AGF 2019 LoR Q&A Session Compilation
Contains heavy spoilers regarding Lobotomy Corporation. Brace yourself and think twice before scrolling down.
An English transcript of the Q&A compilation made by @harutomy1 on Twitter.
Source Tweet: https://twitter.com/harutomy1/status/1206471379819741186
Original Document: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VfNYdXJVZWaY4ZqdT9ulscZNpcWcwXJRvhYLHiQ1j2w/
Q. Is LoR well optimized? Does it require a gaming computer?
A. We do hope it runs smooth. It may depend on the computer, but it certainly runs better than LC.
Q. Giovanni’s hair is short in the character portrait but is a lot longer in the cutscene. Does this mean he was being experimented on for so long that his hair grew long?
A. That’s the case, yes.
Q. Angela mentioned in LC that people do not suffer from physiological diseases anymore, but Giovanni was apparently a patient under Carmen’s care; did he suffer from diseases because he was from the Outskirts?
A. It is true that not everyone can afford to have access to cures or treatments; the poor are especially vulnerable. You will see whether Giovanni was from the Outskirts or not in the sequel.
Q. Is the E.G.O manifested by the heightening of emotions in LoR related to the Sephirah?
A. We will elaborate on that in the sequel.
Q. In the epilogue of LC, one of Angela’s lines changed from “A, your dreams will …” from “My beloved A, your dreams will …”; is there any significance to be found in this “My beloved”?
A. Yes.
Q. Are the Nests and the Backstreets all parts of the City?
A. Yes, they are. (Nests & Backstreets in the City, Outskirts on the outside)
Q. Do you have any plans to sell the merchandises online?
A. Unfortunately, no. We’re simply too short on manpower, so it’ll be difficult for us to package and ship all the stuff.
Q. Parts of the fandom interpret that it was Carmen’s frontal lobe that was used for Angela’s creation. Is it true?
A. Please look forward to the sequel for the exact relationship between Carmen and Angela.
Q. Does Carmen have a significant presence in LoR’s plot?
A. Again, please wait for the sequel.
Q. Is there no correlation between the floors the Sephirahs are assigned to and the Decimal Classification of books?
A. We did try to fit the floors into the classification at first, but we deemed that it wouldn’t let us unravel their stories the way we wanted, so we arbitrarily assigned them.
Q. Will the Rabbit Team show up in LoR?
A. Please look forward to the sequel.
Q. How do you search for fan talk and content?
A. We use the names of the Sephirah. And sometimes “라오루”.
Q. Is ProjMoon’s staff aware of the fan pairings (ships) popular in the fandom?
A. You guys seemed to like a whole lot of them. There’s Netzach and Chesed, and... We’re glad you guys love our characters.
Q. The strand of hair on Chesed’s forehead disappeared in LoR; is it just a consequence of changing up the hairstyle?
A. Yes, it is.
Q. Why did Tiphereth’s eye color change from their past selves’?
A. It’s hard for us to give an answer to that right now… We will try to resolve things we can’t answer just yet in the sequel.
Q. In the art of Kali the Red Mist and Gebura the librarian you posted earlier this year, there’s a noticeable difference in the hair color between the two pictures. Why is that?
A. We wanted to show that the two are ultimately different beings.
Q. Is TT2 still a thing in LoR?
A. No, the Library now runs in its own time scale without relying on TT2.
Q. Chesed at least had a coffee hole in his robot body; how did the other Sephirahs consume Enkephalin?
A. They all have inlets, although not shown in the artworks.
Q. How are the Sephirahs able to maintain a humanoid form?
A. In the Library, everything can be reconstructed (as long as it stays in the Library). So the Sephs were given actual human forms this time.
Q. Is the humanoid appearance the only thing that’s changed about the Sephirahs physiologically, or are they human all the way inside? Do they have physiological traits and needs of an actual human?
A. We’d like to leave that up to your interpretation.
Q. Why did Yesod's hairstyle change?
A. Change in personality due to core suppression and passage of time. (Similar reasoning applies to all the other Sephs.)
