Leonard Boyarsky facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Leonard Boyarsky
Boyarsky in 2017
Occupation	Video game designer, visual artist
Employer	Obsidian Entertainment
Notable work	Fallout, Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines, Diablo III, The Outer Worlds

Leonard Boyarsky is a talented American computer game designer and visual artist. He is well-known for helping create popular video games like Fallout and Diablo III. He has worked on many exciting projects, shaping the look and stories of games that millions of players enjoy.

Early Life and Art Journey

Leonard Boyarsky studied art in college. He earned a bachelor's degree in Illustration from Cal State Fullerton. He also got a bachelor's degree in Fine Art from the Art Center College of Design. After finishing school, he started working as a freelance artist in 1992. He did art for game companies like Interplay and Maxis.

Even though he became a game designer, Leonard was very interested in comic books when he first started in the industry. He has mentioned that Wizardry and Lands of Lore: The Throne of Chaos are some of his favorite video games.

A Career in Video Games

Starting at Interplay Entertainment (1992–1998)

Leonard Boyarsky joined Interplay Entertainment as one of their early employees. He first did some freelance art for games like Rags to Riches: The Financial Market Simulation and Castles II: Siege and Conquest. Soon after, Interplay hired him full-time. He became an art director, lead artist, and also worked as a designer and writer.

His first big project as lead artist was the game Stonekeep in 1995. He was in charge of creating and adding all the 2D and 3D art for the game.

While at Interplay, Boyarsky met Tim Cain and Jason D. Anderson. These two would later become his partners in starting a new game company. The three of them often played tabletop role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons and GURPS after work.

Creating the World of Fallout

One day, Tim Cain suggested to his colleagues that they meet to discuss making a new video game. This game would use a special game engine he had built. Leonard Boyarsky and Jason Anderson were among the five people who showed up. This group became the main team for the game Fallout.

Boyarsky suggested the game should be set in a world after a big disaster. He and Anderson were big fans of the Mad Max 2 movie, which has a similar setting. Leonard really wanted to avoid making another fantasy game. There were already many fantasy role-playing games available at the time.

In 1997, he finished his work as art director on Fallout. He created the game's unique 1950s-inspired future look. He also designed the funny Vault Boy character cards and the game's unusual ending. He even helped improve some of the game's conversations. Before leaving Interplay, he helped design the main story, quests, and characters for Fallout 2 in 1998.

Founding Troika Games (1998–2005)

After leaving Interplay, Leonard Boyarsky, Tim Cain, and Jason Anderson started their own company called Troika Games. At Troika, Boyarsky took on many important roles. He was a project leader, art director, designer, writer, and even the company's CEO.

Their first game was Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura, released in 2001. For this game, he did similar work as he did on Fallout. He directed the art, wrote and edited conversations, and designed the story and quests.

He was also the project leader and art director for Troika's last game, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines, which came out in late 2004. Troika Games also worked on another game set in a post-disaster world, but it was never released because the company faced financial problems.

In early 2005, Troika Games closed down. Leonard took a year off to rest because he felt very tired from all the hard work. Later, Blizzard Entertainment asked him to help with the story and role-playing parts of their game Diablo III.

Working at Blizzard Entertainment (2006–2016)

At Blizzard Entertainment, Leonard Boyarsky became the lead world designer for Diablo III. He also worked on its expansion, Diablo III: Reaper of Souls. His job involved creating the game's detailed history, writing conversations, and designing quests. He believed it was important to build on the existing stories of the Diablo series. He wanted to make them more interesting and easier to understand.

This focus on story was a new direction for Blizzard's Diablo games. Before, the company had not focused as much on developing the story. This change was clear at BlizzCon 2011, a big event for Blizzard fans. There, Chris Metzen led the first-ever discussion panel about the game's story, with Boyarsky as the main speaker.

After this, Boyarsky often appeared in public and became a spokesperson for the story parts of Diablo III. Fans of Diablo affectionately called him ‘LeBo’. There is even a special item in Diablo III called ‘Boyarsky’s Chip’. It is a legendary gem that honors him, and its description even mentions Fallout.

Joining Obsidian Entertainment (2016–Present)

In April 2016, Leonard Boyarsky joined Obsidian Entertainment. Soon after, Feargus Urquhart, the head of Obsidian, confirmed that Boyarsky and Tim Cain were working together on a secret new project. Urquhart also said they were not working on other Obsidian games at the time. Boyarsky has called this new project his “dream game.”

At The Game Awards in 2018, Obsidian announced the game Boyarsky and Cain had been working on. It was The Outer Worlds. This game is a first-person science fiction action-RPG. It takes place on a terraformed exoplanet, which is a planet that has been changed to be more like Earth. The game was released for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One on October 25, 2019.

Games Leonard Boyarsky Worked On

See also

In Spanish: Leonard Boyarsky para niños