Link: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/118028074/dfabulich-choicescript-0cdb371/web/mygame/index.html
This is my WiP game and with very few amount of work done on it. I was not planing on posting this so early. But i have finals coming up and would like to get this off my mind. I just need to know whether i need to improve the amount spent in the actual dream than thoughts and if the immense amount of writing is boring. Thank you for going through the pain of reading so much
-Eternal Fire
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You need to break up your paragraphs a bit. Theyâre awfully long which is making the game difficult to read.
Also be careful of your numbers, youâre mixing spelling them out with just using numbers. For instance âThis was when you were fifteen turning sixteen in 3 months.â
Thereâs not much interaction. It really feels like youâre writing a non-choice story and have just made some minor changes to add in some choices.
Take
âYou didnât mind doing so, you were quite interested. Well what kid isnât? A chance to be a super soldier and possibly a hero defeating hordes of evil single handedly was something too good to pass, and you didnât.â - Here you could ask instead why the player wanted to join the academy. That lets them begin to shape their character in their mind, even if itâs a fake choice. It also breaks up the paragraphs a bit, lets the player pause a moment to soak in everything theyâve read and interact with the text.
Youâve a good idea here. I wouldnât call it boring. I think it does need work, but itâs certainly got potential. You might be better to wait until after your finals when youâve more time to dedicate to thisâŚ
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Ah, first of all thanks for bearing through all that
I would try to find a way in which i can make the dream more interactive but iâm not sure i can without changing it drastically. Iâll be sure to break up the paragraphs like you said.
What i am curious about is whether the writing is good enough because i have some time to edit it up while on the other hand adding in choices will take quite a while.
So if you read the whole thing is there any point which seems rushed or isnât fluent with the rest?
Donât be so critical of your writing.
Okay, consider this an exercise. Take the dream and find a way to break it up, to add in more choices. They donât need to be real choices, they donât need to have a huge impact, they just need to be there. Or, find a way to shorten the dream itself down to just the important points.
As for the writing, well thatâs not what I do. It seems perfectly understandable and legible which is all that matters. It needs broken up into more paragraphs though because as it is itâs huge walls of text. Your writing quality doesnât matter that much. I donât read interactive fiction for the fantastic prose (although when it is there itâs great.) I read it for the story, and my ability to influence that story.
Thereâs not enough choices. It needs choices. Once thereâs more choices and interactivity in there itâll be easier to tell what the pacingâs like.
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Ah, alright. Thanks for the help. Hopefully the improved version will be out by the week after the finals.
*Facepalm
ARH
Exams are after 2 weeks. I do have study but iâd still be working on this, did most of the adding in choices already, worked for about 4ish hours so far. The work is slower but you can expect to see the âGAMEâ version of this within this week.
Alright, i am really sorry, I feel like i am being really annoying but I really would like to know whether what Iâve done so far is at least readable. iâd like to have good grasp of how a game should be made before i start making chapter 1 and 2.
Sorry for seeming like i am trying to gain attention.
I donât have time to look it over again, sorry.
I think the forums are having a little slump at the moment since I think thereâs a few games that havenât had much comments on them. Maybe you can contact the authors of them and see if theyâd be willing to do a feedback exchange with you?
And youâre not being annoying.
Ah, alright, :p, i felt like i was being ignored. But i might as well get the outline and everything for the other chapters done by now, hopefully by the time exams are over the forum comes back. Iâll try to contact the authors. Thanks for your help.
Youâre not being ignored. Iâve had posts that have had no replies too so I know it can get disheartening. All I can suggest is participate in the community, offer your own feedback to others, and hopefully theyâll do likewise. The forums are a bit quiet just now.
Okay it is a bit bad that thereâs been 395 clicks and no one elseâs said anything. Maybe theyâre not sure what to say. Or maybe the robot future is upon us and theyâre all spambots or something.
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No they are probably just people without accounts. I did that for quite some while, it was before the forum was updated.
And quick question. Does it automatically save because of the update or is there a save file command you still have to use.
I enjoyed it.
I will do the two stars and a wish as that seems to be the most effective.
