Robert, age 13 (yearbook photo)
Long before Museica and the PeacefulPieceful Pie Planet — before NationStates and World of Warcraft — even before Dungeons and Dragons had been invented, then-Muser-aged Robert (see photo, above) and about half a dozen of his friends invented an imaginary country of their own and used it as a setting for role-playing and storytelling. Unfortunately, any original maps and manuscripts that still exist remain buried in the Coontz archives. Robert will scan and post them as they come to light. Meanwhile, this description will have to suffice for any MBers curious about their GAPA’s disreputable history. Read on…
[Robert continues.]
The country was called PRUSSIANIA — a floating island about the size of Greenland, ruled by a king and divided into duchies and counties governed by unruly nobles. Did I say “governed”? Misgoverned is more like it, because Prussiania was the most messed-up, miserable place we could imagine. It was a feudal tyranny whose human population consisted almost entirely of peasants — stupid, ignorant, and squalid. There was also a sizable nonhuman population of oversized armadillos, somewhat more intelligent than the peasants and capable of interbreeding with them to produce a spectrum of strange pointy-eared hybrids, some with armadillo-like carapaces, others without. (I’ll have to find some pictures of them.)
For the rest, the most economical way to describe it is probably point by point.
Geology and geography: To float, Prussiania must have been composed mostly of some sort of lightweight, pumice-like rock. Its surface features included a Lord of the Rings-like assortment of mountains, rivers, and foetid swamps. (We were all big Tolkien fans and copied his style in drawing our maps.) Subregions of the country were named after diseases and mental conditions such as Diphtheria, Euphoria, and Phantasmagoria.
Currency, weights, and measures: Impossibly impractical and complicated.
Language: Even worse than the currency, weights, and measures. Although we never worked it out in detail, we agreed that every verb was irregular and that Prussianian had more declensions than any other language. Whenever foreigners threatened to master the language, the natives would add even more cases to it just for the sheer pleasure of confusing and ridiculing them.
Transportation: The skies of Prussiania were filled with zeppelins, propelled by sails when traveling downwind and towed upwind by mighty bull-armadillos. Some were also equipped with fanlike air-oars, which were useless for moving the airships but kept the peasant crewmembers busy.
History: An endless series of futile rebellions.
Religion: There were two main deities, a fertility goddess named Athea (whose devotees were known as Atheists) and a storm god named Voltus. Oddly, the two sects coexisted peacefully, without religious warfare — probably because the people were too malnourished to care.
Myths and legends: My friends and I developed a whole cycle of Prussianian sagas centered on heroes named after products we saw in the laxative-and-antacid aisle of the local drugstore. There was Petrogalar the Barbarian, raised by armadillos (a sort of cross between Conan the Cimmerian and Tarzan of the Apes); Romilar, leader of a band of outlaws who lived in the woods and all wore pink; and various wizards, witches, mad scientists, sea monsters, and mythical creatures, some of which resembled MuseBloggers’ descriptions of wungs.
It was very silly but great fun while it lasted, and it lasted longer than it had any right to. I’ll try to find some of the original drawings and literature and post them early in 2009.
That sounds so cool! And what’s great is that every good nerd kid has probably imagined something like Prussiania at some point in their life. I love the notes on language, that’s great.
Awesome. I’ve had a similar idea, but it never got that far. Before D&D… amazing.
My friends, it takes true bravery to make up a civilization as awfull as Prussiania, and true imagination to make up stories to fill it. And true guts to not laugh so hard you fall off your chair reading about it. But I have two questions; How long ago was this, and what is this thread for?
I’m guessing that Robert is harnessing the power of MuseBlog to bring Prussiania back to ‘power’. I will happily follow this scheme if it does show it’s face.
Oh, man, does that take me back. The equivalent for us (“us” being mainly myself and my good friend E, with almost everyone in the school adding little bits here and there) was what began as some sort of unholy combination of Redwall and Star Wars… yeah, I know. I was in kindergarten, cake it!
It developed and evolved from almost the first day of kindergarten into… well, I don’t remember. The last major event chronicled was sometime in third grade. My memory is somewhat hazy on the specifics, but I do remember a few memorable characters. Noro was probably the archetypal hero of the setting. He rose from struggling to survive in the woods to uniting the various bickering squirrel tribes into a prosperous kingdom. Oh, yes, and the famous Sun-Sword… how could I forget? As I recall, it was made of some sort of extremely durable golden metal (not gold, of course) and could cut through anything. Solid sapphire hilt, too. At first, nothing could harm its wielder, but our fledgling instincts for narrative told us that that wouldn’t make for a very good story. So we invented the Nothing-snakes. Nothing-snakes were probably the most valuable commodity for the villains of the setting… blades coated in their venom, armor wrapped in their skin… Evil wouldn’t have stood a chance without our nonexistent, squamous friends.
