Torchlight

[PNT510]

Torchlight is a Diablo style action RPG made by a lot of ex-blizzard employees. They were making an MMO called Mythos a while back before the company went under due to problems with the other game the company put out Hellgate: London. They then reformed as Runic games and started making Torchlight which is basically a single player version of Mythos.

It's your standard action RPG, point and click until things die and then start looting. You have three classes melee, ranged, and spell caster. You can't customize your characters sex or race which is kinda lame.

As a whole I'm really liking the game. It doesn't try and reinvent the wheel but it does some nice things. You get the choice of having either a dog or a cat as a familiar. It will fight along side you and can even learn spells. The coolest thing about it though is it has its own inventory that you can load up. You can then send it back to town to sell stuff while you keep fighting saving you the trip.

The biggest downside I've encountered so far is the game is easy. I'm only playing on normal difficulty but I am really tearing through things maybe it will get harder as the game goes on. I'm not sure yet.


Anyone else have the game? What are your thoughts? Anyone else even heard of the game? I know it's a pretty small release, but at only $20 I think it's a steal.

[Austrian ViceMaster Alex]

I've played it at a friend's house who actually imported that game, he's really into the Diablo-like games. Personally I'm not a fan of the genre, I loved Diablo but already had enough when it Diablo 2 was released.

Torchlight is a good game with nicely detailed graphics and easy controls. The random-dungeon-creator thing is old news but fitting, the pet is nice to have too, I was using the lynx or bobcat or whatever it was.

I thought the game was easy so far too but Diablo started out easy as well and near the end it got really difficult. A good game if you're into point and click hack 'n slay. The fact that such games are called RPGs makes me cringe.

[PNT510]

What's wrong with calling them RPGs? I know they don't have great stories or deep characterization but they have a lot of enemies to kill and a lot of loot to grab. The definition of a dungeon crawl which was a very popular RPG play style in table top games like D&D.

[Austrian ViceMaster Alex]

Even in the old horse and buggy days RPGs weren't just about slaying and killing monsters, you had some characterization, character development. Yes, Torchlight has all these things too ... but that's the RPG style of 20 to 30 years ago. RPGs aren't like that anymore.