Titan Quest II News

Sparta. Whether the name calls to mind Lacedaemon, Helen of Troy, Leonidas, or the Peloponnesian Wars, Sparta’s legend stands apart. In classical times, its influence stretched across the Peloponnesian peninsula and as far away as Italy.

So naturally, we wanted to feature Sparta in Titan Quest II. But we didn’t want these to be the same old Spartans. In keeping with our philosophy, we wanted to present a unique and fantastical twist that was nevertheless rooted in the history and classical stories that inspire us.

Ours is a world in which the monsters of myth are real, and they pose a real threat to the humans who live among them. Until recently, the Spartans and their powerful military served the role of protectors, defending the towns and villages of Greece from these mythological threats.


But what happens when Sparta falls, and that protection is gone?


Eagle-eyed observers may have noticed that our intro cinematic shows a wall ringing the city of Sparta. Of course, historical Sparta had no such wall. We don’t want to spoil too much, but imagine what happens when the most powerful city-state on the Peloponnesian peninsula turns inward and walls itself off, while seeking a power that can drive back the monstrous hordes and make them rivals to the gods. Imagine what happens when their hubris draws the attention of Nemesis, goddess of retribution, and she takes it on herself to punish them.

This is just a teaser of what’s going on in the world of Titan Quest II when the player starts the game. As they try to evade Nemesis’s wrath and free those she’s punished, their journey will reveal more about what happened to Sparta and why.


And as for that Spartan hipparch featured in the cinematic? He has a role to play, too, and he’s sure to cross the player’s path. To know more, you’ll just have to play the game. We don’t want to reveal all our secrets.

For Titan Quest II we set the goal of creating a lush, inviting, handcrafted world for the player to explore. In this devlog, we want to take a closer look at the inspirations behind our world.



Starting with the classics
Naturally, the original Titan Quest was our first point of reference when building the world of Titan Quest II. The original game is a classic for a reason, and its vibrant, welcoming world is still a stand-out among action RPGs.

A lot of that is due to the game’s unique mythological setting, which uses ancient Greece as a backdrop for larger-than-life stories of adventure, gods, and monsters. We want our world to capture that same feeling of fantastical adventure across a picturesque Greek landscape, so we looked closely at the original game as well as the vibrant natural environment of Greece itself when concepting the game’s world.


A dash of fantasy
In addition to the natural environment, Titan Quest II is full of mythological locations. These are places where monsters or magical beings dwell. Sometimes, they take the form of towering structures built by the gods themselves. Once again, we’ve taken real-world inspiration from ancient Greek temples and villages, but we want to give them a larger-than-life mythological twist.

While some of the game’s locations are recognizable from history, Titan Quest II’s version of these places is decidedly fantastical. Just as ancient Greeks saw the hand of the gods working in their lives, Titan Quest II’s world is one in which all the gods, monsters, and magical beings of Greek mythology are real, and this approach allows us to portray locations like the Messenian Coast and Sparta in ways you’ve never seen them before.



Building a handcrafted world
In Greek myth, heroes never knew what they might encounter when they landed on a new shore. Parts of the world were known, but parts remained mysterious, full of danger and magic. We wanted to bring that same feeling of discovery, adventure, and danger to the world of Titan Quest II.

We use the term “handcrafted” to describe our world because we want every place the player discovers to feel purposeful and distinctive. There should be a payoff for wandering off the beaten path, so our designers have built the world by hand, without procedural generation, to catch the player's eye and draw them toward unique, memorable adventures. Many of the most interesting parts of Titan Quest II’s world are not signposted at all! They’re there for players to discover on their own.

With this post we want to give you an insight into the creation of the official soundtrack for Titan Quest II by taking the cinematic trailer music as an example.
Please enjoy this audiovisual piece:
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The celebrated Greek soprano Aphrodite Patoulidou (https://www.instagram.com/aphrodite_patoulidou) is performing the vocals as well as providing the ancient Greek lyrics by drawing influences from her Greek heritage and working closely together with our inhouse audio director, composer and multi-instrumentalist Bastian Kieslinger https://soundcloud.com/bkeyslinger. Together we are taking you with us on a musical journey through our picturesque ancient Greek world.

The soundtrack of Titan Quest II combines ancient, as well as modern traditional Greek musical influences with orchestral soundtrack elements to create an authentic atmosphere while still using unique elements that provide some room for imagination and mythological fantasy.
As the three Moirai, goddesses of fate play a major role not only in the cinematic, but also in the story of Titan Quest II, we focused on creating a memorable and personal musical theme for them. Aphrodite is approaching the colour of the three Moirai’s different voices assimilating their age, in the singing tradition of Epirus. The ancient Greek lyrics derived from Pindar and Heraclitus can be translated as “One cannot escape one's fate” (Pindar) and “Everything is predetermined by fate” (Heraclitus) and show the differences between the Moirai and Nemesis towards fate / free will, as well as the fatalistic nature of the Moirai.

Bastian plays several uncommon instruments that you can also see in the video. An ancient Greek Lyre, a Pandura, a Bendir Drum, a Bouzouki and a Cretan Lyra. If you look and listen closely you can also spot Bastian’s Bass-Talharpa that supports the unique sound for Nemesis, the Goddess of divine retribution, together with Aphrodite’s intense guttural screams that are translated as “Man's character determines his life, it is his destiny, his god” (Heraclitus) and, contrary to the Morai’s lyrics, highlight the rebellion spirit that everybody is responsible for their own fate.

Are you ready to choose your own fate in Titan Quest II? From now on we will deliver monthly updates or sneak peeks into what we got cooking. Merry Christmas everyone!

Mythologically-inspired action RPG Titan Quest has a sequel on the way in Titan Quest 2, announced yesterday by publisher THQ Nordic and developer Grimlore Games. The sequel will take place in the same world of myth in ancient Greece, and the big bad this time will be Nemesis, Goddess of Retribution, who's ready to corrupt the very threads of fate in order to do whatever evil thing she wants done...
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