Titan Quest Iso
Shawnna Franz
Titan Quest is a 2006 action role-playing game developed by Iron Lore Entertainment and published by THQ for Windows, first physically and then in 2007 through Steam. A mobile port was developed by DotEmu and published in 2016, and versions for PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch were released in 2018. All these versions were published by THQ Nordic. The story follows a player-created protagonist as they navigate Ancient Greece, Egypt and China on a quest to defeat the Titans after they escape from their ancient prison. The gameplay is similar to the Diablo series, with player navigation being handled with a mouse-driven tile-based interface, and gameplay revolving around role-playing mechanics and real-time combat. Four expansions have been created for the game; Titan Quest: Immortal Throne in 2007, and three others between 2017 and 2021.
Titan Quest was envisioned by game designer Brian Sullivan as a role-playing game set in Ancient Greece similar to Age of Mythology. Production began in 2004 after a successful pitch to THQ. The script was written by Randall Wallace, while Sullivan acted as the designer. Despite being in a mythical setting, the team wanted to make the environments and towns feel as realistic as possible, leading to a large amount of research into ancient cultures. Enemies were inspired by the game's regional mythologies, with designs inspired by the stop-motion work of Ray Harryhausen. The music, composed by Scott Morton and Michael Verrette, was created to avoid the looping tracks of other games.
First announced in 2005, Titan Quest received generally positive reviews when released, being both praised as a good example of the genre while at the same time being criticized for its traditional gameplay. Sales of the main game and its expansion have been estimated as approaching one million units. The mobile port was tricky for its developers due to adapting the game for touchscreen controls: like the console version, it received positive reviews upon release. The engine and gameplay of Titan Quest later became the foundation for Grim Dawn, a video game developed by team members from Iron Lore following the studio's closure.
Titan Quest is an action role-playing game set in the pre-Roman Ancient World: these include Ancient Greece, Egypt, and the Silk Road leading through Asia. Players take control of an avatar: players are able to choose gender, name and tunic color.[2][3][4] The three-dimensional world is navigated through an overhead third-person view, with the player character being controlled with the mouse through a point-and-click interface, while abilities are mapped to keyboard buttons. The environment is obscured by a "Fog of War" effect which blacks out unexplored environments on the minimap. Optional text tutorials for gameplay elements are unlocked progressively throughout the game and can be viewed at any time.[2][4][5]
As they progress, players gain experience points through defeating enemies and completing quests for non-player characters (NPCs) scattered around environments: these raise a character's experience level, which grant access to fresh skills and points that can be used to upgrade character attributes such as health and energy levels, dexterity, intelligence, or strength. If the player dies, they respawn at rebirth fountains scattered through the world, although they lose some accumulated experience points. Quests are divided into Main Quests related to the central narrative, and side quests unique to particular areas of the world. Other NPCs can be found in towns and cities that act as Merchants selling equipment and items: these can be both bought and sold. Player characters have multiple equipment slots, which can take armor for limbs and torso, weapons or shields, and accessories that grant passive boons.[2]
Fighting takes the form of real-time hack and slash combat, with players attacking randomly-generated enemies highlighted by the mouse. Available weapon types for characters include swords, clubs, axes, and staves. In addition to the standard attack with an assigned weapon, offensive skills can be deployed. Using active skills triggers a cooldown meter, rendering that skill unusable until the meter depletes.[2] Items and equipment can also be looted from fallen enemies and chests scattered through environments: these range in quality, with grey standing for damaged or low-quality gear while purple stands for a "Legendary" item, and orange denotes a Relic or Charm which can be equipped to the player to increase an attribute such as elemental damage resistance. The majority of items and equipment are randomly generated, and are associated with particular types of enemies. The world's currency, Gold, can be gained through quest completion, opening chests and defeating certain enemies. Gold is used with the various shop NPCs in exchange for their services.[2][5]
