Trenton Webb of British RPG magazine "Arcane" called Planescape "the premier "AD&D" world", noting its hallmark as "a bizarre juxtaposition of legend and nightmare". Game designer Rick Swan said that the original "Manual of the Planes" had in a sense been "reincarnated as the Planescape setting ... TSR's most ambitious campaign world to date. Abandoning the straightforward but dry approach of the "Manual", the Planescape set reads less like a textbook and more like a story. Characters take precedence over game systems, high adventure supplants the physics lessons."