Torchlight III

Although inspiring me to replay Torchlight I & II, I was less than impressed with this third installment when I first purchased it a few months back. In fact, I didn't judge it a true spiritual successor and heir to the Torchlight throne, and could not have recommended the game to others. The fight mechanic was always spot-on, but it was buggy, the differences between character classes seemed superficial at best, and it just couldn't grab my attention as much as the first two games did.
But once I really gave it a chance, and played further than the first area of the first act, it began growing on me. Yes, the zones still repeated themselves in various forms, and no, the bugs didn't go away. And yes, there were still other major issues others have noted; however, the gameplay itself made up for the lack of various features prominent in other isometric hack & slash RPGs, always offering ample means by which your character can endlessly mow down wave after wave of mobs with powerful AOE skills as I waited for updates and improvements to be made.
At this point, I now have a message for those of you who have been holding off from buying this game until some update makes it worthy of the full price: the latest Snow & Steam update (released 12/15/2020), is exactly what you've been waiting for! After several hours of gameplay on the new build, I firmly believe the developers have created a product that is truly deserving of the Torchlight name.
The vast majority of bugs plaguing the game before are now gone. The lackluster skill distribution of the formerly awesome-concept-poor-execution Forged class has been completely reworked, granting an entirely new set of play style options (don't worry, my level 50 Forged character was allowed to completely respec for free after this upgrade was applied). New armor. New weapons. New models for existing items. New quests. New end-game content. More content. Etc...
I can now honestly recommend that you purchase the game and still look my wife and kids in the eye / sleep well at night / look in the mirror / etc... There is still development work to be done, but these developers have obviously heard all of our feedback, and are actively engaged upon improving the Torchlight III experience. Pull the trigger, and you won't regret it!

This game lacks the same amount of depth and features that it's predecessor had, which is damning. I honestly feel it makes up for it with a different kind of gameplay experience though.
I play PoE and Diablo 3 with thousands of hours in both. I love a deep time consuming challenge that leaves you planning builds and options, min maxing, and reading stats and information in forums for hours on end. I really do.
That is not what you're getting here.
IMO what you're getting here is:
Exciting combat. (play on the hardest or second hardest mode if you're not a noob to the genre)
A great coop experience. (especially if you're trying to introduce somebody to the genre)
Enough variation in skills and gear to allow you to spend a bit of time playing with your set up in between killing.
A POLISHED EXPERIENCE: I feel this one needs emphasis. I bought this game months after it came out when it was nearly half price in the sale. All the reviews complaining of game breaking bugs and performance issues and just general jankyness put me off.
I have not had one single crash, noticeable bug or even bad FPS dip in 15 hours of gameplay. Literally everything is working as it should, and it feels smoother and more polished than torchlight 2 IMO.
FULL PAD COMPATIBILITY. Not a big deal for me personally, but holy poop more games need to just have this. I kinda see this as a game you would play to chill out on after grinding something more challenging. It's nice to be able to switch to the pad.
In short this game is FUN. It's not the timesink people expect games in this genre to be. It could well become one if it wanted, and it well might. Anyone remember the state of diablo 3 on launch? This game's launch has been better even with mixed reviews.
The devs add new content, balance and patch constantly and I am genuinely excited to see what happens with this game.
I have refunded a lot of games I have recently purchased for various reasons. This will not be one of them.
My only complaint is that the standard price is high. I feel like maybe the reviews wouldn't be so harsh if most players didn't have to part with £31.

This is a love-hate game.... I`ve got it because my best mates were into the Torchlight mood but I ended up getting the 3rd installment on my own. To be honest it was a mistake even with all the hours put in it and more that I will put in, not because the game is that great but because I like completing all achievements.
When it comes to the love part, well it is mostly if you enjoyed the 1st and 2nd one, then you`ll have to love this one and really important if you are a casual hack and slash gamer with tons of skill points added to the patience bar, the hate part will soon kick in after you commence the game....
POSITIVES:
Huge improvement in the graphics section, extremely flashy, many colors, kinda minimalistic but at the same time too many things happening.
Improved movement and controls, this one is a huge bump over the other installments, but you can swap to the old ways if you prefer.
Good voice acting.
It started with 4 heroes / classes, now it got bumped into 5, all different in play style.
Skill tree is split into 2 per class and the 3rd one is you picking 1 of the 5 relics, which gives you 5x5 different builds. Most abilities are newish and many you can recognize from the previous TL1-2.
Great responsiveness and combo combinations.
Improvement for pets and their skills.
Base building, crafting, bonus collections.
Difficulty is nice you can feel the difference but it is not putting you down if you wanna play on the hardest from the start.
After you complete the game you get an infinite dungeon challenge to min-max your items.
Steam achievements
Steam trading cards

NEGATIVES:

