f13.net

Torchlight is a single-player Action-RPG game and the first offering of indie studio Runic Games founded by Max Schaefer and Travis Baldree. Do those guys sound familiar? Only if you played Mythos and Hellgate: London or knew about Blizzard North. Both were part of (now closed) Flagship Studios. These are the gentlemen with Diablo/Diablo II / Fate Action-RPG and Hellgate: London / Mythos MMOGs under their belt. Within months of Flagship Studios going down, we received news of Runic Games opening and a new Fate-like, Diablo-esque Action-RPG in the works with plans for taking it to MMOG.

Torchlight looked and played well in demos at conventions. It was easy to get into, with a simple interface, good sound and music, and good looking. Released on October 27th, it has received acclaim from many critics and I was curious to know how a game like Torchlight would be developed into an MMOG.
 advertisement

Runic Games President and Torchlight Lead Designer Travis Baldree, Art Director Jason Beck and Zombie Pyrotechnician (no kidding) John Dunbar, a Producer type talked about their plans, their aspirations and their hopes for what we dubbed “Torchlight, the MMO” over the conference table.

“We hope to create a game that plays like Torchlight single-player in an MMO environment,” said Travis.

“Quick gameplay and highly soloable,” tossed in John.

“But with party support skills,” added Jason.

Soon, it was evident that all three were on the same page as they continued to speak of their plans, often ending each others sentences, adding to what each described.

There will of course be more classes. More customization, an expanded “wardrobing” system. Party support skills will be AE more likely than single target.

“We want to preserve the gameplay style. The look and feel of the Torchlight world,” said Jason,

“And we’re keeping the pets,” added Travis. A nod to Fate, revealed by Travis, a feature that not many knew about. In Fate, you could actually teach your pet spells by feeding them the spells. It would randomly use them and then forget them. In Torchlight, your pet can be taught two spells which it uses at random. It also has inventory space, picks up your treasures and takes a jaunt to town to sell them for you.

“Will it do that in the MMO?”

“Maaaaybe…” Travis responded, reminding me that although there are plans, ideas and aspirations, none are carved in stone.

“I’ll make sure it still can summon zombie skeletons!” quipped John.

“With fireballs?”

“With fireballs,” he agreed with a grin.

Torchlight is short on backstory and long on game-play. The town of Torchlight is like a wild-west border town and a precious magical material, Ember has been found in the mines and so it goes, giving you a reason to go into the mines to fight monsters, pick up precious Ember and other kewl lewt that just happens to drop off the monsters that live in there, never mind where that spider kept the honking big sword.

There will be PvP in “Torchlight, The MMO” and they hope recreate the “wild-west” PvP feel in Mythos as well as the Karma system. It will be fast enough so as not to be intimidating. Half hour fights aren’t planned. Quick, accessible, duels and team based PvP features are planned, and Region based territorial control hoped for.

“Competitive PvE too,” said John, “would be nice. Dungeon diving contests. Most points, most loot, that sort of thing.”

The world will be a mix of persistent elements and instanced elements. The open world, the towns and some of the dungeons will be shared, others will be instanced. Runic has a system to generate random dungeons and quests by putting different pieces together. Just like Diablo did with random maps and Torchlight currently does with random dungeons. It’s a feature that keeps the game fresh as you enter what’s seemingly the same dungeon again and again. Apart from the overarching storyline quests, random quests will also be available. Visiting NPC A standing in front of the mouth of the cave will yield a “Kill X number of Y monsters and bring me the head/toe/hand of boss Z for XP, gold and random reward.”

We talked about character development, including Crafting which will be skill-tree based. The team drew on the best of Mythos and what they would bring into “Torchlight, The MMO” from it. One of them was the idea of skill sub-sets; the ability to improve sub-sets of a skill. Another was the achievement system – the idea of equipable perks which gave stat boots.

“The plan really, is to take Torchlight as it is, get it to multi-player and balance for PvP as soon as possible,” said Travis. “From there, we expand the world, add new classes, get it to an Alpha state, start testing and iterate from there.”

“Not just a generic fantasy world, but our own version, our own style,” said Jason who liked that fact that the look and art style of Torchlight could not be simply categorized. “We’ve made a much richer world than a generic fantasy land. Yes, we have heard it called a fantasy/steampunk/pixar mash-up.” With a pinch of luck, it will soon be called the Torchlight style.

