Although under the hood they were still turn based. The turns just kept on running unless you paused. I recently started BG2 and set it to automatically pause after every turn, which effectively made it turn based.
Contrast this with Diablo, which also had turns under the hood but they are abstracted so far away as to be almost meaningless. I think people speaking about this even use frames as the timing reference instead of turns.
The combat has to be turn-based or it becomes an ARPG like Diablo/Dungeon Siege/Titan Quest/Torchlight
Most of the CRPGs are RTWP rather than turn based though. Though I personally prefer turn based.
RTWP = Real-Time with Pause, in case you were confused like me
Although under the hood they were still turn based. The turns just kept on running unless you paused. I recently started BG2 and set it to automatically pause after every turn, which effectively made it turn based.
Contrast this with Diablo, which also had turns under the hood but they are abstracted so far away as to be almost meaningless. I think people speaking about this even use frames as the timing reference instead of turns.