Lots of games/franchises have a similar setting where ancient civilizations are more advanced than the current one. Especially fantasy, but sometimes sci-fi too
I don’t remember who first formulated it, but someone put together the thought that almost all fantasy and a significant fraction of most science fiction is based on the Lost Utopia of the ancients as a trope.
In all games where you want someone to find an ancient wonder there must have first been an ancient people who created those wonders as something of an everyday occurrence.
It’s hard coded into the legend of Atlantis. And by that I mean it’s an assumption of our own cultural ideas in the real world.
But here’s a very peculiar thought for you…
Genetically we know that modern humans are at least 100,000 years old and there are some cases even longer spans in the 300,000-year range. And we tell ourselves that those people were just chilling around for 100,000 years until all the sudden, all at once, in like 9 places on this base of the earth, civilization was suddenly invented in parallel sometime in the last 5,000 years.
But we know how fast cultural artifacts disintegrate. How little time it would take for our entire civilization to vanish from the face of the Earth if humans just stopped maintaining it.
We treat that emergence of modern civilization as a feature of the end of the last ice age and the beginning of the current interglacial period.
But that’s happened five times in the known 100,000 years of modern humanities biological shape.
So why have we always told stories of the Lost Ancients?
Am I seriously suggesting that this is true? Not really. I I did hard to believe that there wouldn’t be at least some significant trait or Trace left behind.
But then again, there was a science fantasy novel called “The Many-Colored Land” (Julian May) which I enjoyed greatly, and involved people taking a one-way time travel trip back into the the Pliocene epoch. One character is worried about whether or not the time travel is going to mess up the timeline because they would be leaving all this evidence behind and another character points out that if some archaeologists were to excavate an entire Brazilian sloop out of the ancient bedrock he would never tell anybody because everybody would think he was either a madman or a fraud.
So we live in an age where we consider the Lost ancient civilization idea to be ridiculous and irrational, and it has been popularized by people who lack any real evidence so we laugh.
But just imagine if we did encounter a sufficiently advanced technology that was indistinguishable for Magic and what it would look like today, or 2,000 years ago. And what our 5,000 years ago ancestors would draw and paint on the sides of cave walls trying to remember the stories told of a civilization so far gone as to be nothing but rumor.
So yeah. Old sucks but ancient is Magic because it’s far enough away that we wouldn’t understand it if we found something from that. That actually functioned.
Another interesting book that has this as sort of a side load on the same idea would be The Practice Effect by David Brin. In that book the main character is trying to figure out why new stuff sucks and old stuff is so good on the World to which he travels. And he assumes that there was some ancient war it ruined to that technology. (Spoiler, not even close, the main characters ancient war supposition is completely wrong. But it’s a great book. I wouldn’t exactly call it hard science fiction though.)
“Look at this. It’s worthless – ten dollars from a vendor in the street. But I take it, I bury it in the sand for a thousand years, it becomes priceless.”
It’s because Western culture has the “Dark Ages” trope where they believe civilization declined after the fall of the Western Roman empire. This is a huge theme in Western fiction and hugely popularized by the Lord of the Rings
It’s the common fantasy trope about ancient times being a lost golden age. It stands to reason in this context that products of that age are superior to anything that came after
“Old” on the other hand, implies the item is relatively contemporary, but outdated, used and poorly maintained.
The game Kenshi outright does both. There are weapon qualities that indicate who made it, and the lowest and highest quality weapons are both ancient. The trick is that the highest quality stuff is implied to be made in a way that no one can create anymore thanks to general technological decline but has been expertly maintained despite that, while the lowest quality stuff is implied to have spent the last century to millennium rusting over in a trash heap. There’s even a less low quality of weapon which is outright refurbished from said trash heap weapons using what technology the repairer can access.
There is a real life basis for this. Some of the oldest artifact blades were incredibly durable alloys from meteoroids. King Tut’s dagger was made from meteoric iron in a time before iron smelting technology was fully viable.
