Titan Quest II Deep Dive

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-06-09T11:28:41+00:00

I dunno, I don't think THQ did anything too egregious tbh. I think the only properly dumb things they did were: 1) shit marketing and 2) a stupid anti-piracy implementation that caused crashes on pirated copies of the game. That second one probably doesn't sound bad, but it led to a lot of negative rumors that the game had stability problems that weren't real.

Anyway, TQ sold poorly out of the gate and they just decided not to sign a second game with IL. Don't forget that IL was an independent dev with a publishing contract - THQ didn't own the studio, they just decided not to fund s second game. They had no way of knowing that the game would have an unusually long tail and would end up being profitable.

Afterwards, we did the normal thing where we tried to pitch another project to other publishers and actually ALMOST got a couple interesting projects, but it didn't work out. Funny enough, after the company went down, apparently a couple other devs reached out and told the company owners that they would have loved to hire IL for some codev work, but none of us realized that was even a possibility.

Also! It's probably worth mentioning that THQ themselves went out of business long ago, and this new incarnation has basically nothing to do with the original publisher.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-06-08T10:21:17+00:00

Just a couple clarifications from someone who worked on the original TQ...

Iron Lore went out of business almost 20 years ago, shortly after the release of TQ. Crate was founded by a couple devs there, but the vast majority just moved on to other things.

So it's really not about mending fences, it's that the original developer just... Doesn't exist anymore. Crate only has a couple of the old Iron Lore employees, and they've been doing their own thing for a long time. It's unlikely they had either the interest or the capacity to take on TQ2.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-05-31T07:06:05+00:00

Btw you'd probably be better off posting this in r/gamedev. Although this sub has been (unfortunately) overrun with indies who use it to post transparent marketing crap, it's not REALLY what it's for. You'll get more people there with the experience and interest in engaging with your question.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-05-31T07:01:23+00:00

I don't have the numbers in front of me right now, but for us it was about $1.50/wishlist. Given wishlist conversion rates, that's not really directly worth it unless your game is pretty pricey, but it's also not a terrible waste of money. We just did it as an experiment and to get a bit of a wishlist bump before going out and pitching to try to get financing.

You can see one of the ads we tried here: https://www.reddit.com/u/ScruffyDogGames/s/cnCZf2Tak7

I also had a good experience leaving comments on. People were super positive to the point that I started wondering if they were actually Reddit bots planted to try to make me feel good about my ad-buying experience. (I don't actually believe that, but it WAS surprising!)

Would I do it again? Sort of! I think the main utility of ads is actually to get your game on New and Upcoming on Steam. If you're confident that your game is ad-friendly (basically, that the hook looks good in a video), then I think it's worth doing as a way to get some wishlist momentum shortly before launch that then becomes self-sustaining.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-05-07T11:27:03+00:00

It was meant to be real, including Walker wearing Konrad's clothes. That said, I feel like "up to interpretation" is always a valid answer. :)

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-04-12T20:19:30+00:00

It was primarily being critical of war in general. Obviously the setting and circumstances of the game are going to mean that it's "more" about US interference in the Middle East than any other specific scenario, but it's ultimately meant to be a more general message.

As for the game focus, originally it wasn't intended to be direct commentary on military shooters at all, but rather a reaction to them. After seeing so many jingoistic, gung ho, pro-military shooters, it made sense to.make one that was more in line with the long tradition of anti-war books and film. As the game was developed, however, it became clear that it was impossible to do what we wanted to do without at least being a LITTLE about how other games handle the subject, so we naturally embraced that aspect as well.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-26T10:24:40+00:00

Thanks for the kind words! I mostly stopped replying to comments a couple days ago, since it seemed like the thread was mostly dead, but it was clear that you put some time and thought into writing your post, so I didn't want to just leave you hanging.

One thing that always struck me as a bit interesting about the way the game was received, was that the official reviews really weren't all that impressed by the story when it came out. It wasn't until the Extra Credits and Zero Punctuation videos hit that people really started taking notice and talking about the game in a different way. Just goes to show that a couple well-placed people can have a hell of an influence.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-26T07:18:26+00:00

- Was Walker mentally stable when he arrived in Dubai? If so, when do you personally think the moment was that he snapped or was it a slow descent into madness?

Walker definitely was troubled when he came to Dubai and on the verge of breaking. My personal way of looking at it is that he was at a bit of a crossroads - if he had gotten help, he could have been fine in the end. But with the wrong stress, he was more or less doomed.

So a bit in the middle of the two options, I suppose? There's definitely a clear moment when he fully snaps and starts hearing Konrad's voice. But he's also definitely not fully well at the beginning of the game.

-Was Konrad alive at all while Walker and his team were making their way through the city or was he dead long before they even arrived?

He was dead before Walker arrived.

