I think it comes down to someone growing up and being really passionate about something, and then seeing it fall apart. I was a roleplayer in WoW, I just played my character and was happy. And in Starcraft I made custom story maps and had some fun with that, but I never wrote seriously for these until about 2018. After seeing the decline of Warcraft, I became a writer for projects like Turtle WoW and Hateforge that aim to fix the mistakes of the past. That said, I do have my own world too.
@@DesignerDave hey, sry for breaking in the discussion, but your answer (and last strings of the video) interested me, what kind of help can person expect to get from you?
A couple of thoughts: -It's comfier to build on something that already exists. -Fanfic gives you more attention than original IP. This is the most damning consideration here because it means good, novel IP is at the whims of capricious consumers who want the same thing over and over again and don't appreciate novelty until someone like Asmongold introduces it to them. -The overwhelming majority of human beings, even the ones who are "creative" and who have made things, they cannot make something cool or memorable and do it consistently. It is an extremely rare ability to be an idea guy and also have good ideas. Look at JK Rowling. She made a western Isekai for backwards, socially stunted millennials to imprint on and that's her only real success. She's tried to make her own Hercule Poirot, but she's not Agatha Christie and my mother-in-law has told me that Rowling has been learning on the job with her own detective series. -Return on Investment for new IP is high risk because of the amount of effort that goes in. You almost certainly will not get anything back on it and because of market saturation, betting on a sure thing is just the more economical option. -Corporatism milks every concept for what it's worth. When I hear the name "Yggdrasil" for an in-game reference I know the developer is mediocre. It might have worked to use obscure mythology in Tolkien or Gigax's day, but that doesn't fly anymore when EVERYONE uses it. -The kinds of people that are fanatical in their devotion to artistic ability are the least capable of managing their money and are the least interested in doing so. When a startup has a tight budget and deadlines, you're trying to plant olive trees in caliche dirt. It's not going to work. We live in a world governed by hard math and that is anathema to the auteurs and the non-math oriented autists. The one that bothers me the most is this. The idiotic mommy culture, participation trophy, "encourage everyone to be creative, even if they suck at it," has devolved into a zero sum game. EVERYONE has a book out. EVERYONE has a world. People with oodles of motivation but no ability to back it up have made content that was in no way worth the effort, won't stand the test of time and can only provoke an emotional response in people who would charitably be described as "quest givers" in WoW. Given that most consumers aren't brave enough to go look for good stuff, the market oversaturation means that hidden gems are buried beneath mountains of garbage and well marketed mediocrity gets to be on top. Western culture wants to be encouraging to the degree that it's not feasible for even 20% of creators to succeed. The average person doesn't have time to get invested in 3 tabletop games, 5 gachas, an MMO, 2 card games and be able to play a new game every week. But there are so many available that being able to parse the content is a job in itself. Robert E. Howard could not survive in this day and age. Nobody would be able to find Tolkien. There's just way too many people making way too many things and it's compounded by a lack of humility amongst incapable people. Imagine Asmongold reviewing a brilliantly designed, engaging game and he hates it because he lacks the skill. He did that with Dark Souls. If it wasn't for McConnell pushing him the entire time, he would have dropped it after an hour cuz he's bad. Oh, I should have listened to the end. I am working on original IPs, some of them are getting done, some have to wait a while before they get worked on, I need to finish an anthology and I have to figure out the best way to publish it to maximize success and not have it die the moment it sees daylight. Given all I've said about making IP in the modern era, the Brood War aria is most fitting. ruclips.net/video/OEUQ7Xkdz9g/видео.html We who are about to die indeed.
In a world of endless consumerism there's plenty of room for trash and treasures alike. It also creates plenty of room for groups dedicated to discerning which is which. Someone else's trash doesn't obscure your treasure, because even if you have a gem, it may never find its audience due to any number of factors. The least of which is the abundance of other stuff out there, which has been a problem since the digital age began and anyone could post a website with their manifesto. TLDR: Spend more time working on your stuff instead of lamenting trash being elevated. :P
I think the main reason is because established IPs already have an audience. So, as a creative the only thing you need to worry about is writing the story you want to tell. You don't have to worry about marketing, social media or any of that. Also, established IP gives you certain constraints, which gives you a framework to get your creative juices flowing. Be that as it may, though, I still think that making your own IP is the way to go. Yes, your may nkt have an established audience, but even with established IPs that audience was nevertheless yours to begin with - it's the audiences of that IP and it belongs to the IP's owner.
I'm working on it, but its tough to commit to any idea for very long and solidify it. For my indie game I hope the story turns out to be more like Hollow Knight where its vague and mysterious and hopefully I can get away with less is more. But yeah I agree and I feel the same way when I see people mod games or make fan art, I wonder why they wouldn't rather use their talent on their own creations.
I love creating my own world. I recently started working on my own TTRPG, I am at early stages of writing the main story, basic guide and the races of the world. I call it "The New Cenozoic" (for now) and it is set in the far future of Earth.
I'm not sure if you have specific examples in mind - perhaps you are talking about this topic outside of game development. If we are focusing on this topic specifically through the lens of game development: it makes sense for developers to transition into building around an established IP because they most likely get their start by modding those games. Most game types where you would build a universe are generally going to fall into genres which are hard to develop for solo devs or small teams. If you want to focus more immediately on worldbuilding over developing the infrastructure of your game, it makes sense to design off the back of something like TES editor or War3 World Editor where that legwork has already been done for you. As a consequence of that you are going to be constrained somewhat by those tools so it makes sense to fit your narratives within that same universe to make use of what character models etc you have available to you.