Star - I like your writing style, I think that you have put just the right amount of detail. Most things I find have either too little or too much but I think that you added enough to keep me interested but not too much so I get bored.
Star - Although you do not have many choices, I like that each choice actually matters. I picked having magic the first time and their reactions were disappointing and uplifting all at the same time, I am glad that the wizard class is not OP.
Wish - I wish there was a bit more background on things in general like the world and laws etc, I do understand that you may not have got that far though.
I personally think that adding the background slowly as the story progresses is easier for me to write and doesnât become extremely boring just sitting through 3 paragraphs of defitions and such after choosing the option of having some background first like in choice of rebels (even though itâs an awesome game though.)
And most of the information will be released next chapter.
Thanks for the review really helped.
First of, i am kind of depressed right now so i might again seem like i am seeking attention so forgive me for that.
I truly feel like i am just working extra hard for no reason. It might just be because of as @FairyGodfeather said that the forums arenât active right now but it feels like people are just trying to motivate me a little to continue this so i donât give up easily.
This really was supposed to be a story, but i turned it into a game because i knew that it would be better for me because i am an amateur writer and the feedback would help me improve. But i am really getting hardly any feedback. I wouldnât mind just writing this as a story and making a more suitable thing into a story but i donât want to be that guy that makes 20 games with just 1 chapter in them.
I have started writing chapter 1 (2) already but i donât know whether it is worth the extra 8 hours to turn it into a choice game, so please help
It did show that your âgameâ was actually intended to be a non-interactive story. Turning a linear story into a game just to get more feedback isnât a good idea.
Iâd say spend those eight hours on trying to find a writers community instead. Itâs been over ten years since Iâve been a member of any sort of writers community online, so I canât suggest anywhere, but I found them fantastic for feedback and for people being supportive and helping out. Admittedly some of the places I had to actively go, comment on other peopleâs stories in order to get them to comment on mine.
Now if what you really want to do is write a game instead, Iâd say just do it. But aim for a small, short project. Not some sort of epic game. The most important writing skill there is is being able to finish your projects. Nothing else matters as much as being able to finish. It doesnât matter if your finished project is awful (and yours wonât be) as long as itâs finished youâve succeeded where so many have failed. And then your project after that one will be even better. Write something, finish it, write something else. And donât give up hope.
I think youâve received some pretty good feedback regardless of the number of responses.
This is unquestionably an excellent concept. The characters, their relationship, and your ephemeral writing style all blend together well. I agree, though, that it can be a bit tough to follow. The paragraphs are long and at times rather awkward. There are strange turns of phrase throughout, such as âYou had chosen to keep it there, for you knew that it would only be a down for you to forget such excellent swordsmanship.â I understand what that sentence means, but itâs not quite proper English as written.
Ah i feel like such an asshole, i promised myself i would finish this game. But please forgive me guys, i think for atleast this i should stick with making it a story i have been thinking the whole day (I have no life)
and i canât find a way of making this into a good game without ruining the characters and storyline. I will finish this slowly overtime as a story. Thank you all once again and sorry for being such a confused person, itâs just that age .
Also i might start work on something different later on, i do not have any actual plans as of now but i will definitely be on this website for quite a while reading other games.
And i apologize once again to end it off. RIP game
-EternalFire
@Eternalfire
Writing games is difficult. Iâve yet to finish one. (Unless you count the project I did in 12 days which I donât really since itâs nowhere close to publishable.)
While youâd think that converting an existing piece of fiction into a game would make things easier it doesnât since you generally have the wrong sort of structure. Things that work well in linear fiction donât always come across so well in interactive fiction (and vice versa).
Youâre right not to want to compromise on your story and characters just to make it interactive.
Hang around on the forums, read the other projects and contribute where you can. You never know, perhaps inspiration will strike and youâll have a fantastic idea for some interactive fiction.
Donât feel bad for this being an unfinished project. Iâve a ridiculous amount of those. (And far too many unfinished game posts on these forums too).
And donât apologise for being confused, weâve all been there.
Iâm closing this thread like you asked.
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