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Blizzard delays unannounced MMO until 2016, resets whole project

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  • Neox
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    Neox veteran polycounter
    holy shit, i hope everyone i know is still involved or has a good backup plan

    :(
  • cholden
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    cholden polycounter lvl 18
    All their projects are a series of iterations. A benefit of sitting on thrones of gold.
  • CordellC
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    CordellC polycounter lvl 11
    It can't be a complete project reset. Three years for a MMO? Let alone a Blizzard MMO? No way.

    At least they didn't do a massive layoff. Hope the dudes there are still having fun on the projects they were moved to in the meantime.
  • Kwramm
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    Kwramm interpolator
    reset != iteration. Either the article or their spokesperson messed things up. But I envy them - sometimes there's projects which you love but where you really think that just starting with a clean slate, doing it in a better way would be so much more awesome. Great for them that they are in this position. Good that nobody gets fired though.
  • Zipfinator
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    Zipfinator polycounter lvl 9
    That article makes it sound like everyone was re-positioned inside the company until they're ready to get back into production on it. If that's the case then it only makes me more excited that they'll come up with something as exciting as WoW was when it came out 8 years ago.
  • Paradan
    man, how much polish can you add to a farmville clone?
  • wasker
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    wasker polycounter lvl 7
    ..uuuh? ^

    I feel sorry for the people involved for their time and effort that wont see the light of day but I'm sure it's going to be worth it in the end if we end up with a worthy WoW successor.

    I guess there goes my hopes of seeing anything Titan related on Blizzcon this year too :P had my fingers crossed that they'd show something from it this year.
  • Jeff Parrott
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    Jeff Parrott polycounter lvl 19
    Bummer. Too much talent to not show it.

    "A delayed game is eventually good; a bad game is bad forever." -Shigeru Miyamoto
  • Bibendum
    The quote is "A delayed game is eventually good; A rushed game is bad forever."

    And that didn't work out so well for DNF
  • Jeff Parrott
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    Jeff Parrott polycounter lvl 19
    Sorry. Misquoted that one. The point is there. I think the game whatever it is would have been huge. But Blizzard has high internal expectations. I'd just like to see some art. They've assembled an amazing art team there.
  • Torch
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    Torch interpolator
    I'd also like to add one,

    "Don't piss into the wind"
  • Bibendum
    Sorry. Misquoted that one. The point is there. I think the game whatever it is would have been huge. But Blizzard has high internal expectations. I'd just like to see some art. They've assembled an amazing art team there.
    Yeah kind of sucks but Blizzard probably throws away lots of art, if you think about all the iterations of the Diablo 3 art direction I'm betting loads of work never saw the light of day.

    Also could be that they'll end up keeping most of the art assets for Titan and they're just shifting everyone away while they rework the core gameplay functionality.
  • cdavidson
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    cdavidson polycounter lvl 8
    Long as nobody's getting shafted out of a job then it wont really matter how long they take.

    I highly doubt it will be a success like WoW was. times have changed.
  • Skamberin
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    Skamberin polycounter lvl 13
    Oh come on :( I was so looking forward to hearing anything about this at this years Blizzcon. Then again... Star Craft Ghost and the Original Diablo 3 is proof that blizzard will make a game all the way to near completion and go "Eeeeh, it's not that good, BALEETED" Crazy, worth it in the end but crazy I guess.
    Oh well, I'll let Wildstar be my focus until 2016 then :P
  • DrunkShaman
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    DrunkShaman polycounter lvl 14
    CordellC wrote: »
    It can't be a complete project reset. Three years for a MMO? Let alone a Blizzard MMO? No way.

    At least they didn't do a massive layoff. Hope the dudes there are still having fun on the projects they were moved to in the meantime.

    Better then ten years of doing nothing and 3 years of rushing the project disappointing many Blizz fans.

    I am pretty sure its just the project and not the people who are working on it as they have a firm understanding of the project I am certain they wont let go of their groups that easily unless they decide to scrap them off too.
  • slipsius
    I get the feeling that they did this because of recent mmos coming out. They see a lot of the game mechanics that everyone is loving, like the soft targeting and what not, and are seeing a trend that they either want to get in on, or improve upon.

