Zestir asked Andrew Ball:

How did you come up with the rich Universe of 'Shadow Quest'?

Andrew Ball Well, I was very inspired by Gargoyle Quest, originally, especially in regards to the upgrade system. I also liked the idea of playing a shadowy, darker character that had to cautiously maneuver around major powers and paranoid zealots while gaining strength. That character had to be formless (or an amnesiac) to give the players that much more creative freedom (as in many other quests), and thus, Shadow was born.

The remainder of the story unraveled from there. I came up with a reason Shadow was where he was when things started, forming the basis of the elemental system and a great past war as a backdrop. The countries came next from a map I drew of the world; I connect each one to each other and to a history going back to the war. I then drew up plans for the political structure and the leaders of each country, which all became large characters in their own right.

Finally, I set as the immediate conflict the rising tension between the various nation states, and the long-term conflict as the instability of the world.

The big secrets and fundamental nature of the world was something I didn't come up with for a long time. But eventually I had to figure out a reason why things were the way they were - why that world existed in the manner that it did, and why it was unstable. This led us to the true origin of Shadow.

So, that's how it happened!

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