Thanks for what you say :-) I have more than 13 years of experience with wow modding and over the years I've created many custom modifications for wow... Small ones, large ones and ones that will change whole Azeroth and Outland. But there has never been much interest in modding in my opinion, perhaps because these videos have never had much reach or people don't realize what endless possibilities there are... Who knows... Sometimes I felt like this area was too much of a taboo among people, or there were few people who could really appreciate the effort no matter how good the mod was. But I kept doing it anyway, hoping to inspire other people... And also because it's better to create and learn new things instead of be a just user. A healthy community is one where everyone adds something imo... :-)
One of the main reasons for me, is the ability to connect to a market which already has millions of fans. Combined with the amount of funding and resources a triple A studio is willing to spend on their IP; wouldn't you be able to have more impact working on and influencing a project which already has an established world, rather than releasing and marketing an indie game which maybe gets a few thousand purchases over its lifespan?
When I was a little kid, I would spend time in the hallways of my school staring at nothing, daydreaming about worlds and characters and adventures and whatever. No smartphones back then, no internet, a dusty old PC where I would play Warcraft when I got back from school. In my insomniac nights, I would resume the stories I started during the day in recess. And sometimes they would leak to the real world in literature and art classes. And I did experiment for a while in the World Editor in WC3 back in the day, but it was never good enough for me. It was nothing special, mostly cringe kiddie stuff, but still, I miss those days. I feel like I've lost the ability to disconnect from the world and daydream like I did before. I fall asleep too quickly in the night to actually return to that fantasy world. And even when I try, I only see a black void with some opaque colors here and there, and hear nothing but the white noise of tinnitus. I've been documenting and writing from time to time about new characters, a unified world, history and development of its civilizations, its habitants and geography, but I can't say I feel the spark anymore. I hope to use it someday, whenever I manage to finish it, and when I feel like it has the spark I have been searching for since days gone by. It's funny. I said back when Reforged was announced that I would finally finish that campaign I started way back then. But then the suits did what they do best, and ruined everything. Maybe it's for the better.
Hey Dave I love your streams and videos. Since you have been basically writing your whole life would you ever consider making a video about what are some good things to include and mistakes to avoid? Especially when trying to make there own world?
I actually go through my whole process while working on SolCraft in this video: ruclips.net/user/liveMCcXk-PUa_s?si=UurnTAmhqiXeScsn&t=589 I'll think about a tips and tricks video for lore creation though.
For me, it's because I am simply obsessed with detail. If I want to make a world, I am going to spent hours literally just sitting there and imagining it, drawing sketches of stuff in it, trying to figure out the political scenarios in it, how players would react to it, and stuff like that. If I am ever to make it into reality, I would want it to be in the form of a full on video game, where the players could interact with it, and that simply is a drain of time and money that I simply don't have at the current moment as I am in the middle of college. But I do write down those ideas on my Google Docs, so at least it's always safe there in case I want to overview it in the future. Until I get to the point I can actually make that dream into reality, I am just going to keep nailing down the concept until it is a very focused vision.
I used to write fanfic about other ips and then wrote my own novels (all of them are horrible). But the only thing that stop me from creating my own world for my indie game ips is because I gain more experience and found out I need at least 5-6 more people to help me with those games and I don't have the budget to hire people. I can go crazy like Stardew Valley creator and spend 7 years working on a project and do everything solo but I neither want to do it nor I can do it at my age with my responsibilities. :D
Yeah, full on game development is quite difficult in a way people don't really understand until they sit down and try to figure it out for themselves. That said, anything stopping you from writing a novel in your own world or a TTRPG?
So I have that work I am on for more than two years, still haven't finished it. It and my other thump nail scribbles and texts are mostly if not all about World of Warcraft. I decided to keep doing it that way, because I just really enjoy doing it about World of Warcraft, it's a world I like being in ,immersed in, coming up with classes, mechanics, levels more lore. All that because I feel the recent content that has been released in WoW is lackluster to say the least, recent as in since WoD. It was mentioned before in the comments, I keep to WoW because it feels comfortable. That does not mean I do not have my own world and magic system which I am proud of and the world itself. Unfortunately the time I have invested in my own WoW content massively dwarfs everything I did for my own world. That's where I currently am Dave.
For me; I've tried making my own fantasy universe multiple times. I don't know if it's a me issue but it seems like every idea I have has already been done before. Like how about an alien race that invade through a portal? Warcraft's done it, how about some elves who are secretly cannibals? Elder Scrolls... etc. Every idea I have is not original enough.
That's one of the things I try to help people work through. It doesn't matter if it's "been done before." Who cares? It's YOUR take on that particular instance. The details and execution are always what matters. The ideas are nigh-worthless on their own. All works of fiction builds on the backs of what came before and THAT is why modern fiction is better than what came before. So don't let that stop you. Your unique interpretation of that particular idea, the themes and plots and characters you explore within that core concept. THAT is what matters. That's what is different. It's YOUR take on it. So keep writing!
@@DesignerDave Thank you for the insight! I'll check out your previous videos and work to improve my writing. It's easy to feel defeated when so much has already been done before and I suppose I just need to figure out what'll get people to read my story about these remixed ideas.
@@grog159 It's your personal take on it that people will be interested in. Look at George RR Martin, basically writing fantasy fanfic of The War of the Roses... But everyone loves it.
Uhh... Yeah no... Warcraft did so many things WRONG that it's hard not to come up with something better if you actually spend time to think things out.
@@DesignerDave You 'should' be right (maybe you are and i'm biased). Now after 2 decades, we ought to come up with something better in all aspects (maybe Stormgate does it, SC2 lacked the easy to use editor, albeit it being more powerful). Then again, people are still creating new custom games (e.g. been playing a lot of tower survivors lately). I guess it's a matter of taste in the end. When i started playing 20 years ago, i'd have liked a somewhat more serious artstyle (akin to Wc2). But other than that, it's still my favorite RTS to this day and mainly so because of the editor and the custom projects.
