Hack & Slash, you say? Well, I find BD's hack and slash more intelligent than Dungeon Siege or Diablo II, so it is more like think & hack, rather than click & hack. Find me a RPG which doesn't involve any form of hack & slash - and for the record, I will name Harvest Moon. But what else? The game which you have some diligently endorse, Mirrowind for example, spends most of its time hack and slash. Torment too has moments of hack and slash. Most rpgs follow the standard formula of hack and slash, then puzzles.
Apparently we two shares different tastes. I have scant regard for KoTR. The game is ridiclously easy, the weapons unbalanced and well, I have this thing about D20 -- all you need to do to be uber is to pump Strength.
At any rate, this has been an enlightening discussion.
To address the Hack and Slash. Yes of course Torment had HS. It wouldnt be a RPG if it hadn't, but it was heavy on the intellectual stuff as well. Fallout was probably even heavier. My point is that there need to be other alternatives throughout the games, and conversation, thief skills, and just plain old lateral thinking should allow other ways of doing stuff rather than just killing critters. Morrowind was primarily HS, but it had some very clever elements in regards to potions and magic which kept me entertained for a while, though I soon found it a chore to have to stop and kill cliffracers every 50 yards.
As to KOTR. Yes it was pretty easy. Dumbed down for the XBOX and I'm not afraid to say so! But on the otherhand it looked glorious and the Star Wars thing helps. Plus the story was fairly good. I wouldn't say the weapons were unbalanced, especially since your enemies used them as well.
While I'm on a roll...Magic needs to do more than just be a way to hurt monsters and heal yourself, otherwise it's just a fancy sword. I quite liked the way magic in BG2TOB was used, but that was mainly because enemy spellcasters had such an impressive array of spells it forced your team to have counterspells, and counter-counterspells etc.
