Greetings all!

A few months ago there was a thread about creating comic book/superhero universes, and not-too recently before that I had started thinking again about the characters and world that I had first started creating about .... twenty-five years ago.

So, whilst I was thinking about which characters I was going to keep in my new ideas, as well as having a few dreams that gave me a few new characters as well as plot points, I got stuck thinking about, "what really makes these people tick?" I started thinking about maybe creating some kind of character sheets to help define them aside from a "OK, you're supposed to be a 'good guy' and your supposed to be the 'bad guy'. Why? Because I say so" mentality. Although I will admit, I have been thinking more about the 'good guys' than anything else.

My thinking is, does anyone have ideas on how I should go about fleshing out my old and new characters in ways that could make them more realistic than just slapping labels on them? I'm.... a little out of touch with how people 'really work' despite how much I have to deal with people on a day-to-day basis. I have lots of questions about how to try to make these chars tick that I can't put into context right now. However, I'm sure that this could also help me with other chars in completely different story ideas that I seem to keep creating but fall apart with..

I also have a question concerning the believability of the modern state of this world that I've created. In this world's recent past (almost twenty years before the current day) there was a big, world changing incident that occurred indirectly because of the existence of super-powered humans and extraterrestrials. The incident was immediately covered up by a secret group within various world governments (that secretly replaced an Illuminati-esque group that came before it) and with the use of high-power telepaths, records altering, media coercion, and possibly reality altering chemicals made the vast majority of the worlds population forget that super-powered humans and extraterrestrials ever existed, and those who do remember are labeled as loonies. However, a new generation of super-powered people are starting to come of age and discover their abilities, while most of the older generation have been in hiding, but are starting to feel pressured to come forward again, even though technically their all wanted fugitives by the secret group.

Does that seem slightly believable or a little too far out there?

I feel like adding a tl;dr down here, but it'd probably be too long winded. Eh, I'll give it a try- please help a geek if for no purpose other than creating in his own mind a believable world with impossible characters that don't seem like a bunch of walking clichés or carbon copies of each other. Thank you.

Well (and I don't know if this will be helpful to you), I always like to write backgrounds for my Elderscrolls characters. Most of the time I just do this in my head but for some I had a lot of fun committing them to written word. Knowing where a character came from and what they've been through goes a long way into understanding the character. I usually include things like who their parents are/were, where the were born, and include any defining events in the characters early development. Hopefully this will help you. If not, well, it must be said I don't make my money writing stories, lol

Ohh, that was my thread. Although after that i have done nearly nothing on any of my universes/worlds (i have a fantasy world/ a superhero world/ and a sci-fi world).

The one thing i have done is to start making the backstory of one of the villains, an attempt to explain how he got his powers and how his moral system/beliefs have been skewed to such a degree that he does evil stuff. My only advice is to think of a scenario (death of someone they love/ getting ill/ being robbed/ getting a low mark in a test) and try to imagine how they would react.

For example my villain was badly injured and was near death, but doctors did an experiment on him that saved him, but also gave him his powers, without him realising. Later, he is struggling to deal with these scary new powers, but also trying to fund raise to help keep the hospital open (threatened with closure). He then discovers that doctors in hospital were responsible for his powers and he feels betrayed, as the powers have had a huge negative impact on his life. Thus a villain is born.