LOOKING GLASS STUDIOS’
The Making of THIEF II: THE METAL AGE
Behind the Scenes at Looking Glass Studios

Steve Pearsall, Project Leader:
	I think you can think about the new things we're doing in Thief II along, sort of, two major areas.  One, is I think we're gonna end up with a lot tighter design, based on our experiences with Thief I.
	The second thing that is gonna be new about Thief II is we're gonna improve the technology of the engine some.

Tim Stellmach, Lead Designer:
	New power-ups, new creatures, a larger number of things that really affect the gameplay.

Eric Brosius, Lead Audio Designer:
	Hopefully we'll be able to expand a little bit.  Although we don't want to change the nature of sound in Thief.  We don't wanna have, like, disco tracks in the background.

Steve Pearsall, Project Leader:
	We've put together a really great team for Thief II.  We've got some of the original team back.  The Lead Designer, Tim Stellmach, was the Lead Designer on Thief.  Randy Smith, who's a Senior Designer on Thief II, was also one of the designers on Thief.  We've also got Sara Verrilli, who is a long-time Looking Glass person, who was a designer on Thief.
	We've added a bunch of new folks, too.  We've got Emil Pagliarulo who was the Editor-in-Chief at Adrenaline Vault.  A person we've worked with a whole lot (who's done a lot of voice-acting for us, in fact), she's a really talented designer, too:  Terri Brosius.  Another new designer is Mike Chrzanowski, who's a long time game-player, and he's come up with some really fresh, exciting, new ideas.  Rich Carlson—“Zdim,” to the Quake community out there.  Another really talented designer Rich brought along with him, from Ion Storm, is Iikka Keranen.  Iikka's working on some really exciting levels and his work's really turning out terrific.  We've also got a designer away from Reality Bites, who'd worked on Dark Vengeance, in the past:  Rafael Jabulani Brown.  And we've got a little bit of extra assistance from Michael Thomas Ryan, who worked on the original Thief and who's also a designer on System Shock 2.

Tim Stellmach, Lead Designer:
	One big difference between Thief, and a lot of action games, is that it's got a lot of story to it.  An experience that tells the story, but that doesn't take away from the action.  At no given time are we pulling you out of the game.  You get some information in your briefing and some information in cutscenes.  You hear some of it, like, overheard in conversations that we stage.  All told, I think I counted up—one day—like, seven or eight individual little ways that we send out little tiny packets of story at you.
	The game-concept in Thief was developed in stages.  We actually started off with a completely different game—Dark Camelot—where it was this, sort of, Arthurian setting, but Mordred was the hero.  King Arthur was this, you know, corrupt despot.  And there was this, sort of like, swashbuckling fight of the underdog-against-the-opressor.

Randy Smith, Level Designer:
	One of the biggest challenges in working with Thief II's fiction is trying to get all the mission designs well integrated into the plot.  When I worked on the Thief plot, it was plot first and then missions came outta that.  And, this case, we tried to think of really good missions first.  And then, there's a little bit of retrofitting work in terms of getting the plot to work well around the missions.

Tim Stellmach, Lead Designer:
	All the time that you're finding out the story in Thief, you're also playing the game.  It's integrated in.

Terri Brosius, Level Designer:
	I'm working on a level called “Song of the Caverns.”  And I really can't say too much more about it, because it's secret.

Sara Verrilli, Level Designer:
	I guess one of things that I enjoy most about designing Thief levels, and working on Thief, is trying to find multiple ways for a player to solve any given problem.

Mark Lizotte, Lead Artist:
	There are three main artists. There is me, who's Lead Artist.

Steve Pearsall, Project Leader:
	Mark's such a fanatic—when he took his vacation, he went to Europe this year, and took a camera along with him and took thousands of pictures.

Mark Lizotte, Lead Artist:
	Then there’s Daniel Thron, who is working on the cutscenes, doing a recurring role for Thief II and Thief I.  And he's having Jennifer Hrobota Lesser to help him.

Steve Pearsall, Project Leader:
	She's doing both 3D modeling and some artwork in support of Dan's work on the cutscenes.

Jennifer Hrobota Lesser, 3D / Cutscene Artist:
	It's a lot more interesting to do artwork for cutscenes where you really have a feeling for the character.

Mark Lizotte, Lead Artist:
	Matthew Gilpin, right now, is the only artist working on Thief Gold.

Matt Gilpin, Artist:
	Probably the best thing for Thief is it really gives a mood.  Like a feeling. You have a very good sense of environment.

Mark Lizotte, Lead Artist:
	Karen Wolff is helping on the briefings.