@@Visuvh And the art is timeless really. I've been playing Turtle WoW which uses the vanilla art and it really holds up. From an RTS perspective, Warcraft III is difficult to top in that arena as well. Warcraft's weakness has always been the lore. It has weak backlore and retcons galore which undermine the characters and stories established in War III. War III was really the pinnacle of the storytelling done in the Warcraft universe, but there are mis-steps even there if you look closer. Primarily because the backlore was too malleable... and now WoW's attempts to solidify it have caused catastrophic damage to the overall lore of the world, and especially the story and characters in Warcraft III. Anyone can do it better, and I've outlined how to approach world building in this video I did about SolCraft (a Warcraft-like game), which I recommend for anyone who intends to make the attempt: ruclips.net/user/liveMCcXk-PUa_s?si=o_8Saj8TkFgKaCzJ&t=586
Realistically, how much would it cost to build a platform similar with warcraft engine. Not to copy the IP, just create a platform with similar or improved features where players create the content. Hear me out, for instance imagine you worked on some cool assets, some cool stories or maps, what if you the be able to sell them to other content creators, imagine being able to build a campaign with an alternative story, I would pay 10 £ for a campaign, and this can be recuring, the platform can take a small percentage of the transactions to keep the platform and content creators happy. I've tried to check how much it would cost to create something like that, i use warcraft engine for stories and world development just because is very familiar and easy to use. But if I had an alternative I think things would change insanely, many people laughed at this idea stating things like,, it took blizard x years and a full team to create warcraft" , but that was over 20 years ago.. surely things may change, this is something I have on my mind since reforge released, but I think this may be a good idea. I tjink prople use warcraft 3 just because they have nothing else remotely close to what u can do to it. Plus most of new engines require so many resources and they are expensive
If you want to do what Warcraft 3 did from scratch, it's a minimum of 2-3 years. Any complex game, no matter how well planned, has a minimum development time of 9 months (assuming no problems). In terms of selling assets and things like that. That already exists in the Unity store and Unreal store, and I've purchased entire packages of stylized asset groups for the purposes of prototyping something quickly. But there are also TONS of free assets you can use. Beyond that I'm not sure what you're asking.
@@DesignerDave My curiosity is purely in term of financial investments how much capital I might need. I know you can get free assests on unity, I've bought a few and got anything that I found useful and where free. I was curious why warcraft fans not get something in return for their work and assets. My point was that we can addopt what others did good and use our imagination to apply it to the warcraft IP. My vision for the warcraft game as a kid was that it would be turned into expansions using war 3 to present the story outside of the player influence. I would have gladly paid 10 20 buck's to play a campaign explining the war of the spiders or the scarlet crusade story. I like rts games but they don't even come closer to warcraft, a good example was starcraft but the futuristic alien stuff is not very appealing to me . I think my main questions would be , in simple words, if I want my own IP similar with warcraft but with my own story my own source code etc how much would that cost in terms of money, time investments ,skills and people that may help me build this. My professional experience is in sales and entrepreneurship, and I am curently studying computing science so I can gain some understanding and also some skills that may help me get something like this done. Also would it be legal for me to do so considering that I am not planing in using their code or their resources in any way. All I want is the concepts , so I can use them for my own vision of something similar, not a copy just something similar fone with a different vision, since blozard is not interested and is something I would like to see it done , I decided to try doi.g something about it, now I understand I can't do it all by myself but I think asking you for some advice about this odea would be good given your expertise. I found your videos useful and they helped me not only with some of my skills but also giving me a different perspective of things. Do you think something like this is worth the work required to achieve? Worth in terms of something that people can find some sort of value in it?
@@ricardosimion2268 You're basically asking me if making games is worth the time/money invested into them. As someone who has loved games his whole life and wouldn't want to work in any other profession, of course my answer is... Yes, it's worth it. In terms of what you're asking for, it's still unclear to me. Do you need help with developing an IP? Do you need help with understanding production planning so you can decide how much time vs money vs the scope of the project, and how many people you need and what expertise is involved? I can help with all that...
@@DesignerDave yes and yes. I want basically to building a new IP , and I need some direction , I did some research already and I am working on building up a world first then move into actually building the ip itself, I watched many of your videos since you opened this channel and I find it easy to learn from you. I used some of your advice to improve my writing by wel.. writing more. You asked why we are using warcraft 3 engine in creating stories and so on knowing we will never own the ip. The only answers at least for me is that I don't have an alternative, of course I can use unity or unreal engine to maybe build everything from scratch but I am not sure if it will be better to do it that way or simply trying to build a platform similar with what warcrafts offers and build my vision on it. I don't have the experience in gaming industry outside of maybe marketing or sales , and for this reason I am trying to understand more about what I am trying to create, before puting money and time into it , but not having experience building this sort of start made me a bit stuck. I think me writing these to you is a way of me reaching out for advice.. it would take a loot to explain here but in short, Yes I need some help and guidance with this idea I have. I think this is something that can have some potential if done the right way.. and at this point I know what I want and I have some understanding of what skills and knowledge I need but I have no idea how to move forward.. I don't have the time I use to have when I was younger but I still wana do some fun things even if they may seem hard or impossible, worst case scenario everything fails but I am left with the knowledge and experience, I learn by doing stuff and sometimes when I get stuck is hard to break through,
@@ricardosimion2268 The first time you build something do you expect it to be perfect? Are you setting an expectation that you will be able to create something yourself that equates to a team of 60, each with 5+ years of experience developing games? On your first attempt? I think you need to align your expectations with your capabilities and start with something smaller then see where it takes you. Make a small game first. Something you believe you can complete in 9 months. Then we can see where things are at and you will understand a lot more about what it takes to make something like Warcraft 3.
