Legacy of Ykesha Developers Diary

This was sent to us by Sony. EverQuest®: The Legacy of Ykesha™ Developer's Diary: Innoruuk's Idol Over the weeks until we launch The Legacy of Ykesha (LoY), we will be presenting these diaries to try to give some insight into what happens during the creation of an EverQuest expansion or extension. One of the most interesting things about any EverQuest zone is the way it feels, the atmosphere of the place. Travel through Neriak, especially if you’re not very welcome there, and you get a sense of the evil that lives there. The Plane of Innovation feels very… oily, rusty and mechanical. Each zone has a very distinct feel to it. There are several tools that designers and artists use to give zones their feel. Lighting, textures, buildings, and obviously the NPCs. But it’s not uncommon for us to forget how important the artifacts and objects in a zone are, everything from the huge statue of Firiona Vie in Kunark to the hangman’s noose in the Plane of Justice. Artists and designers work together to determine what a zone will look like, how it should feel and what sort of objects it should contain. The Legacy of Ykesha called for trolls that live a sea-faring, nomadic life influenced heavily by the power of Innoruuk, god of Hate. These trolls have been isolated for a long time, and they have certainly formed their own ways of thinking about their worship of Innoruuk. The team decided that having an idol of sorts, a representation of the melding of Hate and the life of ocean-bound trolls, would help to show just how different these creatures were. We asked Ronnie Ashlock, the artist that built the idol, to talk about how he built it.
As the art team began working on the city of Dulak, I had discussions with Shawn Lord, Lead Designer for LoY. He saw the idols in the city as very dark and other-worldly, like something from a Lovecraft story. This was a great visual cue, and I began to envision the idols as some massive construct of tentacles and chitin. This is one of the concept drawings that came out of our discussions. Innoruuk’s Idol Concept Art The sketch was a great starting point, but I suspected it would be unworkable as a 3D concept. This hunch proved true as I took my first pass at constructing it for the final game. I made the outer shell of the model resemble the outer shell of the sketch as close as possible. But that was indeed unworkable. So taking great liberty with the sketch, I fashioned a proper nautilus shell by lofting a spiral. I then created the tentacles out of other lofted splines, taking careful considerations of the polygon count limits needed to make the model usable in-game. Wireframe Mesh of the Idol After the mesh was done to my satisfaction, I began to texture it. I wanted to suggest an amphibian and evil look to the idol. Shawn said he wanted people to feel that something just wasn't right about the place; something sinister and disturbing. So I took ordinary family photos of babies crying and manipulated them into the screaming faces seen on the pedestal. I daresay I think I was pretty successful in making people uncomfortable. Texture for the base of the Idol Final version Click here to see an avi movie of the Idol

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Tourist at heart
# Feb 21 2003 at 3:27 AM Rating: Decent
At times, when I grow bored of the same old Grind, I will go for a walk and go places I don't normally go. Would you believe, I played for 2 years before finding the waterfalls in East Karana. I still try to visit other lands. Luclin I find a odd and unsettling place to visit. But it is fun to go places I have never been before. Many are the lands in Velious that I have yet to go to.
The work in Everquest is truely a work of art by any standard.
As to the new zones.... cold chills all the way down.
I wonder !
# Feb 21 2003 at 1:25 AM Rating: Good
Sometimes I really wonder how much people really know what it takes to make EQ ? Wanna See ?
Income approx 5 million a month
Outgo almost 89% with a MAJOR R&D department
Most of the newest Technology in PC graphics and sound have come from Sony.
It takes nearly 2500 computers to run EverQuest :)
Research and Developement is HUGE and expensive, all to let us play a game :) but the rewards far exceed the mere game. Medical imaging and Entertainment aare big winners too.
So think about it Fix Bugs or make new zones?

Why Not both? Fixing bugs will never end, and will always be a major thorn for both Sony and us.
New zones and characters will always be a major thrill for both Sony and Us.
Let em work people, let em work .

Thank you Sony for so much fun and excitement.
Keep up the Good Work !!