OK. Thread hijack over. I now expect everyone to reveal their first embarrassing attempts at worldbuilding. Yes, that applies to YOU.
Sounds slightly like me and my friend Sara’s Dekrane or my personal Kattyland (don’t ask). Making up countries/worlds was and still is one of my favorite boredness-reducing pastimes.
5- Dekrane… I remember Dekrane from the old Writing thread.
Man, I have imaginary worlds up the Gazingas. The first one I can remember lasted a good while- from preschool to second grade. It was a gigantonourmous, lolipop shaped, plaugue prone continent called Out of Order, which I renamed Bustilia because it sounded more ethnic. Out of Order was owned by an old British wizard who lived in a castle made out of toys and yelled at the natives. Other characters included a kind wizard that lived on a mountain on ooo’s northern tip and a girl named Poet who lived in the amazon-like country of Poe (Named after the teletuby) Maybe I’ll talk about the more recent/exiting ones later.
Hm… reminds me of my friend and our many adventures. The best remembered was me and about five guys still had the guts in fifth grade to have super powers. We ran around the school yard claiming lands from zombies with our “Earth, Air, Fire, Water” type of powers. Mine was always wind untill this girl tried to butt in for a day and stole it (Or else she’s tell the teacher that we weren’t including her) and I had to settle for Ice which turned out to be funner anyways. The girl left but I kept my ice powers. We all had super power up drinks that if we didn’t drink we’d die- or lose our powers if we didn’t feel like diesing. And the “evil” we were fighting happened to be zombies. Occationaly one of us would become a zombie and chase around the others untill one of two things happened (The others becames zombies too, or we unzombiefired him). I was the most often one reported MIA and every Monday the others would “search” for me becuase every Friday I had meetings with my OM team during recess. (OM has NOTHING to do with the game-jus so you know) Everyone looked at us like we were crazy but then again we WERE!
My friend once made up an imaginary world for a school assignment. Its Constitution (written in Elvish (I don’t know which tongue)) named “shooting commies” as its national sport. He later explained that “commies” were a type of albatross-like bird found in the northern latitudes.
Man, this is giving me the urge to worldbuild again… I’ll be at E’s house on Sunday, though. We always work well together.
(3) I’m not trying to revive Prussiania at this late date (almost 40 years after its creation, to answer your question). I did try to create a “Prussiania” on NationStates but was informed that the name was already taken, so I made Prussianiania instead but never did anything with it. Who knows? Maybe some of my old buddies are ruling Prussiania now.
(2) I think a lot of people almost invented D&D but didn’t quite put the pieces together. We also talked about creating a “Lord of the Rings” version of Risk, but schoolwork and other distractions got in the way. We were only 13, after all.
(1) The armadillos had a language of their own, but it was probably more sensible than the human language, and we never took much interest in it.
6- Yeah, I remember it too. One of the main flaws of the planet was that it only had three languages and there was a very unrealistic planetary monarchy. :O
In fourth grade, I had a game with a few of my friends where we created a civilization, but never gave it a name. We started off as hunter-gatherers, then we built cities and temples out of bits of brick and things around the schoolyard. We also marked the locations of shadows with sticks and stones in a sort of mini-Stonehenge.
I created a planet called Eswoan later, by myself, which I’ll detail later.
The Grand Duchy of Diptheria.
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
*Falls off chair*
That is wonderful.
This reminds me of a travel book I got as a present once, for the country of Molvanîa. “A Land Untouched by Modern Dentistry.”
The language section of that book is especially great. “Four genders….triple negatives…extreme harsh guttural sounds may pose a health risk…”
I had to create a board game last year for an engineering project with a friend, and it is hard. I think Risk is so successful because it’s relatively simple. A game need to be balanced, and intriguing, but also easy to learn and play.
12- Also the fact that it had a pink sun.
But my first attempt at worldbuilding involved mice in plate armor piloting spaceships, so who am I to carp?
Wow, Prussiania sounds like an unpleasant place. Unless you’re an armadillo.
14- OH, OH! My mom had that book for a while.
I don’t know that I ever did any worldbuilding on that scale. I must have, but can’t remember a thing about it. I tended to focus on characters.
Oh, my.
*laughs about currency, weights, and measures*
Hmm..back in year 5 was probably the first adventures I had with a Taiwanese girl called Ariel. We were unicorns and everything was edible and tasted like somethingn that was the same colour eg white tasted like marshmallow, it was very pleasant and we only had to gallop around…not at all challenging for the imagination!
8 – I played a long sequence of games a bit like that in second grade with a friend. They were all related to each other, and started as Dragons/Dragonmasters/Elemental powers and went to the above with Harry Potter characters, then us as (original) Harry Potter characters, then several other variations on that, and then one where we were our original characters’ daughters.
