The world of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is alive with detail, from the intricate story populated with memorable characters to lived-in (and sometimes abandoned) areas that carry their own tales for players to uncover.

The varied landscapes and denizens make exploring Skyrim’s frosty reaches one of discovery and intrigue, but one detail doesn’t just increase the game’s immersion – it also helped establish the very setting of the game itself.

The player takes on the role as the Dovahkiin, a legendary warrior whose name means "Dragonborn" in the language of Skyrim’s ancient, powerful race of Dragons. However, it’s not just the Dovahkiin who takes their name from Skyrim’s ferocious flying creatures – evidence of the Dragons’ presence lies throughout the entire game’s world as a language, complete with its own script and spoken tongue.

Even the game’s shouts – incredible abilities granted to the Dovahkiin through their voice – are from the Dragon’s language, forming a unique motif for Skyrim that stands out among the Elder Scrolls series. Despite the magical setting, the origins of Skyrim and its Dragon language start with the real-world team at Bethesda Games Studios - so how did the task of creating an entire method of communication for a fictional species begin?

“That is… a great question, and one I don’t specifically remember the answer to,” says Emil Pagliarulo, Design Director at Bethesda Game Studios and current Lead Designer & Writer working on Starfield. “I remember discussing language and writing with (Bethesda Game Studios Executive Producer) Todd Howard, and it just sort of snowballed from there.”

DEVELOPING DRAGON

At the time of Skyrim’s development, Pagliarulo was a Senior Designer primarily responsible for the Dark Brotherhood questline, writing dialogue for the game’s guards and doing initial designs for most of the major cities. Given the game’s focus on Dragons, however, Pagliarulo soon had another major responsibility: creating their language.

“The thing about the Dragon language is that it isn’t just a language. It is, first and foremost, a gameplay device for using the shouts,” says Pagliarulo. Incidentally, the idea for turning the Dragon’s words into powerful abilities came from an unlikely source: David Lynch’s 1984 film adaptation of Dune.

“In that movie, there’s a pretty significant change to the book, in that the ‘Weirding Way’ fighting style utilizes something called a Weirding Module that essentially weaponizes sound,” explains Pagliarulo. “It’s the way that sound is utilized – including the pattern of inhaling and exhaling – that directly influenced the way the Dragon shouts function.”

Now, this creates a challenge unique to a developer creating a game with a rich setting: this fictional language doesn’t just tell a story but also must serve a function in the game’s world. Thankfully, Skyrim’s draconic shouts work as both a game mechanic and a believable language spoken by the Dragons.

“There’s a pattern to the language players may not realize,” Pagliarulo says. “For example, every shout is made up of one to three single-syllable words. Each word also functions differently depending on how many total words are present. If you just have ‘Fus,’ it’s exhaled strongly, indicating the forceful nature of the command. But if you have two or more words, ‘Fus’ is actually inhaled, as it serves to modify the second and third words, which are forcefully exhaled. That was very important to the language when used as shouts – it had to feel forceful. The same kind of force a dragon would use when spitting fire.”

So not only did shouts help provide a basis for Dragon diction but also as a flavorful base for how the language operates. Next up: filling the lexicon with a vocabulary of Dragon words.

“I drew from languages like Swedish, Danish and German. But the one that had the most influence on me was Old English,” Pagliarulo says. Recounting his earlier years working on the Bloodmoon expansion for The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, Pagliarulo found inspiration from an Old English recording of Beowulf, which came in handy once more – this time, as a creative reference for the Dragon language.

CARVED IN STONE

As for the written alphabet, a cuneiform-like script was developed, formed from letters that invoke the Dragon’s fearsome form. “The visual language was Todd Howard’s idea. He wanted something that could look like it was carved into stone with a dragon’s talon, which I just thought was brilliant,” says Pagliarulo. “The symbols themselves were actually designed and drawn by the late Adam Adamowicz, whose talent for interpreting ideas seemed limitless.”

Another challenge unique to developing an in-game language was updating it during the collaborative process of making a video game. “Once we got rolling, the designers started coming up with some new words and phrases, so it was a struggle to constantly keep that database updated,” Pagliarulo remarks, “and in two versions, English-to-Dragon and Dragon-to-English!”

“Also, languages evolve and can become incredibly complex. J.R.R. Tolkien’s Sindarin, for example, is really a fully fleshed-out language with different dialects that he spent years developing. The Dragon language is much, much simpler. In a lot of ways, the Dragon language utilizes one of game design’s greatest techniques – smoke and mirrors. It’s the feeling of complexity designed to draw the player in and get them immersed, but it doesn’t have any complexity beyond that because as a gameplay device, it didn’t need it.”

LENDING A VOICE

The work wasn’t in vain, however. The Dragon language not only immersed players deeper into the snowy reaches of Skyrim’s world but also formed a significant portion of the game’s identity - including its famous Dragonborn theme, introduced to the world in December of 2010 in Skyrim’s announcement trailer.

“The very first challenge with the language was writing the lyrics to the theme song, because it has a unique scheme that rhymes in both English and Dragon,” explains Pagliarulo. “That exercise informed a lot of what the language sounded like, the sort of rhythmic nature of it.”

That’s not the only use of the Dragon language that’s stuck with players all these years. The game’s shouts also resonated with not just fans but the gaming community at large, most notably the shout for Unrelenting Force. If you don’t recognize the name, you almost certainly remember its power words: FUS RO DAH.

“’Fus Ro Dah!’ is probably my favorite shout, because of its forceful simplicity,” Pagliarulo says. “It sort of represents the entire Dragon language and really, it’s just fun to yell! In fact, in the Skyrim trailer, that’s actually me yelling it. It was great to get into the booth and just feel it and scream it.”

Of course, no one single element defines Skyrim, a massive work created with a full team of talented artists, writers, programmers, quality assurance staff and so much more. However, the creation and use of the Dragon language is a great example of Skyrim’s attention to detail and the way Bethesda Games Studios employs a multitude of these details to make their worlds believable, lived in and most importantly, one players love to explore.

MORE THAN WORDS

“It’s right there in the name: Skyrim,” Pagliarulo says. “Even more than a game, Skyrim is a place. A place you can totally live in. Build a house! Adopt a kid! Complete endless procedural quests! I think that’s really the appeal of Skyrim – even after you’ve exhausted all the content, you haven’t really exhausted all the content. And then, if you want, you can start over and have a pretty different experience the second, third or fifteenth time around. And I think all of that is a testament to the hard work, passion, and sheer love the team put into that game.”

That hard work, passion and, interestingly, sheer love isn’t lost on its players, either. Pagliarulo recalls a story where he learned a couple was planning a Skyrim-themed wedding and Bethesda Games Studios wanted to wish the soon-to-be-weds well with a custom wedding cake. There was just one problem: what to write on the cake?

“You can’t really write a phrase on a wedding cake without including the word ‘love,’ right? Well, just like with Klingon, the Dragon language didn’t have a word for love!” Pagliarulo laughs. “So I had to create one.” That word is "Ros” (like rose) and the entire phrase Pagliarulo created was "may your love last forever.”

“Even though the Dragon language is fictional, it’s real for Skyrim and for all the players who decide to live in that world,” Pagliarulo concludes, “and that’s a privilege I don’t take lightly.”