Review: Torchlight

Torchlight, the little game by creators of Runic Games has caught the attention of many PC gamers since its debut at E3. After hearing from gamer friends that it is a “good Diablo rip-off” I figured I had to give it a try being the dungeon crawling loot whore that I am.

For starters it is almost an exact replica of Diablo. That’s not a bad thing, though, because Torchlight does it well. They get all the Diablo systems right (ie: UI, combat), and add their own twist to it. So sometimes the word rip-off should not be taken in a negative context.

The main storyline of the game is about 10 hours long, though if you were to do the side quests and run the extra dungeons the game is about 20 hours. The main story is pretty thin. It’s about a magical source, Ember, that is corrupting people of the town Torchlight because it is so close to the mines where it exists. The main antagonist of the game is fully corrupted and needs to be put out of his misery. That is the basic storyline. It’s expanded by the quests in the game and excerpts from “Alric’s Journal” which are read in between major points in the game. There is one main questline that will take you to the end of the game, and the rest are side quests. Even though the story is paper thin, that’s not what the game is really played for. It’s the loot.

Torchlight was designed to be a fun single-player dungeon crawler where your main concern is getting upgrades to make yourself as powerful as you can be. So what about the loot system? It’s totally randomized, and that what makes it so fun. I’m a personal fan of the “loot game”, which for me is getting the best items my character can obtain and figuring out my best stats. When I see a rare or better piece of loot drop I will usually take a minute to analyze it before I decide whether to vendor it or equip it. Torchlight plays on my loot whore sensibilities in all the right ways. Since everything is randomized, you can get your best pieces of loot from a random trash mob in a dungeon or through the game’s Gambling system. The way gambling works is you talk to the vendor NPC with a pair of dice over his head, then you can see an item in his inventory, but you can’t see the stats. You pay the price the vendor is asking for and the stats/quality of the item you get is random when it appears in your bags. It’s said that some of the best loot in the game is obtained this way so it can definitely be worth your gold! And even when you think you have the best, you can make it even better with enchants and socketing gems into gear.

When you start up the game you have the choice of three character classes: Destroyer, Vanquisher, and Alchemist. Destroyer is the melee class, Vanquisher is mainly ranged, and the Alchemist is the caster. Yes, there are only three choices and I wish there were more, but you can get really in depth with their skills in the game. While choosing a character you can also choose a pet: cat or dog. After choosing names for yourself and your pet, and choosing a difficulty level, you’re ready to play! You can also create multiple characters if you feel like trying something new.

The options of the game are pretty straight forward. There’s nothing crazy to minimize or maximize your game graphics. It’s just simple modes to choose like “Netbook Mode”, as well as choosing the levels of music and sound effects. The game auto-saves too so you never have to worry about forgetting to save. It also stops people from exploiting the gambling system as I’ve heard people have done in the game Fate (which is also just like Torchlight).

When you dive into the game it’s not overwhelming at all. The controls and UI are very simple to understand. You have your usual health and mana gauge, yours Action Bar with buttons already assigned to keys (of course you can always change this), and all your Skill, Stats, Options, Inventory, etc menu buttons center screen on both sides of your health/mana gauges. Torchlight also pre-assigns mouse keys to skills. It is a click-to-move game, but left mouse click is pre-assigned to auto-attack, and right mouse click is pre-assigned to your first main skill. Actually, you can assign two skills to your right mouse click and hit your tab to switch between them easily. This makes for an easy combat system. You just face your character where you want to attack and hit your hot key or mouse click to attack. Some ranged attacks, like spells you can even set your pointer to where you want your attack to land. It’s all very straight forward.

Inventory is limited with all the loot in the game. You have your own small bags, and your bank. Your characters inventory will fill up very fast, but thankfully your pet has an inventory of his own that you can put items in as well. You are also able to send your pet into town to sell items for you, and he’ll return with the gold. The pet is also a nice addition because he’ll fight with you, of course, but he can also wear items and learn spells as well to make him stronger. And by fishing in the game (which is an easy mini game of clicking the fishing hook when the two circles around it align) you can obtain food that will change your pet into a different being temporarily. Transforming your pet will give him a special skill while he is in that form as well.

The graphics are cartoon-like, but it does the game justice. It’s a fun fantasy game so really, why not? The voice acting in the game is what concerns me. It’s not consistent. Some quest givers or NPCs will have full spoken dialogue while others will just give the obligatory, “Hey!” when you click on them.

The town of Torchlight servers as the quest hub, of course, but it is also where all the vendors are. Other than the bank, the Gambling merchant, and the merchants that sell gear, spells, and other miscellaneous items, there are vendors that will enchant your gear, destroy/recover gems, and transmute potions. Thankfully, your character will have plenty of Town Portal scrolls to easily travel back and forth from town to where you left off in the dungeon.

When venturing through the dark dungeons of Torchlight you will notice that it’s all one huge dungeons with different levels taking you deeper and deeper. Actually, there are two dungeons; one is unlocked when you complete the game. As you go farther into the depths of the dungeon the higher the level of mobs. The enemy AI is actually pretty intelligent. They have an aggro radius, and you can also leave their aggro range when you run far enough away. There really isn’t much else to them. They either attack or don’t attack. Only the bosses have any kind of special moves they will release upon you, which I should mention that bosses in the game are named and have a red aura around them to make them easy to point out in a crowd. You can buy dungeon maps from merchants in town too to take you to new unexplored dungeons.

The level cap in Torchlight is 100. The game can be completed in the 30s, but the world remains open after finishing the main quest for you to level and get even better gear and skills. With every level you get 5 points to spread across different attributes: Dexterity, Strength, Defense, and Magic. Obviously depending on what your class is and what talent tree you are specializing in, you will know what attributes you want to have the most of. The gear you get will also need certain stat requirements as well as level requirements. So if you’re an Alchemist, chances are you don’t want that item that requires very high Defense because that’s probably more for the Destroyer class specializing in the more protection-esque talent tree. Each class gets three talent trees; this is where you can specialize your character in certain talents in the game (ie: Vanquisher has a ranged specialty, rogue specialty, and a trap specialty). You open up levels of the talent tree at every tenth level up to 25. At 25 you can obtain the final skill in a talent tree. The great thing about Torchlight talent trees is that it’s non-restrictive. If you are at the right level you can place your points in any place available across any of the three trees.

After you feel like you’ve done everything you possibly could in the game you can retire you character. Retiring your character makes your gear into “heirloom” items that can be passed on to future characters. This ensures a smooth ride and some extra benefits when making a new character.

The only major complaint I’ve heard about the game thus far is that there is no multi-player like Diablo. To be honest, I don’t really think there is a need. This game is just a small game to play in your free time and run some dungeons. It might lose its charm if it were to be expanded into anything more. Besides, Runic Games is working on a Torchlight MMORPG so that should keep the nay-sayers happy.

Torchlight was released October 27^th on PC for $19.99. It can be purchased via Steam or the Torchlight official website. Because it is a PC game it is open for modding and game changing patches to always keep it interesting. Definitely a must buy!

Title: Torchlight Publisher: Runic Games Developer: Runic Games Platform(s): PC Release Date: October 27, 2025

Doin It RIGHT:-TONS of loot! -Endless dungeon crawling. -Open for modding. -Sweet pet inventory and upgrading system.	Doin It RONG:-Inconsistent voice acting. -No multiplayer. -Somewhat weak story.
FINAL SCORE: 9 / 10