Q. What Sephirah had the biggest shift in character?
A. You’ll see once the sequel is out.
Q. Are Abnormalities still a thing?
A. We cannot answer that just yet.
Q. Why did some E.G.O designs change?
A. In Lobotomy Corp, most E.G.O took the shape of standardized suits because it took place in a company. As stated before, one of the key characteristics of E.G.O is that the shape of E.G.O can change depending on who extracts and uses it. This is more prevalent in LoR, hence the different shapes for the same E.G.O.
Q. Do you plan to participate in other conventions or events as guests?
A. Yes, we’d like to if we have the time.
Q. Do things reconstructed in the Library lose their form and deconstruct once they’re outside?
A. Anything created inside the Library cannot leave the Library. We won’t tell what happens just yet.
Q. Are ranged weapons a thing in LoR?
A. Yes. They’re in the demonstration as well, used by Fixers from Full Stop. And all weaponry and armor used by enemies can be converted to books for librarians to use.
Q. Does the E.G.O manifested by the Sephirahs change?
A. We urge you to wait for the sequel and see for yourself.
Q. What is the extent of the ability to reconstruct things within the Library? Can it be used to revive dead people?
A. It is possible, but bringing it to action is an entirely different issue.
Q. What does the icon under each card represent?
A. It’s the attack type. There are three types of attacks: Slash, Impact, and Pierce. Each type may deal increased or decreased damage depending on the character’s type advantages.
Q. Is each floor shaped after the Sephirah’s mental imagery?
A. The design is indeed related to the Sephirah’s inner images, but the artist’s preferences also play a part.
Q. Is there Enkephalin in the Library?
A. It can be made if one wishes.
Q. Is Netzach no longer an Enkephalin addict?
A. We’ll see that in the sequel.
Q. Who is the player this time?
A. The player isn’t precisely equal to Angela, but you do play the game from Angela’s perspective.
Q. There are lots of parallels between Ayin and Angela, like how their names start with A, how they have the highest authority in the place they manage, etc; it feels almost as if Angela were inheriting Ayin’s position. Not to mention that Angela’s new hairstyle resembles Ayin a lot. Is this all intended?
A. Yes, it is.
Q. Are Ordeals a thing in LoR?
A. The Library’s reconstruction could theoretically bring them back, but we can’t say for certain whether they will show up for now.
Q. You said Netzach drew the painting on the Floor of Arts himself; does that mean Netzach has a history of being an artist?
A. The section each Sephirah is in charge of could be something they were interested in, something they could potentially be adept in, or else. There’s not much of a rule other than that it’s related to the Sephirah in some way.
Q. Can the Sephirah or ordinary employees use the power of reconstruction?
A. To a lesser extent, yes. But they will need to have the ability to find the right coordinates of the book they want to reconstruct, since the book is the single most important component of reconstruction.
Q. Can we touch the creatures in the Floor of Arts?
A. Yes. They’re basically like animals.
Q. Do you plan to make plushies as merchandise? People showed much interest in having plushies of the three birbs and the creature Netzach drew.
A. We’d love to, but we unfortunately can’t afford to make goods that are too big in size…
Q. Can you give a brief explanation on the Emotion system?
A. There are four Personalities, each themed after Fortitude, Prudence, Temperance, and Justice. These personalities can alter dice rolls or create different outcomes in situations like the death of an ally character. We’re trying to develop it to have diverse impacts.
Q. Is the Emotions system related to E.G.O manifestation in any way?
A. We don’t have anything set in stone since it’s still in the middle of development, but the long bar on the top of the screen is related to Emotions as well. We plan to give various advantages to E.G.O manifestation such as increased damage or special moves. All we can say for now is that the shift in Emotions will surely have an impact on the gameplay.
Q. Unlike in the alpha gameplay video and this demonstration, the reveal trailer showed librarians and guests fighting in a small space that appeared to be outside of the Library. Will the full game have fights that take place in such small spaces or the outside?