Then again in fifth grade a different friend and I played an even weirder (but really fun) group of games in which we were aliens/had psychic powers/were orphans with powers/more games with powers/more games with powers/etc/etc/etc. During a few of them we managed to freak ourselves out quite thoroughly.
I’ve never invented a country, though. Hm.
About a year ago, a few of my swim team friends and I created a fictional place called the Shadow Network. It was near the front of our swim team facility, in a group of bushes and trees (where it was dark and shadowy), while we were waiting for practice to start. We all had names (mine was Lily).Each of us had a stick that we pretended was a magic sword. We would use the swords to kill imaginary monsters, such as the Saber-Toothed Puffball (an adorable wung-like creature that morphs into a deadly monster when its prey is near) and the Speeju (a very sharp-toothed and fast-moving, but rather stupid animal). We also used the sticks for our sport, slything (knocking the leaves off of trees).We flew around on Flyriders, giant birds that were normally vicious, but could be pacified by offerings of shiny things. They shed their feathers every month to reveal different-colored ones. (Mine was named Dewdrop.)
Unfortunately, one day some people cut down practically all the trees and bushes, and it wasn’t shadowy or mysterious anymore, so we stopped playing.
But I’m considering writing a book about the Shadow Network.
Cake, this is so inconvenient! I was all set to write a nice little low-fantasy novel with great characters, an intriguing plot, and most importantly no otherworld… and this thread comes around and gives me an irrepressible urge to invent a world.
HAHAHAHA! I love the ‘languages’ bit. Your people are even oppressed than mine in The Cruel and Unusual Punishment of Kokonilly!
That’s wonderful. I badly want to hear more stories about this place! A friend of mine and I did something similar but it was no where near as detailed. We had two characters for ourselves as well. I think it was mostly an excuse to draw magesses and female warriors but it was fun.
22) i like the languages to ! The country remindes me of some Terry Pratchet books I read. The language sounds easy to describe though: latin cases with austrian “fälle” and grammar and a french mentality (trust me, I had to learn all of those).
20) i had a country/place/thing with my BFF in america, but had to stop when I moved…
CPA) Where the -iana part come from ? Prussia used to be a country that fit the description. I always try to come up with names for my NaNoWriMos but I can never think of any…
Ha ha, I love how the warriors are named after laxatives. I’m really impressed, actually, it sounds like you guys put a lot of creativity into it.
On a semi-related note, is there a world-building thread going on somewhere? It seems like I saw one a little while back…any info would be greatly appreciated.
Okay, now it’s later, so here are the details of Eswoan. (Pronounced Es-wahn):
Its place in the Universe:
Eswoan was originally simply a made-up planet in the Milky Way, but far from Earth and with no knowledge of it. Later, I established it as being in the Star Wars galaxy and the same solar system as Naboo. They have a long history of good relations with both the Naboo and Gungans.
Eswoan has one moon and a strong magnetic field. Their moon is in a closer orbit than Earth’s moon. The Eswoai (see Sentient lifeforms.) have colonies on this moon, established in their first spacefaring years.
Geology and geography:
Eswoan has one major continent which takes up most of the southern hemisphere. The coastal regions are temperate, with rainforests, and are the only place on the planet where humans can live comfortably. This is where the capital is located.
The southern continent’s interior is a harsh desert, crossed here and there with low mountain ranges. The caves and grottos of these mountains and the associated rock formations are the ancestral home of the southern Eswoai.
The northern hemisphere of Eswoan is mostly ocean, with scattered archipelagos, similar to Earth’s Pacific Ocean. The region near the pole is iceberg-infested in the best of weather and frozen solid in the winter. The northern Eswoai historically made their home among these islands and icebergs.
Sentient lifeforms:
The only sentient inhabitants of Eswoan are reptilian humanoids who call themselves the Eswoai. There are two subspecies of Eswoai, northern and southern, adapted to their environments. Both subspecies have green coloring, downward-facing horns on the back of their heads, the ability to sense their planet’s magnetic field for navigation, and remarkably tough skin. (They can walk on razor blades and feel no pain.)
Northern Eswoai are a paler shade of green with webbing between their fingers, fish-like eyes and gills in addition to their lungs. Their horns are shorter.
Southern Eswoai tend to be darker green, slightly more muscular and have longer horns.
Currency, weights, and measures:
After Unification, (see History) a standard system was developed for planetwide use. Since expanding off-world, the Eswoai also use the metric system like everybody else in Star Wars.
Language
A system of hieroglyphics with 29 symbols for letter sounds. (The English alphabet, plus ch, th and tz.) Eswoai are good at learning languages and many are bilingual, speaking both Basic and their own language with ease.
History
Regional civilizations began in both areas long before either subspecies learned of the other’s existence. After a tense period upon the first meeting, the current planetary republic was created and the capital built, an event known as the Unification. All dates are recorded as before or after Unification. (BU or AU).
