Argaenothruzil Classic

Today I stumbled upon an old email in my archives that was a message to myself containing a single link: http://pub45.bravenet.com/forum/static/show.php?usernum=3860195469&frmid=6335.

This link leads to Argaenothruzil Classic, the original forum that my friends and I used to start our stories. It's been really fun for me to look over how the somewhat vast mythos of Argaenothruzil began as the simplest of universes. The races seem cliché simply because they began that way as meaningless lists of adjectives. Now at least they have backstories, cultures, and geographic locations.

The gameplay of the forum was a lot different back then, too. It was a lot more like a typed form of Dungeons and Dragons. Now it's a lot more story-based, complex, and time-consuming. Sometimes I miss the simple, stat-based factor. The story moved a lot faster, the characters interacted with each other a lot more, and we had a lot of fun. Of course, we were high school students at the time anyway, so we had more time to write.

I guess this is what I've called in the past a "bookmark" in life. Some point where you are forced to look back at an aspect of your life and see how far you've come. Argae is probably the longest-running project on my list, so it's been a fun ride. It's interesting to see how something like a project evolves over the course of years when it's allowed to.

Would I have done things differently if I could start over? Definitely. Now that I know so much about different languages and cultures, I would have made up my own races instead of just hijacking overdone trope races. But at the same time, it has been fun to see my own interpretations of how I think they should be. I also would have eliminated certain plot elements, such as the Civil Elf-Wood Elf conflict. There even used to be a third elf race, Magic Elves, which were merged into Civil Elves.

Anyway, this probably means nothing to you if you haven't been to the Argaenothruzil forum. If you're ever interested in creating a character and practicing your creative writing skills, go to the forum here, read up on some of the lore, and follow the guidelines!