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Because why just stick to our world?

A constructed world is a completely fictional setting, rather than our world in The Future, another planet in our galaxy, or an Alternate History. The heroes of its stories are usually the locals, who neither have nor need a connection with our present-day Earth. In other words, a world that is not obligated to have a connection to a standard existing planet like present day Earth.

This world might be built from standard components, but there is deliberate Worldbuilding going on. It may or may not have a Fantasy World Map. The world may have been based on Earth in a lot of aspects early on, but may have gone through an Earth Drift to make it more distinct.

As one of the most common fantasy settings, some form of Functional Magic is typically present, but this isn't required: constructed worlds exist that have little or no magic. Most High Fantasy takes place in constructed worlds, as well as a great deal of Low Fantasy and Heroic Fantasy.

Compare A Long Time Ago, in a Galaxy Far, Far Away..., usually used in science fiction, where there are multiple worlds all separate from Earth. Contrast Magical Land, where the focus is on visitors to the setting and Like Reality, Unless Noted, and Alternate Universe and Alternate Timeline, where the fictional world coexists with "our" real one. Earth All Along is a subversion of this trope. A world still called Earth but otherwise similar to a Constructed World is a Fictional Earth. Not to be confused with Patchwork World, which is when the setting itself is an amalgamation of several other worlds, sometimes "constructed" in a haphazard fashion.


Examples

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    Anime and Manga 
  • Argevollen is in an unnamed fictional landmass on an alternate Earth. One notable aspect of the show's setting is the complete lack of aerial technology due to environmental and geological changes from the use of strategic weapons. The presence of the Japanese language/names/food indicate that Japan is also present in the alternate Earth in some form.
  • The world of Attack on Titan at first seems to take place in either a post-apocalyptic future or an Alternate History of our world but as more of the world outside of the Walls is revealed it becomes more obvious that it isn't Earth at all. Although it has parallels to our world's ethnic groups and continents, it has several major differences in geography. Most of the story takes place on a landmass that doesn't exist in the real world.
  • The world of Delicious in Dungeon is a Medieval European Fantasy world with seemingly no connection to our own.
  • Digimon X-Evolution. This is the only version of Digimon that is all Mons and no humans enter the picture.
  • The world of Hunter × Hunter mixes a fantasy setting with modern day technology, Sci-Fi elements, and a wide variety of Mix-and-Match Critters. Of note is that the world map is basically an upside-down version of Earth, and there are places with names like Yorknew City. Later it's revealed that this upside-down Earth is only a small fraction of the actual surface area of the planet.
  • Naruto is set in an unnamed world on an unnamed continent (or maybe subcontinent), but is clearly fictional and a lot of Worldbuilding is done early on (for instance, we learn about the politics and geography of the world hundreds of chapters before it really becomes relevant). Being a series about Ninja, it has a lot of Japanese influences.
  • The unnamed world of Eiichiro Oda's One Piece has very distinct geography and weather completely different from our Earth. And the Fantasy Kitchen Sink mythology and the Schizo Tech, like the telecommunication snails...
  • One-Punch Man:
    • It isn't relevant to the story at all, but OPM (at least the manga and anime) takes place in one. Distance shots of the planet shows a giant continent shaped like Saitama prefecture, cities are named after letters of the alphabet, and one brief shot of the moon landing shows a flag that doesn't exist in real life.
    • Speaking of the moon, several shots in Episode 12 reveal that it has lunar mare in the shape of Saitama prefecture as well.
  • Like the games, the Pokémon anime and Pokémon Adventures manga are set in this — in fact, both resemble a Constructed World more than the games do!
  • The Continent in Queen's Blade and in their Alternate Universe, Queen's Blade Grimoire has Melfareland.
  • "Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honnêamise" is set in an alternate version of Earth, with no recognizable real-life countries and a considerably different pattern of history, with the in-universe present day being a collage of various decades.
  • Daikurikku in Simoun. In fact, figuring out its bizarre laws (and the meaning behind pseudo-Latin terms) is one of the (many) fun points of the series.
  • Tegami Bachi: Letter Bee is set in a completely separate world.
  • Windaria, at least in Streamline's English release, is completely unexplained.
  • Despite a brief mention of Egypt at the beginning, the world in Xam'd: Lost Memories is clearly separate from our world.

