Torchlight II Too Big For XBLA
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Whereas the first game had just one just small town and a few dungeons, the sequel has vast outdoor areas, multiple hub cities, different terrain types and, crucially, co-operative multiplayer.
"With Torchlight 2 there is a little more complication as far as just being able to do a straight port, as we did with Torchlight 1," he explained. "In all likelihood, if Torchlight 2 gets to the Xbox it would be probably fairly comprehensively redesigned.
"We would have to be redoing the interface for a console release anyway, just like we did with Torchlight 1, so it would probably make sense to do something more specifically tailored to the Xbox.
"We managed to shoehorn Torchlight 1 in there but just barely," he continued.
"As some people have pointed out, there's a little bit of frame-rate slowdown when it gets super crowded on screen. That's another fact of it not being designed for the system and just being shoehorned onto it."
That said, it still hopes to bring the game to consoles in some form, given the huge success of the original on XBLA.
"Torchlight on Xbox Live did very well for us. I think it's the number one revenue game on XBLA for the year so far. We missed out being the top for units sold to Full House Poker by a little bit but they cost less than we do. It was definitely a profitable and valuable experience and we're happy with the results.
When asked whether he was interested in pursuing a full retail release for consoles rather than sticking to the limiting confines of XBLA, Schaefer replied, "We would absolutely consider that." However, no formal discussions with any prospective publishers have yet been held.
