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[IMG News]

Inside Mac Games has posted a new review of Torchlight from Runic Games. The action RPG gives players the chance to choose a character and venture from the safety of the town of Torchlight into randomly generated dungeon levels.

Here's an excerpt from the review:

Torchlight, by Runic Games, is a light hearted sword & sorcery first person smacker that can truly satisfy one’s need to delve into dark caverns, search for treasure, destroy monsters, find gold, and acquire better gear. It is easy to spend hours in the caverns of Torchlight and it’s a lot of fun as well.

Torchlight is a little town positioned near the entrance of an extensive range of caverns. Within these caverns are veins of a very special material called Ember. This magical mineral can be used to infuse weapons and armor with magical abilities that greatly enhance their value and effectiveness. Trade went well for Torchlight until the day someone delved too deep and exposed something very evil. Now unusual creatures roam the mines, attacking and scaring away the miners. And so the people of Torchlight looked toward heroes to enter the mines and try to stop the madness.

Read the full article at the link below.

Return to Full Article - InsideMacGames News

[badger2d]

From the review:

"There are three trees for each type. You can concentrate on one tree or distribute the points across the different paths. Of course, if you concentrate on a path, it is easier to reach the higher and significantly more powerful abilities deeper into the tree."

The bolded part sounds like it's mistaking the specifics of the game for the traditions of the genre.  It's a little unclear exactly what the reviewer means by "concentrating" on a tree making it "easier" to get the higher abilities, but Torchlight's 'skill trees' don't function with any prerequisites for any skill except character level.  They are really just three pages that more or less present similarly functioning skills together, not skill trees at all in the traditional sense of the Action-RPG genre.  There is no need at all to pick low-level skills on one particular page in order to access the high-level ones on the same page.

[sauljaffe]

Would love to try the demo... the only problem is that in order to get the Mac version (downloaded from Steam) you have to install Steam's malware.

I don't respect any software publisher that makes deals with companies that require you to install malware on your computer...

[Janichsan]

badger2d, on 16 September 2010 - 11:51 AM, said:

  They are really just three pages that more or less present similarly functioning skills together, not skill trees at all in the traditional sense of the Action-RPG genre.  There is no need at all to pick low-level skills on one particular page in order to access the high-level ones on the same page.

To be honest: it also took me a while to notice that. The game is so much like Diablo that I simply expected the skill leveling to work the same.

[badger2d]

Janichsan, on 16 September 2010 - 12:31 PM, said:

To be honest: it also took me a while to notice that. The game is so much like Diablo that I simply expected the skill leveling to work the same.

Yeah I wouldn't fault any individual player for making that assumption...but it's the sort of detail a reviewer needs to get right.

[Hobeaux]

sauljaffe, on 16 September 2010 - 12:23 PM, said:

Would love to try the demo... the only problem is that in order to get the Mac version (downloaded from Steam) you have to install Steam's malware.

I don't respect any software publisher that makes deals with companies that require you to install malware on your computer...

can you clarify that statement? what malware do you believe is installed along with Steam?