Shadowbane was a free-to-play fantasy role-playing video game (MMORPG) created by Wolfpack Studios and published on March 25, 2003 by Ubisoft for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X platforms.

Originally commercial and subscription-driven, Shadowbane was launched in March 2003, and was the creation of text-MUD veterans J. Todd Coleman, James Nance, Josef Hall, Patrick Blanton and Robert Marsa and a team of 45 programmers, designers and artists.

Second, it was the first major MMO to offer dynamic world content as a primary feature of the game.

After the sale of Wolfpack Studios to Ubisoft in March 2004, the live service was transitioned to a new management and (largely new) development team, led by Frank Lucero and Ala Diaz.

This team later splintered off to become Stray Bullet Games in June 2006, and Mark Nuasha was brought in to run the organization.

[1] All servers were closed on March 19, 2008 to prepare for the "Shadowbane Reboot", a relaunch of the game to capitalize on stability and performance gains hindered by previously existing data.

On March 25, the fifth anniversary of the game's launch, two servers were brought online followed by a third due to overpopulation.

Gameplay featured many aspects typical of role-playing video games, such as experience points, character classes, and fantasy races.

Though there were no quests in the game, Shadowbane featured PvP, Nation, and Siege Warfare systems, which offered players a wide range of in-game opportunities.