I wanted to ask anyone who could answer; I know it was revealed somewhere that there was rushed development behind G2’s story bible that resulted in it being deeply incomplete and/or contradictory even as the line was kicking off, so the authors like Merlin Mann and Ryder Windham were having difficulties working with it. I wanted to ask where exactly this information came from, though; not out of skepticism but to see if there was more detail on the specifics of what all went down. If anyone could direct me to that, it would be much appreciated!
It was revealed in our interview with Ryder Windham at the 26:50 mark:
The three choice highlight quotes:
“I should stress that the story bible I first read, LEGO’s own story bible… it was a constant work in progress, it seemed like every several weeks I would get these updates that they were adding things, modifying it, expanding it…”
“…So, I started getting confused again, like… I got the impression that LEGO was… sometimes, they were maintaining their secrecy for ‘security’, keeping the information close, but, in some cases, I think they were finding new opportunities where they thought ‘oh, this would be interesting!’ as part of a backstory. I didn’t always quite understand how everything meshed, and from the correspondence we had… I’m not always sure that they knew how it meshed either. They just thought ‘Oh, this has a good opportunity for a toy,’ and I was like ‘Yeah, but I’m the one who has to write about it!’ It’s one thing to put a few sentences on a toy package or on the website, something to describe a character, but I’m not Mr. Know-it-All, I’m not a mind reader! I’m just trying to figure out how to make this thing, all these story aspects sound… real, I guess, and somewhat logical.”
“For working on the story, yeah, I can’t remember all the details, but it’s just to understand… it was a work in progress. The story bible… I was getting new information while I was working on the books, so sometimes it was an effort to try to tie up loose ends that I didn’t even know existed until I was almost done with the book.”
It’s been years since we conducted it, but I’d imagine there was a lot more specifics gleamed from that interview than just that segment, so it may benefit a re-listen. I’ve forgotten what exactly was discussed in specific detail.
-Mesonak
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Ah, thank you! I don’t remember if I’d listened to this before, but even if so it definitely merits revisiting.