If a random person's recomendation can mean anything to you: Buy this game. The Age of Decadence is a bold, bold foray into the classic RPG genre. It doesn't execute everything perfectly, but what it does right, it does amazingly.

It tells a shockingly detailed and plausible tale of a world that puts humans in front of humanity. Being an RPG protagonist in a ruthless, self-interested world with geopolitical concerns instead of 'ORCS IN DEM DERE HILLS' is a refreshing change of pace. The combat is utterly ruthless if your character is not trained for it, and all but the best warriors will still lose in a four on one man fight. The game isn't terribly long, but that's because they designed each area to be played and replayed with various characters and with entirely different agendas. Your character may be a feared warrior, but if he doesn't comprehend the technological wonders that someone may put in front of him, a whole plot arc will pass him right by. A fast-talking con-man can convince the whole world to follow his lead, where a brillant mind can actually sort out what insane things he is witnessing where other characters will just go 'Yep, it's magic!'

AoD deserves to recieve so much praise for it's story, and it's combat is definitely workable. It lags behind in the third act, and has so many choices that I on more than one occasion inadvertantly betrayed my employer/pushed the plot forward/messed everything up because I didn't realize *which* of the dozens of places and actions would adjust the timeline. The game also suffers from being simply ugly and a tad clunky in animation, but that was never the genre's strongsuit.

Anyone who enjoyed Planescape: Torment or Divinity owes it to themselves to tackle this great game.