I used to play role playing games and still have several game books. My most recent purchase is volume one of the sixth edition of the Hero System. From a while ago, I also have a d20 3.5 Player's Handbook. To entertain myself I've looked at converting a few 3.5 spells into hero system powers. For the most part, I've found doing so workable if you don't ask for 100% compatibility.
Back to writing. One thing that makes many game worlds seem a bit silly is the extent of magic powers characters develop and the fact that having so many spells and powers make's it difficult to give a game world a coherent flavor. Like in a superhero comic book, everything is true. Looking at monsters, rather than spells, you have dragons and gryphons which are inspired by heraldry and legend but you also have shambling mounds which have a much more twentieth century biological feel. Looking at character classes you have enough combinations of special powers to make one's head spin.
In writing fantasy or science fiction you really should avoid a lot of that. While you can have strange things that don't tie into anything else in the world in a way the reader or the characters understand, you need to keep control of such aspects of your world or risk it descending into incoherence. If your characters have magic powers, there should be a sense that limits to magic exist. Even if there are no real rules and a powerful adept could warp reality in any way he or she chooses, there should be interesting dangers and consequences involved in using powerful magic. You see this in the Lord of the Rings where both the Ring itself and the Palantiri had problems associated with there use.
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