A. The interior of the Library can be changed to look like the outside through reconstruction. And the only confirmed stages are the floors of the Library as shown in the alpha video and the demonstration. There could possibly be fights taking place in small spaces as shown in the reveal trailer, but no such stage is in development yet.
Q. I tried scrolling the mouse wheel to zoom in and out, but the zoom speed was really slow. Was this intended?
A. No, that was just a technical problem.
Q. How do invitations and books work?
A. Invitations are made from books. To invite people from the outside and progress through the main story, you must create an invitation using a combination of three books. The basic gameplay loop of the Main Story is as follows: farm books from lower floors, create an invitation to progress to the next floor, farm books from the floors you just unlocked to create the next invitation, rinse and repeat.
Q. I once speculated before that the three birbs represent actions of the ‘Head’ and the Apocalypse Bird the Head itself, do I happen to be right…?
A. That was our intention, yes. Though not as a direct reference to the Head; the three birbs represent the authority of a dystopian government, and the Apocalypse Birb represents the government body itself.
Q. Are there profiles for each Seph?
A. We're considering including that in our next artbook.
Q. You mean you plan to release an artbook for LoR?
A. Yes, we do have it in plans.
Q. Were the White Ordeals an actual invasion from the outside, or a manifestation from the inside?
A. A manifestation, like the other Ordeals.
Q. Guests turn into books when they lose the battle; what about the librarians? Will they turn into a book that you need to recover?
A. No, they won’t stay as books for long.
Q. What happens to a librarian’s E.G.O if they die in LoR?
A. Their E.G.O will not disappear.
Q. Who designed the Midnight of Violet and its mechanics?
A. It was me, the director. >:3c
Q. Are you aware that the Midnight of Green can be cheesed? Do you plan to patch it out?
A. We are aware, and we do not plan to stop it. No game can be truly free of cheese, after all.
Q. Can one turn back into their original form after they were turned into a book?
A. Theoretically, yes.
Q. Do you wanna do the MBTI personality test on the Sephirahs just for fun?
A. We’d like to leave it to the fans. We plan to unravel their personalities in the game, so that you can refer to it.
Q. Is James in LoR a reference to the James in LC, mentioned in Yesod's side story?
(Image provided by @sp_sipon on Twitter)
A. Yes.
Q. What are the inspirations for LoR's gameplay mechanics? The gameplay rules remind me of TRPGs, was that an inspiration?
A. We referred to board games and games of dice, namely TRPGs as you mentioned.
Q. You said earlier that the employees all died at the ending; did they turn into books?
A. They became part of the pillar of light before being turned into books by Angela. From that, they can be reconstructed into librarians. The Sephirahs went through a similar process as well.
Q. Can the employees (books) be put on a shelf somewhere?
A. They can be stored on a shelf.
Q. The relationship between A and C?
A. We may elaborate on that. It is certainly true that A admired C. He trusted her, he counted on her.. Overall, he looked up to her.
Q. Can employees who died before Day 50 and the ending took place show up as librarians?
A. It's certainly possible since their records still remain.
Q. Did everyone who died in the facility turn into books? Or are there any conditions?
A. Yes, unconditionally. As long as they were in the facility while the Seed of Light scenario was in progress.
Q. Can one's capabilities be enhanced as they're reconstructed from a book in the same way an employee's stats can be enhanced with LOB points?
A. Not quite; the enhancements will be focused on equipment.
Q. What about the adjustments Angela made when reconstructing Roland?
A. Angela arbitrarily gave him adjustments just to make a good servant.
Q. Is the E.G.O Gift system gone?
A. We’d like to implement battle gifts that can be obtained at the end of fights.
Q. Will Twilight be a thing?
A. Please wait for the sequel.
Q. Do you have any plans to make DLC or PvP content?
A. We do have plans for a DLC that takes place after the game’s ending. We currently don’t have any plans for PvP.
Q. Are there any distinctions between a regular book and a person-turned-book? Does the property or content of the book change depending on the person’s personality or history?
A. As for the former, no, you won’t be able to tell the difference. As for the latter, yes. By the way, the story is 95% complete. We only have fine details or adjustment left to make.