    Audio Play 
  • The Sojourn starts in the entirely fictional Tantalus Cluster that's just outside the Morgana Galaxy before moving to a nebula on the outskirts of that galaxy. The humans of this setting evolved on a world called Centrum.

    Comic Books 
  • The setting of Bone.
  • Cerebus the Aardvark, though there are some traits of Earth carried over/mirrored.
  • Dreamkeepers has a library worth of world building on its site and as appendixes in the books.
  • The Last God from The Fellspyre Chronicles setting by the DC Black Label, is significantly built up from scratch. The world of Cain Anuun not only has maps, religion (albeit one based on Tolkien's Silmarillion, history and folk songs. The miniseries also has various Apocalyptic Logs to flesh out what a Crapsack World the setting has become and even includes stats for various creatures and character classes according to Dungeons & Dragons 4th Edition rules.

    Fan Works 
  • All That Glitters (Othellia) expands upon the geography established in Frozen, which includes the kingdoms of Arendelle and the Southern Isles, and includes the kingdom of Corona from Tangled. The author also invents fictional countries such as Wallonia (not the region in Belgium), Ostenberg, Dunois, Summershire, Weideland, Romsdal, Vestmar, Fjordane, and Nordheim, as well as the cities of Stralshagen and Amersdam.

    Films — Animation 
  • This is implied in Frozen. The kingdom of Arendelle is a Fantasy Counterpart Culture to Norway, and the sequel short "Frozen Fever" implies the Southern Isles are a counterpart to Denmark. There is also the duchy of Weselton, which has no known counterpart.
    • The Expanded Universe of the Frozen franchise include the fantasy kingdom of Arendelle and often add more fictional locations. Vakretta, Chatho, Zaria, Kongsberg, Blavenia, Seven Islands, Riverland, Eldora, Vesterland, and Yuwabe are all fictional countries either mentioned or shown in books and comics.
  • The setting of Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honnêamise is similar to Earth during the early Space Age — but not identical. Assiduous effort was put into making everything about the world, from geography to clothing to eating utensils, at least slightly different from Earth norms.

    Films — Live Action 
  • The land of The Dark Crystal is one of the most completely separate constructed worlds. No flora or fauna, including humans, exist anywhere within this world; it was carefully designed to be a completely different reality.
  • Star Wars, as the Tag Line says, takes place A Long Time Ago, in a Galaxy Far, Far Away.... Despite the presence of many human characters, the whole story is set on various alien worlds, none of which are the planet Earth. (Earth did appear in some Expanded Universe materials, but none of those stories were ever considered canon even in Star Wars Legends.)

