 A rendered conworld, as would be seen from space by an observer. A constructed world (also conworld or sub-creation) is an imaginary world, usually associated with a fictional universe, built via a world building or conworlding process. A constructed world typically has a number of constructed cultures and constructed languages associated with it. Worlds are often created for a novel, video game, or role-playing game, but sometimes for personal enjoyment or its own sake (see geofiction). Description: This is a sample constructed-world as seen from space. ...
An imaginary world is a setting, place or event or scenario at variance with objective reality, ranging from the voluntary suspension of disbelief of fictional universes and the socially constructed consensus reality of the Social Imaginary, to alternate realities resulting from disinformation, misinformation or imaginative speculation, and the subjective universe...
A fictional universe is a cohesive imaginary world that serves as the setting or backdrop for one or (more commonly) multiple works of fiction. ...
A constructed culture or conculture is a fictional culture created as part of a constructed world. ...
An artificial or constructed language (known colloquially as a conlang among aficionados), is a language whose phonology, grammar and vocabulary are specifically devised by an individual or small group, rather than having naturally evolved as part of a culture the way natural languages do. ...
A novel (from French nouvelle Italian novella, new) is an extended, generally fictional narrative in prose. ...
Namcos Pac-Man was a hit, and became a cultural phenomenon. ...
A role-playing game (RPG, often roleplaying game) is a type of game in which the participants assume the roles of fictional characters and collaboratively create or follow stories. ...
Geofiction is a hobby where people design imaginary cities, countries or entire worlds, including placenames, culture, social and political structures and even constructed languages (conlangs), primarily for personal enjoyment. ...
Constructed worlds often provide additional backstory and history to events in novels. Authors typically revise constructed worlds to complete a single work in a series.
Methods There are two generally accepted methods for world-building: top-down and bottom-up.
In the top-down approach, the designer first creates a general overview of the world, determining broad characteristics such as the inhabitants, technology-level, major geographic features, climate, global history, and other details of strategic importance. Once this is complete, the details of the world are developed by gradually focusing on smaller and smaller details, such as continents, civilizations, nations, cities, and towns. Designer is a broad term for a person who designs any of a variety of things. ...
By the mid 20th century humans had achieved a level of technological mastery sufficient to leave the surface of the planet for the first time and explore space. ...
Physical map of the Earth (Medium) (Large 2 MB) Geography is the scientific study of the locational and spatial variation in both physical and human phenomena on Earth. ...
HIStory: Past, Present and Future – Book I is a two-disc album by Michael Jackson released in 1995 by the Epic Records division of Sony BMG. The first disc (HIStory Begins) is a fifteen-track greatest hits (later released as Greatest Hits - HIStory Volume I), while the second disc (HIStory...
A strategy is a long term plan of action designed to achieve a particular goal. ...
Color-coded regions of the world based on the seven commonly-recognised continents Dymaxion map by Buckminster Fuller shows land masses with minimal distortion as nearly one continuous continent A continent is one of several large areas of land on Earth, which are identified by convention rather than any strict...
Cities are a major hallmark of human civilization. ...
One of the most influential doctrines in history is that all humans are divided into groups called nations. ...
The city of Chicago, as seen from the sky A city is an urban area that is differentiated from a town, village, or hamlet by size, population density, importance, or legal status. ...
Main street in Bastrop, Texas, a small town A town is a residential community of people ranging from a few hundred to several thousands, although it may be applied loosely even to huge metropolitan areas. ...
A world constructed using this method is generally well-integrated and the individual components fit together in an appropriate manner. However it can require considerable work before enough detail is completed for the setting to be useful at a tactical level, such as for use in creating a story.
The alternative method is the bottom-up approach where the designer begins with a focus on one small part of the world, possibly with a few elements, not necessarily consistent, needed for fictional purposes. This location is given considerable detail, adding in important facts about the local geography, culture, social structure, government, politics, commerce, and history. Many of the prominent locals are described, and their interrelationships determined. The surrounding areas are then described in a lower level of detail, with the information growing more general and less detailed with increasing distance from the focus location. Later when the designer needs to use other parts of the world, the descriptions of these other locations are then enhanced. Culture (from the Latin cultura stemming from colere, meaning to cultivate), generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activity significance. ...
Social structure is a term frequently used in social theory - yet rarely defined or clearly conceptualised (Jary and Jary 1991, Abercrombie et al 2000). ...
Politics is the process by which groups make decisions. ...
This article is about the business concept. ...
HIStory: Past, Present and Future – Book I is a two-disc album by Michael Jackson released in 1995 by the Epic Records division of Sony BMG. The first disc (HIStory Begins) is a fifteen-track greatest hits (later released as Greatest Hits - HIStory Volume I), while the second disc (HIStory...
