Shadow of the Eternals will show people the “real” Denis Dyack

When Precursor Games announced Shadow of the Eternals, the spiritual sequel to Silicon Knights' Eternal Darkness, the studio also revealed that it had hired Silicon Knights founder Denis Dyack as its chief creative officer. Dyack has been under fire due to a few high-profile failures, including X-Men Destiny and Too Human, and the company's legal battle against Epic Games over the use of Unreal Engine 3. That case ended in Silicon Knights being liable for $4.45 million in damages, with what's left of the studio attempting to appeal that ruling.

In a Reddit Ask Me Anything, Precursor chief operating officer Shawn Jackson defended the studio's decision to bring Dyack on board over the course of several answers.

"We hired him because he's a valuable asset to the team. We intend to show people the real Denis Dyack through his interactions on the forums and videos. Denis has made many successful games and ran independent studio for over 20 years," Jackson wrote. "We didn't anticipate a backlash because we actually know Denis as the person he is. We believe in Denis and with him focusing on creative, he is excelling at something that he loves."

Jackson also stated that it was unlikely that Shadows of the Eternals would be finished if the crowdfunding drive failed to reach its $1.35 million goal.

"Since we do not have any other source of funding, it is unlikely," Jackson wrote in reply to a question about the game's continuing development in the event of the Kickstarter's failure.

"If the project does not reach it's goal on Kickstarter, we will refund all pledges made through PayPal on our own site," wrote Jackson. "We will entertain all options to make this game a reality because we believe in this project. However, we can't be sure a publisher will share our vision for interacting with the community during development or this would work in the traditional model."