"They're a meditative people. They're communal, not individualistic, and they’d create symbolic art--pattern-based and preferably monochromatic to contrast with their amazingly colorful skin."
“For skin colors and patterns, poison dart frogs as a starting point. Something that jumps against the background of the planet. These people don’t blend or quite belong on their world.”
"The Gormak are running down a tech path unseen in the galaxy. It's important that we see the ship that they're creating and it jumps out as foreign, wrong for Star Wars™. Anything we see that is Gormak should be slick, impressive and create a sense of wrongness in Players."
"The Voss must at all times feel isolated. Voss-Ka is high above the rest of the planet but it's an island in a sea of Gormak. Every other outpost is overrun or threatened. The Republic and Empire see the Voss as standing on the roof of their last building in a losing war but the Voss never reach out for help. They are not looking to be rescued."
Welcome to the amazing job of creating worlds. Above are some of the notes I made before discussing Voss with our gifted concept artists and our ambitious world designers. These talented folks enable us to communicate in ideas, themes and feelings as much as in size, directions and numbers. This is the secret of creating real worlds instead of simply play spaces. Most Players will never notice, for instance, that on Korriban statues of non-Sith are always in supplication, literally supporting the Empire on their worn backs. Few people will stop and trace the path of Jedi resettlement of the wilderness on Tython, try to understand exactly where which war stopped in Balmorra or make sense of the twisted politics that have left some parts of Coruscant abandoned and in misery while others bounced back shortly after the invasion. They will, however, hopefully feel the layers of planning and vision that went into the worlds and because of that, subconsciously believe in the reality of the galaxy they are travelling through.
But we're ahead of ourselves. Handing over a world to concept and world design is obviously one of the later steps the writing department has in the birthing process. Let's start at the beginning, using Voss as a touchstone for the general path all worlds must take. Time travel is a big no-no in The Old Republic but just this once, I’ll allow it. Let’s go back and see the first moments of Voss and the galaxy.
Interestingly, the Mystics have been around as long at the Old Republic has--though the culture and people who would become the Voss came much later. In the first days we wanted to bring something completely new to our class offerings and a group who looked at the Force in a fundamentally different way was intriguing. The Mystics would be grey and dangerous to the eyes of the Jedi, able to see through the lies of the Sith and beholden and interested in neither. They would enable us to explore themes of religion (every culture sees gods but interprets them differently), culture (believing themselves to be the chosen people) and politics (due to the infallibility of their visions, they are happily totalitarian). We had numerous different ideas for how they would look, be thought of by the greater galaxy and behave. For a while we had a running joke of Mystic converts standing in spaceports asking weary travelers, “Have you been to Voss?”
Two problems quickly made themselves apparent. First and foremost, a BioWare story doesn’t work if you don’t understand the shoes you’re standing in. Roleplaying games are about exploration and discovery but you have to have a basic place to work from. Something as alien as the Mystic culture (its express purpose is to be strange to the Star Wars galaxy) is the exact opposite of where we’d want to start a Player. “Never introduce the exception before you teach the rule” is one of the fundamental tenants of strong RPG writing and obviously the rule was the Jedi, the Republic, the Sith, the Empire. There was more than enough content we’d have to catch Players up on without introducing some completely alien idea. Secondly, we realized we had far more Jedi and Sith fantasies than were going to fit into two classes both for story and gameplay. When it became apparent we were going to have four fundamental Force-using classes the chances of a fifth was immediately taken off the table. The Imperial Agent would be our chance to explore new territory while still introducing Players to a core part of the galaxy.
So the Mystics were set aside but we were all fairly sure they’d be coming back for the big show. The stories we’d already begun to invent in our heads were too interesting and them being removed as class candidates enabled us to make them far more alien.
When we first sat down to figure out planets we had four distinct classifications we wanted to fill: Iconic movie worlds, IP favorite worlds, Star Wars™: Knights of the Old Republic™ worlds and brand new additions to the lore. Iconic movie worlds are fairly self explanatory. Was it awesome in the movies? Do you always dream about running around and adventuring there? Does it lend itself easily to MMO gameplay? Let’s do it and let’s make it look more amazing and detailed than anyone has ever dreamed. IP favorite worlds are places like Alderaan and Ord Mantell. We feel like we know these worlds even though we’ve barely seen them and they never showed up (with a tragic cameo exception) in the movies. We have an impression of them, they have a place in our mythos and in the extended universe books, comics, etc. Worlds from the original two Knights of the Old Republic were important for continuity, to answer questions and make sure the game was firmly established as the same timeline.
