Titan Quest: Immortal Throne Interview (con't)

FiringSquad: What are the team's favorite new monsters in the expansion?

Michael Verrette: One of the great things about Immortal Throne and using Hades as a backdrop is it gave us a little more artistic freedom in terms of the types of creatures we could create. In Titan Quest we tried to stick very closely to the typical mythological creatures that people would be familiar with. With Immortal Throne we were able to take things a little further and push the creature design a bit more than we did in the original game. Creatures such as the Anteok, Odontotyrranus, and the Siege Walkers were very popular around the office.

FiringSquad: What other new content can we expect to see in the expansion?

Michael Verrette: The expansion will also feature caravans, which are a new type of NPC that will store additional equipment for players. They will also allow players to transfer items between all of their characters. So if you stumbled across a great staff with your warrior, you can now transfer that item over to your casting character. As I mentioned before we have also added Enchanters to the game which will allow players to create artifacts and also allow them to separate relics from items - for a fee of course.
Additionally we have added things like an auto-sort in the inventory windows, attribute undo functionality when players level up, complete redesign on the multiplayer lobby with a new advanced search feature, selectable pet AI and new control options, and many other tweaks and enhancements to the existing game systems.

FiringSquad: Will the game get any graphical upgrades for Immortal Throne?

Michael Verrette: The graphics engine is the same as it was in the original Titan Quest with the exception of some optimization and minor features, but we have raised the bar with respect to the look and feel of the levels. The level designers focused on taking advantage of vertical space in Immortal Throne so the new gameplay spaces feature more vistas and more areas where the player will be using elevated gameplay spaces. We have added a lot of environmental effects and particle effects to some of the new levels to establish the mood of Hades, which makes the Immortal Throne content quite different than the original Titan Quest levels.

FiringSquad: What is the status of the expansion's progress and when will it be released?

Michael Verrette: Immortal Throne has gone gold and will be shipping to US stores on March 5th and will be available throughout Europe shortly thereafter.

FiringSquad: What hints can you give us about Iron Lore's plans following the release of the expansion?

Michael Verrette: There isn't much I can say about what we are currently working on at Iron Lore. We hope to continue to grow the Titan Quest franchise and are exploring new and exciting directions to take our next game in.

FiringSquad: Is there anything else you wish to say about Immortal Throne?

Michael Verrette: I would just like to wrap up by saying I think the Immortal Throne really rounds out the Titan Quest experience and adds a new dynamic to the game without making it more complicated for those playing for the first time. Between the new content and replaying the entire campaign with nine new class possibilities I think players will really enjoy what this expansion has to offer.