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Join Date 05/2003

Idea for an Asian Fantasy mod

Far Eastern Mythology Mod

I hope its ok I'm putting this topic here, should be appropriate enough I have a good idea for an Elemental mod I want to shoot out and see if I get anyone interested. I love to world build, creative write and mod (to the best of my limited ability). Creating custom races in GalCiv II, writing their backgrounds and watching them play in-game was a lot of fun. I see the potential to do even more in Elemental.

So here's my idea, I love Asian mythology and history, particularly Chinese and Japanese. Given Elemental's rich fantasy setting, magic and modding capability, this could be a perfect basis on which to create an Asian version of the game. Most turn based strategies tend to feature a medieval European look, which is nice, but a Far Eastern theme could be a fresh way to stand out from other mods, that will undoubtedly be based largely on Tolkienesque fantasy settings. I think there's tons of fun stuff to explore here, for those that share my passion.

There could be an almost endless amount of history and stories to draw from. Here's a list of possible source material:

The Tales of the Otori novel series (read and owned)
The Chinese Classical novels (Journey to the West, Outlaws of the Marsh, Romance of the Three Kingdoms - read and loved them, I have the novels to refer to if need be.)
Wuxia films (i.e. Hidden Tiger, Crouching Dragon)
Anime films and shows (Ninja Scroll, Kenshin, Naruto, to name a few.)
Video games (Onimusha, Mystical Ninja Goemon, Dynasty Warriors, Suikoden series, Kessen series, Samurai Showdown)

In addition to general settings, there are endless possible sovereigns we could pull from this material. We could populate the world with people and legends like Miyamoto Musashi, Sun Wukong, Diaochan, Liu Bei, Sakura Haruno, InuYasha to name some. And the unit possibilities: ninja, samurai, oni, nagas, tengu etc.

I don't know how close we could get to recreating feudal Asian architecture, clothing, objects and such, that might be the one toughest thing to work out. I could handle a lot of the non-technical aspects. Creating the world, writing background info, writing up the factions, etc., but in addition to writers and people who can mod using the game itself, we may also need people who know about the grittier stuff like .xml if its necessary. I have no aptitude for programming unfortunately.

This could be a lot to take on alone, but if you like this idea, and you're serious, we can start organizing something. Got a lot of time to spare, just need the interest level to start something up. I could even create a site to keep track of the mod progress and who's involved relatively easily.

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yes, do want
I can write backstories and such, make factions, sovereigns, make tiles, but I know little of asian history / mythology so you'd have to tell me what to make and show me reference, and I'd make it
PM me if u want me on your team

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Yes, I'd love to have you on board The more the merrier. We can PM back and forth for details, but don't be afraid to keep the thread active so hopefully more people notice us. In so doing, we shall give rise to the most epic, and possibly only, Asian fantasy mod so we can monopolize the theme

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That would be awesome. You're pretty hardcore to have read all those books. I've only read Volume I of Journey to the West and a bootleg Louis Cha novel. I'm much more versed in the wuxia movies.

I suggest focusing on one or the other Asian mythology. There's some crossover, but Chinese and Japanese mythology are pretty distinct. Since so much Japanese media (Dragonball, Monkey Magic, Saiyuuki) has borrowed from Journey to the West, and since you didn't mention Louis Cha, you might get more authenticity by focusing on Japanese/anime mythology.

I'm curious if the wuxia films you've seen are all Chinese, or if you include Japanese martial arts fantasy. If you've seen tons and tons of pre-2000s Chinese wuxia films (recent movies like Storm Riders seem to borrow as much, if not moreso, from Japanese anime as from Chinese wuxia literature), you might want to focus on Chinese mythology and reference the Japanese only as examples of other derivative works (or maybe for a few stylistic elements you like).

I'd like to see a focus on Chinese mythology, including modern contributions like hopping vampires, for their focus on hungry ghosts and Buddhist hells. Japanese mythology (the old stuff about Amateresu and such) seems distant to me, like the gods are fictional characters from another world, though stories like Yuki-onna--and the yokai--are rich with folklore and symbolic meaning. I favor the Chinese, but Japanese folklore would be cool; but I could never see a hopping vampire fighting a kappa.