Q. Did the direction of the game or the planned ending changed during development?
A. We set the direction of LoR as we wrote LC’s ending, and that direction hasn’t changed.
Q. Do the librarians have memory of their past life as employees? If so, are they dissatisfied with the current situation?
A. They have “perfect” memory of their past. We’ll elaborate on this in the sequel.
Q. Will the lower layer Sephirahs show up in the game?
A. Yes.
Q. Are there any changes to the dynamics between Angela and the Sephirahs?
A. You’ll see in the sequel.
Q. Do you plan to implement the ability to adjust the difficulty of the game in LoR?
A. No. The game will be easier than LC, however.
Q. What is the age rating you had in mind for LoR?
A. We are expecting 15 years of age or older, but it ultimately depends on the rating organization’s decision.
Q. Whose idea was Argalia the Blue Reverb (a Fixer shown in the demonstration’s story part)?
A. It was me, the director. :3c
Q. Will the characters have their own stories like in LC?
A. Yes.
Q. What is the true form of CENSORED?
A. That’s a secret.
Q. What were the concepts behind unimplemented Abnormalities like Amurdad and My Sweet Lime Orange Tree?
A. We did do our best creating Amurdad...until we lost the files. As for My Sweet Orange Tree, the basic concept behind it was mental breakdown.
Q. Do you ever plan to make a game that delves deep into certain aspects of the world like the Ruins and the Outskirts or one that plays from the perspective of another Wing?
A. We do elaborate on those in the sequel.
Q. About half of the Sephirah had yellow eyes; was there a specific reason for that?
A. No, not really.
Q. Do you plan to hire new staff for ProjMoon?
A. Not in the foreseeable future.
Q. Do you intend to make a novel taking place in the world of LC and LoR?
A. We’d like to introduce the world in the form of games first. And if possible, we do want to make webtoons or novels.
Q. What would be the Pianist’s risk level if it were an Abnormality?
A. Somewhere between WAW and ALEPH.
Q. If the Pianist was just between WAW and ALEPH, how big of a disaster Ending C may be (the ending where Adam releases all Abnormalities into the world)?
A. The Head would take care of incidents of such scale.
Q. How long has the Head existed? Has there been a shift in generations within the organization?
A. We cannot elaborate on that just yet.
Q. Did Netzach’s dream for a beer dispenser come true?
A. It’s possible now.
Q. What is the expected playtime of LoR?
A. We’re expecting 100 hours or so.
Q. What happened to Kali’s parents?
A. We’ll elaborate on that in the sequel.
Q. Does Enkephalin have any scent or taste? How good is it?
A. We never thought about that. It should be good enough for consumption, at least.
Q. In the Funeral of Dead Butterflies’ encyclopedia entry, some sort of religious belief is indirectly mentioned, and the Burrowing Heaven’s encyclopedia directly mentions “heaven”; are religions and faith-based concepts commonly spread in the general public? If they are, is religious belief perceived as something acceptable, or is it considered a taboo?
A. It is known in some places, and less so in others, The perception of faith varies as well. Some consider it a taboo, while others don’t mind it too much.
Q. Do Sweepers always show up at night? Do they only show up in the Backstreets and the Outskirts? Is it impossible for an ordinary person to survive from Sweepers once they’re spotted? Or can you escape by running away or persuading them?
A. It’s...rather difficult for us to elaborate on Sweepers right here. Please wait for the sequel and see for yourself.
Q. Will there be more information on things like the Ruins or Inventors?
A. Eventually, maybe…?
Q. Are body modification procedures (modifying limbs, removing certain memories) really as commonplace as visiting a hospital to treat illnesses and get prescriptions?
A. Yes, they are.
Q. What does Complete Food (the Dawn of Amber) taste like? It’s not harmful to the body, is it? It shouldn’t be too weird that some employees may want to taste it after suppressing it, right?
