regarding changing the game, I can understand those that are upset over Beamdog's business practices.)

Different people have different complaints, dipshit.

 

[Modron]

Different people have different complaints, dipshit.

B-but the codex is supposed to be a hivemind...

 

[Lilura]

BTW, you seem to be an experienced tactical player, so I was a bit surprised that you didn't play SoD on Insane with the extra damage modifiers turned off.

Walkthrough was written blind and on Core because that's what most ppl play (or I'd like to think that, at least). Been a fan of your mods ever since the Racial traits fix for BG1. Gonna do a write-up for Chosen of Cyric, too.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

All of that work for little to no improvement on the original.

A few pages back we had retarded redditors remarking on how the RPG Codex is yelling at clouds over PST:EE, first over the possibility that the mod might change the game, and now over the established fact that the EE won't change the game itself.

Now I'm seeing that the retards are right. Reading this thread is making my brain hurt as it's filled with people whose sole reason for being seems to be constantly upset...over a computer game! Damned if you, damned if you don't. You hypocrites are making the SJWs look good by comparison.

(Note that the above only applies to issues regarding changing the game, I can understand those that are upset over Beamdog's business practices.)

Codex is acting on this game just like you act regarding the Thief franchise...

Spoiler

 

[Delbaeth]

B-but the codex is supposed to be a hivemind...

Cranium rats, I told you so!

 

[Pirata Alma Negra]

Is Brent Knowles still at Beamdog?

 

[hexer]

aVENGER will you release any cool inside info from original PST design docs as bonus content?

Something like Ravel Puzzlewell's first draft Chris released 10 years ago
https://www.rpgwatch.com/files/Files/00-0208/Ravel_First_Draft.doc

If not, can you share some info on these goodies here?

 

[aVENGER]

Is Brent Knowles still at Beamdog?

Yes.

aVENGER will you release any cool inside info from original PST design docs as bonus content?

Not up to me.

Beamdog doesn't own those design documents, we are simply allowed to use them. You would need to contact Wizards of the Coast.

 

[hexer]

You would need to contact Wizards of the Coast.

I did but I was ignored.
Oh well, I just stumbled on this which blew my mind away!

 

[Fenix]

If I had a “faction,” I suppose it would be a follower of Aoskar, since I always imagined his deity portfolio represented the true theme of Planescape – the ability to connect all the planes together and provide access to all of them through portals (and the secrecy of the portals and the nature of the keys to open them was another nice narrative layer).

Btw the only reason why I opened box and killed demon instead of flush it to Baator was that ruby - I always kept all unusual things in case some of them was a portal key.
Sadly it almost never happned...

 

[Delbaeth]

Awesomeness

Reported for brofists' harvest.

 

[Glop_dweller]

To make sure that everything went right, we had QA repeatedly test and re-test every single quest, item, spell and area in the game. In the end, I instructed QA to do side-by-side playthroughs comparing the original PST to PST:EE to ensure that no unintentional changes were made. There's a lot more that we did beyond what was mentioned here, but this should give you a rough idea of the PST:EE development process.

TL;DR
The codebase of the original PST was vastly different compared to the other IE games. We couldn't just take the story of PST and slap it into the SoD engine, it took us months and months of hard work to get everything working properly.

This is heartening to hear. But there are a couple changes that I'm hoping were made. Can you tell us if you fixed the various bugged spells and XP granting dialog loops that were in the original? As I recall, I think it was Ice-Knife that had a memory leak, and IRRC, Blade Storm was removed by one of the UI/screen-res mods, because of issues; also some of the backgrounds were removed in one of those mods, for causing problems... So I am hoping that the extensive (and well appreciated) side-by-side comparison play, did not replicate the unintended behavior of the original game.

All of that work for little to no improvement on the original.

This is certainly my own preference. All I would want to see in a remastered version is turn-key operation on the modern OS'; and possibly the restoration of nearly complete ~but cut content; and/or including any unused dialog recordings from the original.

**I once asked MCA if they cast Michael T. Weiss as Nameless because of his stint as the Pretender... Sadly [as far as he knew!], it just seemed to work out that way; a flukish coincidence rather than clever intent. He was available, they asked; he said yes. But I still wonder if it wasn't someone's idea to try to cast him specifically.

 

[Agesilaus]

So when is Icewind Dale II: EE going to be released?

