INSTANT EXPERT
Initially, Mike Verdu handled business and finance with Bob Bates taking care of development and production. Their roles blurred significantly as time progressed.
Steve Meretzky wrote four games for Legend: Spellcasting 101, Spellcasting 20, Spellcasting 301, and Rpg-adventure mash-up The Superhero League Of Hoboken.
Many of Legend’s games were based on popular sci-fi and fantasy books.
■ Shannara was not based on any particular novel by Terry Brooks but instead was in fact a brand-new tale. It features combat and other RPG elements.
With the advent of CD-ROM, some of Legend’s earlier games such as Gateway II and Eric The Unready were rescanned and rebuilt for a CD release.
■ Sci-fi adventure Mission Critical featured actors Michael Dorn and Patricia Charbonneau.
Legend developed Star Control 3 after its original developers backed out.
■ Despite its text adventure development focus, multiplayer Doom and Duke Nukem 3D were staples around the Legend offices.
According to Mark Poesch, the constant evolution of the Unreal engine strangled the team’s productivity on Unreal II. Unreal Championship got the nod for release first as a result of that.
■ As Legend was closed by Infogrames, the team was working on its next game called Project X. Development never got much beyond proof-of-concept and early game design.