    Literature 
  • Tarra in Arcia Chronicles.
  • Terreille (the Realm of Light), Kaeleer (the Shadow Realm), and Hell (the Dark Realm) in Anne Bishop's Black Jewels series. They seem to bear no relation to our world, and the human races may not be human as we understand it.
  • The titular setting of China Mieville's Bas-Lag Cycle is a truly wondrous, and disturbing place to be.
  • Brandon Sanderson's adult fantasy all takes place in the same verse called The Cosmere. Word of God has officially stated that Earth does not exist in the Cosmere.
  • The Dark Profit Saga gives us the world of Arth, "a funny fantasy world much like our own but with more magic and fewer vowels." It crosses a Medieval European Fantasy with a modern understanding of economics and a healthy mix of humor and drama. The author has cooperated with a group of fans on the Worldbuilding, coming up with the Fantasy World Map and descriptions for a number of races and concepts (including the calendar of Arth).
  • Terry Pratchett's Discworld has no physical connection to our own. However, its basic nature is based on several old theories about how our world works, such as it being flat, and being orbited by the sun, and being on the back of a giant turtle. Its cities, nations and sometimes individual people are often clear analogies to those from earth's past and present.
    • There are hints at there being The Multiverse, however, and memes and particles of inspiration as real physical things sometimes end up on the Discworld that are clearly from our world.
    • In The Science of Discworld books, a clear connection is finally established, but characteristically it goes the other way around than you'd expect: the wizards at the Unseen University conduct an experiment to remove all magic from an area, which unexpectedly creates a Bigger on the Inside universe — ours, baffling in its lack of Narrative Causality. This also clearly establishes that the Discworld is set in an alternative universe with different natural laws.
  • Dragonar Academy is set in a completely isolated world built on magic and dragons.
  • Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea takes place in a world where most lands are archipelagos. Oh, and there are dragons too, of course.
  • The Empirium Trilogy: The world of Avitas has very different geography from our own.
  • After Earth Drift set in, Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser was established to take place in the world of Nehwon.
  • The setting of Forgotten Realms qualifies as well.
  • Grimoire's Soul begins in Kesterline, the westernmost continent on the world of Lystrata.
  • The Grisha Trilogy and its spinoffs the Six of Crows duology and The Nikolai Duology combine this trope with extensive use of Fantasy Counterpart Cultures.
  • The Ickabog is set in a fictional kingdom called Cornucopia with a few neighbouring kingdoms.
  • The setting for the Malazan Book of the Fallen was created by Steven Erikson and Ian Cameron Esslemont and is one of the most expansive examples, as it was initially constructed during role-playing sessions. Since both creators are anthropologists and archaeologists, there is quite a lot of verisimilitude to the setting. It has hundreds of thousands of years of history, a multitude of cultures and spans an entire planet with seven continents which, according to Word of God, is bigger than Earth. Of course, there are also the various non-human races with their ancestor and descendant races and several who are not native to that world as well.
  • Manifestation: The story takes place primarily in the fictional city of San Lorien, in the fictional Northern Union.
  • Moribito and The Beast Player series by Nahoko Uehashi are set in a complete, isolated world.
  • Many novels by Nick Perumov are set in a multiverse called The Consistent. His series Chronicles of Hjorvard and Chronicles of the Rift (including the novel Diamond Sword, Wooden Sword) are set in worlds that are part of that multiverse.
  • Greg Egan's Orthogonal trilogy not only takes place in a fictional setting, it takes place in a constructed universe with unique and meticulously researched physics totally different from our own, and focuses on a race of aliens that evolved in such a universe.
  • Realm Breaker: The land of Allward is split into two main continents with a stretch of sea breaking the land in two.
  • Record of Lodoss War, and its spinoff Legend of Crystania. Rune Soldier Louie also turns out to be set in the same world.
  • Kertiana in Reflections of Eterna by the same author.
  • Reign of the Seven Spellblades takes place in a world that is clearly intended as a Historical Fantasy version of the Eurasian supercontinent, taking place in the Union, which appears to be a fantasy counterpart to the European Union. Yelgland, where 4/6 main characters are from, appears to be England, Katie's homeland Farnland appears to be Finland, Ytallia seems to be Italy, Azia is Asia, and Yamatsukuni, where Nanao Hibiya is from, is based on Japan during the Sengoku Period.
  • Slayers takes place in a Medieval European Fantasy world whose only very occasional similarities to the real world fall under Rule of Funny (like a bandit leader disguising himself as Colonel Sanders because reasons).
  • The world of A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin. The story takes place exclusively on the continents of Westeros and Essos and their surrounding islands, but there's other lands as well such as Sothoryos and Ulthos. This also applies to its TV adaptations, Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon. The world itself has no given name (the fandom commonly nicknames it "Planetos"), and there are several theories in fandom attempting to place it in Martin's sci-fi saga The Thousand Worlds universe.
  • Spice and Wolf has a Medieval European Fantasy setting with completely different geography and immortal gigantic creatures that can adopt (mostly) human form.
  • Take Back the Skies is set in the fictional world of Tellus, notable for the thick, tumultuous storms that surround its islands.
  • Violet Evergarden takes place on Telsis, a continent with numerous nations that are essentially divided up into four main powers: North, South, West and East. The Great War that occurred prior to the start of the series saw every nation consolidating into one of two factions, the Northern Alliance (North and East) or the Southern League (South and West).
  • Wings of Fire is set in the continents of Pyrrhia and Pantala on a planet that clearly isn't our, even having three moons.
  • The world of The Witcher is clearly not set on Earth. Not only are the geography and the species different, it is implied that humans came onto this world (possibly from our own) through some kind of inter-dimensional accident. Also, at one point Ciri begins hopping through parallel universes and visits an inn apparently set in 18th-century France.
  • The setting of The Wood Beyond the World. William Morris is usually credited as the creator of the modern "invented world" fantasy (departing from the tradition of setting fantasy stories in Arthurian Briton, fairyland or Arabian Nights-esque Arabia). Tolkien read the novel as a child, and it was a major influence on his work.