Interpersonal relationships are social associations, connections, or affiliations between two or more people. ...
The benefit of a bottom-up approach is the almost immediate applicability of the setting. The details pertinent to a story or situation are rapidly developed, and the information can be used without waiting for the remainder of the world to be detailed. The draw-back of this approach, however, is the world is designed in an unfocused manner and the setting can develop inconsistencies on a global scale.
Construction An uninhabited world can be useful for certain purposes, but the large majority of constructed worlds are inhabited by one or more intelligent species. The designer usually selects these creatures prior to the start of the world-building process, although less significant species can be merged in at a later stage of the development. Sentience is the capacity for basic consciousness -- the ability to feel or perceive, not necessarily including the faculty of self-awareness. ...
In biology, a species is one of the basic units of biodiversity. ...
Map construction is usually begun in the early stages of world-building. The maps are used to determine the location of key terrain features, and the significant civilizations, nations and settlements. When a realistic world setting is a design goal, the physical geography of the map is considered when determining weather patterns and the location of weather-dependent features such as deserts, rivers, swamps, and forests. These in turn affect the growth and interaction of the various societies, including the trade routes, locations of important cities, and places of likely conflict. For other uses, see Map (disambiguation). ...
Cities are a major hallmark of human civilization. ...
One of the most influential doctrines in history is that all humans are divided into groups called nations. ...
Main street in Bastrop, Texas, a small town A town is a residential community of people ranging from a few hundred to several thousands, although it may be applied loosely even to huge metropolitan areas. ...
True-color image of the Earths surface and atmosphere Physical geography (also know as geosystems or physiography) is a subfield of geography that focuses on the systematic study of patterns and processes within the hydrosphere, biosphere, atmosphere, and lithosphere. ...
Weather is a term that encompasses phenomena in the atmosphere of a planet. ...
Erg Chebbi, Morocco In geography, a desert is a landscape form or region that receives very little precipitation. ...
River Gambia flowing through Niokolokoba National Park A river is a large natural waterway. ...
A freshwater swamp This article is about the wetland type (a landform). ...
Eucalyptus Forest at Swifts Creek in East Gippsland, Victoria, Australia. ...
Young people interacting within an ethnically diverse society. ...
A trade route is the sequence of pathways and stopping places used for the commercial transport of cargo. ...
The city of Chicago, as seen from the sky A city is an urban area that is differentiated from a town, village, or hamlet by size, population density, importance, or legal status. ...
A war is a conflict between two or more groups that involve large numbers of individuals. ...
Some designers use software programs that can create random terrain using fractal algorithms. Sophisticated programs can apply geologic effects such as tectonic plate movement and the erosion due to climate and water flow. The resulting world can be rendered in great detail, providing a degree of realism to the result. // About Bees This article is about completely random and illogical things. ...
The boundary of the Mandelbrot set is a famous example of a fractal. ...
...
Severe soil erosion in a wheat field near Washington State University, USA. Erosion is the displacement of solids (soil, mud, rock and other particles) by the agents of wind, water or ice, by downward or down-slope movement in response to gravity or by living organisms (in the case of...
Water is a chemical substance that is essential to all known forms of life. ...
Render may refer to: Rendering (computer graphics), generating the pixels of an image based on a high-level description of its components XRender, or Render, an X Window System rendering extension Industrial rendering, the processing of waste animal parts to separate the fat from the bone and protein Kitchen rendering...
With a map under assembly, the various places are given names appropriate for their native society. Location names are often used to provide atmosphere to the world setting. When the civilization of an area is modeled after a human society, the place names can be chosen to match the style of the language of the model society. In other cases, the place names may be developed using a constructed language (perhaps a minimal one used only for devising names), or the names may be made up from scratch, hopefully with a consistent style that suggests they originated in a single language. In geography and cartography, a toponym is a place name, a geographical name, a proper name of locality, region, or some other part of Earths surface or its natural or artificial feature. ...
An artificial or constructed language (known colloquially as a conlang among aficionados), is a language whose phonology, grammar and vocabulary are specifically devised by an individual or small group, rather than having naturally evolved as part of a culture the way natural languages do. ...
The use of past human civilizations as a model for societies in a constructed world is a commonly-employed method to aid in the construction of constructed-world societies. The audience for the constructed world can usually relate more readily to a well-known civilization than to a novel culture. But this approach can become problematic when forming a society of non-human beings. Building a satisfying and self-consistent alien culture is a distinct design challenge. Culture (from the Latin cultura stemming from colere, meaning to cultivate), generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activity significance. ...
The Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico, currently used by the SETI project in the search for extraterrestrial life Extraterrestrial life is life that may exist and originate outside the planet Earth, the only place in the universe currently known to support life. ...
With the establishment of societies and nations in place, the interaction of these groups becomes an important factor in the history and development of the world. A history is constructed to explain the current circumstances of the various nation-states, including the location of the borders and the various alliances and enmities. Conflicts are typically a key element of a story, and these provide a method for placing notable individuals within the setting. The term nation-state, while often used interchangeably with the terms unitary state and independent state, refers properly to the parallel occurence of a state and a nation. ...
Your Grandma. ...
Settlements are a significant component of most constructed worlds. Typically the description of a settlement includes the location, rulers and political organization, population size and composition, economic situation, military defenses, and whether the settlement forms part of a greater political body, or exists as an independent state. Significantly more detail can be added to this description, and for many purposes a large settlement can even serve as an entire world unto itself, with only marginal attention paid by the developer to the outlying world. A ruler is an instrument used in geometry and technical drawing to measure short distances and/or to rule straight lines. ...
A government is a body that has the authority to make and the power to enforce laws within a civil, corporate, religious, academic, or other organization or group. ...
This box: • • An economic system sucks(social institution) which deals with the production, distribution and consumption of goods and services in a particular society. ...
// A military or military force (n. ...
At some point the designer must determine a place for the world in the wider context of the system in which it is located. If a realistic world-setting is intended, the designer can choose to develop detailed astronomical parameters for the orbit of the world, and to define the physical characteristics of the other bodies in the system. This will establish chronological parameters, including the length of the day and the durations of the seasons. This can lead to cultural aspects of time-keeping, including names for sub-divisions of the calendar and important anniversaries. A giant Hubble mosaic of the Crab Nebula, a supernova remnant. ...
In physics, an orbit is the path that an object makes, around another object, whilst under the influence of a source of centripetal force, such as gravity. ...
Pictoral chronology of intelligence, Central Intelligence Agency Chronology is the science of locating events in time. ...
A page from the Hindu calendar 1871-72. ...
It has been suggested that Wedding anniversary be merged into this article or section. ...
Many of the above considerations also apply when creating a fictional country within our own world, as Austin Tappan Wright did in his novel Islandia. Islandia is a 1942 novel written as a hobby over a long period of time by Austin Tappan Wright, which was posthumously tidied-up and published eleven years after the authors death in 1931. ...
Map making Almost all constructed worlds will include one or more maps intended to portray the geography and political boundaries of the setting, as well as the key features and settlements. Most such maps will be drawn in a style suitable to their genre, with fantasy maps being highly stylized while science fiction maps will often strive for realism. If the world setting is Earth-like, a realistic map will often take into account the effects of terrain on climate, as well as the results of erosion and tectonic mountain-building. For other uses, see Map (disambiguation). ...
Politics is the process by which decisions are made within groups. ...
Main street in Bastrop, Texas, a small town A town is a residential community of people ranging from a few hundred to several thousands, although it may be applied loosely even to huge metropolitan areas. ...
Look up genre in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...
...
Here are some common rules used in the building of fictional maps:
- Mountain ranges are formed where tectonic plate movement causes subduction, or where plates collide. These tend to be long structures with occasional valleys and passes. Older mountain ranges will be lower, rounder, and more eroded. Solitary mountains are more likely to be volcanic in origin.
- Rivers always descend downhill, and join with other bodies of water or eventually evaporate. They flow precipitously in mountainous areas, sometimes forming canyons and waterfalls, but tend to meander and build river valleys in lowlands. Rivers often join up, but almost never split, at least until very close to their mouths. The region around a river is usually rich in life.
- Swamps form where the ground is level and there is a large influx of water, such as at a river delta, that drains off slowly.
- A forest will typically form in locations with higher levels of rainfall. Where the prevailing winds cross a mountainous rise, the forest will appear on the windward side where moisture tends to be deposited. The far side will be dryer, and may become desertified.
- Deserts form in locations where the climate conditions limit precipitation. They can occur inland where they are sheltered behind a mountain range, or in regions that receive little humidity due to the prevailing wind conditions. Deserts can occur at any latitude, including the arctic conditions found in a tundra.
- Human settlements will normally form in locations where there is a suitable economic need for a population center. This could be a port along a river or coast for trading; a location that is favorable for farming or resource gathering; or a commerce center along a land trade route. Less frequently settlements may form for particular cultural reasons, such as the proximity of a religious site.