The first complete maps of Esowan were compiled by the father-son explorers Ingshi and Dashi Exilon shortly after Unification. The pair were later worshiped as demigods.
Naboo and Eswoan developed space travel at roughly the same time and began their current friendly relationship.
During the rise of the Empire, Eswoan was invaded. Eswoai refugees fled to other worlds, most often Naboo, where they remained for the duration of the war.
Religion
While the northern and southern cultures have slightly differing practices, several deities are worshiped planetwide, including Bree-sah, the spirit of endurance, and Ingshi and Dashi Exilion.
25- Muse Legendarium. It’s long dead and only half-finished, but there’s some quality stuff there.
26- Impressive.
Robert, that is great. I can’t wait to see more time capsule things.
Oh, man, I love world-building. I haven’t gotten much of a chance to do that with my friends since I moved, because middle schoolers are “too mature” for that and all (-.-) but I remember playing all kinds of stuff in elementary school. Still do by myself a lot of the time, but it’s not quite the same.
I remember one time some of our families friends’ kids and my brother and me were playing in our backyard, and we were playing some game where we were all superheroes and every time we had a birthday we’d get new superpowers, so of course we’d have “birthdays” every five minutes or so. Oh, and we got powers in age order, so if H decided he wanted invisibility powers now, I’d get them next, then my brother, and then M a while later.
Oh, and in 6th grade my school decided that after we finished WASL testing for the day we could just go outside and run around, so my friends and I formed MountainClan (which isn’t really worldbuilding because it’s an existing world, but still) and ran around as cats for two weeks. I was Leafstorm, and we had a medicine cat’s den and apprentices and stuff. And then some girls a grade above us decided they wanted to play too, so they were LeafClan and took the territory closer to the school, and we had battles and stuff all week.
We also came up with a system for classifying our school that I still remember: 5th graders are kits, 6th graders are apprentices, 7th graders are warriors, 8th graders are senior warriors, teachers are elders (teehee), the counselor is the medicine cat (because she fixes everything), the secretary is the deputy, and the principal is the leader. And so I guess all the alumni would be StarClan.
Heheh. Alumni=StarClan. That’s just awesome.
(24) bookgirl: The country was named by my friend David, whose ancestors were Poles from Prussia. (Prussia lies on the German-Polish border, and its territory has changed hands many times over the centuries.) I think he originally imagined a German-speaking country, but that idea didn’t last long, as none of us knew German.
30- I am very glad that middle schoolers still exist who are not so wrapped up in being “cool” and “adult” that they are willing to pretend to be cats for two weeks. Perhaps childhood in our culture is not as lost as I thought. Bravissimo.
I love world building. I love universe building as well. multiverse even!
By the way, Robert, if you ever dig up the rules for the Prussiania RPG, you’ll have at least one volunteer to play a half-armadillo zeppelin pilot.
I like to think of worlds now but they never go anywhere. Normally it’s just to get me away. Today we had a last-day-before-break-after-team-championchip-vollyball game dance and I was one of two kids sitting on the bleechers while all the other 8th graders (Senior warriors) but the main point is that I sat there, and made up a crazy world where danceing was a sign that you were on the side of the Darkest, and that you must be exterminated, les just say my gymnasiam is now a grave and the really badly colored bleechers are a safe haven for all.
33- Multiverse… You, sir, have just given me a wonderful idea. *walks off, muttering*
(34) There really wasn’t much in the way of rules — nobody had heard of formal role-playing games in those days — but it wouldn’t be hard to invent some, now that the template exists.
Kitty Kingdom
For a long time (From when I was 6 months old all the way through kindergarten) my brother and I were babysitted by my mom’s coworker’s wife, and naturally we were good friends with her kids (still are). I don’t know when, but at some point we decided to play ‘Kitties’ and that was what we did practically every day from then on. We were almost always orphans, because we all wanted to be kittens. Now that I think about it, It was more ‘Alter egos’ then Worlbuilding, but oh well. Years of running around in cat ears, Rumpadump book in tow, led ton the developement of Kitty Castle, Computer Programing at Kitty Castle, The Golden Valley, 2 Kitty Kitchens, and Kitty Kingdom. Later, we became mages fighting against an army of evil dogs, and build real worlds around the woods we camp in. The latest installment was ‘The Cliffs of Catailia’ where we defised magical powerups like blue houses and Judge Judy’s wig.
37- Meh, I’ve always considered RPG rules to be overly complicated anyway. All you really need is a sense of fair play and a good imagination.
Ha, whenever I start buildng worlds, I get so wrapped up in the languages that I never plan the rest of the stuff. The world I have going right now (actually it’s a world for a story I’m working on) has no geography, culture, or maps, but it’s got two languages with full dictionaries
36- *Hopes POSOC has a idea that isn’t like his*
What is it?
oh, and Robert, you had a typo. it’s pieceful, not peaceful.
