TQ: Immortal Throne - Interview @ Shacknews

This interview with Iron Lore's Mike "V" Verrette was overlooked last Friday.  The subject is obviously their Titan Quest expansion, Immortal Throne:

Shack: Tell us about the new environments we'll be exploring in Immortal Throne.

Mike Verrette: Immortal Throne starts off in the Mediterranean where the player will visit places like the war torn city of Rhodes and travel to the grove of the great sorceress Medea in search of the entrance to Hades itself. Those lucky players that manage to gain access to the underworld will need to find passage across the river of Styx, navigate the plains of Judgment where they will eventually be tested to see if they are worthy to gain entrance to the fields of Elysium. Once there, players will ally themselves with some of the greatest heroes Greece has ever known in an attempt to gain access to Hades Palace and determine the source of the demonic army.

The team spent a long time developing the look and feel of Hades. We wanted something that didn't fit into the stereotypical fire and brimstone imagery that people commonly associate with the underworld. Instead we wanted to create an alternate reality where the undead thrived and lived out their eternal days. We wanted a world that had its own architecture, foliage, geology, etc. From the gameplay side we tried to approach the level design from a different perspective -- where we focused more on using elevated gameplay spaces and took full advantage of the three dimensional qualities of the editor and the engine.