Launch of the MMO is still about two years off and at this time, their first patch for Torchlight the single player game is coming up. Player modding tools are about to be released and it’s full-steam ahead for the MMO. Torchlight is available via download only. At a price-point of $19.95, it has been a “I’ll try it” among my gaming buddies and a couple of programmer friends are already drooling at the prospect of the Modding tools. As for me, I played Diablo II and am loving my doggie pet Phydeaux in Torchlight. There are no plans at this time to bring a multi-player aspect to the current Torchlight game, but who knows what developments will come in the future as Runic preps the game for the MMO?

But if it means I can play a lady alchemist, with pants, I guess I can allow it.  :awesome_for_real:

Tweaked it for you.

Very much looking forward to this!  But I hope they put a few static dungeons in.  I really liked UO because they had/have these permanent dungeons where you knew what was around the corner.  You knew where the lich was etc.  Maybe that's a throwback idea but it makes the world more real to me.

Mythos was great, but their classes were terrible.

  No matter, this will be a day-one purchase free download for me.

How is it more real to have the same lich you've already killed appear in the same dungeon in the same place every time you walk back into it?   :why_so_serious:

The team behind the fantastic action-RPG Torchlight are making an MMO, an MMO that will be free-to-play, but supported by microtransactions. Although little’s known about the MMO, the Torchlight team talk about their plans in the new issue of PC Gamer, on-sale in the UK on Thursday. In the mag, they reveal that they’re aiming for an MMO that feels like a single player game, and it’ll retain the same fast action. Their president Travis Baldree also shows he has a traditional PC gamer attitude towards microtransactions.

Baldree says, “our vision is to have an MMO that plays as close to single player as we can get it. It will have the same focus on relatively fast action: carving your way through hordes of monsters with a large number of hugely devastating skills. The game has to be solo-able, but players will have to have skills that make them useful in a party and make them work together.”

Travis also says that even though the Torchlight MMO business model will be based around microstransactions, he won’t be buying any items. “I will never, ever buy a microtransaction item,” he states. “I’m that kind of player. And the game has to be enjoyable for me, too. We don’t want our monetisation stuff to offer ways to skip the game because the game is boring.”

Many more details in the new issue of PC Gamer UK – on-sale on Thursday.\

It being just like Mythos would be more than fine. The real tragedy of Flagship folding was Mythos, not Hellgate.

If this is just the missing multiplayer component, I won't bark too much. But really, Torchlight 2 is all I want. I realize I'm in a vocal minority, but fuck multiplayer. And fuck MMOing it right in the ear.

Did you play Mythos at all?  It was really excellent.

If this is just the missing multiplayer component, I won't bark too much. But really, Torchlight 2 is all I want. I realize I'm in a vocal minority, but fuck multiplayer. And fuck MMOing it right in the ear.

A Torchlight that is playable with a small squad and has access to an auction house.  That's what I want. 

MMO?  Who cares?  I played DAOC, I know first-hand that "MMO" doesn't mean what people think it means.  MMO = lag.  MMO = barrens chat.  MMO means that your contribution to a battle means both jack and squat.

I just want MO - multiplayer online.  Massive brings nothing that I like.

Free to play Multiplayer Torchlight, I could see myself screwing around with that for awhile.

http://www.pcgamer.com/2010/07/08/light-from-the-darkness-the-making-of-torchlight/

Longer article that was referenced in my previous link.  1/2 Post Mortem on Torchlight, 1/2 info about the upcoming MMO version, though most of it is vague. 

I like the sound of it so far, but there was one quote that really worries me:

<quote>
“I think our overall business philosophy is that we just want to have the widest base possible,” says Erich. “We want as many free players as possible. We’ll worry about converting a few into payers as a secondary thought.”
</quote>

Doesn't that pretty much sum up the business philosophy that sank Flagship Studios?  Build it now and figure out how to make money on it later?

My impression from DDO's f2p system was that a great deal of research, thought and marketing expertise went into crafting it. It wasn't simply tacked on. I believe one of their executives said it took two years to plan. It's very good at breaking down certain significant barrier moments to paying.

- free Turbine Points as you play breaks down the barrier to using the shop. Everyone uses the shop to at least spend the free points.

- big upgrade to your account first time you spend cash. Any amount, the minimum is $6 or so, upgrades you to Premium which is much better.

- continually changing list of discounted items. Even when I had no intention of spending anything I had to look just in case there was a huge discount on something I wanted.

- very regular content updates some of which is free. So if you had hit the paywall and got bored you could come back to try out new free dungeons.

- forum support without giving non-payers the ability to spam every board. The free players forum is very helpful and the elder community really works hard to help new people get started.


