![]() Both games include a character from the original that become the antagonist. Actually, the plot is very similar to Diablo II’s plot. I knew The Alchemist was the bad guy and that’s about it. I’m going to be honest, I had to look up a plot summary because the story just isn’t interesting. The Alchemist then destroys the town of Torchlight and plans to use Ordrak’s power to disrupt the balance between the world’s six elements. Apparently, The Alchemist, who was playable character in the first game, has become corrupted by the Ember Blight coming from the Heart of Ordrak who was the original game’s antagonist. The story takes place years after the events of the original Torchlight. I know development of the original Torchlight was led by some of the guys who were behind the original Diablo and Diablo II and in many ways, the evolution of Torchlight to Torchlight II kind of mirrors Diablo’s evolution to Diablo II. I played the Steam version of the game and downloaded the Steam Workshop version of the SynergiesMOD but you can also download the mod from Moddb. This review will also cover the SynergiesMOD which is best described as a complete overhaul that includes re-balanced gameplay and tons of new content. And unlike the original game, this never made it to console. Developed and published by Runic Games, Torchlight II was released for PC in September, 2012. After that, I explored more games in the genre and so far I’ve only beaten the original Diablo and Diablo III. Something about it just got me hooked and I plowed through it in about two days. Torchlight was the first action RPG I actually completed. At the time, I had played Diablo and Diablo II but never beat either. Give it a shot and I think you’ll find yourself clicking and sorting through loot into the wee hours of the morning.Before the original Torchlight, I had a passing interest in the action RPG genre. The weapons are great, the pets are actually useful elements, and the story is fun (though pretty standard). The game has a fantastic look to it even almost ten years after launch, and holds up more than well in every other way. I can’t see any aRPG fan not liking Torchlight 2. Though since the guns and swords are done so well it’s not that big of an issue. Animations also seem a little rough in parts, and the magic seems little limited. So I hope it’s something that we might see remedied as we head towards Frontier’s release.Īlso, and although they mostly hold up well, in some areas the graphics do look a little bit dated. Since we’ve seen the aforementioned Diablo III make the jump since, there’s really not a great reason for this either. It’s honestly an excellent game, though I haven’t heard much at all about it from gamers I know – even PC gamers. This makes the game more niche I think, and might have limited its audience. But what can you do, you can’t have everything, right? What’s not so greatĬhiefly, it’s not great that Torchlight 2 is not on console. Really great stuff.Īs for the story, it’s pretty basic, centering on some kind of magical plague. Not that they can’t get killed, but they have a nice long life bar too, so the amount of worrying that you have to about them is minimal. You get an animal companion in Torchlight 2, who’s not only great for carrying more loot, but also can attack for you. While you’ll find that the characters you actually play as are pretty standard, the pets are a new mechanic that’s not bee done since. Locales are really nicely varied too, with plenty of different places to adventure through. Likewise, the enemies are both varied and well designed – as are the main character and NPCs for that matter. Always something I like to see, all of the armor and weapons look great too when you don or wield it/them. ![]() The game is colorful and bright (when appropriate), and loaded with detail that the best aRPGs tend to offer. That is not to say that it’s bad in any way though. You won’t even find the level of realism that something like Diablo III offers here, as Torchlight’s aesthetic is purely of the “animated” sort. The graphics are stellar in Torchlight 2, if you like the more cartoony look. So it’s now, six years after its launch, that I’m finally taking Torchlight 2 on full bore. The answer as to what that was is pretty simple – it launched within a few weeks of games like Dishonored and XCOM: Enemy Unknown. Torchlight 2 was much the same, though it added in some big new elements that I don’t think any other game has done since. As a fan of Diablo, Runic Games’ dungeon crawler was a revelation since it was one of the only games using that classic action/RPG formula at the time. With the announcement of Torchlight Frontiers, it might be time to give Torchlight’s past releases a second look.
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