The story behind the Oblivion mod Terry Pratchett worked on

In his Foreword to The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Fantasy, the late Sir Terry Pratchett writes, "Imagination, not intelligence, made us human."

Most people know Pratchett as the author of Discworld, the famous fantasy series about a flat planet balanced on the backs of four elephants. However, what many people don't know is that the knighted author was also a massive fan of video games - so much so that he actually worked on mods for Oblivion, most of which were spearheaded by a Morrowind modder named Emma.

After making the transition from Morrowind to Oblivion, Emma sought to create a companion for herself. This resulted in the creation of Vilja, a Nord alchemist designed to keep Emma company as she traversed the world of Oblivion. While Emma originally created Vilja for personal use, even voicing the character herself, she eventually released her to the public with the help of fellow modder Charles "CD" Cooley. Vilja received a lot of admiration from avid players, but a particularly intriguing email titled "Praise for Vilja" came a few months after Vilja 1.0 launched.

"The first letter from Terry arrived in March 2010, only three months after the original release," Emma told Eurogamer. In this message, Pratchett mentioned how enamoured he had become with Vilja, specifically mentioning his appreciation for the way in which she would acknowledge small gifts such as strawberries. "He also praised the modding community as a whole, mentioning how impressed he was by the effort put into mods, and how much he enjoyed using them."

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