10 Unbelievable Inspirations Behind Your Favourite Video Games

Released in 2009, Shadow Complex was a critical and commercial success, acclaimed for its integration of narrative and gameplay. Interesting enough, the game was actually inspired by the work of Orson Scott Card – the novelist renowned for his science-fiction masterworks, including Ender’s Game, Speaker for the Dead, and Shadow Puppets.

In particular, Shadow Complex is set prior to events depicted in the novel, Empire – a work of speculative fiction concerning the possibility of a second American Civil War. In the game, players assume the role of Jason Fleming, an expert infiltrator tasked with preventing the launch of a powerful airship capable of assaulting certain locations across the country.

The events of the game are concluded in Empire, the former serving as a narrative precursor to the large scale devastation inflicted throughout the rest of the novel.

In this case, Shadow Complex was actually part of a collaborative effort to integrate two separate mediums, one informing upon the other.