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Blizzard cancels Titan
Well, it's official - Blizzard has stopped all work on their mystery next-gen MMO Titan. The never announced project is as dead as Starcraft Ghost. In the interview with Polygon Mike Morhaime says that Blizzard 'didn't find the fun' and that they attempted something very ambitious only for it to never really come together. Chris Metzen states that the decision to pull back was 'excruciating' - "We were trying to do the right thing and build the right, smart product, and keep it all moving," Metzen said. "The opportunity to get that perspective and dust off a little bit, scraped knees and all, stand back up and reevaluate as a team, as leaders, as a culture - it was a big blessing." We reported last year when Titan went back to the drawing board - seems like it may have been a victim of Blizzard's desire to really only focus on the one MMO. When asked about supporting World of Warcraft, Metzen said "My hope personally is that we'll support it forever." Alas, Titan, we never knew ye.
The complexity of Heroes of the Storm
Ten years ago, players told Blizzard that WoW was too simple compared to past MMOs like Ultima Online, EverQuest, and Asheron's Call. More recently, many (including me at one point) said the same about Hearthstone -- that too much complexity had been removed from the genre compared to games like Magic: The Gathering. Today, Polygon posted an interview with Heroes of the Storm game director Dustin Browder. His message: HOTS isn't "DOTA for babies." "If you come looking for complexity in exactly the same places," Browder said, "you will be disappointed. If you come looking for complexity wherever it may be, I think you're going to be surprised and have a great time." Blizzard has stripped away many MOBA hallmarks, such as the item store. Browder says that other features make up for this loss of complexity. Talent selection is crucial. Map-specific objectives also play a huge role in determining the course of the battle and require careful strategy to accomplish. In a video included with the story, Polygon's "MOBA expert" Emily Gera had some further comments on the game: "The masses don't want to play big, scary MOBA games... Blizzard is trying to create a game that has less of a barrier to entry and bypass the classic issue of MOBA games -- that MOBA games are full of jerks... There's a lot of infighting. In HOTS, everyone on the team is in it together." What do you think? Is HOTS dumbing down the genre too much, or are these the changes the genre needs?
Tokyoflash mixes time and geometry to make its Kisai Polygon watch (video)
This week's Tokyoflash watch will certainly tickle the fancy of those who sleep with a set square beneath their pillow. The Kisai Polygon has a ring of triangles representing the hours and the nearest 10 minutes, with the individual minute being shown as a single digit through the middle. If you'd like to indulge in some retail therapy, you can take advantage of the company's pre-sale. Available in black, mirror, blue or pink, it'll set you back $99 (€77, £61) until Thursday, after which it'll cost $129 (€100, £80). Fancy learning how to read it from the team to built it? Head down past the break for the video tutorial. %Gallery-171832%
HDI 3D to ship new line of 3D projectors next year, we mortgage our homes
We were pretty impressed when we got the chance to gaze at HDI 3D's silky smooth, 43-inch 3D LCD last year, which is why our eyes widened when the company announced that it's begun producing a new line of 3D projectors, slated for release as early as 2012. First up in the awkwardly named Laser-Driven 2D/3D Switchable Dynamic Video Projector series is the LSS Pro 1 (pictured above) -- a tank that's powered by as many as two Laser-Drive Engines and capable of displaying both 2D and 3D images on HDI's 300 inch Laser Silver Screen. A full 100 of the systems will be available on February 14th as part of a pre-production run, but they certainly won't be cheap, with prices ranging from $55,000 to $85,000. As many as five similar models are expected to begin shipping by the end of next year, including the Industrial, Origami and Polygon. Beam past the break for more details in the press release, or check out our gallery to see the full lineup. %Gallery-130325%