Finally there were brand new additions to the lore and that’s where the Mystics came back to the top of the list. Now to be clear, the first thing we do when we decide to add a “new” world to the vast Star Wars mythology is to do our research and see if there is a world that already exists and will fit our needs. Is it the right type of climate? The right place in the galaxy? Does it have next to nothing written about it? Awesome, it’s ours. Over the years hundreds of writers have tossed out names of worlds with a sentence or less to describe them. Why create more clutter when we can add to the depth of what’s there?
Looking at the holocron (Lucasarts’ extensive guide to all things canon and beyond) we find Voss. It says three thousand years after our timeline a starship pilot will hail from Voss and apparently several mothers throughout history named their kids after the planet. Okay, we can live with that. People name their kids “Dakota” and “Paris” right? Otherwise, it’s ours. Open for creativity. Let’s create a planet for our mystics.
First of all we’ve got a group of people who are, on the surface, extremely powerful. They can see the future. That’s big. So we need to temper that. There cannot be very many of them and these visions cannot come at will. One man with perfect clarity of the future’s events would be a powerhouse, a whole culture would be unstoppable. So all of a sudden I can see the Voss a bit more clearly. They are not all Mystics. So what is it like to live in a culture where there are people who can see the future but cannot control when they do so? Okay, it makes sense these visions are going to be seen as important. Clearly if they only happen occasionally, they must be for a reason, right? Now these visions are always right, what’s that like? To have infallible leaders? Well now we have a totalitarian people but a happy totalitarian people. A Mystic’s vision is always right so arguments around it are meaningless. Okay, that’s even more interesting. So what happens if a Mystic’s vision tells the Voss to do something terrible to outsiders? What about something terrible to themselves? Great, we’ve got story hooks coming out the Voss-Ka.
So now we want to sell independent (they have the answers), chosen (they are the only ones with visions) but small and isolated (they're rare in our setting, unlike Jedi and Sith). We also want to see their power. They need an enemy. That enemy must be an overwhelming threat to show the Voss resilience and power and must contrast sharply with the Voss. What is the flip side of mysticism and faith? Technology and progress without soul-searching. Enter the Gormak--tech geniuses with a very basic tribal cultural system, a love of warfare and competition and an utter hatred for the Voss who they will never understand. So let’s see, occasionally seeing the future is good for outflanking your enemies but isn’t going to defend against a hundred million blaster cannons. We’ll need to give the Voss some amazingly well placed defenses. Okay, up the mountain they go. And in come the Voss Commandos. After all, if there aren’t very many Voss then every warm body who isn’t off having or interpreting visions is going to learn to shoot back.
But of course the Voss didn’t start up that mountain so we need to trace the history of the people and their development. Voss ruins overrun by Gormak, destroyed wilderness mined and stripped bare by the Gormak war machine, ancient spaces where other cultures may have visited the planet thousands of years in the past. Ruins of both Sith and Jedi varieties in the far flung corners of the world. That will raise some questions. Oh, and the Nightmare Lands. Forbidden space even Gormak don’t dare to tread. The less said about that scary place the better.
This is, of course, a very high-level flyby look at the development process. Writer Jessica Ilko had to put together a three page document that covered nothing but how the Voss speak and how it contrasts with the Gormak. Then there are documents that are explorations of Voss art (monochromatic and symbolic), marriage practices (don’t physically sexually develop until their marriage rituals are performed), funereal rites (usually a Voss speaks as little as possible but they are extremely publicly emotional and wail at funerals and other times of hardship) and all of the other details that makes a people real and enables a writer to see them in a way necessary to write stories that feel true.
It is only after all this work is done that we take a distilled version of all of this information (only the writers are forced to read the thousand plus page fiction guide for TOR or nobody would ever get their jobs done) and pass it to our aforementioned amazing concept artists. They get together with the world designers and then the magic really starts to happen. Of course that's just one planet. Then we move onto the next.