A. They’re like jellies. There’s grape-flavored ones and orange-flavored ones.
Q. Is coffee from the Welfare Team the only snack available to employees?
A. There’s instant coffee as well. Besides, coffee isn’t the only thing available for them.
Q. So in the world of LC and LoR, is the concept of countries gone altogether, and the City acts like a whole continent while each Wing’s turf functions as a country?
A. Yes, that’s pretty much the case.
Q. What happens to the residents of a Nest when the Wing managing it collapses?
A. That will be shown in the sequel.
Q. Do you plan to allow players to customize librarians with user-made assets just like how we could in LC?
A. We do plan to, but it will be more difficult for us to provide template images this time.
Q. You said that the Abnormality cutouts displayed on the collab cafe were life-sized, but Punishing Bird’s size was quite different from what was shown in the artbook; which one is the right size?
A. The artbook shows the accurate size for Punishing Bird. The cutout for Punishing Bird was made larger so that it can work better as a decoration.
Q. Is every book in the Library made from people?
A. Not exactly. The books in the Library are empty by default. The content of a book is only determined when someone with the exact coordinates finds and opens the book; it will be the book the person needs.
Q. Who was the person waving carrots in Project Moon’s Twitter account?
A. It was me, the director. :3c I manage Project Moon’s social media accounts.
Q. What motivated you to participate in AGF?
A. As we were developing LoR, we wanted to seize an opportunity to promote our new game in offline environments. We did consider participating in G-STAR, but we had to give up since the convention was too far from our workplace and our game wasn’t close to ready for a public demonstration. So we decided to participate in AGF instead, as it was much closer and there was more time to prepare the game for a demo. The atmosphere of the convention seemed more appropriate as well.
Q. How much did you know about Lobotomy Corporation’s influence?
A. We only vaguely thought that there were some people who have enjoyed the game, and didn’t have a clear grasp on the exact size of the fanbase. And here we are, selling out merchandises so fast. If we happen to participate in offline events in the future, we will run online surveys for demands beforehand so that our fans don’t experience discomfort.
Q. When you decided to set up a booth, how many people did you initially expect to visit? It seems that the number of visitors far exceeded your expectations.
A. As we said before, we simply didn’t expect this may people to visit. We estimated 100 people at most and prepared a hundred mugs per day, but so many more came. We’re terribly sorry that a lot of fans didn’t have a chance to get the merchandise they wanted despite waiting for so long because of our lack of preparation. We considered borrowing two spaces for our booth, but we feared taking up too much space for too little engagement (or so we thought), not to mention that the option was quite expensive. We’d like to say thank you so much to our fans who came a long way to see us.
Q. Are you aware of BaseMod’s existence? The players started with skins and are now tackling custom Abnormalities; what do you think of this?
A. If you are talking about the mods on dcinside, then yes, we did see them. We see the vitalization of the modding scene in a very positive light, and we hope the fans deliver high-quality content for everyone to enjoy. We personally find it unfortunate that we never got to set up official modding support. We initially planned to integrate Steam Workshop, but we later found out that it’s a lot harder and more cumbersome than we had thought. The developer has to set up everything from scratch including an address, and we didn’t receive any support from Steam regarding that. Besides, we are currently busy developing our next game, so it will be difficult for us to make LC support Steam Workshop even in the future.
Q. Is your stance on secondary creations other than mods still the same?
A. Yes. We have no intentions to discourage creating fan content for LC as long as it doesn’t pursue profit too much. We’re positive about fan creations, and we want to encourage our fans to become more active build up more of that positive force.
Q. What is your stance on modding Library of Ruina?
A. It’s not much different from our stance on modding LC; we want the modding scene to become active, and we look forward to seeing what mods the fans can come up with. Since this game’s combat is focused on cards, we believe the base game could provide an easier basis for mod creators to expand upon.
Q. The UI designer has said that you expect to release LoR’s early access on April 2020. When can we expect the full release?
A. The early access reveal date of Library of Ruina is expected to be in April 2020, and the game’s full release is expected to be somewhere between November and December 2020. Our planned course of action is to serially patch in stories and gameplay aspects after releasing the beta, and ultimately give players the impression that they’re reading a whole book.
