QuestArchives was born from necessity. In late 2014, when the acclaimed Montreal studio
Nebula Interactive announced its closure after 22 years of creating groundbreaking adventure games, there was
no systematic effort to preserve their development materials. Dr. Eleanor Marsh, then a game studies professor
at the University of Ottawa, recognized that a significant piece of Canadian cultural history was at risk of
being lost forever.
Together with digital preservationist Thomas Chen and game historian Martin LaFleur, Dr.
Marsh secured a small grant to acquire and digitize Nebula's archives. The trio established a makeshift
preservation lab in a converted warehouse in Ottawa's Hintonburg neighborhood, working nights and weekends to
catalog thousands of design documents, map sketches, and early builds of unreleased games.
Word spread quickly through the Canadian game development community, and soon other studios
began donating their historical materials. By 2017, QuestArchives had received official recognition from the
Canadian Museum of History as an important cultural preservation initiative. In 2019, we moved to our current
location in downtown Ottawa, where our team of dedicated archivists, researchers, and digital preservation
specialists continues the vital work of documenting Canada's unique contributions to adventure gaming.
Today, QuestArchives houses over 75,000 digital artifacts, maintains relationships with
more than 200 current and former game developers, and provides research access to scholars, game creators, and
cultural institutions worldwide. Our mission has expanded to include public exhibitions, educational programs,
and specialized preservation technologies to ensure that the artistic and technical innovations of Canadian
game developers are accessible to future generations.