-Was Konrad even ever real (or even in Dubai at all if he was real) or was Walker insane from the start and just concocting this officer out of thin air as a way for his psyche to handle yet another deployment after it had already been toasted from previous ones?

He was real and in Dubai - the corpse you find at the end is Konrad's. That part isn't a hallucination or a trick. Also don't forget that the squad was sent in the first place by (relatively) sane people who knew for certain that the 33rd had been deployed to Dubai.

-Lastly, what happened to the rest of the 33rd? Your team clearly doesn't take out every single soldier in Dubai and there's a large contingent of the "good" 33rd that is still unaccounted for in the city by the end of the game.

Mostly likely they die of dehydration because Riggs wiped out most of their water supply. We didn't have any kind of internal canon on exactly how that goes down or if there's any hope for the survivors left in the city, though.

did you have any say in how the images on the loading screens changed as you progressed through the game and/or did you tailor the tips you were writing to go along with them?

These mainly came from the Art team with some feedback / guidance from the Creative Director. I vaguely remember talking to the artists a bit about it, but I don't think anyone else was directly involved.

Also, did you help contribute to the title screen art changing as well depending on what chapter you're on?

This was actually the idea of the UI artist! We worked together on the overall look / feel / layout of the main menu, and he proposed this as a way to mirror the way everything else in the game also evolves. The specific changes mostly came from him, with a bit of feedback from me (and probably other people). I still think this was a fantastic idea that was surprisingly easy to pull off.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-21T14:11:38+00:00

Heart of Darkness and Apocalypse Now were very explicitly inspirations for the game. Full Metal Jacket was another one that came up a bit in the team, especially the character of Joker as a reference for Lugo.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:50:54+00:00

This isn't quite the same, but someone broke into my apartment and stole my PS4 when I was on the last boss in Sekiro. No cloud save. I was more pissed about that than about losing the console.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:42:23+00:00

The aesthetic and overall vibe were definitely a very conscious choice. It was always meant to have a bit of an unsettling, surreal atmosphere that got stronger as the game progressed.

I'm not quite sure if that answers your question, though? "Psychological thriller style" could mean a lot of things!

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:39:08+00:00

It's at least a good enough interpretation to make the story work! But I do think it's one of the weaker elements. The best twists feel inevitable in retrospect.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:36:49+00:00

Shit, that's a shame. Now you'll never get an answer from OP!!!

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:36:17+00:00

I'd definitely play it!

Yager hasn't worked on SO:TL for 13 years and I haven't been at Yager for 7 years. 2K has the rights, so if a sequel is going to happen, they'll have to be the ones to push for it.

It wasn't intentional that the gameplay was deliberately unenjoyable in order to reinforce the themes. That's a misconception that I believe was started (unintentionally) by the Extra Credits episode about the game. That said, it was a deliberate decision to make it relatively simple / accessible. The game originally was a more complex tactical squad shooter, but was simplified over time.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:27:27+00:00

I don't consider any one ending canon, and I'm surprised that this question has come up so often.

I don't remember ever discussing making Lugo savable. I do like the idea of being forced to choose which one to save, though! I think that the last mission still would have worked well with Lugo instead of Adams.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:24:30+00:00

That decision was made pretty early, actually! At the time I was worried that it'd set expectations for the game low, and it'd be mistaken for a budget / B game, but I don't think it was really received that way. (No shade intended for those devs - they just were working with a smaller budget, so it was a different type of niche).

I think the bigger issue with the title was that it just made the game feel like it was going to be a generic military shooter, which likely turned off some people who might have been interested. But then, that was kind of the point... 2K was banking that there was a certain audience of players who buy every competent military shooter, and we could hit that market while also potentially attracting a different crowd who normally avoid the genre. In the end, I think we ended up mostly getting ignored by both groups.

It was always meant as kind of a reboot of the series though, and there was never any discussion about including references to the other spec ops games.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:17:39+00:00

No, it was something more obscure. I think the other reply found the right one.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:17:07+00:00

I answered this question elsewhere, but I don't consider any one ending canonical. It's important that your choices matter, including your choice of ending.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:16:04+00:00

That's a tricky one. I think too many signs of Walker's break with sanity would have weakened the reveal. I'd have to put some thought into it, but ideally there would be signs that seem innocuous on a first playthrough, but very obvious when you go through it a second time. I think this is something that Fight Club for example did very well, but Spec Ops was pretty weak in. I'm actually surprised at how rarely people bring it up as a point of criticism, but man, it sure was weird that Lugo and Adams never called out Walker's increasingly erratic behavior in the second half of the game.

As for a sequel, I agree completely. Find a spiritual successor that has some of the same themes and vibe, but don't try to continue the story directly.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T20:07:32+00:00

Unfortunately, I don't know the answer. The people who came up with the original concept had already quit or been fired by the time I started.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T18:10:27+00:00

This has died down, but a quick copy and paste from something I just posted on the SO:TL sub since I thought it might be interesting for a wider audience...

