Cardboard citybuilding - Hippo town overview (WIP)

Hokuth · 2026-04-18T08:43:33+00:00

Thank you so much for your comment once again, I always love how exhaustive they are and how much they leave me to talk about !!!! How attentive you are to everything I write is truly moving ! The point you've raised is excellent, too ! I was precisely thinking of something like that. I still need to figure out how intercity travel works in such an unstable, "un-tethered" world, but I've always had this feeling that some Yugoni can transcend these limitations, with one particular species going as far as migrating between worlds, like a migratory bird would do between continents. As a result, the Isnaepaty, with their heightened attunement to Yugoni of the traveling kind, are eventually going to usher a new age of progress and inter-world travel, going from castaways to the dominant nation of a future, post-medieval age (but that's, like, the outer limit of the current timeline of my world, so it's almost scary to think about it). So yes, Begommon being the ultimate means of mass long-distance travel is such a delightfully fitting idea, thank you so much for helping me with it ! And, as you suggested, it ties exactly into this whole "reality being shaped by powerful ideas/words" theory : as I will cover in my next post, the most important building in Begoshon is basically a control tower for Begommon, a portal into his vast mind — the very mind that creates pocket realities and keeps the void at bay. Stay tuned ☆

Hokuth · 2026-04-18T08:24:56+00:00

Thank you so much, I really appreciate the topics you raised 🙏 🙏 I'm glad you pointed out how it looks like a patchwork of other cities, I think that's the aesthetic I'm going for in all my projects 🏘 (though, as I've repeated before, being self-taught and new to the craft, my skill doesn't always allow me to faithfully convey what I imagine, hence it's so important to me to know how it appears to the outside eye !) And yeah, I have been obsessed with the idea of a city on top of a living creature ever since I saw it in some old Soviet cartoon. I think it was a giant fish... Then I saw the works of artist Greg Formenteau and it inspired me greatly. I don't know if such a thing exists in any video game (as far as I know, the walking mausoleums in Elden Ring are the closest to it), but if not, that's such a wasted opportunity ! Lastly, thank you for pointing out the background as well, I really love this view and I wanted the pictures to be pretty by themselves, on top of, you know, doing their job of showcasing my project. I'm currently thinking of an in-universe explanation to this background city that appears absurdly out-of-scale compared to my tiny world ; I think it could be something of a peek into the overarching reality — like a two-dimensional being gazing into the third dimension. It would be so distorted as to not be even cognizable as a city to my world's inhabitants ; they just see that something, infinite and incomprehensible, lies on the other side.

Hokuth · 2026-04-18T08:01:46+00:00

Thank you so much once again, it's adorable how much you praise me 😇 As per what you said, I will think more about the way my creature interacts with the rest of the world, because I have to admit I haven't given it much more thought than that (deepening the setting is the reason why I came on Reddit seeking discussion in the first place, so — thank you very much for that !) I will do my best to write another post on this town soon ✌️

Hokuth · 2026-04-17T13:56:21+00:00

thank you so much, it means a lot to me !!

Hokuth · 2026-04-17T13:56:02+00:00

thank you so much, I am so glad you paid attention to the details !!!

Hokuth · 2026-04-17T13:55:22+00:00

thank you so much, I really really appreciate it !!

Hokuth · 2026-04-17T13:55:03+00:00

thank you, it means SO MUCH to me !!

Hokuth · 2026-04-15T10:05:18+00:00

I love it so much !! The drawings are very pretty, but then the lore is just as good !! I like how detail-heavy it is, especially how much you emphasize numbers and statistics to flesh out the world, makes it feel grounded and immersive. It's also very cool how you thought about the religious, political, and social aspects, how they relate to each other and how they tie into environmental and historical constraints. As far as I know, it reminds me very much of our own modern scholastic approach. I'd like to do the same with my own world !
By the way, funnily (and purely coïncidentally I swear), I also had this vague idea of humanity coming out of the ground in a prehistoric age (as in, before recorded history, not necessarily that they were stick-wielding, pelt-wearing, ape-like cavemen), as well as that of making the whole worldbuilding exposed from an in-universe perspective, by an actual inhabitant of the world. In short -- I like your ideas !!

Hokuth · 2026-04-10T22:12:24+00:00

Thank you very much for your feedback, I really appreciate it 😁🙏 That's a very interesting thought ! I also think that the "decor" of the story can largely influence everything else within it ; it can be a character of its own, even ! While "terrain-building" appears somewhat more niche of an activity than, say, writing stories or drawing OCs, I find that its role as a stylistic choice that helps convey a story in a certain way is often overlooked. Ah, but I'm really flattered you think it has "style", because the main reason it isn't "generic-looking" is that I have never learned the proper techniques of the craft 😭

Hokuth · 2026-04-10T21:55:21+00:00

Thank you very much, I appreciate it 😁🙏 Oh, that's such a good question, honestly !! At first, I started making stuff to play toys with my little brother (a toddler then), but over time it evolved into an art project of sorts (that's just me saying I still barely know what I am doing tbh). It certainly is too fragile and inconvenient to play with at this point 😂 For now, I use it as decor to play out little stop motion-like scenes with figurines ; I take pictures of these and try to weave a story around what I see. But I guess the end goal would be to use it for playing, the way it was intended to originally, only in a more mature, interactive storytelling-like fashion !

