EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/gZ73o.png)
so im doing that really annoying thing where i start with the ending
Torchlight 2 is an action RPG, if you don't know what Torchlight or Action RPG means, you should stop reading here and learn how to use Google. There are 4 classes and a skill tree something like Diablo 2. You get a point every level and put it in the skills you want to get more powerful. You don't need any prerequisites other than character level to pick skills, so you can pick something at the bottom of the fire tree if you're a wizard even if you were putting all your previous points into the fairy rainbow unicorn tree before that. Or to put it another way, you don't need Blizzard to get Frozen Orb.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/XbF8d.png)
rawr im a berzerker
The first thing I noticed when I got into the game was the Charge meter. It's that thing at the bottom with a wolf on the right side. When you're hitting monsters, the bar charges up and when it fills up, the Berzerker goes into a rage for a few seconds. Every hit becomes a critical and things start to get dismembered and splattered across the screen when you hit them. As a Berzerker, I basically suck unless the meter is full.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/q5v3s.png)
yes there are lots of flashy colors in this game
The graphics in the game are sort of cartoony and the colors are vibrant. I enjoy the art style but I found out while taking pictures that the effects really block my view of the character. This is not something that happened while I was playing, so I was a little surprised. It is very easy to tell where everything is, although sometimes I had trouble targeting some monsters (this is beta, after all).
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/11FTC.png)
some dead ratmen who were harassing me
As far as difficulty goes, Elite is very hard. There's Easy and Normal difficulty for all you noob casuals out there, and Veteran difficulty for people who have played an ARPG before. Veteran felt just about right to me for having no idea how to play. There is also the option for Hardcore where your character dies permanently, which I always have to have on to enjoy games in this genre.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/uq3VA.png)
this is your brain on berzerk mode
My image of a Berzerker is a little different from the one in the game. I imagine a giant guy decapitating monsters with a massive hammer, roaring and covered in blood. In the game a Berzerker is a sort of dual wielding Drizzt wannabe archetype. I never really see the advantage of using two weapons and to make it worse the Berzerker starts off with claw-type weapons that have low damage and no splash (melee weapons that arent claws deal splash damage). To be fair, I could pick a 2 handed mace and explode monsters if I actually found one.
(Later on when I learned a little more, I did in fact do this and it made things much easier.)
My Torchlight 2 game started with a flash animation style video of the Alchemist from TL1 breaking out of the mines and having a fight with the Destroyer and the annoying quest girl. Apparently the Alchemist now has a giant mechanical deathsuit that belches smoke.
+ Show Spoiler [said cinematic if you're curious] +
After watching the opening cinematic, I started my adventuring career in an encampment with the Destroyer. My first quest was to be an errand girl and run up the road to a town and warn them the Alchemist is coming and to run away and stuff. Obviously the road is covered with monsters.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/okcz7.png)
now with 100% more eyepatch
My starting skill was called Eviscerate and when I used it a red werewolf ghost thing swiped with my weapon. Eviscerate hits in an arc and leaves a damage over time effect on nearby monsters. The other level 1 skill in the tree was a passive that regenerates life on crit. I looked at my character screen and noted my whopping 3% crit rate. The other trees were Frost which looks like a wizardly bent on the Berzerker with magic damage type things and Shadow which looks like a more tactical tree with movement and support skills.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/IzYKE.png)
EVISCERATE
Rather than go down the road so thoughtfully placed in front of me, I decided to go off to the right around a small pond. Because I was playing on Elite difficulty, the ratmen took sizable chunks of my life bar out with each swing of their tiny arms. As I killed them all, my rage meter grew. When I had killed all the monsters, my rage meter filled and expired before I could get to the next group. The awkward timing of my rage bar was a common theme of my time with the Berzerker. I prepared better for the next groups of monsters by dragged the final ratman a little further along before I killed him to satisfy my rage. Doing this led me into a bandit encampment where I was set upon by the brigands. I nearly died when the bandits opened fire on me with their rifles, but potions and my rage kicking in saved me from certain doom.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/inOnc.png)
so this is what it feels like to be in front of a firing squad
After killing all the bandits, I returned to my errand girl quest. The road was blocked in places by javelin-wielding bears behind fortified walls of debris, but I smashed the walls with my kung fu and killed everyone. On the way I rescued some poor noob NPC from a burning house and some ratmen. I wanted to steal his car but I couldn't figure out how to drive it.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/uEMCi.png)
where's the engine on this thing?
I did eventually make it to town. However, I was shocked and appalled to find that these were not normal corn-loving villagers. I had stumbled into a hippie commune. Long haired freaky people sat in circles talking about, like, whatever man. The women wore small strips of cloth instead of shirts. I warned the elder about the Alchemist to finish my quest, but he was like, chill out man, the Alchemist already left, man. The elder sent me off to check on a Guardian or something, I stopped listening. I bought some armor from the blacksmith, who was a Vanquisher so it wasn't dirty hippie armor. With my new armor I set off down the road. However, this road winds through an Indian Burial Ground (or IBG for short).
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/s8GGy.png)
ohhhhh fuck skeletons
The land here was covered with creepy blue phosphorescent mist and weird bluish ghost torches lit the path. Zombies, skeletons, and other horrors waited on the path to feast on hapless adventurers like myself. The most annoying of these is the Vile Gnasher, a cannibal corpse of a zombie that feasts on dead monsters and resurrects them as other Vile Gnashers. This can get out of hand in an IBG very quickly as you can imagine.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/7PcPQ.png)
the dreaded Vile Gnasher up close
Up the road I discovered a hippie waiting outside what appeared to be a crypt decorated in extreme poor taste. The green question mark over her head indicated a side quest. Help a hippie by going into a corrupted crypt almost certainly haunted by giant undead monsters for the reward of a dog collar? Sign me up!
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/p7m9E.png)
the skeleton knights have shields you break
Was this a good idea? I was having trouble killing the normal, non-blood drinking undead. How would I fare against giant abominations who never feel the light of day? I had a premonition of my own death like in a bad movie where they keep flashing forward to the end because they're terrible writers.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/llHIc.png)
aforementioned poor taste in interior design
The crypt was filled with an evil red mist and masses of candles lit by homosexual zombies. I killed a few on my way down the stairs and had to stop and recover from the unnaturally strong beating of their undead fists. I turned a corner and entered a large room where I was ambushed by acid slime.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/sEDO8.png)
acid slimes covered in Eviscerate
What I was not aware of or prepared for was the massive poison damage I received from them splashing acid on me repeatedly. In a second I had lost all my life and my promising Berzerking career had ended.
congratulations! you have died!
I enjoyed playing the Berzerker, but to be honest its probably the least fun of the 4 classes. I didn't really understand how I was supposed to play the zerker given that he was so fragile because of Elite difficulty.
If you have any questions about the game I would be happy to answer them.
, if Diablo 3 wasn't coming out this would be my definite game of choice.
The game itself looks very promising. Well done! 
