QfG timeline and/or plotholes?

[KatieHal]

I'm curious--just how borked IS the timeline for QfG? I've only played QfG4, never beat it, but watched LPs of the first four games all the way through. Didn't pay much attention to timelines, but I don't recall much of that being mentioned in the games either.

[Jafar]

Is it borked at all? I don't remember any weird time related plotholes.

[oberonqa]

There really isn't any timeline borking in QFG... at least none that I can remember.

[spoiler]You start out as a graduate of the Famous Adventurer's Correspondence School and in the land of Spielburg.  You do all sorts of heroic things which culminate in saving the valley... at which point you are named the Hero of Spielburg.  You then depart Spielburg with the Katta's and Merchant to head to Shapier.  After doing all sorts of heroic things which culminate in saving the desert, you are named Prince of Shapier.  Then you head to Tarna with Rakeesh, Uhura and Simba.... do all sorts of heroic things which culminates in saving Tarna from war and a demonic invasion and are magically wisked to Mordavia.  Rinse and repeat with the heroic things which result in saving Mordavia from the Old One being resurrected and then it's off to Silmaria where you do even MORE heroic things which ends up with you saving Silmaria and becoming the King of Silmaria.[/spoiler]

Actually as far as storylines go.... it's pretty straightforward and doesn't take too many turns off the beaten trail.  It doesn't even try to retcon much of the earlier material (something for which I think the Coles should be congradulated for.... as there's a lot of character-centric story beats throughout the series... and it's all dealt with and kept firmly in line... even when it comes to bringing characters back from the dead).

[Baggins]

Basically there are two timelines, there is one that was written by the Coles and published in Shadows of Darkness hintbook which basically places the games over the course of about a three-four year period and there is another implied in QFG4, which implies the games take place over the course of one year. The Coles wrote all or most of the diologue in the game as well.

Beyond that there are some bits that state that Katrina moved into Mordavia about four-five years before QFG4, and other bits in QFGV and lines in QFG4 itself that states that she moved into mordavia a couple of decades before QFG4.

Back to QFG1, there are some inconsistencies which basically state that Elsa was kidnapped by Baba Yaga either when she was 8 or when she was 9. So it places a few of the references to events out of whack. In one case basically she was kidnapped when she was 8 , but she was still at the castle when she was nine and had an encounter with the Weapon's master who refused to teach her. So basically, events are out of order from a chronological standpoint (or rational order of events).

http://questforglory.wikia.com/wiki/Quest_for_Glory_Timeline

http://questforglory.wikia.com/wiki/Tetralogy_timeline

[KatieHal]

I didn't think so either, but some people were mentioning timeline and/or plotholes in the QfG story. Hm...maybe I'll adjust my thread's title accordingly.

[Baggins]

I've given links to the timelines, there are issues with the timeline (basically involving alternate or inconsistent dates given by the designers for the same event, and the order of events for certain back stories). But not really any plotholes that I can think of.

There were also a few things that got changed and retconned as the games progressed. For example originally the Fairy Folk (Erana, Zara et al.) came from the west of Spielburg, but later as the games progressed, their homeland was set far to the east of Spielburg in Mordavia.

Silmaria was said to be the capital of the island kingdom of Mariana (QFG3), but in QFG5 it said Silmaria is the capital of the kingdom of Silmaria.

Most people never notice these changes/retcons to the backstories and universe. You'd have to be paying attention to ingame diologue throughout the series. I only came accross them because I was creating articles for the Quest for Glory Omnipedia, and discovered when I compared things not everything matched up exactly.

[crayauchtin]

Well, uhm, according to one timeline (the more well-known one that I think most fans agree with) all five games occur within one year.
That being said, in QfG2 all of the Katta tell you that the Katta were driven from Rasier the year before. In QfG5 Marrak -- a Katta, tells you all his people were forced out of Rasier "several years ago". But if it's the same year... at most it could be two years ago depending when in the year they were forced out.

Oh, and don't get me started on the fourth one. Just one example: Anna is supposed to have disappeared for about 15 years and the Dark Master is supposed to have moved into Castle Borgov four years prior to the start of the game -- and yet, Anna remembers strangers moving into the castle just before her death -- eleven years before strangers moved into the castle. Like, that's all in the same game!

Some links for ya:
-http://questforglory.wikia.com/wiki/Official_Quest_for_Glory_Timeline <-- this is the "official timeline" as best as we can figure, but the discussion page is worth the price of admission as it shows all of the contributors slowly realizing how we have no idea when almost anything happened.
-http://questforglory.wikia.com/wiki/Mordavia_History_of_Events:_A_Time_Line <- this is the timeline that was published with QfG4... notice there are no dates! (Also, you may notice that the last boyar's name is different in pretty much all of the source material and never appears in the game at all. )
-http://questforglory.wikia.com/wiki/Tetralogy_timeline <-- this is the "single year" timeline which goes along with the tetralogy concept that QfG3 screwed up.

In other words, it's TOTALLY borked. Completely and utterly borkified.


EDIT: Baggins beat me to the punch!

[Baggins]

Ya, in QFG5, Katrina states specifically she moved into Mordavia decades ago. Which actually supports Anna's story.

You should but also read the Mordavia: A Time Line of Events, thanks Cray. It was written by the Coles, it's basically the one that places QFG1-2 possibly 3, 2-3 years before QFG4 (when the dates mentioned in QFG4 are placed on top of it).

The crazy part is the Coles wrote both the Mordavia timeline and the dialogue in QFG4, and the manual for QFG4. There are several inconsistencies, among them is the Boyar's name. There is even several lines in QFG4 from Dr. Cranium that support the Tretralogy timeline.

