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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/46199
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/46199
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

## Creating a world is a lot of work.

It doesn't matter if your world is a single town over the course of a year or an intercontinental saga over several generations. Either way, you need to map out the geography, features, characters and their genealogies, and history.

How detailed you get depends both on your approach to writing and the requirements of the story. I'm one who researches and plots out these things in detail, even when I don't have to. Because I do better having a foundation in place which I can draw on. You might do better with a minimum of this type of research.

Worldbuilding for a fully fictional world vs a partially fictional one vs a real one is still worldbuilding. It still requires research and thinking and writing stuff down. There are pros and cons to each of these and one is not easier than the other. They're just different.

If it feels right for you to set your story on Earth, but one that is completely different from our actual Earth in terms of how countries and technology developed, go for it. Only you can know which approach is the right one for you.

It will be odd though if you keep everything the same except for the names of countries and prominent people and some details about political and other history. Do this only if it makes the most sense for the story. Don't do this if you are trying to save yourself research time. Sometimes it's easier to draw on established histories (which you can find online in simplified form) than to create your own from scratch. You're not going to save yourself any work by choosing not to look up things like who invented such in such in what year and place.

But, if your goal is to build a world from scratch because it's "more fun" then give it a go. You might find the world exhilarating or you might abandon it after a while. But it's worth trying. There's nothing wrong with trying different approaches as a writer to see what works best for you. Ultimately though, choose the approach that works best for the book. That's the determining factor.

Original score: 8