If it’s old, that means we’ve probably done it better since, and it hasn’t been maintained so it’s probably crap
If it’s ancient, then the fact that it’s survived in some sort of working order at all is a sign that you’re dealing with something incredibly valuable, either because it’s been constructed to be amazing or because people have found it to be so valuable as to be worth maintaining for that whole time period
Isn’t it funny how old items in games are like that one uncle who still thinks he’s cool? But then you find an Ancient item and it’s like discovering a hidden treasure chest in your grandma’s attic.
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And best are “legendary” or “mythical”, implying they don’t even exist.
this is true in life too. old stuff is worthless, until it’s vintage, antique, or ancient.
Makes sense. Old items are superceded by newer ones. Ancient items have withstood the test of time.
Ancient stuff must’ve been good if it’s still here.
What about people? Old people vs ancient people?
Lots of games/franchises have a similar setting where ancient civilizations are more advanced than the current one. Especially fantasy, but sometimes sci-fi too
Your grandpa worked in a factory that made terrible products because they had forgotten how to make good stuff like your distant ancestor did
I don’t remember who first formulated it, but someone put together the thought that almost all fantasy and a significant fraction of most science fiction is based on the Lost Utopia of the ancients as a trope.
In all games where you want someone to find an ancient wonder there must have first been an ancient people who created those wonders as something of an everyday occurrence.
It’s hard coded into the legend of Atlantis. And by that I mean it’s an assumption of our own cultural ideas in the real world.
But here’s a very peculiar thought for you…
Genetically we know that modern humans are at least 100,000 years old and there are some cases even longer spans in the 300,000-year range. And we tell ourselves that those people were just chilling around for 100,000 years until all the sudden, all at once, in like 9 places on this base of the earth, civilization was suddenly invented in parallel sometime in the last 5,000 years.
But we know how fast cultural artifacts disintegrate. How little time it would take for our entire civilization to vanish from the face of the Earth if humans just stopped maintaining it.
We treat that emergence of modern civilization as a feature of the end of the last ice age and the beginning of the current interglacial period.
But that’s happened five times in the known 100,000 years of modern humanities biological shape.
So why have we always told stories of the Lost Ancients?
Am I seriously suggesting that this is true? Not really. I I did hard to believe that there wouldn’t be at least some significant trait or Trace left behind.
But then again, there was a science fantasy novel called “The Many-Colored Land” (Julian May) which I enjoyed greatly, and involved people taking a one-way time travel trip back into the the Pliocene epoch. One character is worried about whether or not the time travel is going to mess up the timeline because they would be leaving all this evidence behind and another character points out that if some archaeologists were to excavate an entire Brazilian sloop out of the ancient bedrock he would never tell anybody because everybody would think he was either a madman or a fraud.
So we live in an age where we consider the Lost ancient civilization idea to be ridiculous and irrational, and it has been popularized by people who lack any real evidence so we laugh.
But just imagine if we did encounter a sufficiently advanced technology that was indistinguishable for Magic and what it would look like today, or 2,000 years ago. And what our 5,000 years ago ancestors would draw and paint on the sides of cave walls trying to remember the stories told of a civilization so far gone as to be nothing but rumor.
So yeah. Old sucks but ancient is Magic because it’s far enough away that we wouldn’t understand it if we found something from that. That actually functioned.
Another interesting book that has this as sort of a side load on the same idea would be The Practice Effect by David Brin. In that book the main character is trying to figure out why new stuff sucks and old stuff is so good on the World to which he travels. And he assumes that there was some ancient war it ruined to that technology. (Spoiler, not even close, the main characters ancient war supposition is completely wrong. But it’s a great book. I wouldn’t exactly call it hard science fiction though.)
Wow that was the realest shower thought ever
If it’s 10 years old, it’s probably getting close to falling apart.
