Anderson and Boyarsky would focus on a game set in the universe. Boyarsky expressed the desire to build a game in a new setting, to challenge themselves ." The project began when Boyarsky and Anderson were invited to Seattle to see the latest build of the Source engine. Subsequently, they had discussions with Scott Lynch of Valve about using the Source game engine to create a brand new, groundbreaking first-person RPG. Troika was thus the first external team to be allowed using the Source engine. Activision (who had recently founded a partnership with Valve), suggested them to make a game using the Vampire: The Masquerade setting, for which they had the license. Troika began to research the World of Darkness and the Vampire system before agreeing that it would be a great fit.