The MALAZAN computer game that never was

On the Westeros forums, Luke Scull, author of The Grim Company and a full-time video game designer, reports that he once wrote out a proposal for a game adaptation of The Malazan Book of the Fallen.

I also wrote a proposal for a Malazan videogame. Our producer went to Steven Erikson's house to discuss it with him. I think Ian Camerson Esslemont liked it but Erikson wasn't so keen - my design for the game strongly resembled my current project, The Shadow Sun, while Erikson wanted something more akin to a first-person shooter. As you can imagine, it didn't work out, though I did receive a nice signed and personalised Subterranean Press edition of Gardens of the Moon.

Scull states that the head of his company spoke to both Ian Esslemont and Steven Erikson about the game, which would have been an RPG. However, whilst Esslemeont was keen Erikson was not, and apparently preferred a first-person shooter type of approach.

Later on, Scull talks about how he envisages a Malazan game looking:

Of all the current major fantasy series, I'd say Malazan was easily the best fit for an RPG in the style of Baldur's Gate. The whole series is, after all, a high-level homebrew D&D game played out in novel form across multiple continents with hundreds of characters. It would be an easy thing to strip away the standard RPG races and classes and replace them with Malazan-specific variants, then start the protagonist as a lowly squad member in some far-flung corner of the Malazan Empire during the events of the series. Once you introduce warrens into the mix you can even justify having the protagonist flitting in and out of events depicted in the novels. Even the magic system, while unusual and perhaps tricky to adapt at first, would lend itself to some new and potentially interesting system design outside of the standard Vancian/mana-based approach.

For me, Malazan is not so much character or even plot-driven as it is world-driven. I read it because of the setting and Erikson's febrile imagination; stuff that translates perfectly well to game form and would give a Malazan title a massive advantage over the tepid worldbuilding efforts of even companies like Bioware. The complex storytelling of the novels could easily be ignored or strategically touched upon to enhance the protagonist's own story.

With series that are very character-driven, I agree that it is very difficult to separate the game enough from the source material/central narrative to make it worthwhile licensing as a setting. It's the old Dragonlance versus Forgotten Realms dichotomy; outside of the story of the Heroes of the Lance, the former has very little to offer while the latter is, by virtue of being a complete clusterf**k, a wonderful place to set a game in.

(I know Erikson has criticised the Forgotten Realms in the past. I always found that somewhat ironic in the circumstances.)

Interesting stuff, and a shame it never got made.

Look out for a review of The Grim Company shortly.

Blood and Bone by Ian Cameron Esslemont

Jacuruku: an island-continent located south-west of Quon Tali and west of Stratem. Separated from the rest of the world by large ice floes, Jacuruku has long existed in isolation. The peoples of western Jacuruku lie under the dominion of the Thaumaturgs, mages of tremendous power, whilst the eastern half of the continent is dominated by the jungle of Himatan, domain of the goddess Ardata.

Now the Thaumaturgs have launched an invasion of Himatan, determined to find the fabled city of Jakal Viharn. But even as their army drives deep into the jungle, so their homelands come under threat from the desert tribes of the far south, now united into a formidable army by an invading foreigner...who may not be as foreign as he first appears. Also newly arrived in Jacuruku are the Crimson Guard, summoned to bring to justice their renegade warrior Skinner and those sworn to his service. For K'azz D'Avore and his Avowed, this is an opportunity to heal a painful schism...but at a cost.

Blood and Bone is Ian Cameron Esslemont's fifth novel, taking us to the hitherto unexplored (but oft-mentioned) continent of Jacuruku. The setting is the key to the novel, with the reader soon feeling the humidity and discomfort of the jungle terrain. It's actually rather unusual for geography to be so integral to a Malazan novel (normally it's incidental), and it's a new approach that Esslemont handles well.

In terms of character, the book has a substantial cast taking in Jacuruku natives, Thaumaturgs, demigods, Malazan mercenaries and Crimon Guardsmen. Esslemont takes the time to establish story arcs which are contained within this one novel (such as Saeng's journey) as well as furthering long-running storylines established in earlier books, such the Crimson Guard looking for a new purposes in the aftermath of the Quon Civil War. There's also some excellent use of the established backstory (Jacuruku was once the site of Kallor's empire, the one whose destruction resulted in the Fall of the Crippled God) to drive forward the storyline. Unusually for a Malazan novel, I felt I had a pretty good handle on what was going on throughout. Newcomers might be tempted to jump aboard due to the main storylines being more or less self-contained in this book, but will likely be lost by references to past and simultaneous events (the novel takes place simultaneously alongside Stonewielder, Orb Sceptre Throne and The Crippled God).

Esslemont's prose is readable and compelling (and more accomplished in this novel than ever before), but a little lacking in artistry compared to Erikson's. However, it's also far more concise and approachable. Esslemont handles his large cast and his complex, multi-layered plot quite successfully. In fact,  Blood and Bone just about nudges it as his best book to date.

Blood and Bone (****½) is available now in the UK and will be published in May 2013 in the USA.

Updated MALAZAN reading order and map

Updated with info from Orb Sceptre Throne and Blood and Bone:

Following the publication of Blood and Bone, it's now possible to work out a new reading order for the books to best account for the information given by both authors. This list is not the chronological order of the novels, which would likely be very confusing, but a 'best' reading list accounting for publication and chronological orders:

1. Gardens of the Moon
2. Deadhouse Gates
3. Memories of Ice
4. House of Chains
5. Midnight Tides
6. Night of Knives*
7. The Bonehunters
8. Return of the Crimson Guard**
9. Reaper's Gale
10. Toll the Hounds***
11. Stonewielder****
12. Orb Sceptre Throne*****
13. Dust of Dreams
14. The Crippled God
15. Blood and Bone*** ***
16. Assail (forthcoming)

The placement of Forge of Darkness remains difficult. It is so full of references to things already-established in the Malazan series that reading it first is hard to recommend, but it does clarify some elements of the world and terminologies that may be much more helpful to newcomers than jumping straight in with Gardens of the Moon.

