"Traversing Torchlit Trouble" or "Deliciously Designed Dungeons"

Still waiting to try Torchlight?

I have played it for about eight hours since last night, and it is a nonsensical amount of fun!

Se7en reasons to try Torchlight:

• It costs a mere $20. And even at that price, you can try out a demo here. The game recieved a solid 86% at Metacritic. The user score was even higher at 92% overall.

• You can choose from one of three classes. But each class has three specializations, for a total of nine separate play styles.

• Did you like Diablo? Because Torchlight is sort of like Diablo 2.5. In fact, Torchlight, it seems, cannot be mentioned without mentioning Diablo. Torchlight is to Diablo what Champions Online should have been to City of Heroes. Playing Torchlight is like taking long relaxing bath in the nostalgia pool… of Diablo!

• You won’t need Skynet to run the game, in fact, the requirements are so low, it even has a notebook setting.

• You get a pet that fights for you, hits like a truck, has its own inventory, and you can teach it spells and used food to shapeshift it. The food you feed the pet comes from a fishing mini-game (among other things). But it is the simplest, most intuitive, most enjoyable fishing minigame ever designed for any MMO or RPG.

• There is a level editor. It is the same set of tool used by the designers to craft the entire game. Let’s just say those $20 will undoubtedly get you a much longer shelf-life.

• In 18 months time, the developers will release a free-to-play MMO version of Torchlight.

Se7en helpful hints for beginners

• The game is too easy on ‘Normal’. Try ‘Hard’.

• Your pet can pick up loot if you shift-click on it.

• Your pet can also be sent back to town with an inventory full of stuff you want to sell automatically, so you can continue playing in the dungeons.

• If you have an unidentified item, right-click an ‘Identify Scroll’ in your inventory, and left-click on the item.

• Can’t use an item, but it looks like it might be good for an alt? The game comes with a shared vault system. Every one of your characters has access to it.

• TnT barrels can be exploded from a distance, say if you are playing the Avenger class, to help expedite enemy deaths.

• Shift+F9 takes screenshots. They are saved in the Torchlight install folder.

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