When creating a character, I tend to prioritize the backstory first. History defines and develops its future after all, right? Starting off with the past definitely gives you the convenience—if you already know what possibly affected your character from before, the environment they grew up with, how they were nurtured by the people around them and many more, everything else will come to you naturally and easily.
For example—if your character grew up with all of the attention from the people that surround them, you will immediately know that they will likely be somewhere along the lines of being self-centered or egoistic. Backstories really affect everything, so that’s why—if ever someone will ask me for help—I always keep in mind to help them with the backstory so that they will be able to handle the rest of the details themselves.
When creating a character, do you also prioritize making the biography?
What are some tips you can give others when making a biography?
So when forming a backstory, I don’t immediately write paragraphs right off the bat… well, I do that, but I often rewrite everything so it won’t always be the final. I always jot down every ideas that I have even if they won’t connect to each other because that will be something I know I can take care of later. There’s also this tendency where I begin with the character’s family and also try to at least give a bit of a life to them. I decide what their life is like, how their relationship is with each other, as well as what they do for a living. I also decide how it will affect them and make it make sense and realistic. You can’t say your character grew up in an abusive family and grew up happily, right? Also, researching about things you aren’t sure about will always help you with everything!
After organizing the thoughts and ideas, I will then proceed to organize them into paragraphs andand make sure the events follow each other. When writing the biography, you don’t need to write everything that happened in their life. You can just write whatever you think were the most important events in your character’s life, and you can just take notes of the other details on a document.
It’s usually my highest priority after name and fc, I almost always make the bio before the personality because a character’s backstory can change a whole lot about their personality.
When making the character I don’t priortize making the backstory first, I actually search for FCs and when I find one that gives me an idea of a personality I pick it, pick the name that fits the FC and since the personality is already chosen since seeing the FC for the first time, I just make up a backstory that would make that character the way they are personality wise, then I write the personality and add a few points to not keep it too short and I finish anything else that the character may need
I think backstories are fundamental. It helps you make it easier for yourself in how your character reacts in situations and to people. Someone who had a loving family, they will react to strangers than when they have been abandoned and betrayed
Yeah! Backstories really help shape what kind of person they are today. But at the same time, you think of ways they’d react to scenarios while writing backstories, so that helps with the personality too.
I’m pretty bad at writing them-
Just start writing it, inspiration won’t just come out of nowhere like I always hope it would