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hehe, I've read a lot more fiction than watched wuxia films, but the ones I did see were Chinese. I kind of arrived at the same conclusion to base the mod on one theme and I'm pretty settled on Journey to the West. If you have the other three volumes, they're definitely worth the read. I'm going to skim through the books later to grab some character names, places and the like to start putting the world together. There's a small part in Journey that alludes to a place that readers think was Japan. So maybe I could throw a dash of Japanese mythology into the world for a little extra flavor. I don't think the mod would be complete without ninja units

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I'm used to both cultures and I feel that the 2 mythology can be meshed together quite nicely and easily. A vampire fighting a kappa doesn't sound that bad; it really is no different from the vampire fighting something from it's own side. Now, mixing chinese mythology and wuxia, THAT feels weird. Imagine the great monkey god fighting a mortal with the 18 dragon subduing palms.

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Here's an update for those interested in the mod: combed through the Journey to the West volumes, picked up a lot of good material. I started to jot down some notes and it looks like the world is taking form. As always, I welcome ideas and volunteers once I start to actually putting together the mod.

I'll link various terms to their respective wiki entries if you want to know more. Much of it may not be familiar to those who haven't read into Chinese/Japanese mythology.

The basic story: The Jade Emperor, while presiding over Heaven, noticed that many of the gods were growing bored and discontent. It was then that he decided to carry out a contest. From his private collection he would take sacred texts imbued with incredible power, and cast them down to Earth (called Penglai), and challenge the mortal kingdoms to compete with the gods for the right to receive the powers held within the divine scriptures.

The most mischievous or idle gods would be cast down to Penglai to participate in the game, and have their omniscience and powers greatly reduced in order to make them more equal with the mortals. (Don't know if its moddable, but the scriptures would replace the game's shards.) Some of the gods would be made rulers over their own kingdoms (sovereigns), others would be made to roam the Earth, needing to seek out masters to serve or survive the world on their own strength (hero units).

I have the main factions written out, with their respective sovereigns. Almost all of them were taken from Journey to the West or traditional Chinese mythology. Its true that a lot of Chinese and Japanese mythology is interchangeable, so as not to completely ignore Japan, there are two factions based on it. One of the Japanese inspired factions will be primarily based in the supernatural, the other will be more historical.

As far as the game world's geography: It will somewhat mirror the real world. The Japanese factions will be isolated, and concentrated in a series of islands of varying size. The Chinese based factions will be on one large continent, separated by the island chains by a large body of water.

Contributing to the Project: At this early stage, I need plenty of workable concepts for heroes and units. And if anyone wants to help flesh out the history of Penglai, how it might have come to be, how the various factions evolved, etc., they are welcome to. Just PM me, and I'll share with you some of the other details not included in the post.

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Hey, this came to mind when I was driving earlier. About how it might not be so bad to have a kappa fight a hopping vampire. What if the plot involved a war between the Chinese and Japanese monsters? The Sino-Japanese Yokai War!

A lot of monster movies involve clashes of folklore like that. One of the Mr. Vampire movies, I think, had a western-style vampire as the monster. Yokai Monsters: Spook Warfare had, it seemed to me at least, a very non-Japanese demon versus kappa and other traditional yokai. Then there's Godzilla vs. King Kong and Frankenstein Conquers the World. There's definitely room for crossover, especially when you look at it from a pop-cultural perspective, which videogames naturally entail.

You could even highlight the cultural differences by using a different writing style for each of the factions. The historical Japanese faction's story would read like Japanese history, the Japanese yokai faction like cracked-out yokai fiction, and so on. You'd have one over-arching "God's eye view" that comprises the "true story," but each faction would have its own perspective. Maybe at first reflect that only in unit descriptions, but then mod in faction-specific map notifications and quests, and then different campaigns for each faction.

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Not a bad idea I think I'd have to find out how easy it would be to mod stuff like that in the game, but it's a thought. I'd love to have a Gamera in my army

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update: Started working on the world map this afternoon, its going alright so far, haven't spent too much time on it as of yet though. I'll try to keep track of my progress regularly. If anyone has any programming or 3d modeling experience, and might like to volunteer, please let me know.

post edit: New website up for the mod, please bookmark if you'd like to follow the mod's progress, and especially if you'd be interested in volunteering.

http://penglai.weebly.com/

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This sounds like an awesome concept for a mod.

Ideas: Can't remember the old super nintendo title where it was an RPG and you were like the last ninja of this one clan. It has Oda Nobunaga making a deal with the devil to take over Japan. He ordered your village to be burned down and sent in a hit squad after. Anyways I'd vote for an evil Samurai Faction led by Oda and using Ronin and Ninjas too.

R3K: I loved how the advisors had special magic powers and things in those games. I'd vote for bringing some of them in as recruitable heroes.

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I think it was Inindo: Way of the Ninja.

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