Any world needs some lore to create a sense of logic and structure as well as make things believable. 

This is very much the first draft for the backstory and lore of Wicked Island. I would also like to point out that I really hate lore dumps in games and in no way will I try to present the lore in a similar way in the game.

As far as possible I will use show, don't tell and the lore will be very much optional for the player as it's not everyone's cup of tea.

With that out of the way, here are my ideas for building the world so far.

Feedback is very much appreciated and don't be afraid to be honest as that is the only way for me to improve, both personally but more importantly for the game to become better.

The world

The golden age of humanity has come to an end, the great war has ravaged the once majestic cities of the empire and left many in ruins.

Age old enemies of the Empire are emerging from their centuries of exile while the battle between demons and dragons rages forever on.

Half a century has passed since the butchery of the radiant dragon. A terrible error on the account of the shadow realm and the demons ruling it. They had their artifact and the invasion could begin. But they made an enemy greater than they could ever have imagined.

The factions

Demons

Historically demons only existed in stories to scare children and folk tales. Their presence in the human world was extremely rare and mostly consisted of illegal experimentation by mage.

The demons had strict rules forbidding them from entering the human realm and any demon who defied this rule was considered an outcast and could never come back to the shadow realm.

However internal conflicts changed this. When the Millenia old ruler unexpectedly died from a fall the shadow realms fell into chaos.

Their society had always relied on a strong ruler and the power vacuum tore at the very fabric of their society.

The rules for breeding new demons had always been strictly controlled to keep the overall population constant. Hundreds of years could pass before a new demon was allowed to be born.

This had always been the responsibility of the ruler and without a ruler the demon population exploded.

Thousands of demons came into existence in a matter of months and the new generation had no notions of the rules that had governed their way of life for eternity.

They only respected a shown of force and factions soon formed with divergent interests.

Civil War broke out and a new leader emerged victorious. His primary objective was the expansion of the demon race. Too long had demons limited their own potential in the name of population control.

But demons could not pass from their realm without outside help.

Historically the only way to enter the human realm had been mage conducting summoning's against the demons will.

This only happened rarely and the demons passing to the other side was considered lost.

However the new ruler devised a plan. Every demon in existence was given a playbook how to handle being summoned. They studied the human way of life from books of old. What weaknesses could be exploited and how they could be manipulated.

A few summons happened but they never heard back from the abducted. Until they did.

A powerful human, an emperor even, was approaching the end of his life span. As many humans before him he sought a way to cheat death and had no scruples reaching into the shadow realms for help.

After creating an elaborate sequence of tasks to be performed by the emperor they finally managed to get more demons through an open up a permanent communication channel.

The demon tasked with the emperor remained at his side while the other who had passed over begun preparing for a bigger expansion.

More and more demons passed through and the humans started to notice strange things happening.

To hide their presence as long as possible the demons captured human females and breed them with animals. They created a race of servants they could send out into the world without drawing attention to themselves.

Thousands of demons begun passing into the human realm. But they were still confined to the darker places of the world to avoid discovery.

While humans had noticed their presence the emperor where under demon influence and prevented from acting.

However to fully open the flood gates between their world's they needed an artifact of immense power.

To achieve this they set out to collect the head of a powerful dragon.

After some searching they found the lair of a legendary golden dragon.

They set a trap for the dragon and managed, with some difficulty, to kill it.

With the artifact they opened a permanent portal between their world's.

But they had not considered the response from the rest of the dragons. During their foray into the human realm they had never come across dragons. Now they appeared seemingly out of nowhere and their vengeance was a force they had not expected.

A full out war broke out between dragons and demons. Human cities where squashed like anthills beneath the hoofs of heavy cavalry.

Dragons

Not much is known of the dragons except for their immense power and long lifespan.

Few humans have been known to communicate directly with dragons. Their interests rarely concern the world outside their own and their natural habitats are mountain tops all but impossible to reach.

Drakes are the historical ambassador between dragons and humans. In ancient times humans presented concubines to be seeded by dragons. Their offspring where the first Drakes. The bridge between the world of dragons and humans. But as human ambition expanded at the expense of other races the dragons withdrew their support and the Drakes disappeared from the human world until the war began.

Humans

At first a race of hunters and gatherers that took only what nature could provide and lived in relative peace with the other races.

But as time went on they began cultivating the lands. Clans grew in to villages that grew in to towns. Land became valuable and the other less ambitious races where gradually pushed further and further from the most fertile lands.

