zedzeek: love your taste in music.. but what''s wrong with poetry?

i find music helps alot.. to add to what zedzeek listed (w/emphasis on sonic youth): ride, slowdive, the cure, the charlatans uk, bowie, primal scream (best live show i''ve ever seen), suede, pulp, pink floyd, the beatles, beethoven, brahms, etc...

for literature: william gibson, william s. burroughs, anthony burgess, james joyce, etc..
and sometimes random nonfiction, usually histories..

quote: Original post by runemaster
Stephen Donaldson''s "The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever " was the book that inspired me most.

That series is the bomb. Have you read "The Second Chronicles of Thomas Covenant"? They absorbed me for six whole days. God damn Donaldson''s a good author.

Music oftern serves as inspiration for me, but more so reading stories which challenge the norm, or tell something about humanity. Examples: anything by Asimov, Snow Crash, a lot of Shakespeare, 1984, Animal Farm, Flowers for Algernon, Rendezvous with Rama, well, the list goes on.

I think reading a lot and listening to music a lot is the best way to open one''s mind to new ideas and emotions.

I love reading Sci-fi and fantasy, as well as listening to a wide variety of music, dabbling in a bit of graphic design, I also play guitar for inspiration and don''t mind having a lan party every now and again where there can be many games tried by all. . Reading would have to be my major inspiration followed by Playing games, then guitar and then everything else follows. It also helps if you TALK to people (which I know a lot of programmers here that barely leave the screen ).


-Chris Bennett ("Insanity" of Dwarfsoft)

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Anonymous Poster --> yes, I read the Second Chronicles.AMAZING !!! But unfortunately there wasn''t much left of the Land.But the Elohim and Bhrathairain - now that REALLY inspired me.I also loved Donaldson''s Giants.My Giants are like that too - I can''t imagine Giants being different.
Also, have you read the Gap Series ? It was the best I''ve ever seen - my favorite !
Asimov rocks ! I read everything I could, everything from "I, Robot" to "Foundation and Earth" and I loved it all.

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Hmph. I was that AP. I guess I forgot to type me name in. Poo.

It''s been so long since I''ve read any of that, it''s all coming back to me now. Haven''t read the Gap series though... I''ll have to search for it.

Another series of books that I actually used as inspiration for some stuff is The Sword of Truth series. Come to think of it... they might be by Donaldson too... I can''t rememeber. Some of the series is a little hokey, but over is very cool.

Other really great sources of ideas (not inspiration though, I find) is history here on Earth. All the stories you could ever imagine have already been played out in some way or another on eatrh. You get an idea, find out if it''s already happened somewhere. It may give you ideas about how to proceed.

quote: Original post by dwarfsoft

It also helps if you TALK to people (which I know a lot of programmers here that barely leave the screen ).


-Chris Bennett ("Insanity" of Dwarfsoft)

Check our site:
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made due to popular demand here at GDNet

I think a lot of programmers here think this board is all the social interaction we need

As for music, I think that a lot of Zeppelin's stuff is good inspiration...the Doors too





"The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom." --William Blake

"The road of excess also just ends up making me tired because I'm too lazy" --Nazrix

Edited by - Nazrix on July 29, 2000 1:33:55 PM

Well it is a pleasure to find some people who love Donaldson, for his books are very good. I read sci-fi and heroic fantasy since im six. I play paper role playing games ( which are good for social interaction ). I like poetry and art.

Do some of you know Jack Vance ? His books are full of interesting characters, and the way he presents magic...

David Eddings is more for fun, i found his books funny, but not really that imaginative. The plot is always the same. Still his characters are rather good.

Terry Pratchett, well if you dont know his books then run and buy them all.

Others may be Escher, Giger, Brin, Williamson, Howard, Zelazny, Poussin, Delacroix, Poe, Pink Floyd, Mozart, Grieg, Sibelius, Melies and so on

Between the time when the oceans drank Atlantis and the rise of the sons of Arius there was an age undreamed of...

More stuff.
A great source of inspiration is mythology.Greek, Celtic, Native American...they've all got some cool stories.
Druidism, Wicca, Voodoo...very interesting if you're thinking about magic.
Another thing I sometimes do is just open MS WorldAtlas, pick a random country and read about it's history.Then I take a good look at the map, looking for interesting areas."Hey, that area in «enter country here» looks exactly like what I imagined the Lands of the Rhudari People would be like !".

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Edited by - runemaster on July 29, 2000 3:15:33 PM

I''d have to say a little of everything.

Books: everything you can possibly imagine by Voltaire. Also look up what the people who created the Matrix read.

Movies: The Matrix, Fight Club, Star Wars, Terminator 2.

Music: Metallica, Iron Maiden, classical stuff, mainly Beethoven.

Articles: once in a while I read something interesting online.

Self: dreams are usually good inspiration.

Misc: talking to others, vodka.

If I''ll think of something else, I''ll post

I''d have to say that studying the different forms of magic and what they are believed to be and how to use them is REALLY important into understanding how to implement magic in your game. I spent maby hours trawling the net for such gems and I have a lot of Wicca and Norse references. .

Oh yeah, table top gaming is good as is Multi-player RPG''s (or even FPS) and I think people would argue that both are good for social interaction


-Chris Bennett ("Insanity" of Dwarfsoft)

Check our site:
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