Torchlight II Announced For 2011
Runic Games has announced a sequel to the popular action RPG Torchlight, planned for release in Spring 2011. One notable improvement from the first game is Torchlight II's inclusion of online co-op play, with LAN support and a matchmaking system. "The sequel will feature an updated version of the Torchlight editor, randomized overworld areas complete with weather effects, random dungeons, a selection of pets, fishing, limitless loot, and a retirement system which will allow users to retire an older character and bestow some benefits of it to a newly created character." An MMO set in the Torchlight world is still in development.
Torchlight was built using Ogre3D, an open source graphics rendering engine. I hope that the sequel uses it too.
Ogre3D is written in C++ and is compatible with PC, Linux, Mac, iPhone, Android and other platforms. If you're into programming 3D games or simulations, you should definitely check it out. www.ogre3d.org
(I'm a long time user of Ogre3D but otherwise unaffiliated)
Runic is comprised primarily of developers previously from Flagship Studios (Hellgate London) previously from Blizzard North (Diablo 1 & 2). So they're not exactly 'newcomers', despite the age of the studio itself.
http://games.slashdot.org/story/10/08/05/0422232/Torchlight-II-Announced-For-2011#
At first I was hesitant about Torchlight. But, it ['s boxed version] having no DRM swayed me to get it. I've had a lot of fun with it since. It's not the greatest "Diablo clone", but it's still good fun. LAN multiplayer, however, will breathe a LOT of life into it for me and, quite possibly, cause it to replace Diablo II as the game I play most with my roommates.
The other half of Runic comes from wildtangent. And the last half is in fact new, or at least according to their mobygames profiles.
And because Runic has 3 halfs their games are 50% more fun that the closest alternative.
There's a good reason for that. Travis Baldree, the lead developer of Torchlight, also designed Fate.