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alcibiades
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
of Gold Dragons
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posted March 01, 2015 01:48 PM |
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Zombie_Wizard: Great post, even though I don't really agree with your distinction between the genres (like I said earlier: I don't think there's any exact science when it comes to literary genres). The way I see it - and indeed most of the people I've known in real life - what you call "high fantasy" is what I would call "fantasy". Stuff like Star Wars I'd definitely consider a mixture of bigger parts science fiction and smaller parts fantasy. My point he is not to start an "I'm right, you're wrong" discussion but just to point out that it's quite understandable that many of us here talk besides each other when we have different understandings of the fundamental concepts.
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What will happen now?
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Zombi_Wizzard
Famous Hero
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posted March 01, 2015 02:08 PM |
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@alcibides: Sure. Like I said, a lot of that comes down to personal judgement. These genres and sub-genres like high fantasy etc, are not my idea tho. You can google, and you'll see similar definitions ... or wikipedia. Type high fantasy or sword & sorcery and you'll see what you get.
Imo magic is where I draw the line between science fiction and fantasy fiction. Force is renamed magic in my book. Fantasy imo is not shackled to medieval setting. It can certainly be set in future or in space.
Let me ask you this tho, since I'm curious: What would in your opinion be He-Man and Masters of the Universe? Sci-fi or Fantasy? In case you don't know what this is, Here, see an episode
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted March 01, 2015 02:22 PM |
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Dude, He-Man was a prince who held up a sword to the sky, said something like "by the power of Grayskull" and suddenly he transformed into a super hero with different clothes and everything. It's as fantasy as it gets. They used to broadcast it here when I was a kid.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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alcibiades
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
of Gold Dragons
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posted March 01, 2015 02:24 PM |
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I know a bit of He-Man, and though I don't exactly remember how much magic is in it, I guess I'd also say it was some sort of mix of sci-fi and fantasy. But I guess you could call that a genre of its own considering how widespread it was at that time, but then I wouldn't use "fantasy" for it.
Edit > Reading above though, maybe I don't know too much He-Man. I think I saw the movie once, and remember it quite sci-fi.
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What will happen now?
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted March 01, 2015 02:32 PM |
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But fantasy CAN include technology. In sci-fi, there is a whole other level when it comes to the consistency and rationality of the cosmology. So, when you throw in a few gadgets, fantasy does not turn into sci-fi or some 50/50 hybrid. The best you can say is, the decor and costume involves some sci-fi FLAVOR. The structure though, is still fundamentally fantasy and that's not a very subjective thing.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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Minion
Legendary Hero
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posted March 01, 2015 02:42 PM |
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It is a fantasy alright
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Zombi_Wizzard
Famous Hero
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posted March 01, 2015 02:50 PM |
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artu said:
Dude, He-Man was a prince who held up a sword to the sky, said something like "by the power of Grayskull" and suddenly he transformed into a super hero with different clothes and everything. It's as fantasy as it gets. They used to broadcast it here when I was a kid.
Indeed, that's why I asked this  So for me ofc. it's fantasy. It's just set in diferent planet and includes technology...
To me tho classic fantasy is about a group of heroes (Luke, Han Solo, Chewbacca), led by main protagonist (Luke) in a quest to save a princes (Princes Leila) and defeat evil wizard (senator Palpatine), who has his own champion of darkenss, ususaly in form of black knight (Darth Vader).
On their quest, they are helped by a good hermit / prophet /wizard (Yoda), as well as their skill with both the sword (lightsaber) and sorcery (the force). Usualy they must also destroy the wizard's / black knight's castle (Death Star). 
What artu and I are trying to say is Fantasy set in space =/= sci-fi.
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Dave_Jame
Promising
Legendary Hero
I'm Faceless, not Brainless.
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posted March 01, 2015 02:52 PM |
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Well if I may join this topic, even if rather late, I might bring some interesting points of view here.
