So, You Want To Make A Fictional World


First of all, congratulations. I admire your determination and enthusiasm. After all, even starting to create a world is a mighty venture, and it can be difficult to know how to begin. But you already know that, don't you? That's why you're here.

In this lesson, we're going to focus on the most basic aspects of your new creative environment, which includes making up your mind about things. You don't have to - but do ponder, because this is the foundation that will help you continue and make easier decisions later. So curb your indecisiveness, and prepare your creativity. Even the sky's not a limit in your imagination - literally.


Contents

  • The Role Of Your World
  • Make It Fictional - The Right Way
  • Unique Features
  • Magic And Technology
  • What's Next?


The Role of Your World

Let's start with this, because you probably already know the answer to the question.

What do you want to use this world for? There are a surprising amount of different responses you can have to this - even though, let's face it, you're probably either writing a story or playing a roleplaying game. But some people make video games, make music, tell stories to themselves, create art or just worldbuild for the sake of itself.

Whatever your goal is, it will likely influence the way you build your universe. There are two models for this:

  • The World Has A Goal. When you make a setting like this, its sole purpose is to deliver your medium or preferred form of art. Novels, poems and songs are likely about these kinds of worlds. During the development of such a universe, you need to keep reminding yourself about the goal or the plot of your medium, and how the world serves as a tool to help with that.
  • The World Is A Sandbox. These settings are created to be a fun place to discover, made for more than a single purpose. Roleplaying games typically have these, because they have multiple stories set in the same world; and of course, building as a hobby also generally produces this type of setting.

Of course, a world can be the first type and still be fun to discover, or vica versa, being developed for a more loose medium but still have an underlying theme. It's more like a spectrum, but you should determine where you want your setting to be on it, if you haven't already.

 

Make It Fictional - The Right Way

One of the first things people will ask when looking at a fictional world is: 'Okay, but what makes it different from our world? Let me see the stuff! Entertain me!' Now, this does not mean that you'll have to show every special or supernatural element right away, or that you need to have many such features.

Lots of worlds are fantasy ones, but the classification I'm about to tell you about can fit any setting. Let's see the two distinct types of fantasy worlds:

  • High Fantasy. These are worlds with lots of fantastical elements, places like Tolkien's or Avatar: The Last Airbender's universes. If you throw a rock, it'll more likely hit something magical than not. I prefer these settings, because the possibilities enhance his creativity and serve as great tools. But it might not be your cup of tea.
  • Low Fantasy. A universe like this is similar to our reality, often with a single fantastical element, or subtle ones. You might prefer having a world like this because a potential audience doesn't need to suspense their disbelief as much, providing greater immersion in your stories or creations.

As I've mentioned before, you can also apply this to other types of worlds - like sci-fi settings, for example. But for now, let's stick with the names 'low fantasy' and 'high fantasy', because these are the widely known phrases for this classification.

Now, some might also say that low fantasy settings are also better because the lack of fantastical elements allows the audience to focus more on things like emotion and relationships. This is a bucket of rubbish; let me tell you why.

If you do it smart, fantastical elements will highlight the things you want to emphasize. Let's stick with the example of an emotionally charged story. Add an emotion-based magic system, have the main character struggle mastering it because of their pent-up trauma and emotional instability. And then later on demonstrate how they solved their problems internally by showing the external results (i.e. Magic Works Now! Yay!) . Naturally though, you don't need to make a high fantasy world to highlight something in a similar way.

There are, of course, other things you can make more significant with clever world design. You might add various fantasy creatures or awesome scenes to make your favourite hobby, drawing relevant. Or maybe you really want to focus on the dilemmas of power and godhood; what better to do than adding a pantheon of gods with some spicy family conflict! By the way if you're stuck with this one, just look at the Greeks. They made a better eons-long family drama than any modern TV show.

Now that we're talking about purpose and design so much, it's also time to mention that you absolutely don't have to give reasons or have grand plans when creating your world. Have a gut feeling or a great idea, absolutely want to have something in your lore? That's all the reason you need; include it.

 

Unique Feateures

Not all worlds have these, but yours might be one of them. These features often completely alter the rules of a universe. For example, there could be a setting where the sun only rises every seven days, and only for a few hours. Or maybe your world is entirely made of floating islands and continents, or perhaps it never rains and the only sources of water are rivers and lakes. These features can be regional as well - there could be a mainland and the floating islands, for example.

If you have a close-to-realistic setting, these might be the only things that differentiate your universe from ours. Maybe you have a world where Adolph Hitler got admitted to art school, or one where Julius Caesar was assassinated at the start of his career. Just like magical or resource-related unique features in your world, these small ripples can cause tidal waves in a setting, affecting everything from cultural practices to current geopolitical conflicts.


Magic And Technology

It's important to establish the basics of these things because they majorly determine the tone and style of your world. Mind you, you shouldn't detail them just yet, because you still haven't completely developed the general concept of your world. What you should do instead is describe them in single phrases or words.

Let's look at magic first. This is a complex topic (and also an exciting one) because magic can have many different forms and effects. Your phrase doesn't need to cover all aspects, just one key concept. For example, one could describe The Last Airbender's magic with 'elemental'. There's no need to talk about the spirit realm, branches of magic or the avatar; just the general concept. Similarly, the magic of Lord of the Rings could have the word 'divine' - you don't need to mention demigods, elves or rings. Other magic systems could be described with 'essence-based', 'instinctual in creatures' or 'powered by art'. See what I mean?

Technology works similarly to this. Settings commonly have technological advancement levels similar to either medieval ages, modern days or futuristic times - but there's nothing stopping you from making an alternative history for technology, introducing a steampunk universe, for example.

Although it should be a generally established concept, you don't need to have your whole universe align with a single idea. You can make a separate region or continent where technology is more advanced, and magic is unknown or not present, for example. So don't stress about making this decision; it doesn't determine everything.

 

What's Next?

You now have the basic concepts of your universe; these will help you get started on your worldbuilding journey. What you do next is really up to your preference. Work on whatever you need for your project, or find the most fascinating or fun to work on - whether it's the unique creatures, the magical arts, the spaceships or the various horrid diseases in your setting. You can't work on everything all at once - so start with what you like the most instead. Don't be afraid to jump straight to something specific; that's actually a good thing.

I will also be posting on this blog about various aspects of creating worlds, which should help you get your worldbuilding to the next level; read this post to know how to continue with your process. Feel free to ask questions or request topics in the comments. I hope you found this lesson helpful.

See you next time!

 

Images from Pixabay