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Are the second world elements prominent enough that they influence the development of the character and plot?
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Oct 21, 2019 00:50
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Doctor Zero posted:does it matter? For pitching it to an agent, yes, very much so. Megazver posted:Are the second world elements prominent enough that they influence the development of the character and plot? The war that occurred about a decade prior had a major influence on the characters and how they react as they're confronted by the shapeshifter in the tunnels, as there's still lingering mistrust between the two factions and both sides are represented in the rescue crew.
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Oct 21, 2019 01:09
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Nae! posted:I'm about four chapters deep into my next novel and I'm worried it doesn't fit easily in a single genre. Where would you guys classify something like this? (forgive the hatchet-job of a summary, I haven't written a query draft yet so this is on the fly) Going with horror is limiting, though if there's an air of who could the other be, you'd have a solid stab at Mystery/Suspense. You're so close to urban fantasy but it's not contemporary enough. I'd say just stick to fantasy unless the publisher/agent you're aiming for has a similar but different genre they're specifically looking for that you can call it instead. Doctor Zero posted:does it matter?
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Oct 21, 2019 01:12
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sounds vaguely like "steampunk thriller"
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Oct 21, 2019 02:32
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So if I wanted to share the new first chapter of a new version of Lightning Brigade, should I res my original thread, or make a new one? I'm thinking about making a new one since this will be divorced from the original. It's more to get feedback and show my progress as a writer than anything. Or since I'm planning on just sharing the first chapter, should I just do it here?
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Oct 24, 2019 05:08
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Original thread, probably. Sorry I started reading then stopped, I'll get back to it.
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Oct 24, 2019 05:41
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Oh what you have is a different thing, don't worry. Because why write one novel when you can write twenty
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Oct 24, 2019 05:43
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is the use of passive voice too much in this passage? It's one of the ways I'm trying to obscure things about the viewpoint character and express their depersonalization but I'm worried it might be obnoxious. https://pastebin.com/raw/zZVRnrCa
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Oct 26, 2019 03:57
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oot posted:is the use of passive voice too much in this passage? It's one of the ways I'm trying to obscure things about the viewpoint character and express their depersonalization but I'm worried it might be obnoxious. nah, it's ok, since there's not an observer to observe
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Oct 26, 2019 04:25
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oot posted:is the use of passive voice too much in this passage? It's one of the ways I'm trying to obscure things about the viewpoint character and express their depersonalization but I'm worried it might be obnoxious. That looks fine.
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Oct 26, 2019 14:32
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https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3902215 First chapter is here. I don't think I'll be sharing more unless requested.
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Oct 26, 2019 16:44
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I just read (from a Very Reputable™ tumblr post) that writing in Comic Sans improves your output. Everyone here should challenge themselves to this to see if it works. I'm already fond of comic sans for its ability to be easily read by dyslexics, but I'm gonna laugh if it also helps with creativity.
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Oct 27, 2019 22:28
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I'm doubtful of that, but I do think that using a different font can be good for seeing your writing in a new light. I tend to switch from a bland sans-serif (Arial or Calibri, depending on whether I'm starting in MS Word or Google Docs) to a more bookish serif (Garamond or Georgia, something like that) when I'm editing so the words feel a bit fresher.
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Oct 27, 2019 23:25
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Djeser posted:I'm doubtful of that, but I do think that using a different font can be good for seeing your writing in a new light. I tend to switch from a bland sans-serif (Arial or Calibri, depending on whether I'm starting in MS Word or Google Docs) to a more bookish serif (Garamond or Georgia, something like that) when I'm editing so the words feel a bit fresher. yeah that's the claim - that putting it in a different font makes it easier to read it with fresh eyes, which is a decent way of improving it.
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Oct 28, 2019 01:01
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What effect would putting my writing in wingdings have?
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Oct 28, 2019 01:02
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If no one can read your work no one can tell how bad it is. Checkmate, atheists. 
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Oct 28, 2019 01:37
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Leal posted:What effect would putting my writing in wingdings have? A visual-interpretive way to see what words you use way to often.
