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[malicethedevil]

As a writer I have pondered the idea of one of the issues I have seen people have with most fantasy fiction writers. The strange names. Understandable that it's a different culture, race, etc. but sometimes it only takes away from a story (I feel). It seems as I keep hitting the "name barrier" and in so I am pulled from the story a little so question posed: Do you think that the naming conventions of fantasy fiction take away from the story?

[Evan Balster]

Honestly I think names are a very useful part of the worldbuilder's toolset.  Creators of deep, interesting worlds in fiction spend time developing culture, politics, geography, ecology... language and naming is sort of a centerpoint for the humanities and I think it's inevitable that it'll be traversed quite a lot when working hard at the others.

As a player of games, reader of books and comics et cetera, I think interesting names add to a story in a subtle way.  Familiar naming conventions ("Jeff", "Stockton") can create associations with things in reality, which is often undesirable.  Strange names following a consistent pattern create an association amongst themselves which can lend character to a place or culture and make its elements recognizable.  For instance, having played a bit of Elder Scrolls I'd know "Shub Gra-Bolog" as the name of a female Orc in that universe.

Which is to say, don't expect you can weasel your way out of it without a cost. 

[malicethedevil]

Good points

[gimymblert]

You can still have similar name but with a twist. Jeff? jev! stockton? stokoto! familiar but twist to sound foreign and linked to whatever made up culture you have made. Think of stuff like fake Latin (put us at the end of all word) or fake japan (replace syllabus with Nippon sounding syllabus). Or made up word build with syllabus of familiar (native to the reader) language but mixed in new way.

[Evan Balster]

A consistent sound is definitely a good thing.  As an example, I'm making a little fictional language where each word is composed of a consonant sound followed by some number of "vowel" sounds, with the latter including R, L, and N.  The set of phonemes is similar to english, with the addition of "kh" and "gh" sounds and with a few vowel sounds (at, get, it) and the M/N distinction removed. This gives us names like Suri, Veri, Lu-Ka, Tuli-Sah, and So-Khal, and sentences like "Goli til, sali pol".  Once enough of these have been thrown around it becomes fairly easy to recognize the look and sound, creating a consistent feel.  (At least that's the intention)  Going further I put together some glyphs, where the continuous vowel sound is represented by a line, as seen to the right. I don't really expect people to know what the hell they're looking at with these, but I feel like it adds some believability/depth to a fictional universe when there's writing all over everything and you know you could read it if you tried.  Of course, I follow the Evan Dahm school of worldbuilding and rule 1 there is to be a HUGE NERD.

[sebaslive]

This may appear to be obvious but is still a problem I find. The only problem I have with it is when there is too much information at once. These are strange new languages, people and locations we are seeing for the first time and it can become a daunting task to follow along when you still don't know where you are standing. I was just watching the new Lord of the Rings and they were talking about places I am sure I was supposed to remember but I didn't. Now this should be different when you experience it yourself in games but there is a point where you trust your audience but must also keep within proper expectations as to how much information we should remember at once.

Aside from info dump I really agree that it adds tremendous value and authenticity to the world.

[Evan Balster]

That's an important point, really.  Throwing those words around has the effect of making the player feel like they're inside something bigger than they understand.  This is a discomforting thing, but it's also really cool because it makes the world feel big.  The important thing is to make sure this disorientation doesn't get in the way of their understanding of the story or participation of it, unless such is intended.

Hah, consider the fact that in several of the Elder Scrolls games you start out as a foreigner being brought into another region of Tamriel -- your character doesn't know the funny names of the cities, or the local customs, and neither do you.  It's a little scary, but eventually you get the hang of it all and that mastery helps you feel like part of the world, just as your character gets to feeling like a native.  The games are also straightforward enough that an impatient, goal-oriented player can ignore it all and get along fine.

(I'm usually critical of Elder Scrolls but lore is something they do very very well)

[malicethedevil]

I also like Elder Scrolls for that use of being a new character to a strange and new land, they did well with a lot of the game world and being immersed in it. 

[gimymblert]

At the end it depend on the geekiness level of the audience. Geek like strange thing that is alien and that need to be discovered (level = 1.0), non geek prefer familiar things (level = 0.0). Now mix and match depending on the normalize geekiness factor.