I am using azeroth for my ttrpg campaign, but I have my own spin on it: im adding religions/gods and changing storylines to what im enjoying I feel Kinda the opposite to you: we all own the warcraft universe. I don't have to care what blizzard cooks up: I can play my game and make my own stories in the warcraft sandbox and be happy 😊
@DesignerDave absolutely. Was azeroth originally some homemade ttrpg/dnd setting or world (like chris metzen's home game) that was expanded upon by blizzard? It has that feeling to me
Since 2003 as Former blizzard employer do you know why Blizzard not make WoW Gameplay Graphic same like AA Game? Only Cinematic look realistic but the gameplay Graphic still like Ps2 or ps3 game
In this world there was a war not so long ago between the prometheans and the elves on one side and the rest of humanity on the other. The prometheans believe to be the saviours of humanity from the lies and ignorance of the "inspired" order, so their symbol is fire. The elves fought humanity because of their disregard for nature. But the light elves defected to the human side and helped them to win, so they are respected in society, while the dark elves are distrusted and treated as second class citizens living in ghettos. The dark elves believe humanity doesn't care for nature and view the light elves as traitors. Elves don't need to eat, they gain sustain from the land, but light elves eat to better blend with human society. Dark elves view this need for consuming life as inferior and believe humans don't adapt to nature like they do, building underground and absorbing nutrients by touching the earth, instead they build and destroy. Fires of rebellion and secret sects breed in the underground of the human cities. The prometheans believe in a defender of humanity called "Prometheus". He stole fire from divinity and gave it to humanity. He gave technology and knowledge to humans . He is considered smart and taught humanity not to rely in divinity. In this world, the common folk are dressed only in gray, dark brown and black, which are "not outstanding" and cheap colors, grey is also the colours of the saturn soul, for them, it represents stoicism, and frugality needed to build and escalate. Prometheans dress in black in public and red in private, as they consider them colors of rebelliousness. Nobility dresses in code according to the souls (common people have no knowledge of the souls, not even all nobility is versed on this secret). There's the low nobility who dresses in red or dark red for mars, wine, purple or burgundy for jupiter, green for venus, any light color for mercury and the high nobility who dresses in pure white for the moon and mostly white with gold stripes for the sun. There's also economic reasons for the use of determined colors in this world. The inspired are an order, the prometheans claim to be just a consensus, while the prothean are a cult dedicated to Python, the primordial force of stasis, void, darkness, coldness and stillness. Python is not death, because death is violent, energic and transformative, more akin to mars. The Python is depression, lack of movement, emptiness, void, aging and everything slow or decelerating, devoid of life and color. Python is the opposite of the source, the origin of life and the main component of the sun. Not the physical sun, a bigger spiritual sun in the center of the universe and that is present in all life and energy. The protheans believe in everything contrary to life, they worship everything in regards to their material components, they are cold hearted, they don't hesitate to separate the material components of lifeforms in order to study matter and elements. They can be ruthless, but in their own eyes sensitivities mean nothing more than stuff developed by lifeforms. Their goal is to release matter from the whimsical wishes of life. In their eyes, in the beginning there was endless potential, the elements and energy did nothing, so they could be everything without differentiating nor being anything concretely. The matter was devoid of spirit. But the sun and their lifeforce irradiated on to matter, so spirit infiltrated matter and began to take all kinds of decision, evolving and eventually creating all forms of life, but with endless decision you lose endless possibility, and in their eyes life is selfish and whimsical. Could the python spread corruption and apathy among the leaders of society? could the Python manifest in the upper levels of society and politics to affect societal issues altogether? could The Python could manifest as a state of mind, such as depression, apathy, or despair? Could a new king be the only salvation to the python?
The prometheans believe in equality, so they don't believe in hierarchies, but they clearly admire some members over the others. These admired members gain much prestige and influence among the prometheans. The prometheans have many hypocrisies. Matter and energy is constantly being used to create lifeforms, thus depleting the universe from it's components more and more. The protheans actually believe destruction and death feeds life like combustible to a fire because of the powerful and transformative energies that releases, death is not a quiet process, it can be violent and adrenalinic, also dead carcases feed the very nutrients that nourish the life cycle. Only the stasis, the cease of motivation and endless lost of meaning and purpose (a state similar to depression, boredom or apathy) can extinguish the fire of life. The protheans are a weird cult, but they can spread their mental state like a consuming terminal disease, affected people begin to act erratically and numb to pain often times disturbing, like a mental disease or depressive state. The protheans can use death as means to an end, but only in a dispassionate way, like it was a bureaucratic procedure. The protheans are not living beings, they use living beings, but they actually both crystals and an ideology. Crystals are the genes, ideology is the meme.
I'm creating my own world right now. Out of pure spite towards some story decisions made regarding my favorite characters. It brings me joy.
This is the way.
I think it comes down to someone growing up and being really passionate about something, and then seeing it fall apart.
I was a roleplayer in WoW, I just played my character and was happy. And in Starcraft I made custom story maps and had some fun with that, but I never wrote seriously for these until about 2018.
After seeing the decline of Warcraft, I became a writer for projects like Turtle WoW and Hateforge that aim to fix the mistakes of the past.
That said, I do have my own world too.
Have you considered writing a novel in that world or developing a TTRPG?
@@DesignerDave I have considered a novel, yeah...