    Also, they could be doing it to maybe prepare it from the get go so it can go on consoles as well.

    Or they realize a lot of people arent happy with it being on earth.

    or all of the above
  • Mstankow
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    Mstankow polycounter lvl 11
    I was hoping this game would be revealed like 4 years ago.
  • Isaiah Sherman
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    Isaiah Sherman polycounter lvl 14
    MMOs are very dangerous to make, even for Bliz. They have more pressure than anyone else because they are the MMO king due to WoW. Can they make another game that even gets close to WoW's success?

    I was looking forward to seeing some stuff about it this year too. The in-game cinematics in HOTS are just fuckin' incredible... I was hoping to see Titan footage with similar art.
  • MM
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    MM polycounter lvl 17
    anyone else think it might have something to do with Red5 studios latest game Firefall ?

    Firefall main art direction and concept guys are former Blizzard guys and well you can speculate the rest...
  • Isaiah Sherman
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    Isaiah Sherman polycounter lvl 14
    Competition's art direction would not cause a studio to completely stop (or "restart") production on a game. It's probably due to game design, time, and money.
  • Justin Meisse
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    Justin Meisse polycounter lvl 18
    that sucks, even if it doesn't mean lost jobs, resets like that stab you right in the morale.
  • MM
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    MM polycounter lvl 17
    Competition's art direction would not cause a studio to completely stop (or "restart") production on a game. It's probably due to game design, time, and money.

    true, but what if the over all look and feel of Firefall was too close to what Titan would have been ? from my experience working on Firefall i felt it could have been a blizzard idea for a game.
  • Isaiah Sherman
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    Isaiah Sherman polycounter lvl 14
    There are TONS of games out there that try to emulate Blizzard's art style. A giant money house with proven success would not fret over other studios trying to make Blizzard-like games.

    A "blizzard idea for a game" is also a very curious thought. What defines a Blizzard game? Blizzard is not a genre, but a dev studio. They've made RTS, MMOs, and action RPGs.
  • cman2k
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    cman2k polycounter lvl 17
    My heart goes out to the artists who likely had a big hit to morale. Never fun to find out your hard work is being flushed down the toilet. :(
  • Dataday
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    Dataday polycounter lvl 8
    It could also be they have decided to target the next generation of consoles as well. Either that or the current set of mmofpsrpgs hasnt been sending a weak message.
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    Wasn't this supposed to be that scifi MMO?

    I bet Bungie's happy...
  • IchII3D
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    IchII3D polycounter lvl 12
    I wonder if it was too close to Destiny. They are both going to be published by Activision. Why would a publisher make the same game twice?
  • Computron
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    Computron polycounter lvl 7
    My explanation would be that one is being made specifically for consoles (For now at least) and the other is a PC only WoW successor.
  • Skamberin
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    Skamberin polycounter lvl 13
    Is everything the artists have made completely wasted though? I mean there are still great designs and ideas to take from it and I'm sure some form of kit-bashing is possible. It really does suck though, but as was said by a upper WoW community dude, it'd be weird for Blizzard to release a "competing" mmo for WoW when WoW is still going strong. So doing a redesigns and getting more out of WoW might be a good idea.
  • wasker
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    wasker polycounter lvl 7
    While it's sad to see effort potentially go to waste (it's still all speculation on our part), Blizzard is known for doing reboots if the project isn't heading in the right direction. I dont think we as gamer and fans have much to worry about.
  • ZacD
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    ZacD ngon master
    Skamberin wrote: »
    Is everything the artists have made completely wasted though?

    I seriously doubt they are restarting the project from an art perspective, or even a lore or story perspective, it's most likely a restart on the actual gameplay, and just that.
  • Midgard
    ZacD wrote: »
    I seriously doubt they are restarting the project from an art perspective, or even a lore or story perspective, it's most likely a restart on the actual gameplay, and just that.