Daniel Erickson
Principal Lead Writer
Tags
developer blog|vossCOMMENTS
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I WISH THAT bioware WOULD HURRY THE **** UP in a nice way i am mad about how long it is taking but it looks to be an EPIC game |
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THE REPUBLIC SOVEREIGNTY, a RP/PvP/PvE Republic Guild is now Recruiting Soldiers with the Will to Fight, Jedi that can handle a Blade and Smugglers who can use a Pistol! Join the Ranks as a Soldier, Or Learn from a Jedi, or even have a little Fun! |
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Amazing...Can't wait to check this planet out in the game. |
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its going to be EPIC im not kiding BIOWARE YOUR AWESOME!!!!!!! |
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Revan's most heroic possible fate that I want Bioware to use! (If possible) Revan is one of the best Jedi prodigies... That is why he was named the prodigal knight. Even though he is my favourite star wars character, he could have not lived... It would be most heroic if he traveled to Dromund Kaas to see the emperor, Darth Malgus and entered his throne room where he was welcomed because they believed he had returned to explain victories as the dark lord. But because Revan has now truly become knowledgeable about the Jedi way he has come only to defeat the hiding sith and prevent any future damage to the now healing galaxy. Revan engages combat with the Sith and defeats all of the sith present in the throne room except for one man, the emperor. Revan and the emperor clash with lightsabers when revan asks him why he has the will to live a life that is yes, very long but not endless. The emperor tells him that it is the goal of a Sith leader and that he needs to lead for as long as he can. Revan explains only the teachings of the Jedi can lead to a life that is eternal with the force when the two continue fighting. The emperor sees no way to win the fight against his equal match and decides to use a thought bomb on Revan. Revan, a master of the thought bomb had kneeled on one knee and lowered his lightsaber. Revan then used the force to stop the thought bomb in its creation with all his strength and used its power to cause a force explosion that shot the emperor back in his seat. When the emperor made it back to his feet he raised his lightsaber and swung at the submissive Revan. The millisecond that the emperor's light saber had hit Revan, his body had disappeared into the force, leaving his clothes, lightsaber, and famous armor behind... Revan had returned to his ship the Ebon hawk piloted by the jedi Exile, on the way to find Dromund Kaas. Revan told the Exile what had happened and taught the Exile how to become one with the force. The Exile did so and set the Ebon Hawk on a coarse back into the center of the galaxy to return it to the Republic and Bastila Shan before joining Revan in becoming one with the force. "Revan, the prodigal knight had not been defeated by anyone Jedi nor Sith. He gave into the force with 100% focus and is now capable of being one with the force for all eternity." I personal as a big Revan fan understands that this is a pretty heroic ending to two great Jedi because there is no argument over who killed Revan and how, but solves the problem through himself without a will to live in the galaxy but a need to be one with the force for all eternity. P.S: |
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I love The old republic!! |
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qqq |
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I look on this page prior reading anythiny above and i see 4 (2 being the same almost) in a row and so im saying, POST YOU GUILIDES ON THE GULIDE SECTION! when this game becomes olderish i will just sneak on the ppls gulide websites and just sabatoge one of their little outtings and just smash the new recruits. painfully. with my friends. and some other party members. or i could just infiltrate it... |
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I hope one of the Voss leaders is corrupt and lies about visions. |
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I really hope you guys think about the differences of standard hours in a day on different planets. It would be simply splendid to have different day/night patterns - one planet having 24 std hours (that would be Coruscant), another maybe 95 etc. But considering the amount of content you're putting in TOR, you probably have already thought about this. |
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Sounds like Quest bombardment to me ^_^ |
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Awesome world, grey force user are the best. |
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im joining the republic all the way there the best there braver than those cowards on the sith republic rules!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! |
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I hope some planets you go to you will have to use Oxygen to breath when your outside then remove it when your inside space port or whatever, that would be unique, oh and also to be able to fix your ship yourself, to buy the parts and insert them instead of clicking the 'fix all' button ^_^ |
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glory to the republic!!!!!! |
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Some places on Nal Hutta maybe |
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Sounds like you are describing mass effect a bit here and I am willing to bet there will be some of that in the game =) But I am right there with you in your thoughts... custom ships... what a treat that would/will be... O_O |
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I want to learn how to design games, create a company mmake MMORPGs good ones though |
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This is going to take MMORPG to really focus on the RPG isnt it? About time somebody took that leap. I must say that bioware and lucasarts didnt leap, they used jet packs. Lol. But seriously this double team was the best choice to create a game like this. |
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Lol who dosent <3 jetpacks? |
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que te den |
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It's amazing how you take planets with little to almost no detail and ompletely develope it into a new world. I can not wait to see the details in the design of the land scape and everything. From what I've watched though you are doing an amazing job on it all. I'm more of the exploring type myself i love to find hidden places in the landscapes or secret details etched in the walls of ruins. |
