I’ve achieved my July goal, with not much time to spare! Chapter 5 of The Rise of Cthulhu is now live! I identified a nasty continuity error late last night, where a character could die, reappear, and die again, but I managed to fix it without taking too much time and finish enough testing that there probably won’t be any major problems.
Chapter 6 may be a while, as I’ll have to do some “research” on Lovecraft’s stories set in Kingsport. It’s been aeons since I last read them. I don’t know if I’ll finish writing it by the end of August, but it probably won’t go live until September either way. If I don’t at least finish the first draft, I should finish most of it by the end of next month.
I also don’t really have romance in The Rise of Cthulhu. It doesn’t exactly fit. I do, however, have one pseudo-RO (with another to appear in the second half of the story). There isn’t exactly opportunity to do anything romantic, but in the new chapter you can arrange a date for later (which probably won’t happen until the epilogue, if it happens at all). Winning her over takes some work, however.
I had a humble goal in July to just write more as a daily habit. I made really good progress, taking inspiration from the ‘morning pages’ method in Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. I don’t write them in the morning (I hate mornings) but I do just write without worrying too much about the end result. Helps a lot. End results are for revision.
Happy August! I’d appreciate hearing from anyone who’s recently submitted a Hosted Games project. I’ve read the official docs, but I’m a bit unclear on the beta testing requirements and the timeline — for the beta testing, do you put up the full game on cogdemos or similar, and then post it in a public thread or in the WIP thread? How do CoG staff know that you’ve beta tested it? How long do you have to beta test it? I sometimes get emails about beta testing signups, is that related or is that for CoG label only?
Yes. I want more deep friendships in games! My poor MCs suffer the weight of the world all alone—can’t they have some friends? A mentor figure? Not just the RO, please!
I didn’t reach my exact goal last month (I think?), but I was pretty chill with it lol so all things considered pretty good!
I’m hoping to finish the current chapter, maybe add or edit some variables/ flavor text or the stats.
Again going for a chill, see what happens kinda approach lol
Put up the full game to play. CoGdemos is fine. Game does not need to be publicly accessible (ie. closed or restricted beta is acceptable), but it needs to be at least publicly advertised.
Post the final beta on your WIP thread. Do not post it here or in some other public thread.
Things like post edit histories are tracked on this forum. They can easily check when you updated your WIP thread with a beta testing request. (I don’t know if they check, but just do it.)
You need to publicly advertise the full beta on your WIP thread for at least one month. You can extend (not shorten) this if you feel you need more time.
That’s for CoG games only. CoG helps their authors coordinate beta testing, but we don’t have that. That said, if you are doing the beta testing, you can ask CoG to pin your thread for visibility.
thank you for answering all dozendietcokesaday’s questions, i’m not anywhere even remotely near thinking about HG publishing stuff, but i’m bookmarking your post and will be coming back to it…in due time! also, awesome that you asked if CoG would be willing to pin hobby games entering their official beta—i think that’ll be a huge help for a lot of prospective HG writers, visibility wise!
I was very busy with general summer shenanigans, but worked on the side project (MC and the page can escape), Halloween Jam entry (playing pretty fast and loose with the theme - evil grin), and figuring I will be reworking my wip (listening to advice intended for someone else but figured it applied equally in my case).
August intention:
Work piecemeal on multiple different projects, post a snippet, do a tonne of non Cog related stuff.
On the subject of ROs:
I’ve always deliberately steered away from attempting to write anything related to ROs, but I am planning something in the Halloween jam as my first real attempt, with a platonic option of course. So we will see how that turns out…
I might have written this romance content to be a bit too steamy, hmm. My content is very tame compared to the average romance novel. But I’ve read a few other choicescript games to get a sense of what it’s usually like, and… the average game here is extremely tame? A lot of it is just a kiss and then fade to black.
You have to understand many are made for a very young audience. And what is tame change a lot from cultures. And I personally prefer that games that are not focused on romance have a fade to black that cringe scenes.
All depends on the author skill but if the game is not about romance a focused on the emotional side and romantic dynamics appeal more to me.
For instance I love Dragon age, but the love scenes are cringe should have been a fade to black. However Mass Effect and Baldurs gate 3 made romance scenes far more impactful and they mattered for the plot.
So, my goal this month is finishing off the last of the intro demos, and start weaving everything together. So close, if just real life can chill for a moment.
At least I’ve got a playlist for this particular stretch of the story, it’s amazing how that can keep you on track!
You are great Now that I have all settled in and calmed down with the fandoms and me I have to return to your universe. But maybe I would give the honest feedback to you on private first to not cause Ire to the masses
Some general reflections on reading, versus writing…
The more I try to write up feedback (both for WiPs and prose from people I know IRL), the more appreciative I am of the readers who’ve kindly shared detailed feedback with me. It’s a real art form managing writing constructive feedback with not just tearing people to shreds, especially if you’re commenting on something you don’t think you’d want to read through in its current form overall.
