Torchlight Frontiers, a very different take on the dungeon crawling, isometric games of the series' predecessors, is now set to launch on Steam this summer as Torchlight III, in a much more typical entry for the series and without much of its major changes and innovations.
Under development at Echtra Games for the past few years, Torchlight Frontiers was the first title in the series developed away from the original (and since closed) Runic games. It was designed to operate more like a scaled-back MMO, with a cash shop, a persistent, shared world, dynamically generated content, and more. But that's no longer the case.
"Longtime Torchlight fans will be happy to hear that the game features the same mechanics that set the original series apart from other ARPGs on the market," the game's new blurb reads, via Eurogamer.
"After selecting from Torchlight 3's unique character classes, players will choose a pet to accompany them on their new adventure: a fluffy alpaca, a swift owl or a loyal canine retriever. From there, they will explore forests filled with dangerous creatures and participate in thematic quests to earn powerful rewards."
Echtra believes that Torchlight Frontiers was ultimately better served as a traditional Torchlight game. While that may be possible with the way the game was made, we have to wonder whether something about the way Frontiers was progressing wasn't working, so it's been scaled back, rather than refocused because of something positive.
Torchlight III will debut on Steam this Summer.