41- A number of worlds coexisting in space but in vastly different times. Or something like that, the idea’s not fully developed yet.
I am working on a land for a book series that I’m writing in my head. Almost nothing is on paper yet, but I have a lot worked out.
I keep changing the name of the country, although many localities have been named.
Geography: This thread has caused me to want to make a map. I definitely know where I want some of the places to be in relation to each other. The country has ocean borders, some very important cliffs and forests and some mountains. It has a rather lot of places.
Currency: Brass, silver and gold Marianas. Named for the first known monarch to do a good job. (In fact, she did an excellent job.)
Language: “The Common Tongue”. (English.) Also, Elvish, although spoken by far fewer. Other languages exist, but are not widely spoken.
Transportation: A variety of boats and carriage-like things. Horses provide a large portion of the transportation. Flying ships are also quite common.
History: P. Q. M. (Preceding Queen Mariana): A typical monarchy system, depressingly frequented by horrible rulers. (A saying of the land dating from that time: “The day you have a leader who isn’t greedy, foolish or cruel, badgers will fly.”)
F. Q. M. (Following Queen Mariana): Of particular interest are The Elvish War and the War of Bramblehampton.
The former was a struggle for Elvish independence from the humans. It resulted in each side believing victory, with the elves estranged from almost all contact with humans, but able to govern themselves. Each side distrusts other.
The later lasted four years, but the monarch at the time thought it far less serious than it was and ended assistance after six months. It was a brutal war, with an unknown, blood-thirsty fiend leading the invasion. The invaders knew full well that gaining Bramblehampton would allow them to take over the entire country. The monarch thought it an unimportant hamlet. Fortunately for all, the invasion was put down by a group of rebels lead by a mysterious hothead.
(Note: Bramblehampton is main character’s hometown. Main character’s past involves being one of those rebels.)
Government: An unusual system was established as Mariana descended the throne. The people choose their ruler every seven years. Each town or district may nominate a candidate (perhaps royal, perhaps not). Then follows a complicated elimination system devised by the descending ruler. The people then vote for their choice of the candidates who pass. The ruler still has typical monarch power during the reign, but must descend when the term is up.
Myths and Legends: Mainly about Queen Mariana or typical heroes. Some of the best involve the main character’s father, a legend in his own time who was a quest-er for several monarchs, although he mainly helped commoners.
Another important aspect of the land’s story-telling is the Wanderers. The Wanderers were/are a secret group, traveling alone or in groups, but always helping each other. (Think Aragorn son of Arathorn in terms of lifestyle.)
Like I said, nothing is on paper and everything is subject to change.
43- Hmm. so, same 3-D Cord, but different 4-D cords?
I like the name Bramblehampton.
45- Something like that.
46- So do I.
Wow, this thread has turned into a bunch of world-building comparisons rather than a discussion of the actual topic. Whoops.
32 – Unfortunately, nay. That was in 6th grade, and I doubt whether more then one or two of those girls would be willing to do the same thing today, at least in public. (I’d be one of those, by the way. If it was enough fun, who cares what everyone else thinks?)
48- Oh, I thought since you said 8th graders were considered… Oh, I get it now. Still, many 6th graders I know wouldn’t be caught dead doing anything imaginative. Bravo.
49 – I know, I can’t believe how many people would rather brain meld in front of the TV then do something creative.
On another (somewhat related?) subject, I remember that a few years ago my brother and I randomly decided we’d re-invent some of our imaginary friends. I remember that mine were two hamsters, one black with a white star on its back named Star, and one white with a black moon on it named (get ready for it) Moon.
I’m posting with my iPod touch that I just got!
51 – Ooh, that’s awesome. The apps look like so much fun.
Yea… I just got roloando (that might not be spelled right)
48) sigh… everyone here is “to grow up” to do stuff like that. Instead, they watch T.V. and spend all their money at Starbucks.
54-yea…
54 – I’d agree. I can’t see the value of spending so much money at Starbucks. I was filming a movie at school and the other girls wanted me to hurry up and finish (even though we needed a few more shots) so that they could walk to Starbucks. During school hours, without supervision, and in below freezing weather. Crazy.
50- Yea. Sorta sad. I can’t count how many times a day I make up a better story line just to get the job done. Gym class for example is not gymclass- no it’s a training class for soon-to-be-knights. That makes running the mile a whole heck of a lot easier. I have to be really carful that I don’t tlak to myself while I’m doing that though becuase though I’m not afraid to admit I do play-pretend games I don’t want to go anouncing it to the world.
57 – Ooh, yes, that’s a good one. I’ll have to remember that next time I’m doing sit-ups.
I only worry when I have nothing else to think about, so all I have to do is imagine something and I stop worrying. For example, whenever I feel myself about to cry at school (I hate doing this, because my eyes get all red and everybody keeps asking what’s wrong with me) I say to myself “It’s okay, Meow, you’re a pirate ninja queen. Pirate ninja queens are always tortured by their foes, but they don’t give up and the good guys always win in the end.”
