It is hard to believe that it's been over a decade since we first entered the world of Diablo. The adventure game from Blizzard Entertainment took the world by storm, influencing numerous other games with its click-and-point approach to dungeon diving. It became the very definition of a button-masher game, and many a mouse was sacrificed in the service of wiping out evil between the 1996 title and its subsequent sequel, with the world holding its breath for the upcoming Diablo III.

Well, you don't have to wait any more. No, we haven't gotten our hands on a secret copy of the upcoming Diablo III, but Torchlight will more than suffice for those who have been jonesing for a new button-masher game, or a new RPG title without the constraints of a thick story to wade through.

Developed by Runic Games, which was created by some of the same minds who developed Diablo in the first place, Torchlight is every bit a successor to the Diablo line. Players take control of a character who makes his or her way through the caverns below the haunted city of Torchlight. Citizens of Torchlight offer quests, asking the player to find certain treasures below or building on the central storyline which explores the corruptive nature of the evil below the town. As the player works their way through the caverns the forces of evil get tougher and tougher, while (hopefully) the player's character gets more powerful.

Players get three character types to pick from: the Destroyer, who is a massive brute with strong melee abilities, the Alchemist, who uses magic to blast foes, and the Vanquisher, who excels at ranged combat along with traps and bombs. Unfortunately, each class's gender is locked into the class's model, so players who don't like playing cross-gender will be limited in their selection, not that that's a huge problem for the game. The diversity in the character types should appeal to most players, although those used to having more of a selection may feel a little limited. Thankfully, each class can be enhanced through skills to customize the classes to a player's particular tastes.

The setting of the game is so reminiscent of Diablo that players might start poking around in hopes of finding familiar faces. The music while visiting Torchlight is as comforting to veteran players as it might be to toss Diablo back into a computer and fire it up. This makes sense since Matt Uelman was also the sound designer behind Blizzard's game. Also like its predecessor, the caverns below the town are randomly generated, which makes for a fun experience revisiting the game multiple times. The questlines may stay the same, but the dungeons will be a different experience with each new game. Yet, Torchlight doesn't feel like a rip-off of the older Diablo, but more like the comfort of having a new adventure in a similar environment.

Torchlight was originally designed for the computer and received much acclaim there, but the game required a major overhaul in order to work with the Xbox 360 - the system's controller is very different from a keyboard/mouse interface, which means the click-and-point targeting along with the hotkey system all had to be changed. The result is a simplified system that works really well. You don't get to click on your enemies, but your character does a pretty good job of auto-targeting enemies as long as you have them pointed in a relatively close direction. You may have less keys to utilize on an Xbox controller, but the system allows you to switch between skill sets using your touchpad, giving you the ability to map different abilities to the same triggers and buttons in different sets.

I wouldn't have expected a click-and-point adaptation to be so successful, but Mythic has figured out how to perfectly adapt the flavor of their game while making it conform to the Xbox's limitations. The result is a game that is fun to play to the point of addiction, much like the Diablo series that came before. Torchlight is one of the best Xbox Arcade games I've downloaded in a while - a new game that brings about a great sense of nostalgia while still offering a new adventure to enjoy. You might even forget you're waiting for the next chapter of Diablo as you get lost in Torchlight's gameplay.

Final Score: A