WikiHow: Create a World

Recently I have been reading children's books at an alarmingly rapid rate and I've discovered that the books I love the most are the ones that take place in a world outside of our own. (Recent example: the Five Kingdoms series by Brandon Mull.) 

When I was a kid, I had my own imaginary world. Creating a fantasy world is one of those things that I wish I still had the imagination for, but it would appear that in spite of of my imaginative tendencies, I unfortunately do not. 

Instead, I'm going to combine two of my favorite things, WikiHow and random generators, and see what kind of world I can come up with. 

I found three related WikiHow articles, How to Create a Fictional World from Scratch, How to Create a Fantasy World, and How to Make Your Own Fantasy World, and I'm going to pick and choose my favorite steps between all three because they all have their own strengths and weaknesses and also levels of practicality. 

Mostly I'm going to try to use fantasynamegenerators.com because usually I can find pretty much everything I'm looking for in one of their generators. Most generators give me 10 options and instead of listing all of them every time I'm just going to pick my favorite and move on. Let's get started.

How to Create a New World

1. Name your world.

This actually was not the first step in any of the three articles but I'm going to start here anyways. 

Fantasy Name Generators has an entire category of almost 100 different place name generators, including castles, graveyards, sky islands, amusement parks, and pizzerias. I'm going to stick with the last one on the list, which is called "world names" because that seems the most straight forward. 

And the winner is... The Drifting Forest. 

(There are other place name generators that use made up words as names but that kind of stresses me out because I don't know how to pronounce it and I should really know how to pronounce the name of a place I invented.)

Okay, so we have our name. What's next? 

2. Decide what the landscape of your world is like.

I'm not going to lie, I was unprepared for how much my brain wants to fill in the details and not just stick to the generators, but I'm just going to let it happen. 

The Drifting Forest is exactly what the name implies. It is a forest that just floats around in the sky above an endless void of nothingness. 

But let's investigate a bit further into what this forest is like. I'm going to use the generator called "forest descriptions". 

"The forest was small, crowded, and ancient. Its canopy was ruled by linden, beech, and fir, and ample openings let enough dancing beams of light through for disorderly plants to burst from the fertile soils below. Coiling branches dangled from a couple of trees, and a range of flowers, which were unique to this region, spruced up the otherwise dark backdrop. A variety of beastly noises, which were caused by foraging animals, reverberated through the air, and were strangely synchronized with the barrage of noise coming from a waterfall in the distance."

Sure. We've got a forest with unique flowers and beasts and a waterfall. Into it. 

I'm imagining several hidden villages within the forest. My brain is heading in the direction of Warriors but without the cats.

The descriptions category of generators has opened up a whole new world of opportunities and I'm tempted to backtrack and make a bigger world and have The Drifting Forest just form part of it, but I think for now I'm just going to power through from here and then maybe later replace the endless of void of nothingness with an actual place. 

3. Make countries.

Or in this case, villages. I considered using a random number generator to decide on how many villages to create, but I think we can all agree that 4 is the correct amount.

These ones I had to modify a bit because the descriptions also included the landscape, which we have previously established, and also what kinds of people live there, which I plan on establishing separately. I also deleted some of the repeated language within the description because it's unnecessary.

The village of Fool's March has rare resources.The village itself looks crude. With its blackened rooftops, black wooden walls and broken roads, Fool's March has a gloomy atmosphere.The main attraction is the cemetery.

The village of Eviana has hidden tunnels.The village itself looks stunning. With its bamboo rooftops, sea grass walls and amazing sunsets, Eviana has a bizarre atmosphere. The main attraction is the inn.

The village of Easthaven has ancient lost technologies.The village itself looks humble. With its ceramic tile rooftops, ebony wood walls and calm and quiet collection of ponds, Easthaven has a intriguing atmosphere.The main attraction is the library.

The village of Farwater has magical properties.The village itself looks worn. With its galvanized steel rooftops, murky wooden walls and whistling wind, Farwater has a eerie atmosphere.The main attraction is the wishing well.

I have realized that this process could literally go on forever. I mean we're just talking about a single forest and I already have four villages and distinct cultures to develop, as well as how they relate to each other, and probably also design a map and write out the history of each village... There's just so much to do and I will never have the time or patience to cover it all. I'm overwhelmed just thinking about where to go next. 

I think that's the reason why as an adult I can't just up and create an entire fantasy world as easily as I could as a kid. I get too caught up in all the details and all the many pieces that go into it. I can't just accept it as it comes along, allowing it to change and grow with my imagination. 

I guess I'll just have to settle for reading books intended for those who still have the imaginative capacity to create worlds from nothing.