Typical story, total copy / paste from the previous one.
LAG!!!! I can`t stress this one enough, when I got the game it was running smooth for me, while others complained, few small updates later.... the game lags, not fps, the game lags, now it has transitioned into a random annoyance, where the game starts normally until I need to check the inventory then it`s a dice toss whether it`ll start lagging or continue normally, I feel like there is a background timer that after 30-40 mins it`ll start lagging no matter what.
You have to be online, you cannot even play singleplayer without being connected to the internet, this might be the main reason why those lags happen but who knows.
This one also adds to the LAGS, remember when i said responsiveness and combos? Well you can do 1-2 and maybe a 3rd thing then it is impossible to do anything even though you can see that the hero is starting the animation but nothing is happening.
I did say you have a total of 25 builds? Well it is not that.... Relics force you to play a certain play style as they require certain weapons to work, and they are more suited to be added to certain heroes, so in the big picture it is not freedom it is pre-builds where you choose to have something that works or to put your self in a disadvantage because you love a certain effect which is the only thing you can use.
Legendary set hunting is pure grinding, don`t get me wrong certain grinding is a requirement for these type of games, but this is something else, you can get periods of 0 and then you suddenly hit that sweet random timer where any boss / unique you kill it give you one. And there is devs playing games where you can only get weapons to just annoy you to the point to stop playing.
The never-ending dungeon gets boring real quick, all the levels start to look the same, the main campaign is a fixed layout, and the dungeon maps are either just parts of it or rotated and that`s it no randomness.
Base building and crafting is a joke.... you need 4 bonus totems, re-skill items, never ending dungeon and the pet stash... the rest is if you are that bored of the annoying lags but you wanna play the game so you have something to do which is definitely not the point of these type of games.

Well I would recommend this one if you are a casual gamer who likes hack and slash, especially the Torchlight saga, even with it`s all downfalls I had enough fun to put it in the positive, barely positive to be honest. DO NOT PAY FULL PRICE, not worth that at all, at least not in this condition. I made the mistake to even get it during a sale and that was also a mistake based on how much it`s killing my will to complete all the achievements. There is like 70ish hours of gameplay, to test all classes and all ways of play styles, after that it`s GRIND MODE ACTIVATED!
VERDICT: 5/10
RECOMMENDED WITH CAUTION!

Torchlight III
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After reading reviews i was afraid to try the third one in this series out.
Now i have played a few hours, and to be honest its not as bad as people make it out to be.
Is it as good as torchlight 2? No, it is not as good at all.
Is it a bad Arpg? No, its not a bad Arpg, if annything its a solid one that gives some great fun.
The problem is that Torchlight 3 seems to be trying to improve on the first game.
Not the second for some reason. Plus you can see that it has a MMO like progression system.
While not bad, it is weird. Also it is not as deep like the previous title.
The bugs seem to be mostly fixed, the game plays without any real issue for me.
The story (so far) is yourr typical torchlight story and builds pretty well on the lore.
The gameplay is fun and most aspects of the series is back with some new weird design choises.
But nothing to bad. The game is really a fun experience and does nail the charm of torchlight.
The world is great and really fun to explore to.
At the end of the day torchlight 3 is a fun Arpg that has some great gameplay.
But also if you played the second one, you will see that its a downgrade to how this series originaly progressed. If you can get it on a sale and you like this franchise get it. Its not as bad as i have seen here.
A really fun new title set in the torchlight universe. Dont expect a improved Torchlight 2. And you will be fine.
Have fun !

I came here to the do some justice to the 'mixed reviews'.
It is not like TL1 and not like TL2 eiter, because it is TL3.
It isn't that complex, but at the end of the day I played TL1 and TL2 for the same reason:
Pew-pew and slash-slash.
The graphics are gorgeous, I love the fact you have your own fort you can customize any way you want, that you can transmog your equipment and dye them as well. It has nice new traits and to be honest, this is the first game in the last year that I actually enjoyed playing.
Maybe I'm just special or lucky, but I have not bumped into many bugs so far (singleplayer works fine, multi is a bit buggy sometimes, I agree with that, but nothing major).
Repetitive, yes, but at the end of the day Diablo wasn't better either from that aspect.
I have a day job and when I finish my day I'm tired as fudge, Path of Exile sucked the life out of me with it's complexity, I don't need that.
I log onto TL3, pew-pew, slash-slash and I'm happy. Maybe fort pimping time, and that is all I need.
I'm sure there are a lot of people out there who did not buy the game because of the mixed reviews and everyone being so negative here, so I hope I can defend TL3 from another perspective as well.
The only thing I do not like is the fact that single and multiplayer characters are saved separately, therefore if you want to play with someone at some point, do not make a singleplayer character, because you have to make a multiplayer one. Wish the game told you this earlier.
PS. 'There is no alpaca level'

If you are coming to torchlight 3 for the kind of depth that games like grim dawn, diablo or path of exile have then you will probably disappointed. if you are anything like me then the simplicity of Torchlight 3 was refreshing and i would recommend.
Some of the reasons why i liked this title are listed below, if you dont like the sound of this then this game is not for you.
-loot is highly tailored to your character, you only get loot that your character could feasibly use. so there is never the disappointment of getting a rare item for another class.
-rare items drop often, this seems to be a sticking point for some, but i dont have much time for gaming so a session that i can get through in an hour and have some good new items is a plus
-areas are linear and side quests are limited, all you do in ARPG's is kill things, other games i have played have long quests that involve jumping through hoops so you can get a quest reward that will be about as useful as just playing the game for the same amount of time.
-i am a dyed in the wool pc gamer, but sometimes i want to put my feet up and use a controller, this is the only ARPG i have ever played in which that dosent feel like rubbish, i prefer it with a controller actually.
I have never written a review before but i felt that the treatment this game has got was a little unfair. it isnt perfect, but it is a neat little time sink that i enjoyed

I have 130 hours played, I played it a lot before the major bane nerf, and then before the major class updates.. and now after as well..
the new forged fix is amazingly better.. I'd even say overpowered lol (spin2win)
For the price now.. (or if you can find it on sale).. then the game is definitely worth a buy.
it's fun, its mindless, its a good looter shooter smashy ARPG..
but that's really ALL it is.. there is no depth, no real story, no real endgame(mindlessly doing maps over and over again)
so if you are looking for a new game to be your full time girl.. this game isn't it.
shes a fun thing to play on the side from time to time to kill time.
that's about it.