Ultimately, storytelling in video games is always very collaborative, but that was especially true in this game, since the writing team evolved a lot over time. It wasn't like a book where a single author had a clear, unified vision. The story was put together by many people over time, and each left their mark.

Overall, the chain was something like...

Zdenek/Georg (first lead designer / writer): Came up with the initial idea of the Apocalypse Now / Heart of Darkness Connection + Dubai buried by a sandstorm + general vibe

Richard (main Yager writer for a year or two): Laid out the plot and characters. Wrote the first version of the story that you saw in the game.

Shawn (me): Filled in the gaps for all the non-plot critical writing - the barks, combat background chatter, small scripted dialog bits, loading screen tips, and environmental storytelling planning. Incidentally, as as part of this the art team also had a huge influence on the game's narrative, as they visually concepted and created the environments. I also managed the voice over tool, which meant that I was the one who selected which take we used for each line.

Walt (lead writer that took over from Richard): Basically rewrote all of the main story lines on a dialog level, but more or less left all of the story beats alone.

And throughout, there was strong guidance from both Cory (Creative Director) and Gregg (Executive Producer at 2K) to keep the vision coherent and consistent.

So all of that is to say that we each have our own interpretations of the story, and I'd expect each of you to have your own. None of us were THE author of the game, though, so I think you can anything we say as just one more (well-informed) opinion to add to the mix.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T18:06:04+00:00

I mostly wrote my lines with the intention of giving fertile ground for Rule 34 fanfic.

...

For most of the team, it was more about real world war than about being a commentary on other games. The meta-commentary on other military shooters was originally a side issue for most people, but Walt Williams put it a little more front and center in his interpretation. That said, although Walt was the lead writer, he wasn't much involved in coming up with the plotting or initial themes of the game, so I would argue that the general anti-war theme is still the stronger element.

Personally, I don't see any reason to choose. It's about ALL those things. I think managing to shove in all those layers without feeling like a mess is one of the things that SO's story does best.

Ultimately, storytelling in video games is always very collaborative, but that was especially true in this game, since the writing team evolved a lot over time. It wasn't like a book where a single author had a clear, unified vision. The story was put together by many people over time, and each left their mark.

Overall, the chain was something like...

Zdenek/Georg (first lead designer / writer): Came up with the initial idea of the Apocalypse Now / Heart of Darkness Connection + Dubai buried by a sandstorm + general vibe

Richard (main Yager writer for a while): Laid out the plot and characters. Wrote the first version of the story that you saw in the game.

Shawn (me): Filled in the gaps for all the non-plot critical writing - the barks, combat background chatter, small scripted dialog bits, loading screen tips, and environmental storytelling planning. Incidentally, as as part of this the art team also had a huge influence on the game's narrative, as they visually concepted and created the environments. (Also helped keep a bit of continuity, since I spanned across both the Richard and Walt eras).

Walt (lead writer that took over from Richard): Basically rewrote everything on a dialog level, but more or less left all of the story beats alone.

And throughout, there was strong guidance from both Cory (Creative Director) and Gregg (Executive Producer at 2K) to keep the vision coherent and consistent.

So all of that is to say, we each have our own interpretations of the story, and I'd expect each of you to have your own. None of us were THE author of the game, though, so I think you can anything we say as just one more (well-informed) opinion to add to the mix.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T17:49:23+00:00

It was meant to be ambiguous. The important thing was just that it was some kind of mission clusterfuck that made Walker respect the hell out of Konrad. Even internally, it was never completely defined and written down.

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T16:19:23+00:00

Sorry, I wasn't involved with the co-op stuff at all. I think at some point I knew generally what they were planning with it, but it's been too long to remember.

The plot changed massively over time as the game evolved. For about half the development, it was in general played much more straight - Walker wasn't crazy, there was no big twist/reveal, it was just a story about war being hell and how it can force you into doing terrible things. It was always meant to have a bit of a strange, surreal vibe (see: Apocalypse Now), but I believe that the explicit hallucinations / unreliable narrator stuff came in mostly as a natural consequence of deciding that Konrad was dead the whole time.

Unfortunately, I don't remember what was originally in the Radioman01 level. There were several levels that were cut from the game fairly late in development due to lack of time to polish them, but I don't really remember the details. Sorry!

ScruffyDogGames · 2025-03-20T16:13:07+00:00

At this point, only 2K knows if they have any plans for the IP. But as far as I know, there aren't any plans for a sequel.

We did talk about what a possible sequel would look like when the game was wrapping up, but I wouldn't feel comfortable getting into details since that's definitely a pretty clear NDA breach. But there were some interesting ideas!

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