You can't get all that right if your cash shop is an afterthought. Of course the opposite is also terrible: over-design of monetising features. No one wants to feel they put this cliff in to get you to buy the levitation potion from the cash shop.

You can't get all that right if your cash shop is an afterthought. Of course the opposite is also terrible: over-design of monetising features. No one wants to feel they put this cliff in to get you to buy the levitation potion from the cash shop.

Well the cash per player with the MMO model blows the older pricing model out of the water. I spent over $1000 on WoW. I spent $50+$50 on Diablo 2. I spent even less on Diablo 1 as I picked it up second hand.

And DDO has shown that a good game that generates enough traction gets the spend per player in a F2P MMO up to levels comparable with a sub-based MMO.

Nobody who could release something as a "MMO" is going to want to use the old model (except ArenaNet).

I can understand that sentiment, I always feel like I don't get my months worth of money if I play something else instead during the rare times I am subscribed to a MMO. I don't give a fuck how much others are playing, its just that nagging feeling that I'm wasting money. Its quite irrational, and thus not easy to understand for a sane person.  :why_so_serious:

In my case its more of a "paying a premium price for an all you can eat buffet when you are just a little peckish". I seldom play a MMO more than a week after I resubsribed. Most of the time its 2 or three days.

Torchlight is isometric, right? (High overhead viewpoint, instead of from character's POV). 

Why to developers still make these?

Wait, you're serious?

You lose awareness of your surroundings in 3D in fast paced multi target combats, even if you spin around your camera like a ferret on speed.

So you've played all these different games, managed to find a Torchlight thread... and you don't know that isometric is a stylistic choice?

I usually want us all to be nice to the newer folks but please, go troll some other thread.

I now understand that many people LIKE isometric...

I'm not trolling.  I asked this same exact question when Diablo 2 came out, and the answer was not style or situational awareness, but technical, meaning with 3D + PC you could not get good frame-rates with 30 mobs on the screen, with isometric you could.

I now understand that many people LIKE isometric, to solve the situational awareness issues, at least until we get some kind of holosuite, helmet thingy.

I just brought it up with Torchlight MMO, since most new PC-client-based MMO's are 3d, only older, or browser-based are isometric nowadays.

Man, I will fucking KILL you.

  What the fuck are you talking about.

Wow, the new guy actually annoyed the dancing monkey. That takes effort.

My record was resusbribing, moving my Everquest 2 character from one server to the other, and then quitting after 3 days. That were 20 dollars per day!  :awesome_for_real:

So why haven't sub games tried the pay as you go plan, like a water or power utility? It seems no more or less complex than keeping track of a bunch of microtransactions. Hell, I think that would be the best plan for a MMOFPS like Planetside.

Isn't that how most sub games originally started? Like the old olden days AOL NeverWinterNights and shit?

So why haven't sub games tried the pay as you go plan, like a water or power utility? It seems no more or less complex than keeping track of a bunch of microtransactions. Hell, I think that would be the best plan for a MMOFPS like Planetside.

So why haven't sub games tried the pay as you go plan, like a water or power utility? It seems no more or less complex than keeping track of a bunch of microtransactions. Hell, I think that would be the best plan for a MMOFPS like Planetside.

So the original question itself is a bit imprecise. 

Stop fucking talking about the overhead view -- it's not even fucking isometric. All you are doing is feeding the fucking troll.

To me my question/issue about Torchlight is, and the answer is, are they for purpose of style making an overhead perspective, and not allowing a 1st person, (or close over shoulder 1st person) as a specific game design / style choice, and NOT for technical reasons?

I remember in Asheron's Call 1, which you can fight many mobs at the same time, and is kind of 'actiony', that you could play pure 1st person, or just over the shoulder 3rd person, or if ourside, pull the camera WAY up and back for a high overhead view (but it was centered on the character, one could not shift the camera off that, but rotate it around it).

In AC1 you could walk into a large interior room, that had levels in it, with mobs all shooting arrows / spell casting at you, that I don't see how one could do in high-overhead view. 

Also I don't understand how its less exciting in 1st person (again in a RPG style game) to peek down a hall, or around a corner, rather than scroll around looking down on a map.  To me its like I'm in the character in 1st/close 3rd, but in high-overhead its like I'm driving a doll around a map.

I re-read the article and I didn't get the feeling that advertisements would be a part of the game.

There doesn't seem to be enough character definition to support selling cosmetic equipment (characters seem too cartoony to me for this to be a big draw).

I think they could probably make a good chunk of change off of selling pets.

