Just adding to the already said things to reinforce them. To me they all have these resounding qualities that make them top-notch and forever some of the best cRPGs: Writing (all around), themes, story, atmosphere (music+sound+color pallets), setting, characters, depth, role-playability, and overall impact.
Planescape: Torment. Be aware, it may never get better than this. I recommend playing first time with the unfinished business mods. It's what was intended, really.
Fallout 1+2. Not even comparable to 3, NV, and 4. They stand alone far from those games and should not be thought of in the same vein. Make sure to do patches and unfinished business/restoration project, IMO.
Arcanum. Not as polished as the two above, but still a top-notch, must-play for what you're looking for. Note to play in fast-turn-based mode for best results (it's not broken, you just have to know how it operates.) Definitely definitely do the recommended mods/patches for this.
Inquisitor. This one doesn't get the love it should, but I think it should be right up there with the rest for the already mentioned elements. There are some game-breaking bugs and brutally hard combat, but the flaws are well worth dealing with in order to experience the rest of it. Play on EASY, it will still be hard.
some more thoughts:
BG1+2 are okay. To me, they aren't great and they don't deserve the praise and hype they get. The combat is cumbersome to enjoying the whole experience/story, but even then it's not that well written or deep or involved and the RP aspect is kind of weak (as far as impact/variability, sure, you can thief, druid, mage RP greatly in the D&Dness of them, but, that's only RPing combat, imo. Sure there are other RP elements, being a paladin vs. being an evil mage or whatever, but it's not very deep or elaborate.)
Kotor 1+2 are okay. 2 is better than 1, darker, better characters, less formulaic predictability, but, nothing as awesome as the 3 above.
Wasteland 2 is very good. A lot of people hate on it, but I think that is because it doesn't play how the expect/want it to play and takes some learning even if you are super-familiar with lots of RPGs.
Gothic, which I've recently started to get deeper into is gearing up to be one of the best RPGs ever too it seems. Different beast than all the rest though.
I've recently been playing UnderRail and it is very good too. I am barely scratching the surface of it so far but, I think it is showing great promise and should be mentioned here.
Age of Decadence, which I've not played, but seems to be deep and elaborate and quite unique too, you may want to check out.
MiloRivers: Thanks for the help everyone :)
be sure to come back and tell us all how it went!