Although I am honestly leaning more towards an indie game.
@@Tamamo-no-Bae Happy to help. ;)
World filled with foxes most likely 😂
@@DesignerDave hey, sry for breaking in the discussion, but your answer (and last strings of the video) interested me, what kind of help can person expect to get from you?
A couple of thoughts:
-It's comfier to build on something that already exists.
-Fanfic gives you more attention than original IP. This is the most damning consideration here because it means good, novel IP is at the whims of capricious consumers who want the same thing over and over again and don't appreciate novelty until someone like Asmongold introduces it to them.
-The overwhelming majority of human beings, even the ones who are "creative" and who have made things, they cannot make something cool or memorable and do it consistently. It is an extremely rare ability to be an idea guy and also have good ideas. Look at JK Rowling. She made a western Isekai for backwards, socially stunted millennials to imprint on and that's her only real success. She's tried to make her own Hercule Poirot, but she's not Agatha Christie and my mother-in-law has told me that Rowling has been learning on the job with her own detective series.
-Return on Investment for new IP is high risk because of the amount of effort that goes in. You almost certainly will not get anything back on it and because of market saturation, betting on a sure thing is just the more economical option.
-Corporatism milks every concept for what it's worth. When I hear the name "Yggdrasil" for an in-game reference I know the developer is mediocre. It might have worked to use obscure mythology in Tolkien or Gigax's day, but that doesn't fly anymore when EVERYONE uses it.
-The kinds of people that are fanatical in their devotion to artistic ability are the least capable of managing their money and are the least interested in doing so. When a startup has a tight budget and deadlines, you're trying to plant olive trees in caliche dirt. It's not going to work. We live in a world governed by hard math and that is anathema to the auteurs and the non-math oriented autists.
The one that bothers me the most is this. The idiotic mommy culture, participation trophy, "encourage everyone to be creative, even if they suck at it," has devolved into a zero sum game. EVERYONE has a book out. EVERYONE has a world. People with oodles of motivation but no ability to back it up have made content that was in no way worth the effort, won't stand the test of time and can only provoke an emotional response in people who would charitably be described as "quest givers" in WoW.
Given that most consumers aren't brave enough to go look for good stuff, the market oversaturation means that hidden gems are buried beneath mountains of garbage and well marketed mediocrity gets to be on top. Western culture wants to be encouraging to the degree that it's not feasible for even 20% of creators to succeed. The average person doesn't have time to get invested in 3 tabletop games, 5 gachas, an MMO, 2 card games and be able to play a new game every week. But there are so many available that being able to parse the content is a job in itself.
Robert E. Howard could not survive in this day and age. Nobody would be able to find Tolkien. There's just way too many people making way too many things and it's compounded by a lack of humility amongst incapable people. Imagine Asmongold reviewing a brilliantly designed, engaging game and he hates it because he lacks the skill. He did that with Dark Souls. If it wasn't for McConnell pushing him the entire time, he would have dropped it after an hour cuz he's bad.
Oh, I should have listened to the end. I am working on original IPs, some of them are getting done, some have to wait a while before they get worked on, I need to finish an anthology and I have to figure out the best way to publish it to maximize success and not have it die the moment it sees daylight. Given all I've said about making IP in the modern era, the Brood War aria is most fitting.
ruclips.net/video/OEUQ7Xkdz9g/видео.html
We who are about to die indeed.
In a world of endless consumerism there's plenty of room for trash and treasures alike. It also creates plenty of room for groups dedicated to discerning which is which. Someone else's trash doesn't obscure your treasure, because even if you have a gem, it may never find its audience due to any number of factors. The least of which is the abundance of other stuff out there, which has been a problem since the digital age began and anyone could post a website with their manifesto.
TLDR: Spend more time working on your stuff instead of lamenting trash being elevated. :P
@@DesignerDave [Scott will remember this.]
I think that was one of the reasons why Retera started his Warsmash project.
I think the main reason is because established IPs already have an audience. So, as a creative the only thing you need to worry about is writing the story you want to tell. You don't have to worry about marketing, social media or any of that.
Also, established IP gives you certain constraints, which gives you a framework to get your creative juices flowing.
Be that as it may, though, I still think that making your own IP is the way to go. Yes, your may nkt have an established audience, but even with established IPs that audience was nevertheless yours to begin with - it's the audiences of that IP and it belongs to the IP's owner.
Loved the thumbnail, Dave! On point! 🎉
I'm working on it, but its tough to commit to any idea for very long and solidify it. For my indie game I hope the story turns out to be more like Hollow Knight where its vague and mysterious and hopefully I can get away with less is more.
But yeah I agree and I feel the same way when I see people mod games or make fan art, I wonder why they wouldn't rather use their talent on their own creations.
I love creating my own world.
I recently started working on my own TTRPG, I am at early stages of writing the main story, basic guide and the races of the world. I call it "The New Cenozoic" (for now) and it is set in the far future of Earth.
I'm not sure if you have specific examples in mind - perhaps you are talking about this topic outside of game development.
If we are focusing on this topic specifically through the lens of game development: it makes sense for developers to transition into building around an established IP because they most likely get their start by modding those games.
Most game types where you would build a universe are generally going to fall into genres which are hard to develop for solo devs or small teams.
If you want to focus more immediately on worldbuilding over developing the infrastructure of your game, it makes sense to design off the back of something like TES editor or War3 World Editor where that legwork has already been done for you. As a consequence of that you are going to be constrained somewhat by those tools so it makes sense to fit your narratives within that same universe to make use of what character models etc you have available to you.