Steve Pearsall, Project Leader:
	Karen is very talented.  And she worked on Flight III.
	For a Programming Team, on Thief II we've got Pat McElhatton, who's been a long-time Looking Glass person.  He's worked on a lot of a our, sort of, sound technology.  We've also got Bill Farquhar, who's actually done a lot of the special effects for our flight simulator line.  A new hire, Alex Duran, he's doing a lot of the, sort of, basic technology with the installer and the build system.
	A game system is a lot more than just a renderer.  It's the real sum of all the components in the engine:  The A.I. system, the object system, the renderer, the sound.  And that's one of the things that makes the Thief engine so outstanding, is the sum-total of all of those parts really takes the engine beyond what most other engines can do.

Lulu Lamer, Lead Playtester:
	Most people think that playtesting is fun, and they get to play video games all day.
	And in that, they're right.  And it's really fun, and you get to play video-games all day.  But, a playtester really also has to be really meticulous, and do tedious work that gets to be no fun at all.

Jesse King:
	I can read the Wheel of Fate....
Cameraman (Daniel Thron):
	Ah, okay.
Jesse King:
	Will Thief Gold ship on...
Voice in the background:
	Monday.
Jesse King:
	...Monday.
Voice in the background:
	Please no please no.
Jesse King:
	It's a heart!  So...
Cameraman (Daniel Thron):
	Oo!  That's good.
Jesse King:
	Things're looking good, I must say.

Lulu Lamer, Lead Playtester:
	Playtesting allows people that don't have any idea how the game works to give their feedback, and, you know, say, “I don't understand this.  You guys have been working on this way too long.  You know the plot, and the story, and it makes sense to you 'cause you made it up, but it doesn't make sense to us.”

Eric Brosius, Lead Audio Designer:
	The Audio Department is three people.  It's myself, a guy named Kemal Amarasingham, and a guy named Ramin Djawadi.  It's nice to have them aboard.  Pretty much, everyone splits duties and does everything.
	Thief is very interesting, sound-wise, because it's one of the first games that really uses sound as a central part of the gameplay.
	You work hard on the sound and it's nice to have a game that really shows it off.  In Thief II, we'll hopefully be able to expand a little bit.  Although we don't want to change the nature of sound in Thief.  We don't wanna have, like, disco tracks in the background because it's not appropriate, but hopefully we'll be able to do some more involved things.

Tim Stellmach, Lead Designer:
	So, after Thief II, obviously there's talk about Thief 3, there's talk about other sorts of games, like—Looking Glass, of course, is also famous aside from action/adventure games, for fantasy/role-playing games.  And, you know, Thief would be a really natural fit for that.  You know, some games have the kind of, like, really hit-potential, where you start seeing the action-figure, or the comic-book.  At Looking Glass, we have some tremendous art talent, that—you know, some great sculptors, great artists, guys who've done comic-books before.  And I'd like Thief to be the kind of game where you can go down to your local comic-book store, and pick up the Garrett and Viktoria action-figures.  That'd be great.

Eric Brosius, Lead Audio Designer:
	Someone asked me what I do, and I was like, “Well we make little explosion sounds, and we write little stupid songs for computer games, and we get paid for it.”  Well, people go, “Jeez, how do I get that job?”

Mark Lizotte, Lead Artist:
	Working at Looking Glass is like working at a college dorm.

Randy Smith, Level Designer:
	You can work... any hours you want, as long as it's 18-a-day.  So, you know....

Jennifer Hrobota Lesser, 3D / Cutscene Artist:
	Working at Looking Glass is a little bit like being stuck on a long bus-ride with 50 of your brothers.

Sara Verrilli, Level Designer:
	I haven't actually worked at anywhere else in corporate America, except when I was temping as a secretary.  It's very different.

CREDITS:
Daniel Thron
Camera Operator / Executive Transvestite

Fred Galpern
Producer / Director / Editor / Evil Herbivore

Featuring
(In order of appearance)
Rob $ Caminos as Garrett
Steve Pearsall	Project Leader
Tim Stellmach	Lead Designer
Eric Brosius	Audio Designer
Randy Smith	Level Designer
Sara Verrilli	Level Designer
Emil Pagliarulo	Level Designer
Terri Brosius	Level Designer
Mike Chrzanowski	Level Designer
Rich Carlson	Level Designer
Iikka Keranen	Level Designer
Rafael Brown	Level Designer
Mike Ryan	Level Designer
Mark Lizotte	Lead Artist
Daniel Thron	Cutscene Artist / Fiction Consultant
Jennifer Hrobota Lesser	3D / Cutscene Artist
Matt Gilpin	Artist / Agent 7
Karen Wolff	Briefings Artist
Pat Mcelhatton	Programmer
Bill Farquhar	Programmer
Alex Duran	Programmer
Lulu Lamer	Lead Playtester
Jesse King	Wheel of Fate Guru
Kemal Amarasingham	Audio Designer / Dirty_Wh***
Ramin Djawadi	Audio Designer / The Q

Special thanks to the management,
Marketing department and financing department
Of Looking Glass Studios.
Thanks to the Flight III, Flight Combat,
and System Shock 2 development teams,
Irrational Games and EIDOS.