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sorry about double comment |
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It will be cool if they could add Yavin 4, Naboo, Kashyyyk, Onderon, and Mandalore to the planet list. |
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It will be cool if they could add Yavin 4, Naboo, Kashyyyk, Onderon, and Mandalore to the planet list. |
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IsaacTincher
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Like I said on the other page, I want to join!! But I cant figure out how! |
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This is going to be the best MMORPG game ever |
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ok I am sort of confused... is SWTOR going to be an mmo game or like a regular game? |
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It will be an MMORPG with an emphasis on story-driven play. |
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Thats amazing thank you for the article, sounds like you guys are doing a grate job and the depth of story you are going in-to is staggering. i'm sure it will be a grate sucsses, i'm sooooo looking foward to questing there :) |
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Wouldn' it be bad if this wasn't as good as we thought it would be? Then again it come out of E3 with flying colors. |
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More I see the better this game seems to be... I would play as a jedi (if for Republic), or as the Bounty Hunter (yesssss... for the empire!) |
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I'm with ya on that |
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The more I read about the game, makes me just want to have the game now! lol - I love that it is BioWare making this game, they have never disapointed me yet. Keep up the great job :) |
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I am amazed at the constructiveness of your writers! They truly do strike such a chord with me that I believe that TOR will have quite possibly the most richest of lore backgrounds ever to be concieved within an MMO. That said, the whole "1,000 page fiction guide" made me laugh, it must be a hard job to a TOR writer, but they do it very well and there are certainly no screw-ups or retcons, unlike WoW lore. TLDR, your writers have a skill that is unsurpassed. And your concept team is nothing short of god-like. |
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They should make the Voss playable.. How sweet that would be. Either way keep up the good work BioWare!!! |
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Agreed. TOR: Enter the Voss, anyone? XD Also, being able to play a droid would be awesome too. |
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Have to leave some things for the first expansion. ;) |
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Epic |
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I love the idea of the Voss! There are so many more aspects and nuances to the Force than just good and evil, so it is nice to get beyond the simplistic Light-Side-versus-Dark-Side views of the Jedi and Sith every once in a while. Another way to look at the Force is the conflict between peace/reason and emotion/passion. Personally, i would like the idea of a group that derives its strength in the Force from emotions (namely positive ones like love, joy, and "righteous" anger), unlike the Jedi who draw strength from inner peace, but that teaches its members to do good, unlike the Sith. Such a group would be an interesting predicament for the Jedi who would naturally see them as bordering on the Dark Side. Unlike the Jedi, they would't discourage and even actively encourage love and romance, with some being reputedly "loose" even, and would even accept fear and anger when they are directed with reason and just cause, which slaps in the face of Jedi teachings. Obviously the groups and the Jedi would distrust one another and not get along for the most part, despite having a mutual enemy: the Sith. I came up with the name "Emoj" (the j sounds like g in regime) for such a group and imagined that they'd have a unique, but Middle-Eastern inspired culture, kind of like how the Jedi have a Buddhist-inspired one. The Emoj would look physically altered, like the Sith, but instead of looking hideous, they would merely look different (e.g. different color irises or hair or differences in skin texture), or even beautiful. Of course, fans would fight endlessly about whether the Emoj or the Jedi were right, or both or neither. Lol |
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If the voss were only a playable character... This world looks phenominal! |
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When the expansion comes out youll probably be able to play was them. Droidstoo. |
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I hope Yavin 4 will be a planet, I would love to explore all those hidden Sith temples and kill all those hideously deformed creatures! |
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Holy Cow! I had no idea how much writing you guys did just for one race that will be in a video game. I love it though. Story is really huge for me. I write when ever I can. I loved the Mystis. |
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Hmm... And how many planets there will be in total? |
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thank you for bringing one of my favorite franchises to life Bioware. Ya'll are the best. |
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I would suspect that they may continue adding worlds to the mix even after the game begins. If so, they will not know how many worlds until the final release version of the game is made, although I do hope they dont add one world at a time with internal conflicts. Repetition of that gets annoying. Let someone dominate somewhere, the republic can be the people that used to deal with it. |
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hmmmmm new idea make houses bases any thing to keep our stuff in 1 place |
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I beleive the ships each player gets is were you can store all of your gear |
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now who agrees there show be bigger ships and real space travel like this is just an example when you use your ship in pirates of the caribbean lol STAR DESTROYER! |
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