I was catching up on my reading this evening when I came across an interesting post. Casiella Truza over at Ecliptic Rift posed the question, How does one go about writing in someone else’s world?
It’s a good question. CCP has created a in depth universe, one filled with history and culture. With so much already laid out before you, how would you write fiction for that world?
For me, it takes the same kind of work if you are going to attempt to write in a particular genre. You need to first, read. If you are going to write stories in the Superhero genre, you first should read what others have written. It helps you to build a background of what people are reading and writing. It also helps you to avoid the pitfall of writing the same story that has been written time and time again. In order to write well, you need to be able to read well first.
The same thing goes for EVE Online or any other fan fiction that you want to write. You need to do some research first. There are the Chronicles, the many pieces of fiction in the EVE Fiction section on the forums as well as a great section for EVE Fiction on the EVElopedia. Some corporations and/or alliances have their own player fiction sections on their respective forums. These resources are invaluable for the potential EVE Fiction writer.
So, what do you do if you start writing before you do the research? What happens if you seems to “violate” the prime fiction? What if the prime fiction changes?
Well, you stop and take a look at what happened. Can you keep going with your story? Can you slightly change the focus on an item to work past it? What about a re-write?
Editing work that you have already created is not a sin, it’s the sign of a good writer. A good writer looks at the mistakes they make and learns from the experience. So what if you have to rewrite something to make it fit. Improving a story that you have already written is a service to your readers.
If you don’t think that is the case, then I would direct your attention to the various movies that have been “re-mastered” or had a later release of a “Director’s Cut” edition. Some of these “re-released” films add elements to the stories that fill in the gaps from a previously released version.
If you are writing single short stories that are not going to continue with additional episodes, you would be okay. It’s a small bump in the road. If you are like me, where you have a loosely continuing storyline with a set of regular characters, it can make things a bit dicey.
Take The Bleeding Rose stories that I have been writing. Originally they were fiction inspired on PvP engagements I had when I was a pirate. Over time, I found that the stories were becoming repetitive and honestly, they were becoming boring. It was time to take a step away from dramatized combat reports and to create something new. I changed the focus of my stories from combat experiences to interactions with people.
I took some prime fiction and used it as a base. I picked things like the planet Oris in the Amarr system to be the place of birth for Ga’len. I didn’t make him a direct heir to the emperor or anything, I made him a son of a land owner. I picked things that you know are very unlikely to change. Shuttles, stations, travle through stargates, etc…
Doing things like that will help you. You have to learn to create those “specifically vague” details so that your story can flow when things do change. Once you have that ground work completed, start writing.
If you want to include things like real in game characters in your stories, ask those people before you use them in your story. This can help to ensure that what you write is true to form. Inviting real in game characters into your story can also lead to those people providing useful feedback on your writing project, thus helping the creative process along.
One thing that will help you with your stories as far as EVE Online is that our game is not restricted to what CCP provides for us. Most of the in game history is created by the day to day events in game. Such an open ended experience allows you a lot of room for your stories. You can always write about some people taking a transport ship on one of those NPC hauler convoys that travel between stations in empire. You can write a story about some maintenance technician who works on a stargate and how he hates those bubbles from Heavy Interdictors camping the gate in nullsec as they obscure the view of a nearby moon. The possibilities may not seem endless with a world that has already been created but the “reality” is that most of the stories in EVE Online have yet to be written.
Be creative, test the waters and create!