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Oct 28, 2019 03:37
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Exmond posted:A visual-interpretive way to see what words you use way to often. "Okay, this 'the' word's gotta fukken go. And what's the deal with 'said' anyway? Need some synonyms there."
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Oct 28, 2019 03:41
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Screaming Idiot posted:"Okay, this 'the' word's gotta fukken go. And what's the deal with 'said' anyway? Need some synonyms there." I was really expecting your probation to be for this post.
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Oct 28, 2019 20:03
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Fashionable Jorts posted:I was really expecting your probation to be for this post. lol
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Oct 28, 2019 20:15
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This is gonna be a pretty wishy-washy post for a project whose writing is still in the extremely preliminary phase, fair warning. So: I'm working on a videogame. What I'm trying to figure out, and why I'm posting here, is how best to approach the writing for the dialog. In particular, I feel like I have two main options: Serious or Silly. In other words, do I write dialog that is how a "realistic" group of people would react to absurd situations? Or do I try to make the characters ridiculous as well? My background in fiction writing is pretty much "I did a Let's Play of an RPG" (amounting to ~100k words), so I can do serviceable but not brilliant dialog. My game is going to be alt-history WWII, but there'll be ridiculous superweapons to provide boss fights, and the scale of each individual mission is also absurd even if there aren't bosses -- the player's single ship will be taking on dozens of enemy ships, singlehandedly defeating fleets, etc. To give you some sense of what I'm going for here's some examples of bosses / events I want to include:
So clearly, the events in the game are going to be absurd. Any advice? I mean, obviously, read more + write more, but beyond that? In particular, since this is a game I feel like the writing has to be in service of the gameplay to some extent. Like, it's there not just to entertain on its own merits, but also to provide context and motivation for the events of the missions. There's a big difference between a context-free "go into this zone and destroy these ships" and a "these ships killed your pet cat, hunt them down and get your revenge." Anyway, thanks for reading my ramblings.
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Oct 28, 2019 20:29
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:In particular, I feel like I have two main options: Serious or Silly. In other words, do I write dialog that is how a "realistic" group of people would react to absurd situations? Or do I try to make the characters ridiculous as well? like that one oglaf comic with the sexy dungeon
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Oct 29, 2019 08:53
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"Character development" in the sense that they give up trying to make sense of the world they're in and just roll with it? I guess that could work. I very, very dimly recall an Oglaf comic about a sexy dungeon, but as you might imagine it's not exactly easy to find.
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Oct 29, 2019 15:51
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:"Character development" in the sense that they give up trying to make sense of the world they're in and just roll with it? I guess that could work. It is literally oglaf dot com. Improve your Google fu. Anyway, my take is the best way to go is make it not serious but your characters should think that everything is fairly normal. You can make fun of things without breaking the fourth wall completely. Like the difference between Spider-Man and Deadpool (for the record I love both). Spider-Man might make fun of, say, the Vulture with puns, but Deadpool would crack Michael Keaton jokes. Unless you are just going full on slap-stick, the Deadpool angle would be tougher to pull off.
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Oct 29, 2019 23:52
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A google for oglaf sexy dungeon turns it up, it's the second hit. mildly nws I guess, it's oglaf.
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Oct 30, 2019 00:52
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I know where oglaf is, I just wasn't having nearly as much luck as sebmojo did in finding that particular strip. And yes, safe search is off. Anyway, thanks for the link, I remember that one now. Doctor Zero posted:Anyway, my take is the best way to go is make it not serious but your characters should think that everything is fairly normal. You can make fun of things without breaking the fourth wall completely. In other words, the world is ridiculous, but it's the only world they know so they're used to it? I can see how that'd work for the ship-to-ship combat (wherein your custom ship is easily capable of taking on large numbers of enemy ships that also outclass it), but the bosses are supposed to be explicitly something never seen before -- they're secretly alien technology. So it seems unreasonable for the characters to not feel that something's off when they see a flying battleship, say. I guess my concerns are that at the one end half the dialog ends up being <Captain is surprised by how excessive this new weapon is>, and at the other end it's all <lol this makes no sense>.