    Tabletop Games 
  • Every Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting ever (except for Masque of the Red Death, set on "Gothic Earth").
    • Forgotten Realms: Toril is loosely based on Earth, with most of the action taking place on the continent of Faerûn, a Patchwork Map corresponding roughly to a mashup of Europe and Africa. Several other continents exist, and Arabian-flavored Zakhara, East Asian Kara-tur, and pre-Columbian American Maztica were even detailed as sub-settings in the AD&D years. Toril also has its own Alternate Universe, Abeir, which had pieces of itself swap places with Toril during 4th Edition.
  • All of Magic: The Gathering's planes are original; none of them are based on Earth, and it's generally considered canon that our universe is not part of the Magic multiverse.
  • Legend of the Five Rings is set on the country of Rokugan, a fantasy medieval Japan kingdom. Outside of it also includes other countries, such as Burning Sands, and Ivory Kingdom. But they only get focus when Rokugan is involve in them.
  • In Microscope players actually create a new world and its history over the course of the game, and play scenes within it as they go along.
  • Pathfinder: Golarion again is loosely based on Earth: Avistan corresponds to Europe, Garund to Africa, and Casmaron to west and central Asia; however, East Asia is represented as a separate continent called Tian Xia, which has an ocean separating it from Casmaron but is connected to Avistan via a land bridge across the north pole. The continent of Arcadia is Mesoamerican-flavored, though with a technological level similar to the eastern supercontinent (think warriors wearing feathers and jaguar skins over chainmail). The other planets in Golarion's solar system are also detailed somewhat (the elf species originated on one of them and migrated to Golarion by portal), and become significantly more important in the Science Fantasy Spin-Off Starfinder (set several thousand years in Pathfinder's future).
  • The world of Warhammer, although full of Fantasy Counterpart Cultures, has no link to our world, but the shape of its continents are rough analogues to their real world counterparts. Warhammer 40,000 on the other hand is explicitly our galaxy 38,000 years in the future. Apparently the fantasy setting's world was once set within the 40K one (inside the Eye of Terror), but this has since been denied.

    Toys 
  • The BIONICLE universe had no connection whatsoever to ours, despite inter-dimensional travel being possible there. Multiple alternate universes and pocket dimensions exist, but none resembling ours. The creators have avoided having live-action adaptations of the series for fear that this segregation from the real world would be compromised in order to make way for a Human-Focused Adaptation.

