Runic Games is not afraid of being overshadowed by Blizzard’s mammoth title Diablo III, as they stated they would be releasing Torchlight II ”shortly” after its release.
According to CEO Max Schaefer at PAX Easy 2012, ”Well, I’m sure you’ve noticed Diablo has announced a date. So, we don’t want to fall right on that. The real answer is when (Torchlight 2) is finished, is Diablo 3 right now? Then we’ll wait.”
Schaefer also refuses to use the word ”cheaper”; instead, Torchlight II, at $20 USD, is the ”less expensive” alternative to Diablo III. The CEO also said that the fact that Torchlight II would have an offline mode and LAN support would give it a favorable distinction to the larger action-RPG.
”Be patient. Our total development time on this game is going to be about two years, which is not unreasonably long for this type of game. We’re going as fast as we can. It’ll be worth the wait, it’ll totally be worth the wait. In the long run, people will be happy we took this extra time,” Schaefer promised.