Blizzard Cancels Ambitious Titan MMO After Seven Years

[Fanghawk]

Blizzard Cancels Ambitious Titan MMO After Seven Years

Blizzard tried its best with Titan, but ultimately, it's an MMO the developer isn't interested in pursuing.

After the staggering success of World of Warcraft, the tiniest hints that Blizzard was working on a next-gen MMO code-named Titan is worth paying attention to. The only problem was, after seven years, we still didn't know anything about it. The last we'd heard, <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/124406-Blizzard-Restarts-Titan-Project-Wont-See-Release-Until-2016>Blizzard had restarted the game and trimmed seventy people off of the team. Now the developer has officially confirmed that Titan has been cancelled, citing a lack of passion in the project.

"We had created World of Warcraft, and we felt really confident that we knew how to make MMOs," Blizzard CEO Mike Morhaime explained. "So we set out to make the most ambitious thing that you could possibly imagine. And it didn't come together. We didn't find the fun. We didn't find the passion. We talked about how we put it through a reevaluation period, and actually, what we reevaluated is whether that's the game we really wanted to be making. The answer is no."

According to Polygon, part of the issue is that Blizzard has realized it doesn't need to focus solely on MMOs. Successful small-scale releases like <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/video-games/editorials/reviews/11117-Hearthstone-Review-A-Strategic-Addiction>Hearthstone and <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/132920-Heroes-of-The-Storm-Technical-Alpha-Goes-Live>Heroes of the Storm have shifted Blizzard's focus to other projects instead of putting all its resources into a single massive project.

"We don't want to identify ourselves with a particular genre. We just want to make great games every time," Morhaime continued. "I wouldn't say no to ever doing an MMO again. But I can say that right now, that's not where we want to be spending our time."

Of course, the most disappointing detail for fans is that after all this time, we have no idea how ambitious Titan would have been. Perhaps those details will emerge one day, but in the meantime, Blizzard still intends to keep supporting World of Warcraft. Its latest expansion pack, Warlords of Draenor, <a href=http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/136838-Blizzard-Entertainment-Announces-Release-Date-for-World-of-Warcraft-Warlords-of-Draenor>launches this November.

Source: <a href=http://www.polygon.com/2014/9/23/6833953/blizzard-cancels-titan-next-gen-mmo-pc>Polygon

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[Aeshi]

Man, that's even more disappointing than what happened to Starcraft: Ghost. At least we got some idea of what that would've been like had it been released (and Titan was a new IP on top of that.)

Don't suppose anyone here is secretly a Blizzard employee with Alpha pictures and a willingness to sate my curiosity?

 

[Mr.Mattress]

Wow, it's really been 7 years since we first heard of Project Titan? Man, how time flies.

Still, I'm sorry to hear that Titan has been canceled. I wouldn't have gotten it either way, but I know a lot of other people wanted it (At least when it was first announced).

 

[Nimcha]

Well, that sucks. Cue the yearly WoW expansions I suppose.

 

[Andy Shandy]

Titanfell.

Anyway, can't be all that disappointed personally, considering we didn't see anything of it at all.

 

[crepesack]

Better to scrap a train wreck before it even happens. Despite the trashing of blizzards design philosophy it's good to see a developer recognize that a product that isn't great isn't worh putting out. Even if millions have been spent and hundreds of hours wasted.

 

[plus2exp]

Maybe now they can get to work on Warcraft 4...

 

[Fappy]

At least they were smart enough to cut their losses. I am glad to see they put job fulfillment before the bottom line.

 

[J Tyran]

Cue the translator:-

"With falling World of Warcraft revenues and a more steady income stream from À la carte business models in games like MOBAs and CCGs and the recent mediocre reception of their latest online game Activision told us to stop dicking around with a game that hadn't seen the light of day for seven years."

 

[Doom972]

It seems like even Blizzard can't produce an MMO to dethrone WoW. It was good of them not to get people hyped for it.

I like how Blizzard doesn't release a game if it doesn't meet their high standards, no matter how much money they put into it. It makes me wonder how Diablo 3 got released though.

 

[The World Famous]

I think it's best that they stay focused on WoW. It's still massive, but it's not the unstoppable force it was back in 2008. Hopefully, this next expansion (or the one after it) can get them a little closer to that Golden Age.
Or at least be better than Cataclysm. What a shitty game.

 

[Scribblesense]

I'd love to see what they managed to do though. Some concept art, synopses, treatments, w/e, just so we know what they'd been doing for nearly a decade.

 

[Lvl 64 Klutz]

Lack of passion? Is there really NOBODY at Blizzard that is excited with the idea of branching away from the SAME THREE FRANCHISES? Then again, taking into account how long it has taken them to release the rest of Starcraft 2, I imagine a passion for any kind of work is hard to find in the Amusement Park that is Blizzard HQ.

 

[Ticklefist]

The first casualty of Rob Pardo's departure. Possibly the reason.

I'm interested in seeing what Jeff Kaplan and the gang can do. Hopefully they can go back to WoW and make it a game for people that like video games again.

 

[TheEvilCheese]

Well it's official, even Blizzard can't out-WoW themselves.

On a serious note, good. They really don't need to make a new MMO if they don't want to, MMOs can feel stale and dispassionate even if the team desperately love making them, would hate to see titan go that way.

While WoW is certainly past it's peak, it's nice to know that the niche will be open to more competition when it finally does drop out of the public consciousness. Or the next 2 expansions could be like gold dust / cocaine and get the subs even higher than WOTLK. You never know.

 

[dragongit]

Lord knows how much money they had already pumped into it instead of focusing on their projects at hand. Hopefully they effort hadnt' been completely wasted, and the teams that have worked on it have better experience for future projects and making current ones better.

 

[Fat Hippo]

Better to scrap a train wreck before it even happens. Despite the trashing of blizzards design philosophy it's good to see a developer recognize that a product that isn't great isn't worh putting out. Even if millions have been spent and hundreds of hours wasted.

Somebody should tell Gearbox this. See Aliens: Colonial Marines and Duke Nukem Forever.

I, for one, almost admire them for moves like this. Sure, it's disappointing to many that they will never get to see it, but taking pride in your work to the extent that you won't put out something sub-par even if it would be financially sensible, shows a certain artistic backbone, which is all too rare in the commercial sector of videogames.

 

[RA92]

See, the thing is, first someone else needed to have success in something new for Blizzard to have copied and refined. That happened to MOBAs - so that's where Blizzard went.