    Video Games 
  • Arcanum: Of Steamworks & Magick Obscura: The eponymous Arcanum.
  • The world of Hillys in Beyond Good & Evil. Background lore states it to be a colony world in a separate star system, though no mention of Earth or its culture was given until the sequel. Otherwise, it may as well function as a separate world with its own flora, ecology, and hints of language and culture.
  • de Blob takes place on the planet of Raydia, which has its own cities, culture, and even a natural ecosystem using pure color as a source of life and energy, with nary a reference to Earth in sight.
  • Diablo takes place mostly in Sanctuary. It was created when the angel Inarius and demon Lilith used the Worldstone to create a world where they could hide. Throughout the lore, both angels and demons took the Worldstone and tried to create worlds of their own, but they were always unstable - the angelic worlds were too perfect to exist while the demonic worlds collapsed from the chaos. Only the union between both could create a stable world.
  • The Junkyard in Digital Devil Saga can be described as a bunch of military outposts based off ancient ruins surrounding a massive hypertechnological tower, with a lot of Hindu-inspired architecture and decoration and a lot of unusual attention to the region's waterways and sewers, all in a perpetually-raining land of grey sands. But there are weird details around, like a perfect Disney-style fairytale castle, a massive yacht half-buried in the desert, or a strange European manor in the middle of one of the outposts. And then, the inhabitants start realizing that even though they've never known any other setting, it's strangely unreal to them, and they start remembering things about another place with bizarre rules that somehow make more sense than the Junkyard's simplicity... and most worryingly, despite never having personally seen or been one, they all know what a child is. Eventually it's revealed that the entire Junkyard it's a Constructed World... In-Universe.
  • Disco Elysium: Elysium, the world where the story is set, isn't even a planet, but continents called isolas surrounded by a reality-bending matter known as the pale. A conversation with one character reveals that scientists originally thought the world was a sphere, but the shape of the world seems to be more like a 'dark grey corona.' While it is possible the world was a sphere at one time, it isn't anymore.
  • Dishonored:
  • Dragon Age series: Thedas. Incidentally, even the name of the world is constructed: it was a shortcut for "The Dragon Age setting" used by the developers until they decided to Throw It In!.
  • The Dragon Quest games from IV onward take place in such worlds; the first three look that way at first, but arguably subvert it as III reveals that it all takes place on a very Earth-like world, and that the differently shaped lands of the first two games (which III is a prequel to) are its Hollow World.
  • The unnamed but obviously constructed world of the Drakan series.
  • Dungeon Siege: Aranna.
  • The Elder Scrolls series has a very deep and well-constructed universe. The Aurbis, the totality of creation, is split into Aetherius, Oblivion, and Mundus. Mundus is the "mortal plane" and contains the world, Nirn. Nirn contains the known continents of Tamriel, Akavir, Atmora, Aldmeris, Yokuda, and Pyandonea. (Some of which are believed to have been lost or destroyed.) The games themselves have so far only taken place on Tamriel (with some excursions to Aetherius and Oblivion).
  • Celenheim in Enclave.
  • EXA_PICO: Ar Ciel.
  • Almost all of the Final Fantasy series: Every game takes place in its own constructed world, some more detailed than others.
  • With some exceptions, each Fire Emblem game is set on its own continent within its own, largely self-contained constructed world (though all games take place in the same multiverse). These include the continents of Archanea (Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon & the Blade of Light and Mystery of the Emblem), Valentia (Gaiden), Jugdral (Genealogy of the Holy War and Thracia 776), Elibe (The Binding Blade and The Blazing Blade), Magvel (The Sacred Stones), and Tellius (Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn), with the first three sharing the same world. Ylisse and Valm, on the other hand, are simply the future versions of Archanea and Valentia, respectively, albeit with Broad Strokes applied. Hoshido and Nohr are two kingdoms situated on a different, currently unnamed continent separate from the others. Fódlan is another continent which, itself, is divided into three countries: the Adrestian Empire, the Holy Kingdom of Faerghus, and the Leicester Alliance. Likewise, Elyos is comprised of two separate landmasses, an outer ring that contains — in its intercardinal regions — four of the continent's nations (clockwise: Elusia, Solm, Firene, Brodia) and a central island that serves as the fifth (Lythos). And so on.
  • The planet of Avalice in Freedom Planet has distinct ancient Chinese culture and architecture, but otherwise is in a Science Fantasy universe all its own.
  • FromSoftware:
  • Gears of War takes place on the planet Sera, a rare non-fantasy example that serves as a dystopian Science Fiction version of this trope.
  • Homeworld takes place in the Whirlpool Galaxy. No humans are mentioned, although Hiigarans look entirely human, and some even have perfectly human names: Karan, Imogen, Rachel, Roman, Jacob, Nathan, etc.
  • The Iron Grip series has Theia, a Planetary Romance Earth analogue with wildly anachronistic Punk Punk societies and nations, an ice age climate and a Purely Aesthetic Era feel.
  • While the Jak and Daxter games have a handful of settings and locations, it's very clear that the games take place in a world that's distinctly not ours, with its own alphabet, mythology, history, and wildlife.
  • The only evident similarity between the JASF: Jane's Advanced Strike Fighters universe and the real world is that all the planes are the same. You're flying for the Eastern Democratic Alliance (implied to be something like either United States or NATO; no real explanation is given), and the game takes place on an island divided up between two Quracs called North and South Azbaristan.
  • Kirby is set on a star-shaped planet called Popstar, inhabited by all sorts of wacky Cartoon Creatures. The title character sometimes explores other planets, but not including Earth of course. (Unless one subscribes to the idea that Shiver Star is a post-apocalyptic Earth, that is.)
