Project Titan
Blizzard's ambitious MMO that never was, whose ashes became Overwatch.
Titan was the project name for a cancelled Blizzard Entertainment massively multiplayer online game. Speculation regarding the game began in 2007, but Blizzard revealed little information besides that it would be completely new and not based on the company's then-current three main franchises. The game was internally canceled by Blizzard in May 2013, though publicly they announced that the project would be delayed as they took the title in a different direction. Its official cancellation was made in September 2014. Internally, about forty members of the Titan project used the developed assets to craft a new game which became Overwatch (2016).
Quick Facts
- Canonical status
- Cancelled Project
- Associated figures
- Jeff Kaplan
- Rob Pardo
- Chris Metzen
- Organization
- Blizzard Entertainment, Team 4
- First mentioned
- 2007
- Current state
- Cancelled (2014)
Lore & Background
The exact details of how Titan would have played are not fully known, but Blizzard's Jeff Kaplan, who served on the Titan development team and later became the director for Overwatch, identified that the game 'was a class-based MMO.' Players would have selected a character from several classes, which granted them initial abilities. As they progressed, they would gain points to spend on a skill tree for that character. Kaplan said that, near the point of Titan's cancellation, the variety of skills led to overpowered combinations, describing the result as 'very cluttered and confused.' Shortly after the cancellation announcement, Kotaku ran an article describing the game as 'a massive multiplayer PC game in which players could both maintain non-combat professions and shoot their way through death-matches on a sci-fi version of Earth.' According to the article, sourced by anonymous employees, the game would take place on a near-future Earth where the player would take on a 'mundane job' during the day while fighting enemies at night.
Reader's Guide
Titan was never released, so there is no gameplay to experience. However, its legacy lives on in Overwatch (2016), which was crafted by about forty members of the Titan project using the developed assets. For those interested in the project's history, key figures include Jeff Kaplan (who served on the Titan development team and later became Overwatch's director), Rob Pardo, and Chris Metzen. The setting was established to be in the 2070s, taking an optimistic view of the future. The world was envisioned to include areas inspired by the western coastline of California, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, and locations in between, and also other locations like London and Cairo. The game's cancellation was publicly announced in September 2014, though internally it had been canceled in May 2013.
Did You Know?
- Blizzard has never officially confirmed a specific dollar amount for Titan's development cost, though the project was reportedly expensive.
- Seventy percent of the Titan team was transferred to other projects when the game was rebooted in 2013.
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