Poll Best World-Building: Star Wars vs One Piece vs Harry Potter vs Game of Thrones (58 votes)
Which story do you think has the best world building?
Star Wars
One Piece
Harry Potter
Game of Thrones
Which story do you think has the best world building?
Star Wars
One Piece
Harry Potter
Game of Thrones
One Piece edges out Star Wars IMO with both being better than the other in some regard but OP being superior overall: the sheer grand interstellar scale of Star Wars eclipses OP, however One Piece islands each have their own character as Oda usually takes the time to give a backstory, explain the geography and the history of the people living there. The narrative of SW may not be limited to one planet but the planets themselves I’d argue aren’t as interesting as some islands in OP with many being basic in layout and recycled- Kamino a water planet, Tatooine a desert planet, Jaku another desert planet, Mustafar a volcano planet etc the depth doesn’t go more than the basic geography/general culture info. Whereas in One Piece islands are in the sky, cities on the backs of walking elephants and the lore is intertwined with the location ala Zou and the poneglyphs. Additionally the layout of particular islands is fleshed out when Oda draws the maps, that way we know what is where, the distances in relation to eachother and where the characters are/need to be as seen for Dressrosa, Totland and Wano.
While the planets in Star Wars are simply planets, the islands in OP feel like characters themselves, the rich lore of Wano for example. overshadows any backstory given for a planet in SW taking into account the world itself and its people.
GoT/ASoIAF comes in third. The multi-stranded narrative offers an insight into various locations where we have a good understanding of the struggles of each group of people. The size of settlements for the most part have a well realised sense of scale where we know where things are in relation to eachother- the opening credits do a superb job. But unfortunately, the story sticking to two continents- with only half of Essos being seen on the screen and books- makes its world building lesser overall compared to OP and SW.
Harry Potter’s world building while good, doesn’t even come close to the other three. The bulk of the story takes place in a castle, with more exotic locations like Albania, Romania etc only getting mentioned and the story never taking us there. Hogwarts, Surrey and London make up the majority of seven books with slight departures on occasion like the World Cup but this isn’t nearly good enough. The information the reader/watcher gets is wizard heavy with the other races either only having a cursory overview or a particular representative (Dobby for elves) being an individual to represent the group’s identity. Compare this to the Fishmen in One Piece for example where we have a clear picture of the struggles they face, the discrimination, the slavery, the fight for liberty and freedom with Fishman like Tiger Fisher etc yes we know the House Elves are basically slaves but we don’t get much more depth and it doesn’t help that we only get one character who’s eyes we see most of the story from thereby giving a limited perspective. The addition of Newt and his Beasts helps matters but that still doesn’t move HP from clear last place.
One Piece due to the fact it’s managed by a sole creator who grinds his ass every week in unhealthy fashion.
Star Wars
I picked One Piece largely because a lot of the world building in Star Wars was devalued when the Expanded Universe was pushed out following Disney taking over LucasArts. The new canon is a hodgepodge of old and new, but it’s also a bit of a guessing game on the details. For example, Thrawn is in current canon via Star Wars Rebels, but does that mean the Thrawn trilogy happened? Mara Jade was never named in the new movies, but the “Emperor’s Hand” has been mentioned in the new media. It’s easier to tell what’s canon and not in One Piece.
@eredin12: All the other stories in the poll are written by a single author, whereas Star Wars has been written by multiple. It would be fairer to use George Lucas' films in this comparison, but even if you include the EU, Harry Potter and One Piece would still fare well against it in terms of world-building.
ASoIaF definitely has the best world building. IMO, the quality of lore/world building has nothing really to do with the length of the series (to a degree), amount of characters, narrative strands, and so on. It's more dependent on the depth and complexity of the lore and world the author built. GRRM might not have the biggest world from these options, nor does he touch on his world as expansively as One Piece, for example. However, the lore for Essos, and Westeros, in particular, is so complex and intricate that it reads like history. The details, foreshadowing, continuity he includes in his books add layers to the characters, world, and story that simply isn't matched by OP, SW, or HP.
Lord of the Rings should be on this list.
That series is more world building than it is story lol
Lord of the Rings should be on this list.
That series is more world building than it is story lol
^ Mainly because Tolkien wrote the story only as an excuse to show off the world
Also what does OP mean by best?
None of the above are perfect. But if we are talking about which keeps literary verisimilitude (internal logic) then Game of Thrones.
If we are talking which is the most imaginative, then One Piece.
If we are talking most successful, then its Star Wars and Harry Potter (depending on Film/ Book sales)
In terms of size Star Wars worldbuilding is 2nd to none here. I will go with Star Wars if we include EU.
In terms of my favourite, One piece is due to the large amount of creative and wacky/ magical shit like devil fruits which is balanced and contrasted with a more hard-magic system like Haki.
Game of thrones has amazing lore but is ruined by S7 and S8. I have not read a book though.
Harry Potter has horrific worldbuilding on a technical level. The magic system is ridiculously soft and that made a shit ton of plotholes throughout the story which are unexplained and are left to the reader's interpretation. For example, why don't wizards always use the disillusionment charm on themselves? Why on earth didn't voldemort use the Fidelius charm on some of his Horcruxes? The magic is way too soft. There are so many broken spells but that creates so many plot holes. The magic is not limited in a reasonable way. Nevertheless it is very magical and fun.
@tomtheawesome123: Yeah, Star Wars' space setting gives it a lot more to work with in terms of the sheer number of locations, species, and so on.
I like the way One Piece introduces its world, and its power system. It's easily the most creative one out of all of them.
Harry Potter kinda has a soft spot in my heart, as they were my favourite books as a kid. Something about the world was so "magical" and it was really immersive.
Star Wars, but that's more of cheat to me. Lucas himself only wrote a fraction of the overall Star Wars lore we see today. He set the foundation, but the other creators have expanded on it since then. And because of that, it has a history of continuity errors.
I would say it's a toss up between Oda and Martin for the best for me, as they for the most part crafted their entire mythology on their own, and because of how expansive their worlds are. I would give the edge to Martin though. He does deeper dives into the history, lore, political structure, religion and sociology of his world compared to One Piece imo. One Piece being a battle shonen manga limits it's story telling compared to the A Song of ice and Fire novels. Martin tends to flesh out his world and characters more than Oda.
The Harry Potter universe crumbles on itself when you think about it too hard. A lot of that lore doesn't make sense. I enjoy the series, but it's the weakest one here.
@thatduderox: Yeah, I feel like One Piece has a lot of unexplored elements, but the story isn't ending soon so hopefully that will change. Of course Oda can't include everything though. He once stated that if he included everything he wanted to in the One Piece story, he'd never be able to finish it. Also being a manga artist, it's hard to expand a lot on your world, as the story releases on a week-by-week basis. Props to Oda though.
I'm not seeing how this is fair seeing how the others are at best one TV show or several movies while Star Wars is several movies countless TV shows and novels, comics, game, etc. etc. Star wars has a far larger Medium to develop an entire galaxy full of unique planet which makes their world building far superior compared to the others.
One Piece is great at power levels but in terms of worldbuilding they're a bit lacking. I think it's an even split between them and GoT who both has decent worldbuilding
HP worldbuilding sucks and is incredibly story/plot based
SW >>> OP=> GoT>>>>>>>HP
From what i know of this respective series it's aSoIF, then OP, the Star Wars and HP is as i said before horrible.
I think many people here are focusing on the size of the verse and not in the quality of it, how deep each part of this are, how it helps foreshadow what is coming in the plot etc etc
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