My policy so far has just been not providing feedback on something unless there’s something I like a lot about it, something worth reading on for that I can give positive feedback on to soften / counterbalance any criticism, but I sort of feel guilty about that approach. Surely it’s neglecting the work that might most benefit from the feedback? I know I’d love to hear from anybody who dropped my work and was willing to try to explain why, particularly if they felt (and I agreed) it was fixable. But also I don’t think a message that’s 90% critical feedback is helpful for the vast majority of authors, no matter how valid or thought-out that feedback is…
This is not related to anybody who I’ve actually shared feedback with, for the record - this relates to something I haven’t commented on where I just wrote like 1000 words of critical feedback and then scrapped the entire message since I was like ‘there’s no way anybody could ever get value out of this - it just feels mean in the aggregate, even if it wasn’t intended that way’. So I think I’ll keep to my current policy for now…
After caused many issues I have learned to only gave feedback afterwards given a big trigger warning that I will be real real honest to the fault. I don’t try to de cruel or anything. However I can’t sweet the opinions. I am far more polite than I was… But I still as honest hardcore as always.
The advantage is if I say I like something and why the writer knows I really think so.
For me the main thing of feedback Is help the writers to achieve their goal and create their best. That and if possible thinking on him improving it in a way to attract more audience. Cater egos is not on the pay grade. I am really bad at that
That’s fair! I think it’s critical that people like you exist, because I completely agree with your vision of what feedback should ultimately be for.
I just wish I had that knack of being able to dissect something that I don’t like and still be able to deliver it in a package that helps the author. I’m good (I think…) at feedback for something I like but think could be better, or stuff I really like, but I don’t think I have the knack of doing the same for stuff that I would realistically DNF if not trying to give feedback.
Posting here today as a reader instead of a writer since I haven’t written anything on COG yet (but I do write— just not here, or not yet at least) since we’re touching the subject of beta reading. Which is something I didn’t expect to love doing as much as I do?
Mwah mwah kiss kiss la bise I’ll do it again. If there’s one thing I love it’s to have an opinion, so when yapping about said opinion is useful we reach flow state
I have to admit I’m a little bit guilty of this as well. Tbf I have an enormous TBR list so I simply do not have the time to spend on everything just yet, so naturally I often end up reading from the top most intriguing pitches. I’ve also in the past kinda burnt myself out giving very very detailed feedback on projects I didn’t super want to read in the past (not on here, but on the writing discords and forums where I learned how to give feedback), which made me think I straight up didn’t enjoy beta reading much— it completely changed when I joined the COG forums and considered my feedback more akin to Fangirling+ than clinical reviewing.
But. I do share your views here. I want to be better at that and be able to boost WIPs that aren’t my original cup of tea, may it only be because even if my points might be irrelevant, a wide range of views is always good. Or if the WIP has flown under the radar, they might desperately need any feedback. It’s something I definitely want to work on.
FWIW and from what I’ve seen, you definitely give very useful feedback that I’d love to get if I had a WIP! Although indeed, it’s implied that you haven’t posted the reviews where you felt less confident
I actually agree that a dishonest review does much more bad than good, and the things that don’t work should definitely be addressed. Though I’ve noticed that there’s ways to be kind and polite without needing to be overwhelmingly nice, since we’re all here to boost each other upwards, not hurt anyone. I try not to take stuff too seriously especially as a reviewer, make jokes here and there. Art can be incredibly personal and it takes a lot of courage to share it to a wide audience, and I try to always be mindful of that, while never holding back what I disliked either.
The other thing is that sharing what was liked instead of what didn’t work does just as much good, if not more. The writer knows where to focus their attention, knows their strengths, and it gets easier to correct what didn’t work in the context of what did.
I hope it makes sense!
I’ve noticed a growing trend of IFs where you can decide between fading to black or reading the whole scene, and I think that it’s a very clever way to do it!
And oh god the DAO banging cutscenes lmfao. Playing twister in our underwear and fading in and out of consciousness while we have Leliana belting her song in the background. So cringe, so camp, so iconic.
You know, that actually makes sense! It’s something addressed when talking about character bleed a lot in LARPing communities, that the brain can’t make the difference between real and fake emotions— they’re just emotions, that’s it (and it’s why it’s important to have healthy breaks and grounding exercises after an event). I really do love the post you’ve linked.
As for the topic on ROs, I have a lot to say, but I’ll probably return later for it or else this post will be way too long But I don’t think it’s as dire as it may seem, and shocker to most people who know me IRL I’d be the romance defender here.
Now that I have all settled in and calmed down with the fandoms and me I have to return to your universe. But maybe 
I would give the honest feedback to you on private first to not cause Ire to the masses
I’ll do it again. If there’s one thing I love it’s to have an opinion, so when yapping about said opinion is useful we reach flow state
Playing twister in our underwear and fading in and out of consciousness while we have Leliana belting her song in the background. So cringe, so camp, so iconic.