AVC: Something I always wanted to know from Planescape: Torment. One of the companions, Fall-from-Grace, carries a diary in her inventory. Is there any way to open it?

CA: No.

AVC: What do you call a thing like that? It breaks the rule of inventory, and it’s this little mystery that’s always in front of you.

CA: I think the expression is “flaunting the gaps.” Basically, you include something that’s appropriate for the character, and it’s also appropriate that you can’t use it. You shouldn’t be able to access her diary at all.

It seemed important to me that there are certain things characters would wear and wouldn’t wear, or they would keep around them for their own personal reasons that don’t make a shred of combat sense. These are things that are comforting to them. And it makes sense why it’s in their inventory. And you see the negative game mechanic effect of it—yes, it takes one inventory slot, that sucks—but at the same time that’s appropriate for her. It feels more real [as a way to] tie the story into the game mechanics.​