Origin Issue
So what is all this then?
I suppose, in part, it's an exploration of the history of what I enjoy, which is (in a way) the history of myself; the sort of self-reflection that one does when one gets older, I suppose, even if I've been doing it for almost as long as I have been liking things. So let's go back to the beginning...
Around 1977-1979, I found myself interested in a series of initial interests that set the pace for most everything else.
My parents took me to see the movie Star Wars, which completely entranced me; a whole galaxy of unique-looking aliens, spacecraft, and worlds. I also thought, in the literal-mindedness of the very young, that the Rebel Alliance base was on Earth, because they were based in what was obvious to me were Mayan or Aztec ruins. I might also add that my favorite character from the movie - indeed, all three of the Original Trilogy - was Wedge. Why? Because he was just some guy who managed to be at all the important battles and survive intact.
The following year I was introduced to a new type of game, the roleplaying game, in my gifted school at elementary school - something that could've only happened at the very beginning, when no one really knew what they were. I got to play Dungeons and Dragons every Friday, using odd polyhedral dice, playing characters with unique abilities, traveling through dungeons drawn on laminated maps so we could draw each level as we explored them which (coincidentally, no doubt) was never larger than the map.
As a product of convergent evolution, my dad gave me a copy of The Hobbit to read, a children's book that nonetheless gave the impression of a wider world with a deeper history behind it.
And finally, on a trip to the science center, an exhibit on the latest advancements with computers exposed me to a strange game where you typed in commands on what you wanted to do. I remember telling the guy demonstrating it to try looking under the carpet, whereupon he discovered a trapdoor. A few years later I realized that it must've been Zork, but I had already been exposed to other adventure games by that time.
What is the common thread here? I would suppose that, apart from the interests themselves, there was the idea of worldbuilding and exploration. When I watched Star Wars, I spent days afterwards wondering about the aliens in the cantina, about where the X-Wings came from, what the history of the Galactic Empire was and where its capital planet was found. With D&D, I was able to create my own worlds while also following the development of its initial campaign setting, the World of Greyhawk. The Hobbit made me wonder was laid beyond the edges of the map, and I devoured The Fellowship of the Ring when I finally learned of its existence (and imagine my joy when I realized that it wasn't a single book, but the first book in a trilogy). And with adventure games, I had my carefully drawn maps and puzzle solutions and a desire to create my own; and wondering what laid behind the elements of more developed games like Zork.
They all gave me a desire to know more about their universes and to create my own. Which leads us here today about what I want to talk about in my blog, in the most roundabout way possible:
1) Examining fictional universes and studying their elements
2) Discussing my own attempts at worldbuilding, whether through prose or adventure game design.
3) Anything else that doesn't fall in the above two categories.
I am hoping to keep examples of 3) as few as possible, in whatever time I actually dedicate myself to this blog. If not, well, there's always... eh, you know the rest.
I suppose, in part, it's an exploration of the history of what I enjoy, which is (in a way) the history of myself; the sort of self-reflection that one does when one gets older, I suppose, even if I've been doing it for almost as long as I have been liking things. So let's go back to the beginning...
Around 1977-1979, I found myself interested in a series of initial interests that set the pace for most everything else.
My parents took me to see the movie Star Wars, which completely entranced me; a whole galaxy of unique-looking aliens, spacecraft, and worlds. I also thought, in the literal-mindedness of the very young, that the Rebel Alliance base was on Earth, because they were based in what was obvious to me were Mayan or Aztec ruins. I might also add that my favorite character from the movie - indeed, all three of the Original Trilogy - was Wedge. Why? Because he was just some guy who managed to be at all the important battles and survive intact.
The following year I was introduced to a new type of game, the roleplaying game, in my gifted school at elementary school - something that could've only happened at the very beginning, when no one really knew what they were. I got to play Dungeons and Dragons every Friday, using odd polyhedral dice, playing characters with unique abilities, traveling through dungeons drawn on laminated maps so we could draw each level as we explored them which (coincidentally, no doubt) was never larger than the map.
As a product of convergent evolution, my dad gave me a copy of The Hobbit to read, a children's book that nonetheless gave the impression of a wider world with a deeper history behind it.
And finally, on a trip to the science center, an exhibit on the latest advancements with computers exposed me to a strange game where you typed in commands on what you wanted to do. I remember telling the guy demonstrating it to try looking under the carpet, whereupon he discovered a trapdoor. A few years later I realized that it must've been Zork, but I had already been exposed to other adventure games by that time.
What is the common thread here? I would suppose that, apart from the interests themselves, there was the idea of worldbuilding and exploration. When I watched Star Wars, I spent days afterwards wondering about the aliens in the cantina, about where the X-Wings came from, what the history of the Galactic Empire was and where its capital planet was found. With D&D, I was able to create my own worlds while also following the development of its initial campaign setting, the World of Greyhawk. The Hobbit made me wonder was laid beyond the edges of the map, and I devoured The Fellowship of the Ring when I finally learned of its existence (and imagine my joy when I realized that it wasn't a single book, but the first book in a trilogy). And with adventure games, I had my carefully drawn maps and puzzle solutions and a desire to create my own; and wondering what laid behind the elements of more developed games like Zork.
They all gave me a desire to know more about their universes and to create my own. Which leads us here today about what I want to talk about in my blog, in the most roundabout way possible:
1) Examining fictional universes and studying their elements
2) Discussing my own attempts at worldbuilding, whether through prose or adventure game design.
3) Anything else that doesn't fall in the above two categories.
I am hoping to keep examples of 3) as few as possible, in whatever time I actually dedicate myself to this blog. If not, well, there's always... eh, you know the rest.
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