Creating a Sci Fi Universe

What are the best core themes?

I've always had fun creating worlds. I built up complex worlds in my mind for my lego men to adventure in, I drew out elaborate maps of cities and countries when I was little and daydreamed funny stories or adventures that could have taken places in these places. Later I built MUDs, made complex dungeons for other people to run around in. In recent years I would craft complex stories and histories in my mind to match with events in games like GalCiv 1, or Master of Orion 3 since they lacked stories of their own.

I've written before on the importance of a good story/background for a computer game, how the proper narrative can give context to ordinarily meaningless actions. I singled out the WarCraft series as an example of how story is done right, and games like Master of Orion or Galactic Civilizations where a story could have either made the game playable (in the case of the former), or made it simply outstanding (in the case of the latter). To me, a story in the thread that ties a game together.

So, add my habit of doodling stories in my mind with my appreciation/desire to see well-crafted narratives in video games and you'd almost see the quivering beginnings of a game writer.

Well, except for the fact that I'm not all that great at writing...
And I don't have a game to write for...

Lucky for me, a friend of mine has gotten into game development with the Torque Game Engine in the past year or so and is trying to build his own Space RPG/Sim. Well, for a good space game, you need a story. He and I talked and he thought it would be great if I wanted to write for the game. Since this is a hobby game, and will probably never reach a released or even largely playable state, it's a great platform for me to experiment, for me to get a feel for how to write in this medium. With some work, some feedback from others and maybe eventually some writing lessons I may reach a point where I'm good enough to write stuff that I would ever let anyone else outside a very close circle of friends read... Maybe someday I'd even get to write the story for a cheap 2d sidescroller freeware game! The sky's the limit!

So now, I have a universe to create. It's history, geography, politics, factions, races and technology are all left to me to think up and describe. It's a daunting, but very cool, task.

My problem is I need a starting point, I need to come up with a larger theme to fit everything else into. This is probably the hardest part since a compelling theme drives so much in a story, it dictates how so much else is written.

This is why I'm here, writing to you, my fellow JUziens. Many of you here are sci-fi geeks, you love video games, you may be a writer yourself, or you may just love reading a good story. What sorts of sci-fi core themes and concepts have you really enjoyed in other games/books/movies?

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Cordelia

Join Date 07/2002

Ah...what a fantastic task you have ahead of you! I've often found that while the world itself is important, the characters that populate the world are just as important. And as this is an RPG of course you'll want to spend some time on them.

I want to write a longer response to this, but I'm at work and probably should be working. I'll gather my thoughts and will probably end up responding several times.

Let me start you here, though: The Hero Myth. Read anything by Joseph Campbell. His most famous work, "The Hero With a Thousand Faces" can be found here: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0691017840/103-8297453-4595020?v=glance

For an overview of the hero myth, go here: http://www.yourheroicjourney.com/Journey.shtml

While you specifically asked about core themes and concepts, and the Hero's Journey deals with the trial of a character, I think you can still find a wealth of information here. Joseph Campbell studied the myths and stories of many cultures and put them all together to create a unifying theory of the hero that resonates on a very deep level with all of us. Sometimes the world will grow out f the story you want to tell, and sometimes it's the other way around.

Ok - back to work. I'll respond to the specific world creation question later when I don't have my head in other things. What a cool project!

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Zoomba

Join Date 11/2002

+114

The story is sorta being crafted from both ends at once. The coder guy has a few story elements/events that he definitely wants to have in the game. I'm approaching it from the other end by drawing out a large canvas so to speak. I've never really tried to do the whole writing thing as detailed as I have to for this project, so I'm not sure which way to go with anything... what ideas work and what don't etc. Right now I'm just tossing everything against a wall and seeing what sticks.

I'll definitely check out the Hero Myth book when I start crafting individual stories and such... I've heard a lot about it, as it seems to be the bible for every game writer out there.

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I have always contended that Sci Fi was the hardesst fiction to write. For you not only had to create characters (like every other gnere), you had to create the whole universe!

That being said, I am rabid about books, but dont do games. Sorry.

But the books, most of them I read, manage to work in the nuances of the technology without it being the main part of the story. One trap you have to be mindful of is that you have to make it believable, yet far enough in the future that it is not surpassed by the near future (kind of what happened to a lot of stuff in the original Star Trek). Beyond that, I am not a writer but will be glad to kibbitz some if you need it.

Best of Luck. I look forward to reading more about it!

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