58- That is what I do. Sometimes it doesn’t work but when I does I can carry it on for the rest of the day and compleatly ignore the fact that I really need to put my head down and cry. I normaly try to put it into Knight trainging stuff becuase that is my dream. “Knights don’t cry. Knights aren’t allowed to cry. A knight sure as heck does not cry just becuase s/he is having a bad day. And if I am going to cry then who am I to claim to be a knight?” and that is what gets me though the day folks.
34-Make that 2!
54-Ughh. Starbucks has the worst coffee I’ve ever tasted. I don’t like coffee much now, but when I did I’d never go to Starbucks.
57-That reminds me of an xkcd comic where he talks about working out being equated to leveling up. That’s how I motivate myself in gym now. *3 more laps and I’m on level 8!*
60- Seems Prussiania is reviving whether Robert wants it to or not.
59) I think the same thing with my french teacher, except it’s more like :”knights don’t cry during torture”.
@Pretend games: Whenever I’m at Lazer Zone (laser tag) I just can’t resist. I always pretend I’m on the front lines of some futuristic interplanetary war thingy and I’m the warrior queen! Yay imagination!
On a side note, from when I was in kindergarten to the middle of sixth grade, me and my two friends were completely immersed in magical imagination games. They involved a concept called “lapsing” in which one of us would fall to the ground and awake as another person, one of our “personalities”. If all three of us “lapsed” at the same time we would be lost together as our personalities in the middle of the strange place that was school and so we would go through so many adventures before lapsing back into ourselves again. Some “personalities” were from made up planets and places and storylines but a lot of them were from real-life books, movies, or videogames or even worlds created by another member of our group. For example, I myself had a personality called Ruby Jewell, who was an interplanetary space-time traveling reporter that I thought of all by myself, but I also had a personality called KIM, who was a computer program from the world of Tron. And then suddenly in the middle of sixth grade, we just stopped playing. No more lapses, no more magic.
The main player and the core of our group was a girl that I won’t name who was amazingly creative and into it, but she was also bipolar and creeped us out sometimes. Maybe our slight fear of her was why it dissolved…
HUGE tangent there, I’m sorry… but the lapsing game was basically my recess and sometimes my school day for seven years…
30- Sorry for the 2post, but….
That sounds amazing! My little group had warrior-cat personalities, eg: Me = Flamepool, S = Sunstorm, M = Shadowfire, and J = Wildfire. We would usually all lapse at the same time so that we could have Warrior-style adventures evading the evil Twolegs and getting back to camp. But yours sounds a bit more fun, seeing as you were warring Clans.
Go cats!
In second grade, I played lava monster a lot, and I devised a plot around the game where the players were a troup of monster fighting supergirls dragging monsters from the depths of a firey realm that may have been you-know-where. I even was planning to write a book about it, ‘The Legend of Lucy’ Alas, this was not a shared daydream.
That’s awesome, Robert. Truly amazing. It’s cool to see another person’s imagination at work, particularly for such a treasure as this, one that few have known about for so long!
I never stop working on my imaginary country. I have more maps and writings about it than you could ever imagine! I think this kind of creativity is important to everybody, and most electronics cannot replace this creativity (the blog excluded, because it offers the chance to create imaginary adventures and countries with people we’ve never met and whom we couldn’t find on our own!)
63- Aww sounds like so much FUN! My friends always used to talk about hose places but my mother wouldn’t let me go…or have a water gun…or play war. She was pretty strict about that stuff.
This summer, though, was amazing. So in my Navy Seals (one of the activities you could sign up for. It includes a training camp (One day) a all-for-one war (soon to be described) and Raids of other groups. (Is it any wonder I was the only girl?)) Well we had the all for one war where e3veryone runs around with water guns. I was on Main Trail and NO ONE was there and I was behind a bush waiting for an ambush of about five kids who had teamed up and right there my imagination ran wild and suddenly I was on a planet fighting mysterious monsters that couldn’t stand water. Oh that was a fun day.
Anyways Red-tailed HAWK(66)- I think you are right. Imagination games like the above mentioned do a lot to scocity and the world around us. If people didn’t get out there and DO stuff or at least think it then we would have a really boring world. This sort of stuff can’t be replaced by video games and Uggs.
I have a whole file somewhere devoted to the middle eastern countries of Lunus and Inja and one other that I forget at this moment. The anonymous country is poor, Lunus is crowded, and Inja is just about right. They have complex street plans, dozens of regional and social dialects, and weird ethnic dress. Injuns worship Ra, everybody else worships the Lune. (The lune thing comes from the Loony Loon Worshippers, which was a pseudo-cult a couple years back when some school friends and I were involved in a frey involving defending our teacher’s stuffed lune toy against an army of imagionary babboons)
Re: Pretend games: I don’t make stuff up as much anymore (until I was twelve or thirteen it was practically all I did), but I did decide last summer that if you thought you were in an alternate universe, you might as well be, and Eva and I (she was sixteen at the time) spent an enjoyable day or two pretending we were in alternate universes.
