Good times atleast for the first 15 hours ... beyond that it's a fine line between fun and tedium.
So it comes as no surprise I was eagerly awaiting Titan Quest upon its release. Per usual form for games I'm anticipating - On release day I'm at the door of Fry's Electronics as they open. I pile into the store, steal a copy from the cart (they haven't even tagged or placed the game on the shelf) and run to the checkout. I'm late for work already, excuse me if I don't have time to chit chat.
After a long day at work (as my mind drifts back to the dvd copy of Titan Quest in my car) and after chilling with the wife and scrounging some eats - I'm off to my studio to install this beast. 10 minutes later ... I'm playing.
Beautiful game. Wow. And it sounds good too. The amount of detail the developer has put into the levels is bordering on photo realistic. And this isn't just the renders of the game engine. The layout of the levels are as much contributors of that feel as the graphics themselves.
This game is fast, frenetic, mouse death inducing good times. Early on in the game (we're talking character levels 1-15) the fun is in the discovery of the infinite variety of ways at which you can customize your character's classes and abilities, learning how the loot plays a role in the balance of your character, and really playing with styles of play to ensure your ass doesn't get handed to you by a mob of undead. There's some serious replay value in all of those mentioned above.
As you traverse the 4 different worlds, infinite amount of quests, and idle chit chat with the locals, one thing starts to stick out. This game has no character - if so it's a dull coder with no sense of humor. After 15-20 hours what was once interesting and fun becomes tedium. But here's the kicker - I don't think it's anything you would imagine, it's a combination of many smaller unrelated things.
The camera. Completely under utilized. This could have really been used to zoom in at conversations, intense battles, or emphasize items, places of interest, or put an exclamation on an emotion. Instead the camera zoom is adjustable via your setting - boring. I'm not talking aggressive camera pans and zooms either - subtlety is key - and on this point it was missed. Aside the face use of a close zoom is ... well useless.
The text. Too small and too much of it. I'm a designer, usually it's people telling me that. Now I know how it feels. Additionally, there was way too much NPC talkie talk - to the point once I realized it didn't further my story, I bypassed it completely. It might have set the stage for the world of Titan Quest, but the way it was told - I wasn't interested. And I'm an avid reader.
The user interface was bland. It didn't excite or enhance my experience. It was just there. A few times I'd wished it could disappear because my key commands served my purposes save the health and mana meters.
Like a run on sentence you just wanted this game to end. And it did ... at some point. Once I finished I actually had the ping of desire to restart my game and replay all 33 1/2 hours to advance my character through Legendary and collect some more bad ass loot. Dejavu - that's why I stopped playing World of Warcraft ... Why would I do that to myself once again?
I didn't. I put it up for sale on eBay and moved onto the other games on my desk.