If we talk about genres, we should know that there are 2 basic categories of them, Stylistic and Thematic. Fantasy and Sci-fi would both fit into the later one. Their most distinctive features are not related to how they are presented but by what.
This said the content, and the means of presentation are not the only ones that are crucial. It is true that the most basic characteristics could be boiled down to Future vs. Past, or Science vs. Magic. But I would dare purpose a different way how to set these two very close genres apart.
When we talk fantasy, and not only "generic" fantasy, we should think colours, images, visual and conceptional freedom. Reading a fantasy book often leads to vivid imagination, creating a depiction of what we read. How often have you struggled when a cinematic interpretation of a character did not match the image you yourself created?
If we now would talk about sci-fi, its challenge, and appeal, is not the images create in our minds, but in the complex mechanics of the particular work. Our understanding of what it is about or the topics it addresses. How relevant is the topic to our own, how realistic it is, and how rational the actions are.
This may be only my personal definition but the difference between Sci-fi and Fantasy is in what they challenge. Fantasy challenges the limits of our imagination while Sci-fi limits understanding.
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Storm-Giant
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
On the Other Side!
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posted March 01, 2015 03:06 PM |
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Kimarous said:
lordgraa said:
Sorry to interrupt your Star Wars discussion 
What do you think about the new music from Heroes VII Romero just presented (Concerto in Ahab Minor from Heroes: Might & Magic VII):
https://soundcloud.com/paul-anthony-romero/paul-anthony-romero-solo-piano-concert-live-in-munich-germany#t=1:27
Could it be the new Barbarian theme or just some medley? He started with Barbarian theme from H1 so maybe its a hint maybe not
OK... offtopic off and back to R2D2 =o)
If it is the Stronghold theme, here's hoping the in-game version isn't piano-based. I know they like to mix things up and not go for the obvious (see The Elven Coronation)
I don't see why the Barbarian theme would be just piano based - all the music tracks presented so far aren't like that. Romero played a piano version of it because, duh, it was a piano concert xD
Kimarous said:
but with that said, "piano" is perhaps the least "barbarian" instrument I can think of.
Burn the heretic! 
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Pawek_13
Supreme Hero
Maths, maths everywhere!
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posted March 01, 2015 03:15 PM |
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Edited by Pawek_13 at 15:15, 01 Mar 2015.
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Storm-Giant said:
Burn the heretic!
But this sounds like a harpsichord, not a piano...
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted March 01, 2015 03:21 PM |
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Dave_Jame said:
This may be only my personal definition but the difference between Sci-fi and Fantasy is in what they challenge. Fantasy challenges the limits of our imagination while Sci-fi limits understanding.
This is very personal indeed and it wouldnt work in many situations. In many cases, they are both alegorical and political the same way. Game of Thrones does not challenge my imagination (in the sense you mean), all the fantasy elements are quite traditional anyway; dragons, witches etc... Game of Thrones is about relationships of power and that is about the limits of our understanding, not imagination. A sci-fi structure can very well be about the same theme and the difference would be the cosmology of the universe, not if it challenges our understanding or imagination.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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Storm-Giant
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
On the Other Side!
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posted March 01, 2015 03:24 PM |
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Pawek_13 said:
Storm-Giant said:
Burn the heretic!
But this sounds like a harpsichord, not a piano...
Whatever
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Dave_Jame
Promising
Legendary Hero
I'm Faceless, not Brainless.
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posted March 01, 2015 03:50 PM |
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artu said:
This is very personal indeed and it wouldnt work in many situations. In many cases, they are both alegorical and political the same way. Game of Thrones does not challenge my imagination (in the sense you mean), all the fantasy elements are quite traditional anyway; dragons, witches etc... Game of Thrones is about relationships of power and that is about the limits of our understanding, not imagination. A sci-fi structure can very well be about the same theme and the difference would be the cosmology of the universe, not if it challenges our understanding or imagination.
It is kind of hard to express this opinion without going to deep unto literary theory.
The key idea here is to not get attached to particular examples. It is true that both of these genres, as well as many others, may address various themes, such as coming of age, social satire, relationships, political movements, and they very often done.