If it’s 100 years old and hasn’t fallen apart yet, it’s probably made well enough that it’s not gonna fall apart in the next 100.
If it’s 1000 years old and still kicking, then is it really gonna break in another 100 or so?
Makes sense. In real life old items are garbage, but ancient items are exoensive antiques.
Think about stuff today, stuff made before 1950 “antiques” are normally good quality. IKEA shit from the 90s is old but shitty.
They built things better back in the day! Used to last much longer. Not like the trash these days!
“Look at this. It’s worthless – ten dollars from a vendor in the street. But I take it, I bury it in the sand for a thousand years, it becomes priceless.”
Belloq.
It’s because Western culture has the “Dark Ages” trope where they believe civilization declined after the fall of the Western Roman empire. This is a huge theme in Western fiction and hugely popularized by the Lord of the Rings
same with real life, my 1999 Pontiac Grand Am is an old car, but my dads ’66 Shelby Mustang is a classic car
Any common mill garbage can become old. But to become ancient it needs to be truly special to begin with.
The exception being Ancient Nord gear unless enchanted somehow. It might beat Foresworn gear, but practically everything does already.
I guess they just don’t make them like they used to…
Compare a 1970s Toyota with a 2010 Toyota.
One is old, the other will outlive all of time.
It’s the common fantasy trope about ancient times being a lost golden age. It stands to reason in this context that products of that age are superior to anything that came after
“Old” on the other hand, implies the item is relatively contemporary, but outdated, used and poorly maintained.
In real life, “Old” cars are typically bad and don’t sell for a bunch, but “ancient” or “older” cars are seen as relics and sold for a bunch.
The game Kenshi outright does both. There are weapon qualities that indicate who made it, and the lowest and highest quality weapons are both ancient. The trick is that the highest quality stuff is implied to be made in a way that no one can create anymore thanks to general technological decline but has been expertly maintained despite that, while the lowest quality stuff is implied to have spent the last century to millennium rusting over in a trash heap. There’s even a less low quality of weapon which is outright refurbished from said trash heap weapons using what technology the repairer can access.
Old items are just old, Ancient ones have survivorship bias.
Survivorship bias. The Ancient things that are still around are of a higher quality than the Ancient things that aren’t.
Old is more recent so the lower quality items will still be around as well as the higher quality things.
There is a real life basis for this. Some of the oldest artifact blades were incredibly durable alloys from meteoroids. King Tut’s dagger was made from meteoric iron in a time before iron smelting technology was fully viable.
How is this not a shower thought? It’s spot on IMO.
Because ancient has been imbued with magic, obviously
If it’s old, that means we’ve probably done it better since, and it hasn’t been maintained so it’s probably crap
If it’s ancient, then the fact that it’s survived in some sort of working order at all is a sign that you’re dealing with something incredibly valuable, either because it’s been constructed to be amazing or because people have found it to be so valuable as to be worth maintaining for that whole time period
It is kinda like some Japanese yokai. After enough time, items just spontaneously grow advanced technology or legendary enchantments
They call that the “test of time” that upgrades the former into the latter.
This applies to the real world
Old plate, no one cares. Ancient plate, stop the press and get a museum on the line.
The myth of the Atlantis lives in the minds of all mankind.
Ancient wisdom was superior storage packaging, so ancient items come out in mint condition
It’s like how old furniture is just meh, but antique furniture is peak.
22 year old iron sword of tetanus vs Excalibur
It’s a rule. If it’s old, it’s terrible and shouldn’t be acknowledged. I’ve been living this way a long time. It’s my oldest rule.
Survivorship bias. The old items have been around for long enough to get damaged, the ancient items are so old that only the best ones survive.
In games, ‘ancient’ means magic. In real life, it means tetanus.
A misprint is very valuable, but a defect is worthless.
Isn’t it funny how old items in games are like that one uncle who still thinks he’s cool? But then you find an Ancient item and it’s like discovering a hidden treasure chest in your grandma’s attic.