Hellgate London Review

Torchlight sells 1 million

Runic Games, the folks who worked on Diablo and Hellgate: London, have announced that Torchlight, their popular dungeon-crawling RPG, has sold over one million units across all platforms.

Torchlight was first released on PC near the tail-end of 2009 to an ecstatic reception, and the game debuted on the Xbox 360 via Xbox LIVE Arcade in March this year.

“We’re very excited to share Torchlight’s success with our fans and supporters. It’s been a great ride so far and we can’t wait to give everyone more of what they want in Torchlight II,” said President Travis Baldree. “It isn’t every day you sell a million games. We’re grateful to be here.”

Runic Games is currently developing Torchlight II. Read El33tonline’s review to see just how addictive the original Torchlight really is.

Hellgate: London - Review - play.tm

However, now that Hellgate: London (for that be its name) has been pushed, squinting, into the daylight ready for inspection, it's a little jarring to realise the first impression you're left with after playing it for any length of time is a certain sense of 'is this it?' You see, it's quite possible that gaming history will view Hellgate: London as a something of a victim of its own hype. The lazy yet fairly accurate 'Diablo in 3D' label proving to be both its biggest achievement and its biggest curse.

While the game's setting, a ruined and demon-ridden version of London in 2038, is as far from the fantasy world of Diablo as you can get, the basic underlying game remains essentially the same. Explore randomly generated environments performing quests given to you by NPC's you meet, and generally killing anything you come across while picking up as much loot as you can. The major twist to that tried, tested and much loved mechanic is the shift from a top down view into full on 3D. In fact, since the game is played either from a first or third person view, to an unknowing eye the action could easily resemble any one of the more traditional shooters filling the shelves at the moment. However, much like Diablo, there's a whole belly-full of RPG features hiding under the bonnet to beef up the experience.

Starting off with character design and you're given a choice of three factions to pick from, each with their own two classes. First up is The Templar, an order of divine warriors, who come in two melee classes, Guardian and Blademaster. These two are both played from a third person view allowing you to see the hacking and slashing far more clearly than a first person view would allow. Next up we have The Cabalists who use the dark power of the Hellgate to fuel the spell casting of their two classes, the Summoner and the Evoker. Lastly we have the ex-military brute force of The Hunters. The Marksman class being your more traditional FPS style gun wielding marine, while the Engineer adds a nice line in robot control to his arsenal. These classes all provide a surprisingly different game experience with the difference in both viewpoint and tactics between classes proficient in ranged combat and those more suited to melee combat making it almost feel like a different game.

The one thing you could always trust a game with such strong links to Diablo to get right is treasure. Thankfully enemies drop it by the bucket load and it's not unusual to find some really funky bits of kit laying around after a shootout. It's this sense of imminent discovery that gives the game its addictive edge, the prospect of potentially finding something cool just round the next corner proving to be a real draw. Another layer of fun is to be found when you realise that these bits of kit can often be augmented by extra bits and bobs you find to create rather cool bespoke weapons designed to suit your own needs. In a nice touch these extras can be removed and re-applied to new, more powerful weapons as you pick them up so you're never left feeling that you've wasted anything. The one downside with all this loot is your limited inventory size; it soon starts to feel tiny compared to the amount of stuff there is to be picked up.

Hellgate: London: Covenant

GameAxis Unwired

Hellgate: London

Exodus

Hellgate, London