  • The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule.
  • Lunarosse. Since Corlia made it herself, it literally is a constructed world.
  • The Neverhood: Constructed out of clay.
  • The main setting of The Night of the Rabbit, Mousewood, is based on unpublished tales written by the game designer Matt Kempke. These stories can be unlocked during gameplay, though.
  • The Ogre Battle series takes place primarily on the continents/nations of Zenobia and Lodis, whose geography has nothing to do with Earth's.
  • Zig-zagged throughout the Phantasy Star series:
  • Pillars of Eternity, its sequel Deadfire, and the upcoming* prequel Avowed are all set in the world of Eora, which has several smallish continents separated by ocean. Pillars I takes place in the Dyrwood, ruled by the Glanfathan civilization until they were colonized by settlers from Aedyr across the ocean to the west. Pillars II takes place in the Deadfire Archipelago southeast of Dyrwood.
  • Pokémon is a strange case — All main series regions (and some side-series ones) are based on ones in the real world, real-world animals and locations are referenced in older Pokémon entries, and a Team Aqua grunt mentions Poseidon in Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire. However, the unusual technology, elementally superpowered wildlife with no onscreen real-life animals in sight, increasingly complex and unique mythology and history, and plain old Word of God, among other factors, make it very much seem like a Constructed World.
  • Ratchet & Clank is set in a vast sci-fi universe full of aliens and robots, but humans and Earth are nowhere to be seen at all. TJ Fixman once claimed that humans don't even exist in that universe, but admitted that it could be retconned in the future.
  • Ravenmark has the world of Eclisse, a typical Medieval European Fantasy.
  • Ridge Racer, loosely tied with the above Ace Combat, also features a completely independent universe, mainly to justify the fictional car manufacturers and models. While the fourth game makes reference to real world countries, the places and cars are fictional.
  • Rise of Legends features the world of Aio, a Science Fantasy world filled with Steampunk empires, genies, magicians and alien gods.
  • RuneScape is set on the Medieval European Fantasy planet of Gielinor, plus a few other planets that the player can visit. Although it originally was implied to be a planet in our universe (most of the life on it was imported from Earth by Guthix), it might as well be a separate world. This has since been mostly retconned. Although King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table exist in the game and are said to have come from England, the creators of the game now mostly ignore them and it has been since revealed that humans actually didn't come from Earth, but rather from a completely different planet called Teragard that definitely isn't Earth. Earth most likely does not exist in the same universe as Gielinor.
  • Sacred: Ancaria.
  • Septerra Core: Septerra.
  • Shining Force has its own fictional map.
  • Siege of Avalon: Eurale.
  • Star Fox: The Lylat System.
  • Super Mario Bros.:
    • The Mushroom Kingdom. Originally Mario and Luigi were supposed to have come from Brooklyn, where Donkey Kong and the other early games were set, and then they got sucked down a drain-pipe into the Mushroom Kingdom; later games, like the various "Yoshi" games involving Baby Mario, contradict this (at least for the Bros' childhoods), and the idea has basically been abandoned. They're still Italian, though.
    • Even the structure of the planet has changed in the Mario world; it's always been known that there had to be some weird changes in geography given all the kingdoms and islands that get shown throughout the franchise, but the geography itself was shown to be a copy of Earth in games like NES Open Tournament Golf or Mario Kartnote . Super Mario Odyssey shows off a whole new geography for the planet, with the Mushroom Kingdom itself portrayed as a large, mushroom-shaped continent a little way away from a much larger landmass.
  • Two of Supergiant's games, Bastion and Transistor are set in different examples of this.
  • Them's Fightin' Herds takes place in the world of Fœnum. A world inhabited by sapient hoofed animals that have formed societies. Somewhat similar to Equestria, but the main inhabitants are far more diverse.
  • The noir fantasy world of the Thief series (though it does have characters with Earth-like names, it's very clearly set in a setting completely removed from everyday reality).
  • The Trader of Stories has a really pretty one.
  • The continent of Zemuria in the Trails Series is set in an unnamed world, with each story arc taking place in a different country. The place names, cultures, and fashion heavily crib from Middle Ages Europe, but the different system of measurements, existence of genuine if obscure magic and apparently genuine miracles from the goddess Aidios shape its world in different ways than our own. Magitek, in particular, is thoroughly explored as technological change and a shift in global politics sweeps through the land.
  • The worlds visited in the Ultima series are mostly various constructed worlds (one takes place on Earth, and in most of them you are visiting those worlds from Earth). Starting with Sosaria, later known as Britannia, and with ancillary worlds like Pagan and Serpent Isle, plus the places visited in Ultima Underworld II.
  • A Very Long Rope to the Top of the Sky is set on a world (the Lydian continents and the surface below) whose history, and prehistory, is fairly in-depth, including a few things that almost no one knows, and the PCs have to rediscover.
  • The Warcraft series and World of Warcraft take place mostly on the planet Azeroth. Other key worlds include Draenor (later called Outland after it was almost destroyed by fel magic), the homeworld of the orcs and temporary refuge of the draenei; Argus, the homeworld of the eredar/draenei and the Burning Legion's base of operations; and the Shadowlands, the universe's afterlife.
  • All of the Infocom (later Activision) Zork games. The games make satirical references to Earth culture but there's no evidence that this is Earth. Some sources suggest that Zork is the name of the planet on which these games are set.

