Eye of Mesra

For other uses, see Eye.

"Ask Again Later"

―Eye of Mesra^[2]

The Eye of Mesra was a small, round fortune-telling toy. An old desert tradition, they were commonly used by children of Mos Espa, Tatooine.

Description[]

"Everything Will Proceed As You Have Foreseen"

―Eye of Mesra^[2]

A fortune-telling toy known as the Eye of Mesra was small and round in appearance, and resembled an eye. The exterior was colored a light shade of pink, while the interior section was colored blue with a black colored pupil decal.^[1] When the user asked the Eye of Mesra a question, it would respond with one of many types of answers, including a positive, negative, or noncommittal response.^[2] In this way, the Eye of Mesra was similar to the Quay novelty toy, another type of fortune-telling device.^[3]

History[]

"I've spent years perfecting my crafting skills, and now I'm ready to announce my mastery to the galaxy. I've chosen an unusual subject for my masterwork: an obscure religious icon of the Weequay species called the Eye of Mesra. For my design I require a rare material, and I hope you can locate it for me."

―An unidentified citizen, to a spacer^[2]

The Eye of Mesra had its roots as an old desert tradition. Although they were commonly used by children in the Tatooine city of Mos Espa,^[1] they could also be found on many other worlds of the galaxy, such as Naboo.^[2] However, it did share a namesake with Tatooine's Great Mesra Plateau.^[4]

Behind the scenes[]

"In Dark Times, Nothing Is What It Appears To Be"

―Eye of Mesra^[2]

The Eye of Mesra received entries in a number of source books, including the Star Wars: Episode I Insider's Guide (1999),^[5] Star Wars: Episode I The Visual Dictionary (1999),^[1] and The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia (2008).^[6]

Their first appearance was as an item in the 2003 video game Star Wars Galaxies: An Empire Divided, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game developed by Sony Online Entertainment and published by LucasArts, prior to its closure on December 15, 2011.^[2]^[7] The item acted as a sort of mini-game, allowing players to ask the the Eye a question in return for a random answer,^[2] much in the same way as a real world Magic 8-Ball.^[8] In fact, the game's directory tree files refer to the Eyes of Mesra text Strings Table File as "magic_eight_ball."^[9]

Following the release of Publish 25's New Game Enhancements on November 15, 2005, the Eye of Mesra was modified to actually allow the player to type a question into a prompt window displayed by the item.^[2]^[10] The Eye of Mesra was later featured in a December 1, 2015 StarWars.com news post, titled Let's Go Play Ball: Toys and Games from a Galaxy Far, Far Away by Tim Veekhoven.^[11]