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Oct 30, 2019 01:19
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No, your characters should certainly still be surprised. But it would be the difference between someone in the real world seeing a massive battleship and saying “holy poo poo, they have built the biggest ship ever to float!” Or someone in the real world seeing a 50 meter high banana slug and losing their sanity. You could of course go the HitchhikersGuide route and make everything fantastical to the characters, but then if you play it silly then they might seem to not be taking anything seriously and it might feel forced. I guess at the end you could play it either way, I just prefer the style where if the world is crazy, then the characters should be a bit crazy too.
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Oct 30, 2019 02:54
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Goddammit i gotta stop reading CSPAM, my story about the giant amnesiac set in a world where undead beings composed of people devoured by living, malevolent entropy and shadow is being taken over by the main character getting into bigger and bigger problems with the world's police. Like, in the end we're gonna find out he is actually the avatar of the entropy that caused the whole mess who purposely submerged his memories after being defeated by the champion of a life goddess, and that he only returned to his evil ways not because of what he was, but because of the world making GBS threads on him and everyone he knows at every turn, but goddammit Blank stop assaulting cops. Screaming Idiot fucked around with this message at 03:09 on Oct 30, 2019 |
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Oct 30, 2019 03:05
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Doctor Zero posted:No, your characters should certainly still be surprised. But it would be the difference between someone in the real world seeing a massive battleship and saying “holy poo poo, they have built the biggest ship ever to float!” Or someone in the real world seeing a 50 meter high banana slug and losing their sanity. Ahh, gotcha. It's a matter of degree then, that makes sense. Thank you!
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Oct 30, 2019 05:03
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I'm interested in getting a couple of beta readers for an adult fantasy novel I'd like to start shopping around next year. Is this the best place to ask?
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Nov 15, 2019 20:57
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What do you mean by "adult fantasy"?
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Nov 16, 2019 06:33
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SelenicMartian posted:What do you mean by "adult fantasy"? I mean a general fantasy book that isn't aimed at young adults or middle grade
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Nov 16, 2019 06:39
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Nae! posted:I mean a general fantasy book that isn't aimed at young adults or middle grade then it's not fantasy I kid! I kid! Genre stuff is legitimate as well.
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Nov 16, 2019 06:51
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Nae! posted:I'm interested in getting a couple of beta readers for an adult fantasy novel I'd like to start shopping around next year. Is this the best place to ask? What is the format of the feedback are you expecting from your beta readers?
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Nov 16, 2019 15:12
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Stabbey_the_Clown posted:What is the format of the feedback are you expecting from your beta readers? 1) Try to read the whole book. If you get bored and bail, tell me where you bailed and why. 2) Tell me what parts worked for you, what parts didn't work for you, and what parts didn't make sense. I'm not looking for anything insane like line edits or massive changes, I'm more looking for a general sense of 'Is this story interesting enough to hold you through to the end? If yes, could anything be improved along the way? If not, where'd you get bored with it?'
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Nov 16, 2019 17:29
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I might be on board to do that for you, how long is it? Is it formatted I could read it on an iPad (not sure if I can do any markup there)?
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Nov 16, 2019 18:19
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REMEMBER SPONGE MONKEYS posted:I might be on board to do that for you, how long is it? Is it formatted I could read it on an iPad (not sure if I can do any markup there)? It's 109,000 words, so about the standard length of a published fantasy novel. I can export it in the iPad e-reader format and DM or email you the file. I am not sure if you can do any kind of note-taking or mark-up in there, either.
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Nov 16, 2019 18:22
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Can I get an invite to the TD discord? Want to get critique on two drafts I have for this weeks TD.
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Nov 16, 2019 19:15
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Is there a guideline for some general text formatting styles? I need an extra reason to fine-comb the text in the third draft stage(eventually), plus there's a page I really need to contain a very specific bit of text.
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Nov 16, 2019 22:31
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I don't understand what you mean. There are style guides?
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Nov 16, 2019 23:34
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