Voideran KnightAngel
ShadowKnight of 40 seasons
Lanys
Fix before new
# Feb 21 2003 at 12:41 AM Rating: Default
Yes, I agree that VI should concentrate on fixing bugs rather than churning expansions/new zones etc. But of course the latter is the easier way of making $$$$ ;-)
#Anonymous, Posted: Feb 21 2003 at 3:48 AM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) VI no longer exists, it is JUST sony entertainment now. Just FYI...
RE: Fix before new
# Feb 21 2003 at 12:51 AM Rating: Default
I know I wish I had nothing but a bug free Old World to play in. Such an intelligent and well thought post :)
Hmm...
# Feb 21 2003 at 12:09 AM Rating: Default
Hmm... Apparently they aren't as much of mindless drones as we may have thought =)
Well
# Feb 20 2003 at 11:44 PM Rating: Default
Was great but where is the rest? That's too damn short.
#Anonymous, Posted: Feb 20 2003 at 11:38 PM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) H.P. Lovecraft was perhaps the most sinister novelist and shortstory author that ever lived.He was the greatest influence on Stephen King and Dean Koonze,to name 2 that I am sure of,not to mention numerous others.U will feel the cold,icy fingers of death creep into your mind as u read his work.CHECK into it,if u have ANY love of horror,or just plain good writing.
RE: Lovecraft
# Feb 20 2003 at 11:49 PM Rating: Default
Lovecraft was a mere amateur compared to Poe. Read "The Pit and the Pendulum" and tell me you don't agree.
RE: Lovecraft
# Feb 21 2003 at 1:01 AM Rating: Excellent
-REDACTED-
6 posts
Apples and Oranges. Poe and Lovecraft wrote about two very different things. Poe was about the terror in a human being's mind concerning actions in this world. Murder and guilt in The Tell-Tale Heart, murder and rage in the Cask of Amontillado, the shadow of grief in The Raven, the terror of imminent doom in the Pit and the Pendulum, etc. Lovecraft was about things otherworldly. His universe worked under the premise that humans were far from the only creatures in the universe, that there were beings far more powerful than us lurking about everywhere. The knowledge of the things Mankind was never meant to know, and the knowledge of just how insignificant and helpless we human beings are drove his characters mad. Lovecraft was about things so alien, so sinister, so twisted, and so powerful that even talking about such things would shake one's foundation of reality. If a human being were to have a glimpse of the universe somehow... see EVERYTHING and realize how tiny and insignificant human beings are in the Grand Scheme of Things, I'm willing to wager that person would instantly go insane. THAT'S the sort of thing that Lovecraft wrote about. Personally, I find it easier to find chills in Lovecraftian stories because it COULD be true. That's the point. We don't know. And if we did know, we wouldn't be able to handle it. Poe's stories could be true, as well, but it's still something that happened to someone else. While TCoAmontillado may touch on my claustrophobia and the sheer terror of being buried alive, I still doubt that will happen to me. Likewise, I don't see myself murdering someone and hiding the heart underneath my floorboards. But Lovecraft's beings COULD be in every dark corner. There are so many unexplained things in this world, and to think of the types of things that Lovecraft wrote about being responsible for those unexplained things... the mind can produce its own terror left to its own devices.

So, they are both powerful, creepy authors, but they wrote about two very different things, and they are, in my opinion, impossible to compare, like trying to compare Everquest to Unreal Tournament 2K3. Both can give you a rush, but how they achieve it is very different.

/analysis off

I also noted that the picture had a very Cthulu-esque feel to it. I'm excited about this expansion, and impressed with the designers' efforts.

Fritoe Banditoe
37 Beastlord
Rodcet Nife
RE: Lovecraft
# Feb 23 2003 at 12:34 AM Rating: Decent
Fritoe I really enjoyed your take on Poe and Lovecraft.
Tell me do you consider King and Rice to be the Poe and Lovecraft of our lifetime..and how do you think they compare to Poe and Lovecraft ?