[malicethedevil]

Even still the naming conventions can both help and hurt, but do you think that Fantasy Fiction is getting a bad rap because of naming conventions? I mean not that being a "nerd" or "geek" is bad - hell I have fun when someone calls me that, but still - I am just saying that there are people who don't continue to read one because of the naming conventions - or in this case play games that have those type of naming conventions.

[Evan Balster]

I feel like it's probably pretty rare that the names themselves discourage a player.  The sense of disorientation when presented with too much information at once, perhaps, but names?  I can't imagine why someone would quit playing a game because of a town named Chorrol.

[malicethedevil]

I don't mean Elder Scrolls but the more in depth RPGs that aren't as well known - having difficulty thinking of one from the top of my head - I didn't like em -

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

wasn't there *just a topic* for this?

http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=31125.0

[Eigen]

This gives us names like Suri, Veri, Lu-Ka, Tuli-Sah, and So-Khal, and sentences like "Goli til, sali pol".

This sounds like estonian

Suri is died, veri is blood, tuli is fire. Sali doesn't mean anything but sounds right so it could easily be a new word. We have names like Mari, Liis, Jaan, Mart, Rein, Alma, Ülo, Juhan, Krõõt, Kati, some of which are older, but still common around here. To a non-speaker they probably sound very unfamiliar and strange.

So picking a language less than a million people speak in the world and using that as a reference might also be a way to go.

[Evan Balster]

Eigen:  Neat!  I'll investigate.  I've become a little attached to those names, so I suppose I might weird out some Estonians, haha.

Did you know there are some other Estonian folks in indie games?  Andres Reinot, who's a good friend of mine, was born there and is a native speaker.

[Eigen]

Well, there are the Teleglitch guys most recently, Clysm and his Seiklus has a strong connection to Estonia as well. There's also kinnas with his art. There are probably more but I can't remember right now. Also there are guys who've been a part of a larger game development project, like Indrek Plavutski (InCreator) as an artist in Blackwell Deception.

Most notably the guys behind Drag Racing, though Russians by nationality, live and work in Estonia (and cheer for the national football team).



While we're on the subject, there are so many endangered languages in the world, they might as well be made up, sadly :/ Just make your pick or see here for a list with estimated numbers of speakers. There are some with just 1(!) speaker left. Kind of bums me out.

[Evan Balster]

I knew about Cly5m.  (What's he doing these days?)  Seiklus got me into exploration gaming.  But I don't think he's Estonian.

Anyway, yeah, using actual world cultures and languages as reference is indispensable for worldbuilding.  Learning more about these things gives you a better understanding of exactly how broad some things are -- as an example, check out this Wikipedia article on various consonant sounds used around the world.

[Eigen]

Phonetics is really complicated. I'm not going to pretend I fully understand it. As the article states:

Estonian and some Sami languages have three phonemic lengths: short, geminate, and long geminate, although the distinction between the geminate and overlong geminate includes suprasegmental features.

It's pretty complicated and differentiating between geminate and overlong geminate is sometimes difficult for even a native speaker. It really only comes up as an issue when writing.


Anyway, I think whatever kind of fantasy language you come up with, it should have certain rules, not just taking words and making them weird. Having even a simple ruleset behind everthing helps make it feel more believable I think. Also try pronouncing the names you come up with. Sometimes reading a word and actually saying it out loud make a whole lot of difference and something that looks good on paper just doesn't sound right.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

I knew about Cly5m.  (What's he doing these days?)  Seiklus got me into exploration gaming.  But I don't think he's Estonian.

Anyway, yeah, using actual world cultures and languages as reference is indispensable for worldbuilding.  Learning more about these things gives you a better understanding of exactly how broad some things are -- as an example, check out this Wikipedia article on various consonant sounds used around the world.

from what i know, clysm is mormon and lives in louisiana. he went on a mission to estonia (most mormons go on missions, males anyway? i'm not that familiar with that religion). so he can speak estonian, but isn't estonian

as for what he's up to: he's working on games, just very slowly. he has full time job now so he doesn't have as much time to make games but has not given them up

[malicethedevil]

from what i know, clysm is mormon and lives in louisiana. he went on a mission to estonia (most mormons go on missions, males anyway? i'm not that familiar with that religion)

   Being familiar with the "Mormon" religion, yes most Mormon males do go on missions, (not all) and females can go too, but many don't. Though Estonia seems to have an interesting language I just don't know if I would want to use it in a game or writing.