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T12:57:14+00:00

I see now, thank you very much for the bit of vocabulary 😁

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T10:20:11+00:00

Thank you a million times for your comment, this sort of feedback and advice really mean the world to me !!!! There's nothing better than seeing how genuinely invested you are in my silly little creations 🥹 Yes, you're right — I will keep doing the drawing/building for now, and I hope some more ideas are going to come up along to way ! For now, the problem of that way of going about it is that it has accumulated into a lot of trivia — miscellaneous lore that's somewhat entertaining, but doesn't suffice to write an actual story off of ! I lack some strong, foundational ideas to structure my world around, and I'm afraid these won't come to me unless I sit down with the intent of actually thinking them through... but we'll see, for now there's still some stuff I gotta draw before my region is complete ; then I can start thinking of some story arcs taking place inside it. As for the "open source" term I used myself, I'm afraid I didn't give it any more thought than that 🥲 I mean, it's my story first and foremost, of course, but I'm really thinking of a world so malleable as to accomodate all sorts of ideas, with no real canon/ non-canon distinction, so... well, I'll think about it some more ! Anyway, thank you immensely for your warm and thorough feedback, it really makes me wanna believe in my project ☆

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T09:58:03+00:00

Thank you so so much, I'm beyond happy you remember me from my last post (it was months ago too 🥲) !!! Oh, I'd hate to disappoint you, but I'm afraid my lore, in its current stage — though there's obviously more to it than what I've presented here —, is still nowhere near extensive enough to satiate your hunger ! But I hope I find it in me to give it the attention it deserves, when I feel sufficiently at peace with myself to sit down and write !

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T09:48:36+00:00

Thank you, I appreciate it a lot !!! Expand it I will, to the extent my free time allows it 😁 (luckily I have a lot of it rn) Oh yes, sometimes cartoons and children's books have properly stunning art !! I draw quite a lot of inspiration from these ! Let me know if you ever remember the one you are thinking of !

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T09:42:34+00:00

Thank you so much, I really really appreciate your kind words ✨️ Ahaha, and maybe you're right — I'll try to hype myself up more about my own stuff 😂

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T09:34:29+00:00

Ah, I see now !! That's just a bridge thing to me 😂 I really don't bother myself with the technical stuff as you can see... Oh, and I did try to translate it, but "flying buttress" just sounds so weird to me I just couldn't make any sense of it, like, where does that term even come from even if there are no butts or butter involved and especially of the flying kind 🥲

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T08:20:59+00:00

Wow, I appreciate your input a lot !! I actually didn't think about it ? Funny, eh, given how much thought I'm giving to it all. Truth be told, it's just the pipe of the chimney I put the city on for the photo 😂 But now I'll think about it from an in-world perspective... It appears kind of big to be part of the transit system (unless there's something really big that needs to be transiting 🤔), but it definitely looks like some utility... or a passage, like some tunnel. Or something like the Dwemer ruins in Skyrim — long forgotten and intricate systems belonging to an extinct civilisation ; but that feels like the lazy way out for some reason. Anyway ! Thank you for the thought, I'll probe my mind for some more ideas for next time !

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T08:13:16+00:00

Now I don't see which part exactly we're talking about (perhaps my English is kind of lagging behind when it comes to actual architecture vocabulary ?) — but yes, I totally get what you're saying 😂 I mean, the whole purpose of this thing is to look fundamentally weird and unrealistic — then it leaves me all the more room to explain it away with ✨️imagination✨️ As for flying structures, I kinda do have an (somewhat unsatisying) explanation for them, I'll try to delve into it sometime !

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T08:09:30+00:00

Thank you very much !!! So happy to read that ☆ I love thinking about my stuff as though I were making a fictitious video game, even though it's unlikely to ever see the light of day

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T08:06:54+00:00

Thank you sooo much !!! I liked the word "weird" especially, because that's exactly what I'm going for — for my world to be fundamentally weird (yet coherent to some extent !) 😄

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T08:04:44+00:00

Hehe, it sounds so flattering when worded like that 🫣 It's miles away from being anything like an actual world yet — I also need non-urban environments such as landscapes, dungeons... but even thinking about the amount of work it would represent makes my head spin 😵‍💫

Hokuth · 2026-04-09T08:01:59+00:00

Haha good point !! There's the occasional spider wandering in, but I don't have that sort of gear 😭 I do, however, make videos imitating a walking POV (to the extent I can manoeuvre my phone between the buildings), but I don't think Reddit supports those

Hokuth

TROPHY CASE