    Visual Novels 
  • Played with in Melody. We do not know which country the story is set in (or even if it exists in real life), but there are references to real people, events, and places throughout the story.

    Webcomics 
  • Archipelago is set in a world built upon the ruins of infinitely giant ships, which crashed a long time before the story.
  • The Back o' Beyond is set in a world fairly similar to our own, but with some hints of the supernatural, such as liches, magical springs and amulets, and mermaids. Two countries have been named so far, Sairith and Goshenia.
  • Bits Fair is set in a fictional pre-industrial world that feels like a mix between Asian and European cultures, featuring a vast empire that encompasses an entire subcontinent and mindly powers.
  • Debugging Destiny largely takes place in a simulation with a constructed world. There are no maps because the world can rearrange itself. When asking about history, all that is known is that whatever came before ended. There are lingering remnants of the previous world, but most are hideously powerful.
  • Kubera
  • The Order of the Stick takes place on an unnamed world ruled over by three (four, but one was destroyed) pantheons corresponding to a cardinal direction and associated continent — Northern, Southern, Western, and Eastern. Each pantheon exactly corresponds to a Real Life pantheon: Northern = Norse, Western = Babylonian, Southern = Chinese Zodiac, and Eastern = Greek (and deceased). The world is in a generally medieval setting, although they do take inspiration not only from Europe but also the Middle East and Asia, and certain areas (such as Cliffport and Tinkertown) have been technologically advanced via magic and a steampunk flair (both of which are pointed out and lampshaded). In addition to standard non-magic fighters, there are a plethora of magic, psionic, and holy warriors in the world, as befitting its Dungeons & Dragons-inspired setting.
  • Overside, the setting of Rice Boy, Order of Tales, and Vattu.
  • Splitting Image takes place in the kingdom of Aeolia, a region closed off from the larger magical world of Faelumbre. Though they are aware of our world in some way, Faelumbre works by its own rules, and Aeolia has been closed off from both.
  • Stomp! takes place on a world called Traagler.
  • Tower of God is set in a tower that has at least 135 floors, with each floor being several kilometres high and having a surface the size of North America. They don't breathe air but Shinsu which gets more viscous the higher you get, which is why swords are replaced by simple rapiers called Needles. An outside world exists and people are faintly aware of it, but it's the kind of world where people build gods and children get trapped in caves for eons.
  • Unsounded is set on an entirely invented continent divided between several nations, with an enormous amount of background detail devoted to showing that this world is nothing like ours.

