Runic Devs Lend Stuck Players A Hand

[John Funk]

Runic Devs Lend Stuck Players A Hand

What happens when a customer runs into a fun-ruining bug in a game, and since it's an offline title there's no support department to help him? If you're a developer at Torchlight creators Runic, you step in yourself.

Now, I really liked Torchlight [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/reviews/6697-Review-Torchlight], and it's a great game, but it's a game that's being developed by a smaller, more independent development team - so naturally, there are going to be a few bugs. One particular bug involved characters who would get stuck on the terrain and be unable to perform any actions, such as teleporting back to town.

Runic Games' President & Project Director Travis Baldree posted a workaround [http://forums.runicgames.com/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=1595] on the game's forums, but for whatever reason it just wasn't working for one unfortunate gamer. So, the developers took his save file and manually edited it to pop his character up a level, where he was free to roam the halls and slaughter monsters mercilessly once more.

Now, this sort of thing isn't exactly uncommon in MMOGs or other online games - that's what live support is for, isn't it? On the other hand, Torchlight is a completely offline game, and Runic is a fairly small startup company. You have to imagine that with a small team, they're already worked pretty hard with addressing post-launch bugs and issues. So even if it was something so trivial as changing a variable or two in the code, it's just a fun little example of good customer service. Kudos, Runic team.

(Reddit [http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/9yko6/])

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[Zagzag]

I really wouldn't expect a developer to care this much about customers in an offline game, but you can always be proved wrong.

 

[ZeroMachine]

You know, Torchlight only slightly intrigued me in the first place, but the fact that the company that made it is so damn nice may have just sold me on the game. I might buy it even just to show support for what could hopefully be a very good, user-friendly company.

And I never do that!

 

[Gigaguy64]

Wow, this is nice to see.
I love it when a developer accepts its games bugs and dose its best to eather fix them or help the players affected by them out.
I hope this developer dose well, it looks like they have some good people on the team.
Kudos from me as well.

 

[Kollega]

Now that's what i call good customer service. Turned up to eleven.

 

[Daniel Cygnus]

This has just given me an interest in Torchlight that I didn't have before. These guys are awesome.

 

[Gxas]

Good to know that I can get problems solved in this game. I've run into a few bugs here and there but just shrugged them off because, well, it just came out yesterday. I'm happy to see a developer taking time to help customers.

Please Runic, continue to make games while keeping this tact.

 

[LazerFX]

This is tipping me more and more to buying Torchlight - I was interested before, this now makes me more so

 

[pignoli]

These guys have a very genuine passion for what they're doing. Stories such as this and even the quickest of sessions on Torchlight will rapidly confirm that. Oh yeah and the tools they made the game with are going to be available for free. I don't think it gets much better than this. They absolutely deserve to succeed and the game is brilliant. But iiiiit!

 

[WrongSprite]

I've now decided to play the demo, and it's great fun. Probably worth a purchase.

 

[ma55ter_fett]

Thats very nice of them, since most developers today give less than a shit about one customers problems.

Might just buy this game to support the company.

 

[Ancientgamer]

I just got the demo today, If I like it I'll be sure to buy it.

 

[TheDoctor455]

Why can't all devs show this much support for their game?

EDIT:
I'm looking at you 2K and Bethesda.

 

[Sevre]

I'm intrigued, I'm going to look into this game.

 

[In Limbo]

I played the demo last night, and it's pretty fun. Satisfying combat, seamless (so far) randomisation, and refined RPG metagaming mechanics. For $20 it seems like a good buy, though I have to finish my current game first - before I get addicted.

 

[Eversor]

And here is a shining example of a studio that isn't about grabbing as much cash as humanly possible, but rather giving fellow gamers a quality product and assure good time. I love these guys more and more, and if there will be a physical collector's edition, I'll buy it.

From gamers, to gamers. That is clear.

 

[TsunamiWombat]

Purchase decision made. Well played Runic, Well played.

 

[Magnalian]

Good to see there are some companies out there who still care about their customers even after the dough's been spent (I'm looking at you, Microsoft! D:<).

 

[SenseOfTumour]

That's epic, especially compared with some support which seems to stop at 'well, no-one else is having that problem, it must be your system, we can't look into it until you've reinstalled the game, all your drivers, changed out your video card and memory with replacements, reinstalled windows with a different version, and hopped on one leg while reinstalling the game.'

I'd already bought it ages ago, but I think tales like this are what's going to really help the smaller developers get their name heard.

It's also refreshing to see good news repeatedly posted here, when non gamer news only dwells on misery.

Breaking News! People help other people in crisis!

Just doesn't get seen much does it? No wonder we want to escape real life to our games

 

[DSK-]

Brilliant. I apologise because of this late response, but that is fantastic. Bravo Runic!