After leveling up for the first time, the player can access Masteries, skill tree-based upgrade systems where skill points unlocked upon leveling up can be used to access and boost different skills. Mastery abilities expend energy, which is replenished over time when skills are not in use or by using energy drinks. There are eight available Masteries to choose from (Defence, Warfare, Hunting, Rogue, Earth, Storm, Nature and Spirit). Players can access two Masteries at any one time, mixing skills from both trees. The combination of different Masteries create different character classes: for instance, combining Nature and Earth Masteries grants players the "Summoner" class, while Defense and Warfare Masteries create the "Conqueror". There are 36 possible Classes, which include pure disciplines within one Mastery and hybrids between different Masteries.[2][4][5] After a certain point in the game, the player has access to Mystics, NPCs which can reallocate skill points for a fee.[2]
In addition to single-player, the title features cooperative multiplayer, where players can accept invitation from up to six other players to join their game session through either LAN or online connection. Alongside being able to fight enemies together, players can swap messages and exchange loot. There is also a Level Editor available, where players can access developer tools and create their own levels which can be shared with other players. The editor features a large number of options for environment customization, including adjusting the shade of environmental elements like roads.[2][4]
Titan Quest begins with a narration, detailing how the Titans once ruled the primordial darkness before the light of the Olympian Gods appeared: after a great war, the Titans were exiled and imprisoned, and the Olympians ushered in a golden age. An unknown time later, a trio of lesser Titans known as Telkines broke the conduit linking Olympus with the mortal world, and summoned armies of monsters to prepare for the release of the Titans. The player character begins their quest at the village of Helos, where beasts are destroying the local crops. Fighting their way through Greece, they learn of Telkines from a group called the Order of Prometheus. After defeating the first Telkine beneath the palace of Knossos, the player travels to Egypt and attempts to restore the connection between Earth and Olympus. The ritual fails, and they must defeat a second Telkine. The player then pursues the final Telkine along the Silk Road to China. Pursuing the Telkine to the Wusou Mountains, the player is too late to prevent the release of the Titan Typhon, who travels to Olympus to destroy the gods. After the player defeats Typhon, Zeus declares that humanity has proven itself able to live without the protection of Olympus.
Multiple expansion packs detail further adventures undertaken by the player character. In Immortal Throne, the player descends into the Underworld to confront the source of an outbreak of monster attacks. In Ragnark, the player travels to the Norse realms, allying with the inhabitants of Asgard against an invasion by the Jotunn and the schemes of the treacherous Loki. In Atlantis, the player is called by Poseidon to help against attacks coming from the corrupted city of Atlantis. In Eternal Embers, the player travels to China and must deal with the ten sun spirits, who seek to avert their prophesied destruction and begin attacking mortals.
Titan Quest was the brainchild of game designer Brian Sullivan: while he was working on Age of Empires, which sported a Grecian setting, he came up with the concept of creating a similar game while including the region's mythology.[3][6] The concept work for Titan Quest began in 2000, when its developer Iron Lore Entertainment was formed by Sullivan and Paul Chieffo. The two brought together a skeleton team to create a demo with which to find a publisher. During this time, the game was described by producer Jeff Goodsill as being "on the drawing board".[7][8][9] The creative leads on the project were Sullivan, Chieffo, programmer Max McGuire, and artists Rich Sullivan and Josh McHugh.[8] According to Sullivan, the pre-production process lasted over a year.[3] Iron Lore's January 2004 pitch to THQ was successful, and development began once they had secured a contract in 2004. The initial staff up to that time was just nine people working in a small office area: when production started and further staff were hired, the team size grew to 38, which included temporary and late development additions.[3][7] Sullivan was involved in multiple areas of the development, but his main responsibility was game design and overseeing content creation.[10] Titan Quest was aimed at both casual and hardcore gamers, as the necessary prices for games necessitated reaching out to a wide audience to get a profit. For this reason, the team chose the action role-playing genre.[3] Developing the game was made more difficult by the necessity to create Iron Lore around it, recruiting and training new staff.[9] Other studios were also involved with development. Towards the end of development, Demiurge Studios was brought in to help with the final stages during the alpha-beta-ship stages. Demiurge first helped with memory optimization; then worked on the level editor and modification functions so they worked as an independent function; and finally created installers for both the demo and the main game. Demiurge's involvement gave Iron Lore more time and energy to devote to fixing bugs and polishing gameplay.[11] The CGI opening cinematic was created by Blur Studio.[2]
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