General:Ken Rolston

Ken Rolston
Role(s)	Game designer, writer
Softworks tenure	1996–Mar 2006
Alias(es)	kenrolston krolston Socucius Ergalla RevLovebutter

"What is really important is for you to be crazy. If you are not crazy, you cannot get started as an artist. I don't know how you get crazy, everybody's going to have their own way!"
—Ken Rolston, ECGC 2014

Ken Rolston (b. 1949) was the lead game designer and visionary behind Bethesda Softworks and The Elder Scrolls throughout the mid to late 1990s and early 2000s.

Before joining Bethesda, Rolston designed for a number of pen-and-paper RPGs, including Dungeons & Dragons, Paranoia, and RuneQuest. Rolston departed Bethesda after the completion of Oblivion for what was thought to be permanent retirement after about 25 years in the Gaming Industry. However, this only lasted for about a year before he returned to work for Big Huge Games in February of 2007 as the lead designer for a brand new roleplaying IP called Crucible, which was unfortunately canceled due to THQ's (Big Huge Games's owner) financial difficulties. Big Huge Games was bought out by 38 Studios, and subsequently, the gameplay systems of Crucible were flipped around into a new game using 38's Kingdoms of Amalur IP, which was a singleplayer roleplaying game called Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning.

Credits

• An Elder Scrolls Legend: Battlespire — Design and Dialogue
• The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard — Editing / Help And Liberal Theft From
• The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind — Lead Designer / Writing and Quest Design
• The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind: Tribunal — Lead Designer / Writing and Quest Design
• The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind: Bloodmoon — Additional Writing and Quest Design
• The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion — Lead Designer

Texts authored

This list is non-exhaustive and includes only texts which have been confirmed to be written, fully or partially, by Rolston.

Morrowind

• The Cantatas of Vivec
• The House of Troubles (final edits on Michael Kirkbride's work)
• The Monomyth (the Cyrodilic Myth)

Out-of-game

(See also: Ken Rolston's Posts)

• Caius Cosades' Visit to Uriel VII's Tomb
• Caius Cosades' Letter
• Interview with Three Booksellers (with Douglas Goodall and Todd Howard)
• Interview with Denizens of Tamriel (with Michael Kirkbride)

Relevant Interviews

• 1997: Gamepen: Interview with the Bethesda Softworks' Elder Scrolls Team
• Jun 2000: GAME.EXE: Interview With Morrowind's Developers
• Jun 2000: RPGVault: The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
• Jun 2000: Voodooextreme: Interview with Pete Hines and Ken Rolston
• Dec 2000: Joystick: Interview Concepteur principal de Morrowind
• Feb 2001: Gamespy: Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind Preview
• Jun 2001: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #1 Introduction and Gameworld
• Mar 2001: Morrowind Italia: Interview with Ken Rolston
• Jul 2001: PC Gamer: Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind Interview
• Aug 2001: Computer Games: Ultimate Preview Guide - The Elder Scrolls: Morrowind
• Aug 2001: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #4
• Oct 2001: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #10 Special Places
• Nov 2001: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #11
• Dec 2001: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #12 Interesting Opponents
• Dec 2001: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #13 Surprise!
• Dec 2001: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #14 Favorite Skills
• Jan 2002: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #16 Off The Beaten Path
• Jan 2002: Computer Games: Road to Nowhere: Day of the Dinosaurs
• Jan 2002: Computer Games: Road to Nowhere: A moment in the mind of Morrowind's lead designer
• Feb 2002: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #18
• Mar 2002: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #19
• Mar 2002: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #20
• Mar 2002: RPGVault: Morrowind Developer Q&A; #21
• May 2002: PC Zone: The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
• Oct 2002: GamersPulse: Elder Scrolls III: Tribunal
• Nov 2002: Computer Games: Vivec Unleashed: The Elder Scrolls III: Tribunal
• Apr 2004: ElderScrolls.com: Most Memorable Elder Scrolls Moments (archive)
• Apr 2005: Atomic: Daedric By Design
• Jul 2005: PC Zone: Games That Changed the World: The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
• May 2006: HARDOCP: Oblivion's Ken Rolston Speaks
• Feb 2008: GDC: Collaborative Writing and Vast Narratives: Principles, Processes, and Genteel Truculence
• Jun 2011: Wiwiland: Ken Rolston Interview
• Feb 2012: Reddit: IAmA RPG Game Design Visionary, Ken Rolston
• Apr 2014: ECGC 2014 Keynote w/ Ken Rolston - How to Pitch a Game
• Jun 2017: Gamasutra Plays Oblivion with lead designer Ken Rolston
• Sep 2017: Interview with Ken Rolston: Lead Designer on Morrowind and Oblivion
• Mar 2019: Polygon: Morrowind: An oral history

External Links

• perfect.krolston.com
• Ken Rolston on Wikipedia
• Ken Rolston on MobyGames
• Ken Rolston on Twitter

Gallery

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  Morrowind-era Concept art of a Breton mage based on Ken

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  Socucius Ergalla, a Morrowind NPC whose name is an alias for Ken