    Web Original 
  • Ascension Academy: A pre-industrial mixed technology and magic fantasy world brimming with monsters. Ravaged by the Dark War 300 years ago, the Cross-Allied Forces enforces the Ancestra Charter and the various alliances between the races and nations of the world to maintain peace while the world rebuilds after having lost over 80% of its population. But that noble cause has been laden with beurocracy and corruption over the years as the threat of the Darkness grew ever more distant and faded in the minds of the world. Now all that stands to stop the Darkness from breaking free once more is Ascension Academy and its Cadets. But will they be enough?
  • Guts and Sass: An Anti-Epic draws inspiration from various low-tech Earth cultures, but has a distinct set of original semi-domesticated pastoralist, feudal agriculturalist, Proud Warrior Race, merchant-trader, and hunter-gatherer cultures. It also features original landmasses and ocean currents, as well as an alternate tidal catalyst (the planet has no visible moon).
  • Neopets takes place in a world called Neopia. It has a Level in the Clouds; a floating Mordor; Two medieval worlds; a pirate island; a tropical island with Mayincatec ruins in the jungle; Ancient Grome; Wutai; an icy mountain; a haunted forest with a Circus of Fear and Überwald; A Steampunk city/Lethal Lava Land; An Egyptian desert; an underwater city that rose from the ashes of Underwater Ruins; Prehistoria; a space station; a moon; and a world made of jelly (that's just silly). Schizo Tech doesn't begin to cover it.
  • From the ketchup stains on Monty Oum's napkin, we got the world map for Remnant, the world of RWBY. Here, humanity is isolated to distant settlements by the creatures of Grimm, marauding shadowy monsters whose sole purpose for existing seems to be destroying humanity. Mankind has survived this long only thanks to supernatural crystals called Dust, which has boosted their technology to a more-or-less modern level, only with elementally charged guns and an alternative to the internet. Most animals besides the Grimm seem pretty similar to real life ones, though humans have a Little Bit Beastly subspecies called Faunus, for all your minority metaphor needs, and every person has the potential for Aura, which functions as a personal forcefield/health bar and can develop with training into a unique superpower called a Semblance. Then there's the matter of the Four Maidens, a legend regarding four young women passing down altogether magical powers.

    Western Animation 
  • Adventure Time:
    • Zig-zagged; Ooo really seems like this, having almost no connections to our world and a completely different geology (for one thing the planet is missing a chunk of its mass). Except that we later learn that Ooo is Earth All Along, thousands of years after the "Mushroom War", a disastrous thermonuclear event. The main character is the only human seen because he's one of the Last of His Kind except he isn't; humanity turns out to have been on a different continent. The reason the world is so different is that said apocalypse caused magic to return to Earth, fundamentally changing and mutating all surviving life. However, this "pre-magic" Earth still had long-lost magical relics such as the Ice King's crown, and a toddler Marceline was running around with her half-demon blood, so it can be said that Ooo is more like the post-apocalypse of a world that was once very Earth-like.
    • Pendleton Ward has stated that Ooo was originally conceived as a straight example, but then ended up being post-apocalyptic instead when the episode with the unfrozen businessmen was written.
  • The Avatar: The Last Airbender canon takes place in one. While it certainly has elements of various Asian and First Nation cultures, it's certainly a very separate fantasy world. For example, almost all the animals are Mix-and-Match Critters, a significant proportion of the population is able to control one of the four elements, it has their own path of technology advancement (which includes the invention of steam-powered jet skis before the hot air balloon, for example), and is linked to a Spirit World. One of the most important spirits is the Avatar, who is continually reincarnated into a human body, and is close to a god in terms of power and respect. Further development was seen in The Legend of Korra, where further shifting in politics, technology and metaphysics was seen.
  • The world in The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack shows some elements of this, the most notable example being in the episode, "Lost at Land," in which we get to see Flapjack's world from space.
  • Equestria from My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic is a world all its own and differs from our reality in several significant ways (such as all forces of nature being controlled by magic ponies), in contrast to G1 My Little Pony where humans from Earth visit Dream Valley. Averted in the My Little Pony: Equestria Girls spin-off series, where we follow the characters' human high school counterparts, where the only difference between it and our world was the Amazing Technicolor Population. Well, at least before it's discovered that an ancient Equestrian scholar used it as a dumping ground for some of their more problematic villains and artifacts, and magic started leaking through from the mirror portal in spades.
  • Ninjago is set on an Earth-like planet, but there are only two giant islands on it (that used to be one) with some smaller ones, and no continents to be seen. Most people in this world don't even seem to know what the word "earth" means, which is constantly lampshaded.

Alternative Title(s): Conworld

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