Quest for Glory Omnipedia
Quest for Glory Omnipedia
Quest for Glory Omnipedia
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Production timeline

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This article or section contains information from Lori and Corey Cole’s (Transolar Games) extended Hero Universe (Hero-U Canon and/or Apocrypha).

Details may include information from Hero-U and Summer Daze, other published sources (pre-QFG & later) including books, comics, documentation and DnD supplements. It may also contain information from unreleased novels (and games), notes, concept materials, and developmental ideas from Quest for Glory outside of the original series canon.

The Production timeline is a timeline of the series release. According to the Cole's development bible the series timeline more or less mirrors the series release dates (see Timeskip timeline, Mordavia History of Events: A Time Line and Tour Guide to the City of Silmaria).

Background[]

During the development of QFG5, Corey Cole stated:

The story has been developing for nearly ten years in the form of Quest for Glory, or the Hero's Quest. It started with a simple request from a dire need; a post on a bulletin board that stated: Hero Wanted. So you want to be a hero?[1]

Sierra released a series timeline that listed the series by release dates.[2]

According to Corey Cole:

Hero-U is designed as the "next generation," so probably takes place 18-20 years after QGV.[3]

He has mentioned that Hero-U takes place approximately some two decades after QFG5[4] on the Isle of Sardonia (he has also said that QFG5 could be around 10 years after QFG1). Corey has also said that Lori has said that Hero-U is about 30 years after QFG1.

Lori says the timeline is that this game takes place about 30 years after So You Want to Be a Hero. (HQ or QG1, your pick).[5]
The general thought on Hero-U is (or at least was at one time) that children of characters from QG5 would go there, which places it about 20 years after QG5. But I don't think we've worked any of that out quite precisely. Lori is better with words than numbers. Still, if her calculations are correct, that would place QG5 about 10 years after Hero's Quest / QG1.[6]

Corey has said they view the series having taken place over a ten-year period which mirrors the development time of the series:

It took us ten years to create the original Quest for Glory series, and in our minds that's how much time passed in the games.
Game time matching real time works well for the way we thought of time passing in the series.

Corey mentions;

Ref the timeline between 4 and 5, while I haven't put much previous thought into it, we could look at it like this - The hero is a trouble-shooter who is called in when and where a hero is needed. After effectively saving the world in QG4, he gets a well-earned rest because there are no world-shaking disasters going on. He probably lives well, helps kittens out of trees, and minor hero stuff like that. The assassination of King Justinian is a major event that suggests even worse things happening. So the hero is pulled out of semi-retirement (or really just non-heroic daily life) to put on the cape again. Or whatever was his costume in QGV. To save Silmaria, and possible the world, because that's what heroes do.
The corollary to, "Never compare your daily life to someone else's highlight reel," is that the hero has a daily life that isn't exciting enough to retell in games. The Quest for Glory games are his highlight reel.
That doesn't mean it's a bad life - It's probably a great one. Just not enough stuff going on that people would want to replay it.

Corey has said in order to maintain production timeline mirroring the in-game time in his head he ignored the reference to three months in QFG3:

As for three months (plus three days) from Quest for Glory II to Quest for Glory III, ok, sure, treat it as you Will. We won't stop you for the simple reason that we don't necessarily remember all those things. And we never actually wrote a timeline when we (mostly Lori) wrote the games. To *us*, that timeline is flexible. If you (any reader of this) choose to lock it in based on hints in the games, sure, fine, go ahead.

The alternative is that the teleportation spell initiated the timeskip to the production date period see Timeskip timeline.

Timeline[]

  • 1981 earth time-Birth of a Hobbit/The Tower of Indomitable Circumstance.
  • 1989 earth time-Hero's Quest, Famous Adventurer's Correspondence School: How to Be a Hero is published.
  • 1990 earth time- Adventures of a "Wanna-Be" Hero is published. Trial by Fire, Famous Adventurer's Correspondence School: Advanced Adventuring Course is published.
  • 1992 earth time- Wages of War, Famous Explorer's Correspondence Course is published. Quest for Glory 1 VGA.
  • 1993 earth time- Shadows of Darkness, HERO: The Journal of General Job Adjusting: Issue IV, and QFG4 hintbook is released.
  • 1994-1995 earth time- QFG4 CD
  • 1996 earth time- Quest for Glory Anthology
  • 1997 earth time— Quest for Glory: Collection Series
  • 1998 earth time- Dragon Fire is published.
  • 2018 earth time- Hero-U: Rogue To Redemption is released.
  • 2023 earth time- Summer Daze: Tilly's Tale (note as a prequel this is outside of the normal rules of the development bibles).

See also[]

References[]

  1. ↑ Corey Cole, FACS Newsletter, April 22, 1998
  2. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20010913052055fw_/http://www.sierrastudios.com/games/qg5/making/timeline/timeline.html
  3. ↑ Email correspondence, April 2023
  4. ↑ Email correspondence, February 2013
  5. ↑ Email correspondence, 2013
  6. ↑ Email Correspondence, September 2018
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