Interview: Puzzle Quest, Vicious Cycle's Eric Peterson's 'Holy Grail'

On paper, the genre-bending Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords reads like a madman's manifesto, meshing together elements of classic puzzlers like Bejewelled with those more commonly associated with traditional RPGs for an experience that is anything but traditional. Nonetheless, the game proved to be one of 2007's surprise hits, as it tapped into both the casual and hardcore gaming communities like few games before it. It also helps that in the span of just a few months Puzzle Quest has managed to be ported to nearly every platform under the sun, including the game's most recent incarnation for the Wii.

In the wake of this release, Joystiq got some face time with Eric Peterson, CEO and president at Vicious Cycle Software -- one of Puzzle Quest's two development partners, about this latest release, the series, and which version, to him at least, represents the definitive Puzzle Quest experience (Hint: It's not the Wii version).