This is the WORLD where I write my musing about manga/anime/video games and make comments on certain aspects. It's just a little something to stir up a conversation so please don't take me TOO seriously on the things I write here. I'd love to hear your opinion so feel free to comment.
- Created By red:leaf
Genre Time Freeze
Has anyone played Legend of Dragoon? It's a pretty decent game and highly underrated. The voice acting is real terrible though. Like in this scene. I die every time. WARNING: Minor spoiler.
My friend has this theory about LoD, that time has stopped some thousands of years prior to the events you actually play in. The plot of Legend of Dragoon is super involved with THE PAST. And when I say THE PAST, I mean like 5,000 years ago or some ridiculous number like that. (I'm obviously not fact checking these things....) So my friend's theory is that time stopped in THE PAST because how the heck can 5,000 years past and civilization hasn't advanced past medieval structure?
He has a good point.
I mean, think of how far we've advanced in the last 30 years alone.
And then I was having a Lord of the Rings marathon (to celebrate the release of the Desolation of Smaug) and they mention how there hasn't been a King of Gondor for 1,000 years. They're still fighting with swords and spears too. Maybe Middle Earth is also in a time freeze...?
And thinking over it, this seems to be problem is fantasy genres that are set in the past--time stagnation. All forward societal and technological evolution comes to a stand still. J.R.R. Tolkein semi-addressed this in terms of language. The language evolved over time and space but apparently nothing else did.
I noticed this in steampunk genre too. Coal was a relatively short energy time period and was quickly passed over for petrol.
Sci-fi genre seems to be quite the opposite of this stagnation. It leaps and bounds forward in societal and technological evolution (although where it lands in debatable). What it does well is reference its past. Mostly I figure this has to do with making a reference point for readers. Couldn't fantasy do much a similar thing?
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