I think they could also make some money off of basing housing on having a paid subscription - they did mention "converting players into payers". You don't really need a house to play the game, but some folks just go mad for housing.

Paying for better luck?  My luck is typically mostly miss.  It would annoy me to no end to buy some luck, and get nothing but items that I couldn't use.  I'd probably buy luck that was more focused (i.e. more drops for my character class).

I guess I care because I like their games and would like to see them not go out of business again.

Banned for a week for not shutting the fuck up.

Yeah, I don't like the idea of paying for a better drop chance either, with my luck nothing would drop.  This is why I don't play the lotto.  Hell, i really WOULD rather pay for straight up gear than do that, at least I know I'll get something for my money.   I wish they'd just charge monthly :-/

I guess I care because I like their games and would like to see them not go out of business again.

Given my experiences during the Borderlands and Demigod launch and the COD4, "which server are we playing on tonight... oh no, more asshats, ok, which server now", I'd have to say that I'm happier that this won't be what you described.

Given my experiences during the Borderlands and Demigod launch and the COD4, "which server are we playing on tonight... oh no, more asshats, ok, which server now", I'd have to say that I'm happier that this won't be what you described.

Why is that? The only issue with what I posted is if you want to play with random strangers in a Diablo-alike.

Having said that, a GW-like solution would work for me. I'd be up for an expack every year or so much more than a $15 sub fee. I just don't play enough these days to go back to the EQ/WoW pricing model. Ironically, that's why I went for the lifetime sub for LotRO - big upfront cost, but now I don't feel a need to log on to "get my money's worth" and just log on whenever I have time.

Me too. But the Guild Wars model was rather sucessful. AFAICT. Release an expansion every year or so. Dip into microtrans for silly cosmetic bullshit. Etc.

Yes, I really like this model myself.  So much so that I would actually buy silly cosmetic bullshit to support the game.

Azazel, my experience with Demigod and Borderlands was that it was a pain in the ass to actually get connected with all four of "the regulars".  "Holy crap this fucking sucks", level of pain in the ass.  Some of the regulars are very much less technical and having to walk them through configuring routers is patience-draining.

COD4 was an exercise in finding a server that we all had decent ping.  Frequently we'd finally find a server with good ping and shortly thereafter people would start to join.  50% of the folks we were happy to see, the other 50%... not so much.  So, time to find another server.  This continued until one of us (not me) got so fed up with the 5 minute delay every time we wanted to play that he went through the effort of installing a server (and then he had to maintain it with every patch). 

I don't think any of the regulars would mind paying to to not have to deal with having to dick around with getting everyone connected and not having to play with douchebags.  Having doucebags in the same hub is fine (/ignore), actually having to play with them, no thanks.

I definitely agree with the lifetime sub angle for exactly the same reasons.  As mentioned, I'll even support games I like via cosmetic microtrans.  I won't tolerate being held captive to advertisements - I can't watch tv, I won't wait for internet video for more then 15 seconds, it just pisses me off to no end.

It's a bit of a tangent, but I'm fine with ads when they fit the game. real-life billboards for shit when I'm driging around in GTA or Saints' row? Fine. On the edges of the field or racetrack in FIFA or a racing game? Fine again. Outside of those, nope.

Titan Quest though was as simple as setting up a game, choosing Internet, then the other three would connect to me and off we'd go for some glorious co-op. We mostly played locally by LAN, but more than a few times our friends connected from their house to my PC which was hosting, and my wife sitting next to me also connected via the net (since we were in Internet Game mode) and no problems at all. No asshats, no gamespy, no Borderlands-style "the PC is our primary platform" bullshit.

This is exactly what I want to see again.  But there's no money after the initial sales in that model so we're not likely to see it because developers (and more to the point, financiers) seem focused on getting their money hats by repeatedly taking money from the same customers rather than making a game good enough to garner lots and lots of customers.

Cool, co-op LAN play.

I'm happy for those wanting LAN play.

That said, it means nothing to me - my siblings and friends are scattered throughout the world.  Give me hosted gameplay (frequently called "MMO"), or at least online gameplay that is as simple as hosted gameplay, or we won't be playing.

Torchlight is isometric, right? (High overhead viewpoint, instead of from character's POV). 

Why do developers still make these?

Coming into a thread horribly uniformed...

Expect the MMO to be 3D, with traditional MMO camera options.

I'm happy for those wanting LAN play.

That said, it means nothing to me - my siblings and friends are scattered throughout the world.  Give me hosted gameplay (frequently called "MMO"), or at least online gameplay that is as simple as hosted gameplay, or we won't be playing.