Titan MMO was an "utter failure" says Blizzard's Jeff Kaplan
"It was devastating."
In a remarkably frank interview, Blizzard has referred to cancelled MMO project Titan as an "utter failure".
Titan was officially cancelled in November 2014 after more than seven years of development.
Jeff Kaplan spoke more candidly to GameSpot than he ever has, publicly, about Titan, and said, "We failed horrifically in every way ... In every way that a project can fail. It was devastating."
"You're only as good as your last game," he added, quoting a phrase often used at Blizzard. "My most recent game was an utter failure called Titan that got cancelled."
Blizzard creative director Chris Metzen also featured in the video - the first of three about Overwatch, the colourful arena shooter that rose from Titan's ashes. Overwatch goes into open beta 5th May.
Metzen talked a little about where things went wrong.
"We were feeling the success [of World of Warcraft] and thinking, 'We could do another one of those. How hard was it? Maybe there was a little bit of pridefulness and thinking we'd turn right around and rock one out."
But the ideas and ambition and scope spiralled out of control, and pressure mounted the longer Titan took. "We got a little squirly under the weight of this giant idea that we were chasing where we lost some connectivity with each other," Metzen said. No one wanted to put a foot wrong and began working with blinkers on.
Eventually, the hard decision was made and Titan was closed. "At the point at which we, how would I say it, shut Titan off, we were pretty low," Metzen added. "And being very honest about it, we weren't used to feeling that way. We had had so much good luck, and failing was rough, and it tested us in ways we hadn't been tested before."
Not much is known about the game Titan was to be. There were rumours that it was a sci-fi MMO with shooting, rather than it be a World of Warcraft in space. Perhaps there are clues in Overwatch, perhaps not - Blizzard has never said.
Overwatch is coming to PC, PS4 and Xbox One on 24th May.
