Torchlight- PC, 2009

Published by Perfect World Entertainment, Inc./Encore, Inc.

Developed by Runic Games

Story- 8.4/10

Gameplay- 8.6/10

Design- 9.5/10

Control- 9.0/10

Sound- 9.6/10

Fun Factor- 9.5/10

Overall- 9.0/10

Torchlight, the new brainchild of the guys up at Runic Games, is an artistic take of the typical “left-click attack, right-click skill” PC RPG. As cool as it looks, does it have what it takes to stand up to its predecessors?

Never heard of Runic? Sure you have, it’s essentially Blizzard North without Blizzard. What’s Blizzard North?! They produced Diablo II.

Story- 8.4

The story is simple and to the point; Torchlight is a mining town stationed on top of an area rich with Ember, giant crystals with magical properties. However, certain Ember are corrupt, infecting the surroundings with evil. Alric, one of Torchlight’s most favored civilians fell into the hands of corruption and will stop at nothing to resurrect an ancient evil to plague the town once again. Your job is to journey into the depths of the mines, discover the secrets of Ember, and stop Alric at all costs.

There’s not much to do outside of the main storyline. After you complete the first few quests, three new optional quest branches open up. Of these new quests, you can search for jewels, recover someone’s lost armor and weapons through several alternate dungeon areas, and defeat certain “champions”, or boss versions of common enemies. Unfortunately, none of these take very long to complete, so it’s very possible to complete EVERY quest all at once in one play through. Once the game is completed, a new quest opens up, but I shouldn’t say anything else about it… don’t wan’t to be too “spoilery”.

Gameplay- 8.6

Now, I didn’t want to do this much, but I doubt there was any way of avoiding it; If you’ve ever played Diablo II, then Torchlight shouldn’t take that long to get used to. Talk to people in town to get basic information about…everything, then head to the next area to destroy stuff. Complete a quest, drop a Town Portal scroll to warp back into town (yes, it’s still called a Town Portal) and talk to the person corresponding to your completed quest to move on. Rinse and repeat.

Repetitive, yes, but there’s plenty of incentive to push you through the game. There’s plenty of armor sets to unlock, new spells, and of course, better weaponry.

There are plenty of things from Diablo II that can be seen in Torchlight. The “waypoints” from D2 have been replaced with “waygates”, basically transitioning from a teleport platform to a “stargate“. Skill trees are back, along with the same character attribute system. Identify and Town Portal scrolls are still the same, HOWEVER, characters can now learn spells that act as those scrolls, so there’s no need for scrolls after about 3 hrs of gameplay.

The pet system is a new addition to the engine. Each character comes standard with either a cat or dog, player’s choice. The pet acts as a your partner, kind of like the hired help in D2. Your pet has it’s own inventory, can learn spells, and if you wish, can be set to attack, defend or patrol. Pets can also be sent into town to sell the contents of their inventory, which is excellent if you can’t teleport out of your current location to go sell things.

Design- 9.5

Like D2, Torchlight’s areas are randomly generated; two people may be in the exact same area on two different games, but the map layout will be completely different. As far as traversing from area to area, Torchlight runs on an elevator-like system. In most action RPGs, the player moves across a vast landscape of different weather conditions and terrain. In Torchlight, if you aren’t going down, then you’re heading in the wrong direction. There’s 35 floors to explore, each one progressively harder than the last.

Control- 9.0

My only beef with the control scheme came from personal error; every game that I’ve played this year until the accident has been on the Windows side of my MacBook, so you could assume that I’m not used to “Alt+Tab” function or the fact that “command=Windows Key”. There were a few instances where I would use the Tab key to switch my right-click spell, but I’d hit the Alt key to see what loot was on the ground, thus minimizing the game. Oops.

Sound- 9.6

The sound quality in this game is amazing. Everything is unique to it’s own area; no sound clips are reused. With a surround sound system, you actually feel immersed in the world that is Torchlight. I only expect the best from Matt Uelmen, and he does not disappoint.

Fun Factor- 9.5

Torchlight is one of the best PC titles of 2009. Yeah, that’s a lofty statement, but that’s alright considering the competition was the hypefest of Modern Warfare 2. It may not tide you till the MMO version releases in 2011, but you’ll have a good time with Torchlight while it lasts.

Overall- 9.0

Torchlight is the much-needed addition to the dying “action RPG” genre on PC. I say “dying” because I don’t count MMO’s a action RPG’s; it’s a different plane of gaming. Torchlight, although short, is a must have for action RPG fans. If there was a game that could contest Diablo III for what we hope will be the pinnacle of the action RPG, this is it.