Iron Lore Vets Form Crate, Buy Black Legion

Two veterans from shuttered Titan Quest-developer Iron Lore formed their own Cambridge, MA-based studio, Crate Entertainment, according to new media reports. The new company was founded by Iron Lore's former lead designer Arthur Bruno and art director Eric Campanella in February 2008, shortly after Iron Lore closed due to lack of funding. Crate works with and uses the facilities of fellow Cambridge, MA-based independent developer Demiurge Studios. Though there were opportunities for the two to join an already-established studio, Bruno told New England technology site MHT, "I thought, I can take a job at another company and keep doing what I’ve been doing, or I can do something more than that." Crate purchased the rights to two games that were under development at Iron Lore, including a project titled Black Legion. The title is an action RPG for the Xbox 360, and Crate is currently shopping a demo for it to game publishers. "One of our real goals is to take the solid game play we established in Titan Quest and repackage it to make it sort of grittier and more appealing to the mainstream audience," says Bruno. "We’re trying to evolve the action to something that will bring the RPG to its next level."