PLANESCAPE TORMENT, the greatest computer roleplaying game ever made bar none, is set for a surprising re-release next week. The game has recently appeared in a few "Best Game Evaaaah" polls online and in magazines, typically in the Top 20 somewhere and Interplay's recent semi-rebirth as a budget games company has seen it come up for reissue.

For the last few years, boxed copies have only been available on Ebay where they have swapped hands for upwards of $80. So the new release is good news. Erm, for us British fans anyway, as no US reissue is planned at this time due to Wizards of the Coast getting a bit annoyed over the situation. Interplay have also 'strategically' re-released FALLOUT 1 and 2 and FALLOUT TACTICS in recent weeks, almost certainly not related to the imminent release of the FALLOUT 3 game of the year edition.

What was slightly surprising is that Interplay are charging an eye-bulgingly surreal £17.99 for the game. Whilst the game is one of the greatest things to ever appear in human history, at the same time it's a ten-year-old 2D game that can only run out of the box at 800x600 resolution (thankfully, mods can shift this upwards). Seriously, £18? Just for making it Windows 7 and Vista-compatible? And whilst the game is astonishingly awesome, it is also 'only' 30 hours long, which compares unfavourably with the BALDUR'S GATE collection box set for the same price from Interplay, which has four games that are almost as good and has about 300 hours of gameplay in it. WTH?

Conclusion: Awesome game is available again. Let the world rejoice! And then wait a few weeks before it inevitably drops below £10.