Rise of Legends Interview

GNPC: Even though the game world is original, the factions seem to be drawn from the real world. Can you discuss the inspiration behind groups like the Vinci or the Alim? How have you adapted them to fit the game?
Tim Train: Not so much drawn from the "real" world in the ripped-from-the-headlines kind of a sense, but rather the concepts for each nation were inspired by "legends," if you will, that come from around the world. The Alim nation, for example, was inspired by the stories of the Arabian Nights, and includes Genies, Afreets, desert magic, glass citadels, and hidden treasures. Leonardo da Vinci's drawings of course inspired our Vinci nation, and we added "steampunk" and Miyazaki-style elements to create an wondrously-advanced-yet-strangely-backward technological nation. In neither case have we really tried to stay true to our starting material in terms of accepting a lot of constraints from it - rather we've been inspired by each legend as a starting point or touchstone and then taken it in a creative fantasy direction.