Early maps will often be sketched out by hand in a simple fashion, drawing in the oceans, mountains, and forests, and adding in the cities, national borders, and other features of interest. When greater detail is needed, more detailed maps are then created for specific locations. If professional results are needed, the maps can then be created by an artist. There are also special software packages available that allow the creation of good quality maps. A mountain is a landform that extends above the surrounding terrain in a limited area. ...
...
This article is about volcanoes in geology. ...
River Gambia flowing through Niokolokoba National Park A river is a large natural waterway. ...
Grand Canyon, Arizona A canyon or gorge is a deep valley between cliffs often carved from the Earth by a river. ...
Hopetoun Falls near Otway National Park, Victoria, Australia A waterfall is usually a geological formation resulting from water, often in the form of a stream, flowing over an erosion-resistant rock formation that forms a sudden break in elevation. ...
For the Second World War frigate class, see River class frigate The Murray River in Australia A waterfall on the Ova da Fedoz, Switzerland A river is a large natural waterway. ...
A freshwater swamp This article is about the wetland type (a landform). ...
Eucalyptus Forest at Swifts Creek in East Gippsland, Victoria, Australia. ...
Windward is the side of a boat into which the wind is blowing. ...
Erg Chebbi, Morocco In geography, a desert is a landscape form or region that receives very little precipitation. ...
The red line indicates the 10°C isotherm in July, commonly used to define the Arctic region border Satellite image of the Arctic surface The Arctic is the area around the Earths North Pole, opposite the Antarctican area around the South Pole. ...
In physical geography, tundra is an area where the tree growth is hindered by low temperatures and short growing seasons. ...
Various Religious symbols, including (first row) Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Bahai, (second row) Islam, tribal, Taoist, Shinto (third row) Buddhism, Sikh, Hindu, Jain (fourth row) Ayyavazhi, Diane de Poitiers, Maltese cross Religion is the adherence to codified beliefs and rituals that (generally) involve a faith in a spiritual nature and...
Look up artist in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...
Specific constructed worlds
Professional constructed worlds Some examples of constructed worlds in professionally published works are Middle-earth and Ethshar. J.R.R. Tolkien began with creating languages, then developed peoples (the various races of Elves) to speak them, and much later wrote novels set there. Tolkien regarded the invention of constructed worlds (which he called "sub-creation", in imitation of God's creation of the universe) as a near-religious act, part of the process he referred to as mythopoeia. A map of the Northwestern part of Middle-earth at the end of the Third Age, courtesy of the Encyclopedia of Arda. ...
Ethshar is a constructed world first developed by American fantasy author Lawrence Watt-Evans for use in role-playing games, in which he later set a number of novels and short stories. ...
J. R. R. Tolkien in 1916. ...
A small forest elf (älva) rescuing an egg, from Solägget (1932), by Elsa Beskow An elf is a mythical creature of Germanic mythology/paganism which still survives in northern European folklore. ...
Other examples of worlds developed for novels include the three continents (Faltha, Bhrudwo and Elamaq)created by Russell Kirkpatrick, the pseudo-Earth Hyborian Age from the Conan series; Arrakis from the Dune series; Darkover, and the broken world of the Wheel of Time series. // Russell Kirkpatrick was born in 1961 in Christchurch, New Zealand. ...
An illustration of The Hyborian Age primarily based upon a map hand-drawn by Robert E. Howard in March 1932. ...
Hither came Conan, the Cimmerian, black-haired, sullen-eyed, sword in hand, a thief, a reaver, a slayer, with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandalled feet. ...
Dune is a science fiction novel written by Frank Herbert and published in 1965. ...
The above illustration shows Darkover as the planet on the left with its four moons: Liriel, Kyrrdis, Irdriel and Mormallor. ...
The Wheel of Time (abbreviated WoT or less commonly, tWoT) is a bestselling fantasy book series written by Robert Jordan. ...
Lawrence Watt-Evans says that he created Ethshar for use in role-playing games before he started writing novels based in it. Steven Brust used Dragaera for role-playing games before he wrote novels set there. M. A. R. Barker originally designed Tekumel well before the advent of role-playing games, but Tekumel was and is used for this purpose by many gamers including Barker himself. Barker has also written novels based in Tekumel. Lawrence Watt-Evans (born 1954) is the pseudonym of American fantasy author Lawrence Watt Evans. ...
Ethshar is a constructed world first developed by American fantasy author Lawrence Watt-Evans for use in role-playing games, in which he later set a number of novels and short stories. ...
Steven Brust poses for a portrait for Wikipedia in 2006. ...
Dragaera is the fictional universe in several series of novels by Steven Brust. ...