    Indeed, it's been like 5 years since "Titan" was "discovered" by discovered I mean that we knew that there was another game being developed, but in secret. I would bet that "Titan" has been in development for 6 years, and well, compared to the great ideas and mechanics that we're seeing in the new MMORPG generation, I think they just realized that "Titan" wasn't that cool and wasn't giving something new to catch the player's interest.
  • ZacD
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    ZacD ngon master
    Yeah the last 2 years have had a lot of MMO's released, they probably got a good picture of what works, and what doesn't.
  • leslievdb
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    leslievdb polycounter lvl 15
    so is there something conclusive official online yet or are we just going by rumors?

    i don't know either its true, in that case its good on their side since it shows they still have the power/capital/passion for making a proper game by going back to the drawingboard when they feel it isn't what it could be.
    Another option is that its just a false rumor.
    or the last option is that its a false rumor by blizzard themselves so they can blow us away with a badass trailer while we didn't expect to see one
  • Isaiah Sherman
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    Isaiah Sherman polycounter lvl 14
    IchII3D wrote: »
    I wonder if it was too close to Destiny. They are both going to be published by Activision. Why would a publisher make the same game twice?

    Interesting point.
  • almighty_gir
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    almighty_gir ngon master
    Can they make another game that even gets close to WoW's success?

    no, absolutely not.

    MASSIVE OPINIONATED POST ALERT.

    i don't think they can live up to the success of WoW... WoW was built up over a long period of time, it didn't start out as this huge raving success, it took its time to get there, and once it got there it never let go (and that's fantastic).

    but the problem is, every mmo... EVERY mmo that's released now is compared to WoW, and titan would be no different. there will always be "something" that pisses each person off because "it's just not WoW". on top of that, the mentality of players has changed quite drastically now from when WoW was launched. at launch it was a grind fest, the majority of players took a LONG time to get to end game, and when they got there it was rich and varied with plenty to do. over the years it's become easier and easier to hit max level from rolling a new toon, and the content has largely stayed the same with the exception of cataclysm. the reason it's gotten easier? players don't want to grind anymore. they want to get all of the achievements in super quick time. and they want to play end game on the first day. it's almost as if players just want a compelling RPG with a social element attached over the oldschool mmo complex.

    and therein lies the problem. Titan has to be drastically different enough from WoW that there can be little to no comparison between the two games. and it has to strike the increasingly difficult balance of grind vs achievement, something that's in constant flux among established games let alone a new release.

    and let's not forget, the reason many people are still playing WoW isn't because WoW is so fantastic... it IS a great game, to be sure. but there are better, newer titles (again my opinion) that aren't as successful for a simple reason: people are committed to WoW because they feel they've invested a huge portion of time/money into it. to switch to something else would mean everything they've done in WoW is a waste. people don't like that feeling, even if it's true, even if they KNOW playing WoW is a waste of their time, they'll keep doing it because they don't want to face that reality.

    i honestly don't see how anyone, even Blizz can create something that's as successful as WoW has been. it was created in the middle of a perfect storm, all the stars aligning, and all the fates coming together. Titan will be fantastic, i'm sure. but that won't make it as successful as WoW, from a financial point of view, which lets face it, is the only view that they care about.


    TLDR: WoW is like Gangnam Style. it was a phenomenal success, but as a phenomenon, it's unlikely that you could ever achieve greater planned future successful follow up.
  • Kwramm
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    Kwramm interpolator
    that sucks, even if it doesn't mean lost jobs, resets like that stab you right in the morale.

    I think it depends if the team is behind it or not. For a team it can be equally bad to work on a product where everyone knows that if you could do it all over again, learn from your mistakes, change direction a bit, it would be so much better!

    i.e. it hurts working on a product that will never show its full potential - and you know it, even before release
  • slipsius
    For anyone that is upset about the reset, Just remember, Starcraft 1 was reset THREE times....
  • Alberto Rdrgz
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    Alberto Rdrgz polycounter lvl 9
    i heard this project was a mess like a year ago... :(
  • ErichWK
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    ErichWK polycounter lvl 12
    Wasn't Diablo III reset 3 times, also? Remember.. Resident Evil 4 had to go through 3 resets. And from those Resets we got some pretty amazing games and the father of the modern 3rd person shooter. Resets can be good!
  • David Nilsson
    Duke Nukem Forever was reset at least three times and... uhm... nevermind.
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