West World Tech

These drawings represent the idea I had in mind for the tech of West World.  One of my original notations before I began seriously writing in 1998 is that I wanted "Jules Verne technology."  Obviously, I imagined a cross between western and sci-fi.  Recently, I discovered a genre that encapsulates this look - steampunk.  The drawings of guns are all my work, but not necessarily my design, so to speak.  I actually searched the Internet for images of "Steampunk guns," and then combined the bits and pieces that I liked into something that would fit the West World universe.  A lot of inspiration for the guns comes from the artwork of Matt Kohr for his "Cowboy Cave" project (www.mattkohr.com).  Most of the other inspiration comes from actual steampunk props that various people have made.  The most significant change that I made is the inclusion of a revolver chamber for the guns that fire "laser bullets" in the West World story.

As far as the starships are concerned, when I first started writing, I was trying to think of a technology that would really make my story unique from others out there.  For example, Star Wars has the lightsaber, Star Trek has the transporter, and so on.  Since my story evokes the past, I thought it would be really cool for my starships to have solar sails.  Especially since the story revolves around a lack of natural resources, I thought it would be unique to present these huge vessels as needing a secondary power supply.  That was in 1998.  Since then, a movie called Treasure Planet came out that had starships with solar sails, Count Dooku's ship - the Solar Sailer - made about a 30 second appearance in Star Wars: Episode II, and now we have "hybrid" cars that combine two power sources.  The drawings that follow represent basic vehicle classes; in other words, not all Auri-Entel starships are going to look like the one on this page, but they would share commonalities.