As I have said, ideas can appear from anywhere. Sadly it can also be about anything. And it doesn't always work well for a story. In this case I was browsing a webcomic app and barely got into the first sentence of the synopsis and it said "in the city of galleries" or something and then my brain immediately popped out a new idea.
I imagined a world that was like a cross of the concept of a link between world's 2-d portait, paper Mario, and a pop-up book kinda thing. I suppose that a book of a pop-up world wouldn't relalydo well as an adult book, or as a kids book. One takes too much material, the other becomes too... It's like imagining the entire lord of the rings trilogy being turned into a pop up book. Not exactly kid friendly, or mature enough for adults. Hard to say. So ultimately, to have a long story in such a world... Makes it better to be a videogame. I mean... Like I said. Link between world's and paper Mario.
If one were to do something like that... Well... It would be very difficult, considering you have to place the entire book in a 90° third person perspective, and then if you made it 2.5d then it has multiple layers. Ultimately it takes a lot of description and setting down rules of in order to make it easier. But it would be... Interesting.
Considering a world where the surfaces of the surroundings dictate so much about your reality would be very interesting. Maps would be so simple... And yet it would so perfectly and accurately describes the entire world in which it sits. Imagine having a scale model of the earth that you can rotate and it would show cities and roads and all the topographical parts. That's what it's like for a paper mario-esque world, the difference being they could build that accurate map with our current technology level. We somehow need to get a lot more detailed technology. Oh well.
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Parallax, for those who don't know, is a term that refers to multiple 2 dimensional layers that, in the attempt to recreate dimension of depth, it has these layers that move at different speeds. Like when you are riding in a car on a high road that shows you several hills, the nearest items move quickly, but the ones farther out on the next mountain, all move slower in your view. And the big mountain at the very end moves not at all, it acts as a backdrop in your vision to all the others.
Now, converting this to a world... It's easy to imagine for me... To describe... Good Lord no. The more layers means the thicker the local area. A plain may have five layers of nothing but grass of varying colors of wavy gold. But a forest will have like seven layers of different types of trees, and then a city may have like three to five layers, or, could go all the way up to ten layers. With the farthest layer being either the exterior wall of town, or the interior Manor of whatever is at the center. A church, a nobles house, a market, a castle, a barracks. Whatever. This 'central' parallax, in a story, would then need to depict a place of importance. Because it's a town mostly. But other places can be used for that too. A difficult thing to do truly. Maybe it can be like a Picasso painting overlay for a chapter where a character is sucked into a slightly ruined book or something. Ideas like these function better with visual material. Unfortunately. Because it IS an interesting concept to be certain. After all.. a 2d creature that has turned sideways is invisible for all intents and purposes, especially in a 2d world where all creatures have an external perspective.
Considering perspective in a book is very important. It's good to keep these in mind as an author. :3