The Mind and Thoughts of a Normal Guy

Idea's on Fantasy

If there are two things I love to read its science fiction and superheroes (although the second one might always be considered part of latter, I don't know). Not to say that those are the only things I like; fantasy is something I've always liked, but I generally don't like to read about it. The reason is simply because I find most of it to be stale ideas written over again - just different character names doing basically the same thing. I've read a few of the books from the genre, such as a book from the DragonLance series (which I personally didn't like) but the only fantasy series I like thus far is the Wheel of Time series. I'm also a big video game buff and while I like the RPG genre as a whole I just can't continue with the fantasy ones a lot of times because it runs into the same problem as the books in the genre - same stuff, different name.

I hear some people say (though, admittedly, I don't know for sure because I've never read them) that everyone basically just bases their ideas off of Tolkien's The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings.

So why do I say I love Fantasy? Well, I like the idea of a mid-evil world of my own making, with its own name, original continents and characters but as I brought out before, the genre lacks originality in every story I've come across (Though, I haven't read many fantasy stories here yet, to be fair). Instead the bland generality of backwaters character finds item, gains party, looks for special item, and defeats evil embodied, or a few other regular dozing tales, think outside the box.

I am largely a sci-fi writer but I got to thinking on my way home from work today - what if hostile, highly technologically advanced aliens invaded a mid-evil world filled with dragons and magic. To add further innovation, what if your group of main characters had to trek through a dark labyrinth fighting some of these said aliens to survive and escape, like a survivor/horror. Do you think that would spice up the genre, make it more interesting. I'm going to start developing such a book and if I get it completed, I hope it will be a fresh breath to this largely stale genre.