Dr. No
RE: Lovecraft
# Feb 21 2003 at 12:00 PM Rating: Default
I want to know how a discusion of books started in an EQ post. I guess MMOG players are a little more inteligent to FPSers.

Doogly
Druid
29 lvls young
Sryn
Etherial Sisterhood
RE: Lovecraft
# Feb 21 2003 at 6:49 AM Rating: Default
What Mebashin said :)
Very well articulated analysis of the two authors relative styles yumme. I applaud you as well as the EQ teams. Hurrah! If only more posters spent as much time and obvious effort in conveying their ideas and opinions...what a place this would be! Thank you Yumme and thank you everyone that works on the EQ world for all of us players.
Sincerely,
Krellvev Starfire
RE: Lovecraft
# Feb 21 2003 at 4:15 AM Rating: Decent
gee, thanks, now I'm scared to ever post a thread again until I finish a Doctorates in Comparative English Liturature.

Very well thought out and expressed.
/applaud
#Anonymous, Posted: Feb 20 2003 at 9:50 PM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) Bleh, what am I going to do now, heh ! !
#Anonymous, Posted: Feb 20 2003 at 9:50 PM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) Bleh, what am i going to do now, heh ! !
#Anonymous, Posted: Feb 20 2003 at 7:01 PM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post)
#Anonymous, Posted: Feb 20 2003 at 7:58 PM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) Hey Hey!! Its a "Amygdalan" Head from Plain of Fear.... I hope Legacy of Ykesha will have some upside-down Gnoll heads on ****** too.
Proceeding
# Feb 20 2003 at 1:26 PM Rating: Default
I essentially like how the game, in terms of graphics and things like this have been proceeding since the earliest days of the game. Personnally, i started playing around Kunark, and have seen the game evolve into a point where the devs and artists are taking much more time it seems to do things like make places have a feel to it. Places like the simple cities of Freeport or the plains i guess are a bit more simple, but now from the Planes onward, and back into certain zones in Luclin, it has become much more pleasing to the eye, and just fun to look at all the artwork and time put into the game. Perhaps I'm being too hypercritical of them, there doesn't seem to be many people that through and through agree with everything VI does. But I definately think they've created a game that no other comes near, and never will I think. You can list off numerous MMORPGs, and none of them are as original or as fun, or socially interactive as EverQuest. DaoC, is a copy, it tried to emulate EQ, and was so blatently bvious about it, I'll never try to play it. Even some of the keys they use are the same. UO I played for awhile back in the day, and that was fun, they came out about the same time. But it isn't anything near EQ, and the entire game was destroyed I think, by what the GMs did. If you ever played it, rather, if you played it for a long time, you know what I mean. Now with the Devs showing how the game was created, LoY I mean, it adds a whole new aspect of seeing what they think and how they made just quirky stuff in the game.

Just my ideas, flame or whatever as you will.
RE: Proceeding
# Feb 20 2003 at 8:51 PM Rating: Decent
I totally agree with you. So many people take so much time to complain and whine about the little things that go wrong, that they don't appreciate all the hard work that goes into this game.

People complain that the GMs don't seem to care. Well, when you have as many things to do as they, you might understand why they get frustrated when people petition them because they can't find their corpse.

These people bend over backwards day in and day out to make this game run, let alone be enjoyable.

I think if more people stopped complaining, and started appreciating, the entire game would be more enjoyable for everyone.
#Anonymous, Posted: Feb 20 2003 at 10:42 PM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) gm work??give me a break....i was being harrassed by a player who was ks my camp actually 3 players i could not play i filed a report, a pettition with 4 gms on at time including an admin..after 20 min NOTHING..i telled the admin gm told him my prob...he told me to file a report i told him i did he LOGGED off or went invis....i have petitions that i made months ago NO reply.....ive lost xp and eq NO reply.....and when they do reply its well sorry we can't do ANYTHING an leave....
RE: Proceeding
# Feb 22 2003 at 4:01 AM Rating: Default
<quote>like right now i am getting MORE patches for LOY and i don't HAVE loy.for the past week i have NOT been able to play because EVERYTIME i try i get a STUPID LOY patch that takes 2 hrs on 56k modem.....I DID NOT WANT LOY yet i am having it shoved down my throat..</quote>

Um.. ya know there is an option to NOT download the ykesha files..