But one key difference is basically established the moment we associate a work with one of them. Fantasy, as it is its nature, generally acknowledges the existence and presence of supernatural event. This gives out mind a free pass on accepting the presented events as something un-real, and therefore allows it to focus on the depiction of these events, rather than their understanding. This does not mean that such a work cannot present an explanation of such supernatural or un-realistic events, and they often do, but these explanations themselves are already influenced by their association with presence of fantasy.
Sci-fi on the other never accepts the supernatural events and features as supernatural. There is no simple explanation presented to us and the mind is forced to try and understand the given explanation rather than to simply accept them.
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted March 01, 2015 04:05 PM |
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Edited by artu at 16:07, 01 Mar 2015.
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Well, not really. Let's say, I'll make a political satire and I decided to have a story involving time travel. I can pick a fantasy universe where jumping into a magic mirror transfers me into any historical moment or I can pick a sci-fi setting where I build my time travel machine which uses black holes to do the same thing. The cosmology, flavor and rationality of these universes will be quite different but what the audience will focus on will still be the story and the satire. In the sci-fi version, they will not stop to think and understand the actual concept of time travel and how the machine works because all of them already know that is not expected. It is not expected because what we have is fictional science anyway, there is no real explanation, the machine is just a plot device.
What you suggest may be relevant in works of real hard-science-fiction that gets philosophical about the scientific knowledge and the ramifications of that progress itself. But I wouldnt lay it out as a general distinction.
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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Dave_Jame
Promising
Legendary Hero
I'm Faceless, not Brainless.
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posted March 01, 2015 04:28 PM |
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Then there is a question we must ask oursleves. Is such a story predominantly a satire or is it predominantly a Fantasy/Sci-fi story.
Are the supernatural features important for the message or are they just a tool to establish the setting.
Each work consists of a combination of several genres we can identify the impact of them. But there will always be one that will be the predominant one.
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted March 01, 2015 04:37 PM |
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Edited by artu at 17:07, 01 Mar 2015.
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Yes, that would be a good question indeed. I dont know, think of the Star Trek series, there is usually some political or philosophical issue in the background, that could also be investigated under a fantasy universe. But would you call Star Trek not predominantly sci-fi?
If you go down that road, what will be left as predominantly sci-fi? A Space Odyssey, I Robot, Blade Runner... Interesting question though...
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Are you pretty? This is my occasion. - Ghost
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The_Polyglot
Promising
Supreme Hero
channeling capybara energy
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posted March 02, 2015 11:59 AM |
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OMG Necro theme is just perfect! I'm a happy Heroes fan 
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Friend-shaped
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Galaad
Hero of Order
Li mort as morz, li vif as vis
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posted March 02, 2015 12:13 PM |
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Edited by Galaad at 12:14, 02 Mar 2015.
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I quit, lol
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ThatRedSarah
Famous Hero
Adventuring Hero
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posted March 02, 2015 04:19 PM |
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Hi!
I was reading the creature descriptions on Homm7 wiki page and i saw that the troglodytes have obtained something called "burrowing movement ability".
Do we know what this means? Maybe they can move past obstacles and castle walls by going under them? Maybe even under creature stacks  This might be useful with the new flanking game mechanics. It would also increase their movement options, because i think they are probably pretty slow in general...
Basically they are like short distance flyers?
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Wellplay
Famous Hero
Poland Stronk
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posted March 02, 2015 04:21 PM |
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ThatRedSarah said:
Hi!
I was reading the creature descriptions on Homm7 wiki page and i saw that the troglodytes have obtained something called "burrowing movement ability".
Do we know what this means? Maybe they can move past obstacles and castle walls by going under them? Maybe even under creature stacks This might be useful with the new flanking game mechanics. It would also increase their movement options, because i think they are probably pretty slow in general...
Basically they are like short distance flyers?
Marzhin mentioned that it gona be something like this. But not 100% decided yet how it will work.
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