Shadowgate is a point-and-click style game of adventure and exploration originally developed by a small team at ICOM Simulations for the Macintosh. This was the third game in their "MACventure series," as the games have been affectionately dubbed. The original lineup consisted of Deva Vu, Unintived, Shadowgate, and Deja Vu 2. All but the Deja Vu sequel were later ported to the NES by Kemco.
The NES versions featured a fresh coat of paint and some tweaks with the interface. Although Deja Vu was the only MACventure title to receive a sequel during the original development, Shadowgate is the one to have persisted. It's received two sequels done without the original team on the TurboGrafix CD and the Nintendo 64, a followup novel in 1991, a board game, and an official sequel from the original creators set to release later this year.
After releasing a remake of the original game in 2014, the renewed passion for the name eventually lead to releasing a VR game. Without this game, we would never have gotten 2024's Beyond Shadowgate...but that's getting ahead of ourselves. Mines of Mythrok features the adventures of an unnamed sorcerer conscripted by a scion of Lakmir to help defeat Talimar. Since this is not Jair, this is a whole separate story in the Shadowgate universe.
That's plenty of intro text, on with the guide!
