Diaries

Designer diaries (or developer diaries) are written by members of a game’s development team to incite interest in the game and appreciation of the production process. Often they can contain valuable information about early idea’s for the game’s story and gameplay. The Oddworld Scriptures has a complete catalogue of Oddworld designer diaries.

Oddworld: Abe’s Exoddus

Oddworld’s first designer diary was written by Lead Game Designer Paul O’Connor and published by videogames.com throughout 1998.

Oddworld: Munch’s Oddysee

Following the success of Paul’s first designer diary, he was invited by videogames.com to submit a second series for the development of Munch’s Oddysee from late 1999 to early 2001. At the same time, another diary series by Paul was published by PlayNOW!. Finally, two short diary entries by Paul were published on Microsoft’s promotional website MunchOnThis.com.

Oddworld Stranger’s Wrath

Two designer diary entries for Stranger were published by GameSpy, each by a different author.

Raymond Swanland, 09/12/2004
Gautam Babbar, 05/01/2005

In 2004, four entries in a unique series, Alf’s Inhabitants Anonymous, were published on Oddworld.com, documenting the activities of the studio’s varius departments. The fourth and final entry was a special report by Danielle, who interned at Oddworld Inhabitants.

April 2004
May 2004
June 2004
July 2004
August 2004, ‘My So Called Life … as an Oddworld Intern’