Is it worth diving into this game in 2021?

[Ace Trainer Chloé]

Hi there,

I love ARPGs, started with Diablo 1 and 2 back when they were the big thing. I played my fair share of PoE, really loved Grim Dawn, and have fun from time to time with Last Epoch. I have never tried Tortchlight though. Is it still worth playing in 2021? How long it is, is there a lot of content?

[noctilucus]

I can't compare to PoE, Grim Dawn or Last Epoch - have been away from RPGs for a long time. But if I compare to many others, I'd still recommend TL II, especially with the current sale going on.
In a poll, it's said to be 20 hours to complete, 30 hours including extras.

I feel there's more variation in monsters and environments than many other RPG's, also more colorful and I also feel there's more variation to the weapons and items - at least I've found myself regularly changing equipment to try and see if a new combination yielded better results.
It also brings an elegant solution to typical RPG issues such as inventory limits, buying potions, keeping track of multiple missions in parallel.
Maybe one thing you need to know upfront: it can be quite chaotic at times, with many enemies attacking you at once so it becomes a bit of a clickfest.

[HiFive]

I definitely believe it's worth it - especially on sale. There is good end-game content. You can play NG+ up to NG++++ or something (I can't remember the exact number of times you can repeat the story on the same character). There is also the Mapworks, which gives you a good variety of dungeons to level up on. Both NG+ and the Mapworks can be used to level up to 100, where you can work toward getting the top gear.

Each class is quite unique, so it's fun to play the different ones, as well. There are also a ton of mods for this game, and it's fun to try all sorts of different combinations. Then there are the very large, expansion mods, like Synergies and the TL2-ACE mod.

[TOG | Phanjam]

If you like the grim/gritty/dark artstyle that is normally used on these types of games, you may not enjoy TL's more cartoony style. Design-wise tho, the cartoony style seems to have helped this game age very nicely graphically speaking.

As a filthy casual player I will say gameplay and content wise its not much different from other ARPGs including those great titles you named earlier. So I think its every bit as fun as an ARPG can get (again, speaking as a casual). But bear in mind also its business model was not one where it was supposed to provide new content on a continuous basis.

Altho the 4 classes provided in vanilla are basically the same old player archetypes, they have enough skills variety to be interesting and allow you to experiment with odd-ball builds if you like. But the balance of builds viability and enemy difficulty make TL2 a fairly 'forgiving' game, meaning you can still do okay and have fun with sub-optimal builds. Of course each class can still be min-maxed if you want, tho the re-spec system is kinda rudimentary.

I'd say the 20-hour estimate is too short! (did i mention im a casual player?). I have 1K+ hrs in TL2 already and ive not once finished the game . But im not going to use that as evidence that it's a great game, only that i enjoy it a lot ;) (or that i'm a hopelessly un-talented player!)

The real Achilles heel of this game is its multiplayer. By the devs own admission, the netcode of TL2 is just not optimized. Its very sensitive to transient internet anomalies so connections are hard to establish and to maintain If multiplayer is an important factor in your choosing/enjoying a game, then TL2 will disappoint you on that front.

Then there are the mods - With the exception of GD none of the ARPGs you mentioned really support mods. Runic Games supported modding from the very beginning (since TL1) and even released the complete software tool (called GUTS) they used to make the game itself. The result is more than 1,500 mods on steam workshop alone, and about that same number if you combine the mods in a few other hosting sites. Okay, so a lot of them aren't that great but the point is it makes for really great replayability of TL2.

Sorry for the wall of text. That's my definitely-not-objective opinion of whether TL2 is worth picking up in 2021 XD

[Ace Trainer Chloé]

Thanks for all your answers. I've played a bit and it's pretty fun so far, I can see myself playing it for a while.

[noctilucus]

Avec plaisir. Glad to hear you like it so far!

[Druss]

synergies 2 is a great mod. I'm generally not a mod guy but it adds so much to the experience. A lot more randomness which imo is where T2 falls down slightly in comparison to POE.

[Seinekar]

For solo, totally. You have endless content due to mods.

It aged ok due to be cartoonish graphics, so aesthetically is fine.

Synergies being the bigger and more ambitious, but there are many mods worth it (some you can combine)

For multiplayer, its an issue. The game is unsupported as developers ceased to exist, and there is a very common "firewall" error wich won´t allow you to go online (even if you don´t have firewall at all) - for MP as workaround you (and your friends) can use Radmin, Hamachi or similar software to simulate you´re playing on LAN.

[RIPDixie1865]

If you love ARPGs you should also consider Titan Quest. It's on sale right now and I consider it to be the greatest ARPG of them all.

[Nakos]

Torchlight 1 is very closely analogous to Diablo 1, except brighter, and more cartoony. Torchlight 2 is more elaborate, with a much larger world and a larger quest set, it's probably closer to Grim Dawn in terms of scope. That said, it is simpler and shorter than Grim Dawn.

Personally, I'd say it's worth playing.

[Cpt-Qc]

The game is still really fun but it's not very hard and doesn't offer nearly as much content as the others recent games named. It does support Workshop content so you can adjust the game pretty much however you want.

If you want the game to feel less outdated I would suggest playing with SynergiesMOD. That mod is a complete overhaul that is both harder and has a lot of endgame content. If you enjoy farming, it will last you a long while.

[noctilucus]

On the difficulty level: I noticed that after playing through the game once and moving on to NG+ I found myself usually outclassed by 5 levels or so, causing frequent deaths and as a result a massive cash drain if I didn't want to backtrack too much.
So anyone who feels the game doesn't give you a challenge: that may be the way to go :)
For other players it's worth playing some additional maps before moving on to NG+ as this allows you to level up and farm, fighting enemies of a level of your choice.

[Zulu Rewts]

Absolutely.
It is one of my all time favorite classic now in terms of, games I always come back to, even after 10+ years now.

The gameplay is truer to Diablo than Daiblo III ever was...when they say TL II is the spiritual successor to Diablo II, it is so not an overstatement.
This game is incredibly good, so, the classes are so original and there's so many ways to play them.
I always play here and there in between "my games of the moment" and quite often, I find myself going on a binge of playing this game like crazy.

Add me if you'd like to coop play sometimes, and especially if you'd be down to play hardcore mode.

ZuluRewts