Thanks for what you say :-) I have more than 13 years of experience with wow modding and over the years I've created many custom modifications for wow... Small ones, large ones and ones that will change whole Azeroth and Outland. But there has never been much interest in modding in my opinion, perhaps because these videos have never had much reach or people don't realize what endless possibilities there are... Who knows... Sometimes I felt like this area was too much of a taboo among people, or there were few people who could really appreciate the effort no matter how good the mod was. But I kept doing it anyway, hoping to inspire other people... And also because it's better to create and learn new things instead of be a just user. A healthy community is one where everyone adds something imo... :-)
Just joined your Discord, my man! Keen to touch base with you about Ubi, if you're up for it.
One of the main reasons for me, is the ability to connect to a market which already has millions of fans. Combined with the amount of funding and resources a triple A studio is willing to spend on their IP; wouldn't you be able to have more impact working on and influencing a project which already has an established world, rather than releasing and marketing an indie game which maybe gets a few thousand purchases over its lifespan?
I like to think that I can create things that would compete.
When I was a little kid, I would spend time in the hallways of my school staring at nothing, daydreaming about worlds and characters and adventures and whatever. No smartphones back then, no internet, a dusty old PC where I would play Warcraft when I got back from school. In my insomniac nights, I would resume the stories I started during the day in recess. And sometimes they would leak to the real world in literature and art classes. And I did experiment for a while in the World Editor in WC3 back in the day, but it was never good enough for me.
It was nothing special, mostly cringe kiddie stuff, but still, I miss those days. I feel like I've lost the ability to disconnect from the world and daydream like I did before. I fall asleep too quickly in the night to actually return to that fantasy world. And even when I try, I only see a black void with some opaque colors here and there, and hear nothing but the white noise of tinnitus.
I've been documenting and writing from time to time about new characters, a unified world, history and development of its civilizations, its habitants and geography, but I can't say I feel the spark anymore. I hope to use it someday, whenever I manage to finish it, and when I feel like it has the spark I have been searching for since days gone by.
It's funny. I said back when Reforged was announced that I would finally finish that campaign I started way back then. But then the suits did what they do best, and ruined everything. Maybe it's for the better.
Dare to daydream again...
Hey Dave I love your streams and videos. Since you have been basically writing your whole life would you ever consider making a video about what are some good things to include and mistakes to avoid? Especially when trying to make there own world?
I actually go through my whole process while working on SolCraft in this video:
ruclips.net/user/liveMCcXk-PUa_s?si=UurnTAmhqiXeScsn&t=589
I'll think about a tips and tricks video for lore creation though.
@@DesignerDave Awesome thanks for the link must have missed it :)
For me, it's because I am simply obsessed with detail. If I want to make a world, I am going to spent hours literally just sitting there and imagining it, drawing sketches of stuff in it, trying to figure out the political scenarios in it, how players would react to it, and stuff like that. If I am ever to make it into reality, I would want it to be in the form of a full on video game, where the players could interact with it, and that simply is a drain of time and money that I simply don't have at the current moment as I am in the middle of college. But I do write down those ideas on my Google Docs, so at least it's always safe there in case I want to overview it in the future. Until I get to the point I can actually make that dream into reality, I am just going to keep nailing down the concept until it is a very focused vision.
I used to write fanfic about other ips and then wrote my own novels (all of them are horrible).
But the only thing that stop me from creating my own world for my indie game ips is because I gain more experience and found out I need at least 5-6 more people to help me with those games and I don't have the budget to hire people. I can go crazy like Stardew Valley creator and spend 7 years working on a project and do everything solo but I neither want to do it nor I can do it at my age with my responsibilities. :D
Yeah, full on game development is quite difficult in a way people don't really understand until they sit down and try to figure it out for themselves. That said, anything stopping you from writing a novel in your own world or a TTRPG?
So I have that work I am on for more than two years, still haven't finished it. It and my other thump nail scribbles and texts are mostly if not all about World of Warcraft. I decided to keep doing it that way, because I just really enjoy doing it about World of Warcraft, it's a world I like being in ,immersed in, coming up with classes, mechanics, levels more lore. All that because I feel the recent content that has been released in WoW is lackluster to say the least, recent as in since WoD. It was mentioned before in the comments, I keep to WoW because it feels comfortable. That does not mean I do not have my own world and magic system which I am proud of and the world itself. Unfortunately the time I have invested in my own WoW content massively dwarfs everything I did for my own world. That's where I currently am Dave.
For me; I've tried making my own fantasy universe multiple times.
I don't know if it's a me issue but it seems like every idea I have has already been done before. Like how about an alien race that invade through a portal? Warcraft's done it, how about some elves who are secretly cannibals? Elder Scrolls... etc. Every idea I have is not original enough.
That's one of the things I try to help people work through. It doesn't matter if it's "been done before." Who cares? It's YOUR take on that particular instance. The details and execution are always what matters. The ideas are nigh-worthless on their own. All works of fiction builds on the backs of what came before and THAT is why modern fiction is better than what came before.
So don't let that stop you. Your unique interpretation of that particular idea, the themes and plots and characters you explore within that core concept. THAT is what matters. That's what is different. It's YOUR take on it.
So keep writing!
@@DesignerDave Thank you for the insight! I'll check out your previous videos and work to improve my writing. It's easy to feel defeated when so much has already been done before and I suppose I just need to figure out what'll get people to read my story about these remixed ideas.
@@grog159 It's your personal take on it that people will be interested in. Look at George RR Martin, basically writing fantasy fanfic of The War of the Roses... But everyone loves it.
There is a high pitched ring from your mic, you need to get that fixed my brother LOL
@@hupsaiya Yeah... :(
@@DesignerDave it's usually really easy to fix, get a pop filter and apply a stronger Noise Suppression to the Filter on your recording device ez
TLDR - Warcraft did so many things right in the first place, it's hard to come up with something better (including the powerful editor).