Q. Will the LoR collab cafe be held some time after LoR’s early access release, or after the full release?
A. We cannot answer that for certain just yet; we need more time to prepare.
Q. The plot of Lobotomy Corporation was focused on the manager of a facility and his colleagues, with a bit of lore for individual Abnormalities and a limited outlook on the outside world. What will be the flow of Library of Ruina’s plot?
A. In Library of Ruina, we’d like to explore the world in earnest. Topics encompassing the world, such as what is common sense and what isn’t in the outside world, and the impact the sudden downfall of L Corp had on the world will be the main focus; and the player will be able to experience what Angela feels as she encounters the outside world for the first time in her million years of life. We hope you enjoy the story of Library of Ruina.
Q. Will we get to know everything about the world in detail? Do you plan to make more games continuing from LoR?
A. We’d like to give the players a wide and shallow perspective of the world, and we expect the player to piece together the tales and hints about the world from the game’s story to complete their own worldview. We haven’t decided anything about making sequels to LoR, and we aren’t sure if it will be possible, but if we do happen to make a sequel, we’d like to move on from Sephirahs and shift the focus to entirely new characters.
The following questions were asked to the UI designer and the artist, since the director said he’s not taking any more questions for the day. Big thanks to all three of them for answering fans’ questions.
Q. There’s only one illustrator on your team, and you have showcased lots of illustrations for LoR; isn’t the work burdensome? Do you ever work overtime?
A.
UI designer: our artist works fast, so they manage to leave on time everyday.
Artist: It was tough at first, but now I’m alright. I do have quick hands, but the urge to go home early is also a driving factor.
Q. A picture of the interior of a residence in a Wing was once posted on Project Moon’s Twitter. A lot of Korean fans said that the pic has a “Korean” feel to it; was this intended?
A.
Artist: Yes, it was intended to have a bit of “Korean” taste to it, since it’s a Korean game after all.
Q. Can we expect unreleased Abnormalities to show up in LoR, LC2, or other future projects?
A.
UI: We’d really like to if possible, but ‘modularization’ is a big problem…… We do hope to make them work somehow.
Q. Do you plan to have an online Q&A session in the future for people living in other parts of the country?
A.
UI: We will consider that!
Q. Can you make a badge merch out of LoR’s logo?
A.
UI: I will suggest that to the director, though we will have to simplify the logo first if we were to do that.
Q. Who came up with silly nicknames such as DangoCreature?
A.
UI: We sometimes use stuff jokingly discussed between me, the programmer, the artist, and others as placeholder names and flavor texts for testing.
Q. Do you have plans to release LC or LoR on platforms other than PC, like smartphones or the Switch?
A.
UI: Porting Lobotomy won’t be realistically feasible, but we did discuss that regarding LoR. Especially since a lot of Japanese people prefer consoles over PCs as gaming platforms, while Koreans mostly use PCs. (Other platforms are not guaranteed yet, but they are considering it)
Q. There are many typos and grammatical errors in Lobotomy Corporation’s script; do you plan to resolve them? Also, there were a number of errors in LoR’s text as well, though not nearly as bad as LC’s.
A.
UI: We’re still busy developing LoR, and the amount of text is quite enormous, so we won’t be able to resolve the issues in LC anytime soon. However, if you can compile a list of errors for us, we will gladly refer to it once we’re done with preparing LoR. We will try to be more careful with spelling, spacing, and such in LoR.
Q. This was only present in the reveal trailer and not the alpha gameplay trailer or today’s demonstration; is this a foreign language or something?
A.
UI: Oh, this… This is a bit embarrassing… This was only in earlier builds of the game, and is gone now… It was Netzach’s name written in… Herbrew, I think.
Q. In the picture of the Index posted on Project Moon’s Twitter, the Organization’s logo was a hand lifting the index finger; could this mean that the Middle’s logo is...
A.
UI: We haven’t decided upon logo designs for the Ring and the Pinky, but yes, the Middle’s logo is what you think it is.