General:UR

Jupiter

Around the release of Daggerfall in 1996, Kurt Kuhlmann and Michael Kirkbride pitched Producer Todd Howard a science fiction pirate game set in the far future of the real world. This game pitch for a pirate game was retooled by Todd Howard into a more greenlightable Elder Scrolls spinoff, and Redguard was created in its place.

Of note, 10th Planet was an unrelated science fiction product in production at Bethesda around the same time.

Game Pitch

The game pitch featured the real world gas planet of Jupiter as its setting, in far future that name was forgotten, and it is now called UR. Kuhlmann and Kirkbride's love of ancient cultures had them taking inspiration from the Etruscans, Medes, and Babylonians -- specifically there would have been "Babylonian Bull-People" as a race. In place of physical ships the boats of the setting would have been air whales -- the main story would have focused on a group of pirates in the sky boats of a barely-hidden gas ocean on UR. Metal would have been so scare that each cannonball has its own individual name. Meat too would be entirely scarce, in light of this the people were cannibalistic and normalized cannibalism, with them feasting on human bone-meal.

"Ur" is a very common term in the works of Michael Kirkbride, meaning: primitive, original, or earliest.

Rebellion

For fun, in 1999 Kuhlmann and Kirkbride formulated their own science fiction television show set in the Star Wars universe called Star Wars: Rebellion, which included elements from their pitch for UR. The used of Medes for the character of "Titus Mede" in Rebellion is notable -- this character was later retooled for The Elder Scrolls.

Legacy

Given the evolution of game development, many setting concepts from the pitch for UR have crept into The Elder Scrolls:

• The Pirates were retooled into the Restless League for Redguard
• Air Whales were retooled into Snow Whales for The Seven Fights of the Aldudagga and Skyrim
• Babylonian Bull-People were retooled into Morihaus and the Minotaurs for Knights of the Nine
• The Medes were used as a surname for Titus Mede and the Mede Dynasty introduced in The Infernal City and Skyrim

See Also

• Canceled Games

References

Note: The following references are considered to be unofficial sources. They are included to round off this article and may not be authoritative or conclusive.