Citystates began competing for land and a multitude of wars broke out. At this time the Trollkind had been pushed far from their original homelands. After several bad harvests starvation ravaged through Trollkind and humanity alike.

It was the start of the great uprising, when Trollkind all across the lands united to push back humanity and regain their homelands.

Divided humanity stood little chance against the physically superior and highly motivated Trollkind. But nothing unites as an external threat. A coalition was formed unanimously to push back against the perceived injustice. Over time the bonds forged grew strong enough to last and once the invaders had been defeated and precautions devised humanity stood united as a single unit. This was the birth of the Empire and the beginning of the golden age.

For centuries the Empire stood, erecting great cities and connecting them by both sea and land.

Trollkind

I'm ancient times they lived side by side with humans. Mostly their interactions where through trade but it was not unheard of with families of both humans and Trollkind.

But as humanity's ambitions grew the mostly content Trollkind where pushed further and further from the fertile lands.

Hunger started plaguing them and after several cold seasons their desperation drove them to attack the humans.

They retook their old territories and sought peace with humans. But generations had passed and the humans saw the lands as theirs and the attack as an unprovoked aggression.

This lead to the great war where humanity United under a single flag that soon became the empire.

At first their superior physique played to the Trollkinds advantage but the humans soon perfected the art of war and organised massive armies.

With superior strategy an co-ordination the humans drove them out of their lands high into the mountains.

They set up castles and fortifications at every major outpost and patrolled every road between them. At first the Trollkin attempted to raid for supplies but the human response was always swift and brutal. Over time they abandoned their ambitions on the human lands and secluded into the inhospitable mountains. Their sense of injustice became part of their society and a deep hatred for humans defined their very existence.

Werebeasts

There had always been stories of beast half human and half animal. Only rarely did they pass over from folktales to disrupt reality. Most where the unhappy accidents of cross species mating's.

That was until the demons begun appearing. Reluctant to make their presence known they abducted human females of fertile age and breed them with feral beasts.

The offspring became their servants. While noticeable they would not be directly connected the demonic presence.

Werebeasts come in all shapes and forms. Their intelligence is limited but their obedience and loyalty to their masters unbreakable. Their primary instincts are reproduction and slaughter. This makes their use for demons limited to army building and general disruption.

Wildlings

A few humans remained nomadic when their brethren started settling the lands. At first this presented an opportunity for trade and exchange of ideas. But soon the lands they hunted where sought for cultivation and the ones that refused assimilation or slavery where pushed further and further into the mountains.

Sharing their fate as well as their common enemy with the Trollkind, bonds were forged and they lived in mutual respect.

While not common it was not unheard of with cross breeding and over time the wildlings grew in both size, strength and lifespan, their blood infused with that of Trollkind.

The Island (please note, not the demo Island)

Backstory

Once the trade hub of the empire, now only ruins remain. In the 50 years since the dragon war begun the island was the first of its many victims and was raised to the ground.

Most humans that survived abandoned the island and the few that remained has lived a hard life ever since.

The dragons left guardians to look out for demons appearing again.

At the same time the demons lurk deep in old dungeons that were once part of the great city.

Trollkind soon arrived when they heard of the empires demise. A clan of wildlings followed with them.

The demons breed whatever humans they find with wild beasts to strengthen their numbers.

Locations

One ruined port with massive old docks where the ships arrived. Now full of Trollkind who reside in the ruins.

Next to the port what remains of a once large city.

A few smaller outposts fallen into ruin.

A large cave where the wolf queen lives with her beasts. Somewhere deep in a forest.

A large village where the Trollkind has set up camp.

One smaller village nearby where wildlings live.

Several small outpost camps where Trollkind watch for intruders.

Forests full of boars and wolves (and werebeast-forms of both).

Highland full of bears and goats.

Dungeons full of demons.

The dragon island with 3 guardian dragons and several Drakes.

The small village with the remaining humans.

The fishing hut with the small bridge where the players starts out.

The desert separating the dragon island from the rest. Mutated insects, the work of demons, live here, attacking anything they see.

Conflict still rages across the island between the various factions.

The player

Stranded on a strange island after her ship sank at sea during a storm.

She was on the last ship to leave the now ruined capitol.

Her backstory a blank slate for the player to imagine.

If you have read this far, congratulations! And I hope you don't feel you completely wasted whatever amount of time was put in to reading it.

It is rough, it is probably breaking all kinds of rules of writing. But it's something.