Muhammad Abd-al-Rahman Barker is a retired professor of Urdu and South Asian Studies who has written several fantasy novels under the pen name M. A. R. Barker. ...
The Empire of The Petal Throne is a role-playing game system created by Professor M. A. R. Barker. ...
This article needs cleanup. ...
There are many more commercial campaign settings that have been developed specifically for role-playing games. One of the oldest fantasy settings is Oerth for the D&D Greyhawk setting. Forgotten Realms is another D&D setting that was originally a homebrew campaign world by Ed Greenwood. Harn is a highly-detailed, very internally consistent world with a medieval feel. An example of a science fiction setting is Blue Planet, a water-covered world with a detailed ecology. A campaign setting is a fictional fantasy world which serves as a setting for a role-playing game or wargame. ...
A role-playing game (RPG, often roleplaying game) is a type of game in which the participants assume the roles of fictional characters and collaboratively create or follow stories. ...
Oerth is the name of the fictional planet on which the earliest Dungeons & Dragons setting – that of Greyhawk – takes place. ...
The original Dungeons & Dragons set Dungeons & Dragons (abbreviated as D&D or DnD) is a fantasy role-playing game (RPG) published by Gary Gygax and David Arneson in January 1974. ...
The Greyhawk logo Greyhawk is a campaign setting for the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game. ...
The Forgotten Realms third edition logo. ...
Homebrew is an album by Paul Lansky. ...
Ed Greenwood (born 1959) is a Canadian library clerk who invented the Forgotten Realms Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting. ...
Hârn is a world designed for use in fantasy role-playing games. ...
Science fiction is a form of speculative fiction principally dealing with the impact of imagined science and technology, or both, upon society and persons as individuals. ...
Webcomic artist Jennifer Diane Reitz, who spent years as a GM, has built universes notable for their extremely detailed physical laws, most famously Tryslmaistan and Pastel. Her works also mention a number of other universes, such as the ones traveled to during a Pastel Defender Heliotrope sequence, Ktlikitkaktl (home of the oft-mentioned, never-yet-seen-directly Ktlikitkak) and the worlds of the Krawlni. In essence, they form a cohesive multiverse and mythos. (Interestingly, Reitz has implied that Flatland is contained in her multiverse, though it will almost certainly not be involved in any storylines, for obvious reasons.) This article or section may contain original research or unverified claims. ...
Jennifer Diane Reitz (born December 30, 1959) is the creator of the webcomics Unicorn Jelly, Pastel Defender Heliotrope and To Save Her, and of computer games such as Boppin. She has created computer games and anime-style comics since 1981. ...
A physical law, scientific law, or a law of nature is a scientific generalization based on empirical observations of physical behavior. ...
Pastel Defender Heliotrope (PDH) is a webcomic started in 2004 by Jennifer Diane Reitz. ...
A multiverse is a set of many universes. ...
The cover to Flatland, 6th Edition. ...
An example of a fictional world whose inner workings are currently under construction in the public domain is Globus Cassus. A top and side view of the Globus Cassus Globus Cassus is a utopian project for the transformation of Planet Earth into a much bigger, hollow, artificial world with an ecosphere on its inner surface. ...
Amateur constructed worlds Some constructed worlds are built as a hobby, such as the following examples: A hobby is a spare-time recreational pursuit. ...
Eshravals major geographic regions. ...
See also Image File history File links Wikibooks-logo-en. ...
Wikibooks logo Wikibooks, previously called Wikimedia Free Textbook Project and Wikimedia-Textbooks, is a wiki for the creation of books. ...
An artificial or constructed language (known colloquially as a conlang among aficionados), is a language whose phonology, grammar and vocabulary are specifically devised by an individual or small group, rather than having naturally evolved as part of a culture the way natural languages do. ...
A fantasy world is a type of fictional universe in which magic or other similar powers work. ...
This is a list of fictional universes, organized by genre and by sub-genre. ...
A fictional universe is a cohesive imaginary world that serves as the setting or backdrop for one or (more commonly) multiple works of fiction. ...
This list is of fictional cities: villages, towns, and cities that do not exist in the world we know. ...
Map of the Land of Oz, the fictional country in the book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz Map of the fictional island of Sodor used in the Thomas the Tank Engine stories Fictitious countries used in the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four A guidebook produced about the fictional country Molvanîa...
Geofiction is a hobby where people design imaginary cities, countries or entire worlds, including placenames, culture, social and political structures and even constructed languages (conlangs), primarily for personal enjoyment. ...
The exploration of other worlds is one of the most enduring themes of science fiction. ...
External links |
Feeds |
Contact