Uhh... Yeah no... Warcraft did so many things WRONG that it's hard not to come up with something better if you actually spend time to think things out.
@@DesignerDave
You 'should' be right (maybe you are and i'm biased).
Now after 2 decades, we ought to come up with something better in all aspects (maybe Stormgate does it, SC2 lacked the easy to use editor, albeit it being more powerful).
Then again, people are still creating new custom games (e.g. been playing a lot of tower survivors lately).
I guess it's a matter of taste in the end.
When i started playing 20 years ago, i'd have liked a somewhat more serious artstyle (akin to Wc2). But other than that, it's still my favorite RTS to this day and mainly so because of the editor and the custom projects.
@@Visuvh And the art is timeless really. I've been playing Turtle WoW which uses the vanilla art and it really holds up. From an RTS perspective, Warcraft III is difficult to top in that arena as well.
Warcraft's weakness has always been the lore. It has weak backlore and retcons galore which undermine the characters and stories established in War III. War III was really the pinnacle of the storytelling done in the Warcraft universe, but there are mis-steps even there if you look closer. Primarily because the backlore was too malleable... and now WoW's attempts to solidify it have caused catastrophic damage to the overall lore of the world, and especially the story and characters in Warcraft III.
Anyone can do it better, and I've outlined how to approach world building in this video I did about SolCraft (a Warcraft-like game), which I recommend for anyone who intends to make the attempt:
ruclips.net/user/liveMCcXk-PUa_s?si=o_8Saj8TkFgKaCzJ&t=586
Realistically, how much would it cost to build a platform similar with warcraft engine. Not to copy the IP, just create a platform with similar or improved features where players create the content. Hear me out, for instance imagine you worked on some cool assets, some cool stories or maps, what if you the be able to sell them to other content creators, imagine being able to build a campaign with an alternative story, I would pay 10 £ for a campaign, and this can be recuring, the platform can take a small percentage of the transactions to keep the platform and content creators happy. I've tried to check how much it would cost to create something like that, i use warcraft engine for stories and world development just because is very familiar and easy to use. But if I had an alternative I think things would change insanely, many people laughed at this idea stating things like,, it took blizard x years and a full team to create warcraft" , but that was over 20 years ago.. surely things may change, this is something I have on my mind since reforge released, but I think this may be a good idea. I tjink prople use warcraft 3 just because they have nothing else remotely close to what u can do to it. Plus most of new engines require so many resources and they are expensive
If you want to do what Warcraft 3 did from scratch, it's a minimum of 2-3 years. Any complex game, no matter how well planned, has a minimum development time of 9 months (assuming no problems).
In terms of selling assets and things like that. That already exists in the Unity store and Unreal store, and I've purchased entire packages of stylized asset groups for the purposes of prototyping something quickly. But there are also TONS of free assets you can use.
Beyond that I'm not sure what you're asking.
@@DesignerDave My curiosity is purely in term of financial investments how much capital I might need. I know you can get free assests on unity, I've bought a few and got anything that I found useful and where free. I was curious why warcraft fans not get something in return for their work and assets. My point was that we can addopt what others did good and use our imagination to apply it to the warcraft IP. My vision for the warcraft game as a kid was that it would be turned into expansions using war 3 to present the story outside of the player influence. I would have gladly paid 10 20 buck's to play a campaign explining the war of the spiders or the scarlet crusade story. I like rts games but they don't even come closer to warcraft, a good example was starcraft but the futuristic alien stuff is not very appealing to me . I think my main questions would be , in simple words, if I want my own IP similar with warcraft but with my own story my own source code etc how much would that cost in terms of money, time investments ,skills and people that may help me build this. My professional experience is in sales and entrepreneurship, and I am curently studying computing science so I can gain some understanding and also some skills that may help me get something like this done. Also would it be legal for me to do so considering that I am not planing in using their code or their resources in any way. All I want is the concepts , so I can use them for my own vision of something similar, not a copy just something similar fone with a different vision, since blozard is not interested and is something I would like to see it done , I decided to try doi.g something about it, now I understand I can't do it all by myself but I think asking you for some advice about this odea would be good given your expertise. I found your videos useful and they helped me not only with some of my skills but also giving me a different perspective of things. Do you think something like this is worth the work required to achieve? Worth in terms of something that people can find some sort of value in it?
@@ricardosimion2268 You're basically asking me if making games is worth the time/money invested into them. As someone who has loved games his whole life and wouldn't want to work in any other profession, of course my answer is... Yes, it's worth it.
In terms of what you're asking for, it's still unclear to me. Do you need help with developing an IP? Do you need help with understanding production planning so you can decide how much time vs money vs the scope of the project, and how many people you need and what expertise is involved? I can help with all that...
@@DesignerDave yes and yes. I want basically to building a new IP , and I need some direction , I did some research already and I am working on building up a world first then move into actually building the ip itself, I watched many of your videos since you opened this channel and I find it easy to learn from you. I used some of your advice to improve my writing by wel.. writing more. You asked why we are using warcraft 3 engine in creating stories and so on knowing we will never own the ip. The only answers at least for me is that I don't have an alternative, of course I can use unity or unreal engine to maybe build everything from scratch but I am not sure if it will be better to do it that way or simply trying to build a platform similar with what warcrafts offers and build my vision on it. I don't have the experience in gaming industry outside of maybe marketing or sales , and for this reason I am trying to understand more about what I am trying to create, before puting money and time into it , but not having experience building this sort of start made me a bit stuck. I think me writing these to you is a way of me reaching out for advice.. it would take a loot to explain here but in short, Yes I need some help and guidance with this idea I have. I think this is something that can have some potential if done the right way.. and at this point I know what I want and I have some understanding of what skills and knowledge I need but I have no idea how to move forward.. I don't have the time I use to have when I was younger but I still wana do some fun things even if they may seem hard or impossible, worst case scenario everything fails but I am left with the knowledge and experience, I learn by doing stuff and sometimes when I get stuck is hard to break through,
@@ricardosimion2268 The first time you build something do you expect it to be perfect? Are you setting an expectation that you will be able to create something yourself that equates to a team of 60, each with 5+ years of experience developing games? On your first attempt?