59- I do the same thing, only with “Jedi don’t cry”, etc.
63- My brothers had their birthday at Laser Tag last year. The Laser Tag building had an arcade attached for the people who were waiting to play Laser Tag, including an air hockey table with UV lights and sound effects. There was a window by the air hockey table where you could see the “battle” that was going on. I pretended I was on some frontier world, trying to make money for a ticket off-planet by playing air hockey.
Me and my friend Talia had two personal imaginary countries, Kattyland and Dogenland, respectively. Every time I would come over, we would set about making pamphlets and posters about the geography, attractions, and other attributes of our countries. Talia still has all of her stuff, but I don’t know where mine is.
4- You had a hero named noro? In 5th grade I created a world, and it had a hero named noro! I tried writing a book about it, but it fizzled away. I still add to it sometimes, but I don’t try to write about it. I called it terra alienus. AND NOW, FOR A DESCRIPTION OF TERRA ALIENUS!*
*People with allergies to long posts should avoid this like the plague
The north is a frozen and uninhabited wasteland with a large hudson bay-ish bay, although it doesn’t really have any significance, nor a name. South of there is a large and loosely populated area of taiga and tundra called the muurahainen (3 wung points to anyone who can tell me what that means in a foreign language) wherein live the yashrai, which I rather shamelessly plagiarized from the discworld trolls. South of them is a great plateau similar to the tibetan plateau called gourimai which is also uninhabited. South of that lies a series of 4 vast peatlands, the mbeska, tlonza, mbuokni, and bengai peatlands inhabited by goblins, which are tall, with large pointed ears, long noses, and long fingers/toes. To the east and west of the gourimai are three orcish kingdoms. The orcs look like urukhai, however, they are pacifists who practice a religion somewhat like buddhism and cultivate extensive gardens. West of the gourimai is the kingdom of olam. east of the gourimai lie the kingdoms of tokyai and nagasi, all of which are in a densely populated deciduous forest. South of olam is an area of scrub bordering on a vast gulf called ayabhata inhabited by the darsheh, which are amphibious and reptilian. South of tokyai and nagasi lies a savanna inhabited by some more goblins, these ones seminomadic herders. Along the southern shore of ayabhata is a plateau called gjakouri on which dwarves live in the republic of gjoukouradh, which is bordered to the east by the arukven range and to the west by the ocean. South of gjoukouradh is the empire of yavaaruk, which consists of the province of darjad in the north, which is inhabited mainly by dwarves and is mountainous with many mines; the province of ashuri which is bordered to the north by darjad, to the west by the ocean, and to the east and south by the avenfor river and is heavily forested, with fruit and wood plantations, and also inhabited by dwarves; the province of anu, where the capital, yavaaruk, is, bordered to the East by the province of avari, to the south by the sunja river, to the north by the province of ashuri, and to the west by the ocean; the province of avari, bordered by the arukven range to the east, anu to the west, gjoukouradh to the north, and the province of basagai to the south, and mainly inhabited by the dilenya, which are small dog-headed ape-ish bipeds; the province of luka, in which is the great lake tjath, and is bordered by the arukven to the east, basagai to the south, anu to the north, and the land of the hantvars to the west, and is also inhabited by the dilenya; and the province of basagai, which is a great marsh bordering on the ocean in which dilenya live and the people’s army of liberation lurks. To the west of the yavaaruki empire is a scrubland wherein live the hantvars, which are rather like giant burrowing owls. They have their capital at the immense muuruukuutuu Burrows. South of the savanna is the desert empire of salamar, also inhabited by goblins. It is bordered by the arukven to the west, the ocean to the south, savanna to the north, and ocean to the south. Its capital is the great city of salamar (i wasn’t feeling very creative with names for capitals at the time.) The empires of yavaaruk and salaman are the main focus, and i went in to the most detail regarding them. Yavaaruk is the older of the two by approximitely 1000 years, and was originally a northern empire encompassing gjoukouradh, darjad, and ashuri. It spread southwards, taking over much dilenya land. Now, all that remains of the once great dilenya lands is a small strip of land along the arukven range. However, around 600 years after the founding of yavaaruk, gjoukouradh seceded in the 15-yearâ€war of secession.