When it's not considering the future of card-based sensation Hearthstone, Blizzard is somehow juggling the MMORPG Goliath that is World of Warcraft and its latest project, MMOFPS Overwatch. In fact, it turns out the pressure of building a game that could compare to the mighty WOW was one of the killing blows that sent the now cancelled Project Titan into a developmental grave.
"It just wasn't coming together as a game, we had such high expectations for what we wanted us to do, you know, in a post World of Warcraft world, how do we, you know, make another great MMO?" says Blizzard game designer Jeff Kaplan in the latest issue of Gamesmaster. "And I think we let the expectations really overwhelm us and overwhelm the project. At a certain point you just realise things aren't coming together."
New projectOverwatch clearly has some big influences from Blizzard's pastand present, but after spending a full five years working on it, has any of Project Titan's DNA made it into Blizzard's new multiplayer shooter? "There's definitely influence from Titan in the game," comments Kaplan. "[Senior vice president] Chris Metzen and I talked a lot about this, you know, he and I have been pretty reflective on the whole process. There certainly were elements that were from Titan, kind of when you have a broad reach of games behind you, you tend to pull all of them in some ways."
The latest issue of Gamesmaster, with Overwatch on the cover, is out now. Buy a copy here or subscribeto future issues.