So the question becomes, are the Coles schizophrenic?

WE won't even go into there reinvisioned version of the Gloriana universe in the non-Sierra sources... :p One only needs to look at the two versions of Marete... or how it ignores aspects of QFG5 storyline, for example all the women could be saved from Hades.

Of course Sierra's version of equivalent to England, Isle of Gramarye vs. the non-sierra version of Albion...

We basically treat only the game's and Sierra material as "official" and the Cole's new non-official (as in not owned by Activision), non-Quest for Glory version of Gloriana as basically alternative universe... I can assure you this is not meant to be an attack on the fans nor the Coles... its primarily the nature of the fact that its the Quest for Glory Omnipedia... and mainly concerns the heyday of the series, its series primary owners (Sierra/Activision), and said games as primary sources.

"several years ago".

Ya the problem with the word "several" is it is generally agreed up on in linguistics to mean more than three-four but less than "many":p...

On a related note the money changer in QFG3 states almost the same thing, implying its been several years since he too was forced to move out of Raseir :p....

(Posted on: July 20, 2010, 05:15:41 PM)

As far as Sierra timelines, Police Quest probably has the most borked of all... It basically reset itself every game in some fashion...

[crayauchtin]

for example all the women could be saved from Hades.

I have a sudden vision of Silmaria being overrun with all kinds of deceased women. BOTH the women were saved in the alternate version!

We basically treat only the game's and Sierra material as "official" and the Cole's new non-official (as in not owned by Activision), non-Quest for Glory version of Gloriana as basically alternative universe...

We have to! It cuts down on the inconsistencies.... note: "cuts down on" not "eliminates"

I can't comment on Police Quest, I never got into it for whatever reason. I'll admit to enjoying high fantasy a lot more than most other genres, probably part of the reason for that, but really.... I think the main character should have been named Graham. I don't see a problem in all of the Quest series having the same name for their main character.

[Baggins]

Well, Cray, I recommend hop over the police quest omnipedia, and look up the timeline. The big issue is Sonny Bond's birthdate is different in each game, as is Marie Bonds, as is Jessie Bains birthday (they are the big mains in the original series, the hero, his girl, and the villain). Then when the remake came out for PQ1, it set the date 1 year after PQ3 (and at least one character that appears in PQ2 sex was changed, age changed, and name changed). So not even PQ2 or 3 works with the remake... Then when you move onto Open Season and Swat games which make use of Sonny Bonds and/or Marie Bonds in some form, its difficult to tell if they are following the original trilogy timeline, or some warped version taking place after PQ1 remake.

I generally consider the original trilogy the "canon" since it makes a little better sense chronologically, and is version the Official Book of Police Quest novelizes (the remake is treated as a kind of novelty). Besides that character that switches sex between the games, and the whole fact that PQ1 remake takes place after PQ2 and PQ3 chronologically is a huge issue.

[KatieHal]

LOL, I think schizophrenic might be an exaggeration.

When I was playing QfG4, I always assumed that the castle inhabitants pulled the same trick vampires in just about every story pull--fake their death, then pretend to be new people altogether and move in again. Which would account for both them being there for decades and also for only a few years.

[Baggins]

What I mean by schizophrenic is some of it may be purely from Lori Cole and some of it from Corey Cole as we have seen on various boards, they don't always know what one person has written over the other. Generally speaking Lori was the primary writer of the entire series (and Corey doesn't always remember what she wrote specifically).

Shadows is one of the few he actually took a large hand in writing. So that may explain why there is discrepencies in character names for the Boyar. It's also possible they each wrote bits that were included timeline and the manual, and the game,and didn't check to see if every thing fit together. ...or even changed there ideas as they went, some of the older details made it into one of the sources and was published before they could change fix it (or they forgot to fix it before it was published). They mention having written something like 900,000 pages of text for four sources combined (including the phone hint line).

When I was playing QfG4, I always assumed that the castle inhabitants pulled the same trick vampires in just about every story pull--fake their death, then pretend to be new people altogether and move in again. Which would account for both them being there for decades and also for only a few years.

This is more or less my theory as well, except it doesn't quite fit in that some of the dialogue states that they were the same individuals, the "Dark Master", who Anna knows moved in some time before 15 years ago.

From ingame perspective this is not an issue as Dark Master and Katrina are often thought as seperate individuals, or Katrina acts like she isn't other said individual to trick you.

The main problem comes from the Coles character biographies in the Shadows of Darkness Hintbook, where they state from an omnicient perspective that Katrina/Master moved into the castle "five years ago". People already know the master had moved in. I think its possible though that most from Anna's time that knew the Master had moved in 20 years ago, have since died (the game actually talks about many of the towns people dieing over the years since the darkness), and those still around now never heard the original gossip. They have developed new gossip, about new strangers moving in in the last four years. Actually, when that date is added to the Mordavian timeline of events it more or less hits upon the time that Ad Avis came to the castle after dieing in QFG2.
http://questforglory.wikia.com/wiki/Who%27s_Who_in_Mordavia

That being said Katrina probably doesn't spend her entire time at the castle, and has proble moved in and out at times, which may also explain the specific detail that she moved into the castle "five years ago".

[crayauchtin]

I agree with that last bit, Baggins. As I said on the Wiki, my personal solution to this inconsistency is that Katrina and her cohorts clearly travel (with the exception of Tanya and Toby, who fortunately have no timeline inconsistencies that I can recall). It's entirely possible that they have moved into Castle Borgov more than once.

[Baggins]

No idea about Toby, but Tanya was kidnapped what wasa it two years before the game?

[crayauchtin]

That's what we have in the timeline anyways.

[Baggins]

Well, I think I added the citations from the game, stated by her parents.