I've always been a huge fan of the sci-fi and fantasy genre, reading books, playing video games, and watching movies Since I was a kid. I loved how they could break all the rules, how the stories and worlds didn't have to originate from what we knew about life, they were totally free.
Anything was possible.
A good game would give me new ideas, a good movie showed me realistic visualization and how a hero acted, and a good book provided framework for my imagination. When I was growing up I always had ideas roaming around in my head, thoughts about worlds and characters that I'd designed just for fun while day-dreaming. I thought it was so cool that it was possible to create these ideas and concepts.
Here are some of my favorites:
1- Redwall -
The fantasy story about all the little rodents and beasts acting as if they were people in some medieval hero story. There were puzzles, good food, heroism, villains, and a lot of love in those little creatures. Perfect for when I was young. There was like twenty books too, so it was an easy world to really get into. Brian Jacques also has some other books that I found really enjoyable.
2- Halo -
My favorite video game of high school, me and my friends would play as often as we could. Not only was the game great, but the world was really cool too, and I found myself reading books, looking at art, and brainstorming ideas for the story. Really cool sci-fi ideas and world.
3- Terry Brooks -
This guy was my Tolkien, Tolkien was too detailed for me when I was younger, so I went for the Shannara books, I thought they were great, easy reading with good stories, even if the series was fairly repetitive. I just started watching the show from MTV, it's decent. The other series from Brooks I loved was the Landover series. Such an amazing and underrated series with great humor, characters, and world. I highly recommend it for younger readers, and anyone else really.
4- Harry Potter -
It's over-hyped but that's because it reached a huge audience and remained excellent throughout the series.
5- Hyperion Cantos -
I'll admit I kind of hated the Endymion books, but the first two Hyperion books are some of the best sci-fi ever imo. Classic characters, fantastic world building, mystery, and an epic quest, what's not to like? I hope we get a couple movies out of this, a good couple movies.
6- Anything Brandon Sanderson -
This guy is amazing, everything he cranks out is good. Sometimes his writing style is a bit cheesy, I feel like he writes for a younger audience at times, but overall the guy is one of the best ever in my opinion. I suggest starting with Mistborn, it's great.
7- Mega Man -
Specifically X 4, that game was one of my favorite games ever, and the game series has some really cool stuff in it. Besides, megaman is a badass, he's always jacking enemy weapons and finding sweet robot suit loot.
8- Cloud Atlas -
Multiple timelines, incredible vision, and philosophical questions throughout. Part sci-fi, part historical fiction, part comedy, part detective story, this one has something for everyone There is also a book, I haven't read it, but heard it's great and plan on checking it out at some point.
9- Star Wars -
Not just the movies either, the games, books, and toys were all sweet too. Well, with the quantity of books and games and whatnot I didn't try it all, I'm sure there were some duds.
10- Cyberpunk -
Snow Crash, Neuromancer, Altered Carbon, anime, the Deus Ex games... The near future setting works really well for me, and I've found quite a few different works that I've really loved.
11- RPG's -
I used to play all sorts of RPG video games: Final Fantasy, Pokemon, Xenogears, Breath of Fire, the list goes on. These kinds of games were usually massive created worlds with unique characters and romping stories. Mostly PS1, PS2, and anything older that I could get my hands on.
This was just a short list, I'm still watching movies and tv shows and reading books, just fewer now than I used to. The one thing that has really improved is film, movies and tv shows in the sci-fi and fantasy genres have gotten much more realistic and awesome.
What genre is your favorite? How bout some favorites? Let me know in the comments!
@jakeybrown