Simply hit cancel when your patcher starts up and hit that simple advanced button. and UNCHECK the box that says legacy of ykesha. Nope you dont HAVE to download it.
RE: Proceeding
# Feb 20 2003 at 10:30 PM Rating: Default
I have to agree with you on the point that alot of detail is put into every zone but after the 2 doller increase in monthly fees which obviously paid for the developement of this when theres still increadably fun quests and zones that are bugged and have been bugged since luclin came out. Hollowshade Moors war quest was one of the best quests i ever did and had fun doing it and that was while it was 66 % bugged. Now its 100 % bugged and for the kitties to work on there epics trhey have to HAVE to have a GM reset the zone which usually takes 3 to 7 days unless patch comes up. VI really needs to put more focus on fixing broken stuff then bringing in new stuff that a portion of will be bugged. Just my 2cp.

Shalanaa 61 SK torv
#Anonymous, Posted: Feb 20 2003 at 7:44 PM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) "DaoC, is a copy, it tried to emulate EQ, and was so blatently bvious about it, I'll never try to play it. Even some of the keys they use are the same."
Lovecraft
# Feb 20 2003 at 1:11 PM Rating: Default
This is quite exciting to read about since I am an avid Lovecraft fan. So many times I've tried to form my own images from his words, but to actually see them put into graphical form is going to be wonderful to watch. To those of you who are not familiar with H.P. Lovecraft and his stories, do yourself a great justice and go read his stories. If he truly had the dreams he wrote about, he must have been quite a unique man.
Lovecraft-esque
# Feb 20 2003 at 12:55 PM Rating: Default
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115 posts
Anyone else notice how Cthulu-like this paticular idol looks?

Very interesting article.
RE: Lovecraft-esque
# Feb 21 2003 at 6:27 AM Rating: Default
Exactly my thought as soon as I saw the image the first time. I wish that the final version had remained truer to the concept art - the sense of evil and menace has completely gone

Tantala Gmagissima,
58 Mage of Xev
RE: Lovecraft-esque
# Feb 20 2003 at 8:14 PM Rating: Default
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59 posts
absolutley...I thought so the first day this image showed up on the start-up screen. The finished version seems to have lost some of that.

Good article...
RE: Lovecraft-esque
# Feb 21 2003 at 2:30 AM Rating: Default
hehe , same here ... the 1st day they put this pic on the patcher I was like 'uhh ? why did they put here a pic based on Lovecraft books ?'.
Now I understand why it was so close : sea and dark feelings are basics in both cases. I also feel the final version lost a lot of the feeling the sketch offered.
One of the reason may be here again Lovecraft-related : we are much more affraid by things that looks massive and seems to have no definite shape (doesn't the sketch looks like a bunch of ugly gelatineous things that could easily moves and tries to attack you as you come closer to it).
The ending version have an aspect closer to what would really be an idol, with the pedestal....


Sylviania Delaforet
58 Ranger of Tunare, the Mother Of All
RE: Lovecraft-esque
# Feb 21 2003 at 5:26 AM Rating: Default
Looking at the original sketch... the eye spirals outwards into a mass of tentacles... making me think that the eye is sitting in the centre of a mass of rubbery, slimy arms...

By changing it to a Nautilus shell (which is, by the way, the WRONG WAY UP!) they've taken that element of movement away and made it static and shell-like... not nearly so animate to look at.


I do like the crying baby texture, tho... I think that's a nice trick the way it's been further distorted by stretching its' width, giving it an even more 'tortured' expression.
#Anonymous, Posted: Feb 20 2003 at 9:39 AM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) That was fascinating. It might be a lot of hard work, but I think they had fun with it. =P Personally I'd go planning if I actually got to choose a stage, that's the fun part. =P
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