Making L2 - Turning the Dream into Reality

All the objectives that will be included in Lineage II started to take shape following the work of designing the original mythology. After building up an enormously huge amount of original mythology, revisions were made many times until the final version was determined. Based on that, the designers started their full-scale graphics work. If the planning stage can be compared to planning the overall frame for the game, the graphics stage can be compared to giving that frame flesh. The job was difficult and it took a long time. In order to create the fascinating and refined graphics of Lineage II, the time and effort taken was 2-3 times that of other games. The catch phrase of the Lineage II Development Office was, "You who work hard must work even harder!" It's not an exaggeration to say that this communicates accurately the mindset of those in the development office.

Q Here's what I want to ask first of all. What was the most difficult aspect of realizing the enormous Lineage II world in graphics?

A **Team Head Cheol-Woong Hwang (hereinafter, "Hwang"):** Making the quantity of graphic resources that can fill in the wide fields and achieve a structure from the content that existed only in document form so that it can be realized in the game system in a way that can be played were both difficult tasks. If there had been someone to tell us correctly about this, we could have done things twice as fast (laugh). In one village, it's difficult to calculate the correct time for manufacturing processes, so it took about 2-4 months just for that.

Q Oh, really. It's always a problem to find things out correctly. When looking at Lineage II, the atmospheres in the villages are different for each race -- how did you grasp the concepts of each race?

A **Hwang:** The concept for humans was quite ordinary. But for Elves and Dark Elves, we made a lot of efforts to create unique environments. The Elves boast of a brilliant culture, even though the race had gone to ruin, so rather than making it dazzling, we designed it so as not to lose the natural and royal high-class feeling. On the other hand, for the Dark Elves we designed for a feeling of a somewhat grotesque and serious feeling in order to express the rough history of these who had been expelled from the Elves. We were really satisfied with the results.

Q The players often joke around that the Dark Elves make them think of "Sister Mania" and the Dwarves of "loricon". Of course, the Orcs were designed for "muscle mania" (laugh).

A **Hwang:** Originally, the Elves and Humans were designed with a concept for the Korean market, the Dark Elves and Orcs for the US market, and the Dwarves for the Japanese market. It's true that the results came out in this unexpected way and there haven't been satisfactory responses in certain countries regarding races designed for other countries. As might be expected, it's very difficult to find a design concept that satisfies everyone internationally.

Q Was there a race that was particularly difficult? Was there a character that really felt like a huge troublemaker all around?

A **Hwang:** Of course! (laugh). The race that was the most difficult was the Orcs. Orcs had never been a leading race in previous MMORPG games. And in the other games, they entered the game as the bad guys. However, the Orc race in Lineage II worships fire and has the image of a strong warrior race that occupies a high position. It was very difficult to design a race that no one's seen, just based on the word "Orc". We stopped and started work on this multiple times for over a year to achieve today's Orcs.

Q The continent is set up so that the land gets higher and higher the farther north you go. Was there a particular reason or purpose for this?

A **Hwang:** There are actually flat areas at Talking Island or Giran. But it is true that the general trend is for the land to rise as one goes inland. This is something we intended to do from the time of the first world design, so we designed it so that the heights of the mountains rise from west to east and from south to north. The purpose of this is so that as a player starts to play in the start zone, he can start moving as his level increases and the scenes change consecutively little by little.

Q I'll go around and take a close look at the scenes of the area in the future (laugh). In that case, were there any problems caused by differences in the planning and actual work?

A **Hwang:** It is natural that the game designers have an understanding of 3-D structures that is less than the graphic designers. This means that the graphic work must progress to a certain extent in order for the proper plan to be completed. Therefore, I can say that all maps were designed in draft stage and then we revised them based on feedback from the Game Design Team so that the final completed versions were reached. For example, castles for sieges have gone through five revisions until now and we expect it will take another six months to finish it completely. That's because the feedback regarding it is endless. There aren't many places where the plan and graphics were forced to match each other. However, this is just what must be done in order to complete the game.

Q Finally, please say a word to the players regarding Lineage II.

A **Hwang:** Lineage is the only online game in the world where you can turn back from the mist of the early morning hours to feel the wind on your back, with your compatriots looking over a hill from which the ocean while the morning sun rises over the horizon.

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Source : http://legacy.lineage2.com/background/making\_2.html

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