†By the 1300th year of rule, the ruling families had succumbed to inbreeding and became a seperate species of dwarf with a very low IQ. Under their rule, salamar was able to conquer the western slope of the arukven. This unpopular event allowed various lesser nobles to de facto rule the nation for perhaps 100 years until a dwarvish clan from the city of corazho took over and established a theocracy. The nobles promptly kicked them out using a coalition of private armies in (depending on if you are asking a devout darshrutk or a noble- it didn’t really matter to non-nobles or non-devout darshrutks) the war of the devil or the glorious war of rightful restoration. This time, the nobles elected a leader, derani taravan, who ruled for 5 years before handing it over to his son, at which point we reach the present day. Meanwhile, around 700 years prior to the present day, the yashrai were expanding from the muurahainen down into the vunerable peatlands, which sparked an exodus down into the desert, displacing the resident knamai, pronounced keh-nam-i. They fought back, and so the refugees, operating out of a vast camp along the avenya river later to develop into salamar city, fought the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd knamai wars, culminating in the knamai being subdued and placed in the southern hasimau peninsula, which was a colony of the new empire. Originally, salamar was a democracy, but the 3rd president staged a coup, becoming the new king. In about 200 years, the previously-boring empire began a string of exciting-but unpleasent- events. Firstly, yavaaruk invaded a section of the arukven, which salamar was unable to repell. Secondly, across the nation knamai freedom-fighting groups rebelled. Thirdly, coalitions of business-beings began creating trade leagues, which replaced the guilds with larger, more efficient, more centralized factories with worse conditions. The guilds fought back, burning industrial quarters and sending assassins after high-level leaguesbeings. The leagues started acquiring private armies they would later use as insurance governments would stay friendly. 4thly, using stockpiles of league-manufactured weapons, salamar retook the arukven, also taking a tribute from the independent dilenya tribes of the western slope. Post-2nd salamar-yavaaruk-war settled down into a history mainly composed of unsucessful revolts, and the rulers began to inbreed. Fortunately, before a new species of goblin was achieved, there was a coup, and before that family achieved new-species status they were also overthrown , this time by a businessbeing named tlapai marsenasku. However, he had the bad luck to be leader in a time when naz madr and other prominent leaders of the lower class were preaching a pseudo-marxism and his bread-and-circuses ideology of ruling was no longer a viable concept, although in less class-conscious times he would have likely been able to prevent rebellion effectively, as he was willing to make reforms for long -term profit much more than previous leaders. And now at last, with 1225 words, this long post comes to an end!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
72- I had a hero named Noro once. It’s a pretty cool name.
A few days ago I was hanging out with this little kid and what do you know… I actualy got to play pretend with someone but myself.
We were dino’s-unoriganal but… it was nice- and I was the…. um… the one with spikes on top. And I had to eat the grass, paper *rolls eyes* and then the little boy could randomly come and attack me as the T-rex (hey! I actualy know that one!) It was quite fun. I didn’t even mind having to eat paper ( I did that anywho) In the end we became dragons, and he stopped attacking me and we ran after random made up wizards (‘cept he called ’em Magikers I don’t know why) it was the funest time I’ve had a while.
I’m going overboard on my french class- I keep imaging that my teacher is Darth Vader on a bad hair day and we’re the unfortunate commanders. We used to be 17 kids in 5th grade, but the teacher whittled us down to 13 at the start of the year (8th grade), and 11 now (end of the first semester), one of which is currently flunking. If this keeps going, there won’t be anyone left for graduation (in 5 years), especially since I’m going to skip a grade to get away from her. The problem is that she always wears horrible clothes and paces in front of the blackboard, where there is a narrow strip of floor (like by the bridge on the starship). I’m the best student in her class (straight Bs), which means I always end up volunteering for pop quizes and revisions so that she doesn’t pick someone flunking who will fail. It’s not terrible for my grade, but I think I could use a lot more appreciation from my classmates.
AM and I have made some crazy worlds (especially with the religions). One had a temple for the god of ideas that seemed good at the time. It included dinner, bunnies, light bulbs…
…The “number” infinity, the number 8…
Wow, that’s so cool! I tried to make up an imaginary country too… It was called Illyad, and it was an impoverished island.
Enceladus and I made up a timeline for our world. There were the spans of different civilizations on it. There were also markings for “first stone tool”, “first intelligence”, and “first life”. Some of the civilizations were before any of these points, although we weren’t too clear on how this was possible.
We also tried to make a world that was a double sided flat sheet, and total opposites. When one side had war, the other had peace. When one side had a golden age, the other side had a dark age. Eventually, they’d contact, and have a large war where they’d fight about which side was the top.
This thread has inspired me to work on “Smiala” some more. It’s a country I’ve made, and I just finshed created three religions that exist in it.
A few months ago, in an especially dull science class, Keiffer and I each claimed quadrants of Mars. Mine was Southeast, I seem to recall. It had a long set of laws, and the first two were these:
1. All laws following this are void. Beings caught obeying any following laws will receive any punishment deemed appropriate at the time by officials.
2. All laws following this apply. Beings caught disobeying any following laws will receive any punishment deemed appropriate at the time by officials.
Needless to say, it would not have been a very happy place.