I think you need to align your expectations with your capabilities and start with something smaller then see where it takes you. Make a small game first. Something you believe you can complete in 9 months. Then we can see where things are at and you will understand a lot more about what it takes to make something like Warcraft 3.
I am using azeroth for my ttrpg campaign, but I have my own spin on it: im adding religions/gods and changing storylines to what im enjoying
I feel Kinda the opposite to you: we all own the warcraft universe. I don't have to care what blizzard cooks up: I can play my game and make my own stories in the warcraft sandbox and be happy 😊
@@konstanten3270 Just don't try to make money off it. ;)
@DesignerDave absolutely.
Was azeroth originally some homemade ttrpg/dnd setting or world (like chris metzen's home game) that was expanded upon by blizzard?
It has that feeling to me
Since 2003 as Former blizzard employer do you know why Blizzard not make WoW Gameplay Graphic same like AA Game? Only Cinematic look realistic but the gameplay Graphic still like Ps2 or ps3 game
Because it was the style and it has withstood the test of time.
In this world there was a war not so long ago between the prometheans and the elves on one side and the rest of humanity on the other. The prometheans believe to be the saviours of humanity from the lies and ignorance of the "inspired" order, so their symbol is fire. The elves fought humanity because of their disregard for nature. But the light elves defected to the human side and helped them to win, so they are respected in society, while the dark elves are distrusted and treated as second class citizens living in ghettos. The dark elves believe humanity doesn't care for nature and view the light elves as traitors. Elves don't need to eat, they gain sustain from the land, but light elves eat to better blend with human society. Dark elves view this need for consuming life as inferior and believe humans don't adapt to nature like they do, building underground and absorbing nutrients by touching the earth, instead they build and destroy. Fires of rebellion and secret sects breed in the underground of the human cities. The prometheans believe in a defender of humanity called "Prometheus". He stole fire from divinity and gave it to humanity. He gave technology and knowledge to humans . He is considered smart and taught humanity not to rely in divinity. In this world, the common folk are dressed only in gray, dark brown and black, which are "not outstanding" and cheap colors, grey is also the colours of the saturn soul, for them, it represents stoicism, and frugality needed to build and escalate. Prometheans dress in black in public and red in private, as they consider them colors of rebelliousness. Nobility dresses in code according to the souls (common people have no knowledge of the souls, not even all nobility is versed on this secret). There's the low nobility who dresses in red or dark red for mars, wine, purple or burgundy for jupiter, green for venus, any light color for mercury and the high nobility who dresses in pure white for the moon and mostly white with gold stripes for the sun. There's also economic reasons for the use of determined colors in this world. The inspired are an order, the prometheans claim to be just a consensus, while the prothean are a cult dedicated to Python, the primordial force of stasis, void, darkness, coldness and stillness. Python is not death, because death is violent, energic and transformative, more akin to mars. The Python is depression, lack of movement, emptiness, void, aging and everything slow or decelerating, devoid of life and color. Python is the opposite of the source, the origin of life and the main component of the sun. Not the physical sun, a bigger spiritual sun in the center of the universe and that is present in all life and energy. The protheans believe in everything contrary to life, they worship everything in regards to their material components, they are cold hearted, they don't hesitate to separate the material components of lifeforms in order to study matter and elements. They can be ruthless, but in their own eyes sensitivities mean nothing more than stuff developed by lifeforms. Their goal is to release matter from the whimsical wishes of life. In their eyes, in the beginning there was endless potential, the elements and energy did nothing, so they could be everything without differentiating nor being anything concretely. The matter was devoid of spirit. But the sun and their lifeforce irradiated on to matter, so spirit infiltrated matter and began to take all kinds of decision, evolving and eventually creating all forms of life, but with endless decision you lose endless possibility, and in their eyes life is selfish and whimsical. Could the python spread corruption and apathy among the leaders of society? could the Python manifest in the upper levels of society and politics to affect societal issues altogether? could The Python could manifest as a state of mind, such as depression, apathy, or despair? Could a new king be the only salvation to the python?
The prometheans believe in equality, so they don't believe in hierarchies, but they clearly admire some members over the others. These admired members gain much prestige and influence among the prometheans. The prometheans have many hypocrisies. Matter and energy is constantly being used to create lifeforms, thus depleting the universe from it's components more and more. The protheans actually believe destruction and death feeds life like combustible to a fire because of the powerful and transformative energies that releases, death is not a quiet process, it can be violent and adrenalinic, also dead carcases feed the very nutrients that nourish the life cycle. Only the stasis, the cease of motivation and endless lost of meaning and purpose (a state similar to depression, boredom or apathy) can extinguish the fire of life. The protheans are a weird cult, but they can spread their mental state like a consuming terminal disease, affected people begin to act erratically and numb to pain often times disturbing, like a mental disease or depressive state. The protheans can use death as means to an end, but only in a dispassionate way, like it was a bureaucratic procedure. The protheans are not living beings, they use living beings, but they actually both crystals and an ideology. Crystals are the genes, ideology is the meme.