The side-novellas form a totally separate side-story. Aside from recommending that they be read after Memories of Ice, they can be read whenever.

* Night of Knives introduces several characters who play a role in The Bonehunters.
** Return of the Crimson Guard picks up shortly after The Bonehunters, whilst Reaper's Gale tells us explicitly that a year has passed since the events of TBH.
*** According to dialogue, Toll the Hounds takes place six years after Memories of Ice. According to every other piece of information in the whole series, this is flat-out impossible, and needs to be ignored. Orb Sceptre Throne retcons it to about two years after MoI. The presence of a child born after MoI who is five years old in TTH also has to be ignored.
**** There is an argument for moving Stonewielder after Orb Sceptre Throne, as it shares a major scene with Blood and Bone viewed from an alternate perspective and thus happens simultaneously. This also puts Toll the Hounds right next to its direct sequel, Orb Sceptre Throne. However, there is a subplot in Stonewielder which takes place before Orb (thanks to the time-bending properties of the Warrens) and continues in it, requiring Stonewielder to be read first.
***** According to dialogue and various events, Orb Sceptre Throne takes place before the conclusion of the Dust of Dreams/Crippled God duology.
*** *** Blood and Bone takes place simultaneously with the events of The Crippled God and immediately thereafter.

Forge of Darkness by Steven Erikson

It is more than a quarter of a million years before the time of the Malazan Empire. In this ancient age, the Tiste race is divided between noble families and bickering militias, trying to find their place in the world following the devastating wars against the Forulkan and the Jheleck. When the Tiste ruler, Mother Dark, takes the obscure Draconus as lover and consort, the noble houses are incensed and the seeds are sowed for civil war and religious conflict.

Forge of Darkness is the first novel in The Kharkanas Trilogy, a prequel series to Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen. This trilogy will chart the splintering of the Tiste race into the three sub-races seen in the main series book (the Andii, the Liosan and the Edur) and explain much of the ancient backstory to the series. Some characters from the main series - such as Anomander Rake, Silchas Ruin, Hood and Gothos - appear here as much younger, far less experienced figures. However, those hoping for I, Anomander Rake will likely feel disappointed. Rake is a central character in the events unfolding and appears a few times, but much of the action takes place around new, much less important characters. Also, while the story is set more than 300,000 years before Gardens of the Moon, this isn't the alpha-point of the entire Malazan universe. Tiste society is many thousands of years old when the story opens and Rake, Mother Dark, Ruin and Draconus are already important characters with significant histories in place.

Instead, the trilogy is much more concerned with clarification of events in the main series books and explaining why certain things are the way they are. Surprisingly, the series addresses questions that I think most fans thought would simply be left as, "That's how it is," such as the nature of the gods in the Malazan world (and the apparent realisation by Erikson that 'gods' was not the right word to use for them), why the different Tiste races have different appearances and why the Jaghut evolved the way they did. Some long-burning questions are indeed addressed, such as the reasons for and the nature of Hood's war on death, but for the most part Erikson is not really concerned with really addressing obvious mysteries (those left wondering what the hell the Azath Houses are will likely not be satisfied by this book, in which even the race they are named after is baffled by them).

Instead, the narrative unfolds on its own terms. As usual, Erikson has a large cast of POV characters including nobles, soldiers, priests and mages, many of them with slightly cumbersome names. However, Erikson strives to differentiate his characters more from one another then in previous novels. Forge of Darkness enjoys a shorter page-length than most of his prior books (clocking in at a third less the size of most of the Malazan novels) and is far more focused. The plot is a slow-burner, divided into several relatively straightforward narratives. This is Erikson at his most approachable, easing the reader into the situation and story rather than dropping them in the middle of chaos and expecting them to get on with it (such as in the first novel in the main series, Gardens of the Moon).

Of course, Erikson isn't going to give the reader an easy ride. Minor peasants continue to agonisingly philosophise over the nature of existence with surprisingly developed vocabularies at the drop of a hat. There are too many moments when characters look knowingly at one another and speak around subjects so as not to spoil major revelations for the reader, regardless of how plausible this is. There is an awful lot of hand-wringing rather than getting on with business. But there's also a few shocking reversals, some tragic moments of genuine emotional power and some revelations that will have long-standing Malazan fans stroking their chins and going, "Ah-ha!"

Forge of Darkness (****) is Erikson's attempt to channel the in-depth thematic approach of Toll the Hounds but weld it to a more dynamic (by his terms) plot-driven narrative whilst also satisfying the fans' thirst for more information and revelations about his world and characters. It's a juggling act he pulls off with impressive skill, with some polished prose and haunting moments. But those who continue to find his reliance on philosophical asides and long-winded conversations tiresome will likely not be convinced by this book. The novel is available now in the UK and USA.

Cover art for BLOOD AND BONE by Ian C. Esslemont

Here's the UK cover art for Ian Cameron Esslemont's Blood and Bone, his forthcoming fifth Malazan novel.

The novel is due for release in November this year. Barring last minute delays, that will make for three Malazan novels in one year (following Esslemont's Orb, Sceptre, Throne in January and Erikson's Forge of Darkness this month).