I started getting into Computer RPG about the time "The Bard's Tale" came out. It was made by "Interplay Productions". It is a great game forged in a time where 16-colors was a luxury, so the game-play and story really needed to carry it more so than too many games do today.

I stuck with most of Interplay's other titles and eventually one came along that really stuck with me, which is really what I am posting about. The game was Wasteland. This was a post-nuclear war RPG that really reminds me of Shadowrun. You had attributes (yeah Luck was in there), individual skills (with SR-like ratings not %), Skill points, Cool weapons (AK-97 anyone?) to name a few similarities. It was really ahead of it's time, much like "The Bard's Tale" was.

Another game to spin out of Interplay was "Neuromancer" based on William Gibson's Novel of the same name. It really helped bring Cyberspace onto my computer and become a "decker". On some level, I see alot of Neuromancer's (the game) Cyberspace elements inline with Shadowrun. it was to the Matrix, what Wasteland had in common with the Physical elements of Shadowrun.

The next Interplay/ECA product that really reminded me heavily of Shadowrun was "Fallout". This had all of the coolness of Wasteland and hi-rez SVGA graphics of it's day. A quality game, that (as I asked above) was based on some type of Pencil & Paper RPG.

At some point, I seem to remember making the connection of some of the Interplay folks (Electronic Arts too) made a leap over to FASA and they started working on products like BattleTech. Some of the names I remember where: Brian Fargo, Micheal Stackpole, ...Although not an SR-like game, it definitely was popular in it's day.

So my question is this: Does anyone know for sure if there is any direct relation between Interplay, Electonic Arts, FASA? Or more generally, did SR get its roots back in "Wasteland" or am I just dreaming?