I played a bit of the NWN element but I am enjoying it so far! Might get this instead of the other two;

Haven't read all of the posts here, so perhaps it's already been recommended, but if you liked Diablo II, another possibility here at GOG might be Divine Divinity.

Arcanum of Steam Works and Magika might be another one, as though it does come with turn based combat, if I'm not mistaken I think you can turn that off and go with real time combat if that's your forte (more like Diablo in that regard). With that the number of companions you can have is determined by one of your attributes, I want to say Charisma but it's been so long ago when I played that one I don't remember. But most players can usually have at least 2 or 3 companions. It's a pretty neat game because of the way technological characters are mostly immune to magic and vice versa, it can get interesting.

It can also get frustrating when you have a magical healer in your party but because your character is tecnological, most of the healing spells fail too. lol. It's another one to consider though if you haven't already.

For Brian Fargo his favourite is Icewind Dale.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=apg08u6n2YM

Did BG had realtime combat with interactive pause? I even can't remember it's too long ago since I have played it, I always thought it had turnbased combat, but thanks for the clarification.

All the Infinity Engine games do.

The Baldur's Gate engine was originally developed for tunbased combat but this was when realtime was all the rage, still is, so late in the development they changed it to realtime. If you know what to look for it shows.

Just throwing in my two cents. If you're going for something easy to get into but still a lot of fun, I'd go with IWD2. Baldur's Gate starts off slow and you'll likely want to continue to the second one afterwards, and Planescape start reeeeeally slow but gets awesome. IWD2 is a great hack-and-slash strategy D&D game thing, and since it's a little more combat and a little less story it might be easier to put aside for a while and play something else. Plus, if you're a customization freak like me, making your own party of 6 people is awesome/time consuming.

EDIT: And like OldFatGuy, I highly recommend Arcanum. Great game for turn-based or realtime (though turn-base is arguably better) with lots of playstyles and general awesomeness.

It wasn't long ago I suggested to get Icewind Dale first and then try Temple of Elemental Evil. I think I might change my opinion now though. Get them all, but if you only want to get one, get Planescape: Torment. It's awesome.

Also, don't let some comments fool you. I thought Icewind Dale's story and atmosphere was quite good. It's not as text heavy and you usually don't have as many dialog options, but being text heavy or not doesn't necessarily make a story good or bad. Just try to read Atlas Shrugged.

As far as my (very) subjective opinion goes it's like this:

1.) IWD1/IWD2
2.) Baldur's Gate 1 and 2 w/ ToB
3.) PS:T

It's all very close though. The main reason I liked IWD so much was the aesthetics. The music and varied maps really hit a homerun with me. I didn't mind making all of my blank characters in the beginning, because I'm someone who seems to create personalities for them in my head as I play. So they feel fairly fleshed out by the end (Note: I don't write full bios about them or anything, but over the course of the long game they sort of develop their own personalities. It's weird.)

But I really can't help you--it's one of those wonderful decisions where you really can't go wrong with any of them. Eventually you'll want to play them all.

This is something that I do too with IWD, and I feel like it makes the key difference. Without you personalizing your characters it can feel a little empty, but with it it can arguably be more fulfilling than the others since you make every character and decide how they tie into everything.
Wait, you don't write full bios? Am I the only one who does that? XD

Haha. I've tried before but it seems so forced. And as I said, they seem to develop their own personas as the game progresses. If I were to shoehorn them in at the start that would remove the discovery. Like I said, it's weird. I can't think of another game when this occurred.

edit: You know, I've been meaning to replay those games. Maybe I'll try it when I finish with BG2, which I've just started. Maybe it'll be faaaaabulous.

Just buy and play Baldur's Gate 2. It's quite possibly the greatest rpg ever made. It has a good mix of varied combat encounters, decent story, and great character interactions.

It isn't essential to have played BG1.

Planescape is a great game, but a bit more dated in some ways (graphics and interface), and also more subject to specific taste (very text heavy). IWD is decent fun in its own right (I like the sort of combat shared by the games), but as an actual rpg it's far inferior to PS:T and BG2.

ARcanum isn't really diablo like though unless you play it that way and if played that way is rather bad compared to Diablo. (and i"m saying this as someone who likes Arcanum and isn't a fan of Diablo) Arcanum is rather more like the first two fallouts with he best thing about it being the amount of choices of how you play rather than the actual combat.

Well, you don't have to do it during character creation. You can customize your characters' backstories (and voice and colors) at any time just like the BG games.