 

[Gerrard]

7. What parts of the game would you go back to rewrite or expand (if any)?
CA - Probably the Buried Village, as we didn’t have time to flesh it out in as much detail as we wanted. Also, we would have loved to include more plane-travelling in general, but we just didn’t have the resources and time.

Such a wasted opportunity. Imagine if a studio with some actual talent were doing this.

 

[Melcar]

So when is Icewind Dale II: EE going to be released?

I think their excuse at one point was that IWDII used a heavily modified IE (hey, so does PST) and the game itself just wasn't as popular as the other IE games (well shit, your IE fans will still buy it).

Man, if they did a IWDII EE with proper 3D acceleration and multiple resolution support I would .

 

[aVENGER]

As I recall, I think it was Ice-Knife that had a memory leak, and IRRC, Blade Storm was removed by one of the UI/screen-res mods, because of issues; also some of the backgrounds were removed in one of those mods, for causing problems... So I am hoping that the extensive (and well appreciated) side-by-side comparison play, did not replicate the unintended behavior of the original game.

Whenever cinematic spells are cast, the engine zooms in to the original viewport while the cinematic runs and returns to the normal zoom level after the it ends.

That way, the fullscreen visual effects look as they are supposed to and no background elements are removed.

 

[amurath]

As I recall, I think it was Ice-Knife that had a memory leak, and IRRC, Blade Storm was removed by one of the UI/screen-res mods, because of issues; also some of the backgrounds were removed in one of those mods, for causing problems... So I am hoping that the extensive (and well appreciated) side-by-side comparison play, did not replicate the unintended behavior of the original game.

Whenever cinematic spells are cast, the engine zooms in to the original viewport while the cinematic runs and returns to the normal zoom level after the it ends.

That way, the fullscreen visual effects look as they are supposed to and no background elements are removed.

Is is possible to make an option to skip the spell videos/animations - either by pressing ESC or in the options menu? Some spell animations are obnoxiously long - like Mechanus' Cannon or Celestial Host - and it's annoying having to watch them over and over.

 

[Deleted member 7219]

Not having Unfinished Business makes this not worth your time. Just get the original, fix pack, UB, widescreen patch, UI mod.

 

[Dexter]

a lot of underlying systems were radically different from those present in BG2, IWD and by extension, our EE version of the engine.

the PST spell system is nothing like the systems seen in the other IE games. It took us literally months of day and night effort just to get the spells to work properly in our version of the engine

we had to rebuild the UI from scratch since it too was very different from what the other IE games used.

The code for the PST UI was also very different from what the other IE games used (i.e. animated portraits that change as party members get hurt) so making that work required quite a bit of effort as well.

Lastly, the scripting language that PST used is fairly different from that of the other IE games. Meaning that we had to implement all of the PST-specific engine functionality related to NPC AI behavior into our engine and then test it thoroughly to ensure that nothing unintentionally broke due to the vast differences in the codebase.

The codebase of the original PST was vastly different compared to the other IE games. We couldn't just take the story of PST and slap it into the SoD engine, it took us months and months of hard work to get everything working properly.

So essentially you put a shitload of work in to port a game (PS:T) over to an engine branch inherently not meant to work with it (BG2) for near to no visible payoff whatsoever (well, BeamDog will grab the cash for any transaction that goes towards cult classic PlaneScape: Torment from now on, so there'll be visible payoff, and there's the blur and the outline thing, but aside). If it was really as hard as you make it sound it sounds like ressources would have been better spent on something that might yield some actual results, like developing your own game.

Are you going to try and port Temple of Elemental Evil to your engine next, or maybe Lionheart or similar?

Now I'm seeing that the retards are right. Reading this thread is making my brain hurt as it's filled with people whose sole reason for being seems to be constantly upset...over a computer game! Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

Are you sure you weren't looking for http://social.bioware.com or https://forums.beamdog.com/ ?

Who here was asking for or giddy for a "BeamDog Enhanced" version of PS:T before they came and offered it? The main thing that would actually improve the game(s) they are "Enhancing" or make it an actual "Remaster", which is update the art for high resolution displays they are either unwilling or unable to do. Other than them forking off cash into their company coffers this is an exercise in pointlessness without doing the actual work.

 

[Murk]

It takes months to have portraits change based on HP?