Creating the fictional background for a game world isn't significantly different from creating a background for fiction.

Sometimes the reader will decide something else than the author's intent; this is certainly true of attempts to empirically decipher reality.

Observe, don't imitate.

There are readers who want every point to be clearly and unambiguously set forth, and there are those who want to pry ideas and meanings out for themselves.

There are people who believe in an absolutely transparent prose; with every respect for clarity of expression, I don't.

Well, it's an adventure story, and a Bildungsroman, of course, but there was also the intention to describe a culture that had been seen in rather narrow terms.

We're not lost. We're locationally challenged