June 2022's Writer Support Thread

Game Development Writing and Content
1

Welcome all to the support thread for June 2022.

:spiral_calendar:

:birthday: Happy Birthday to June babies.

:rainbow_flag: June is Pride month – be sure to show your support to those you know that are part of the LBGTQ community :two_hearts:

There are developers and authors that are worthy of our support, so with that said, to celebrate Pride Month, I am going to highlight a couple of teams/studios from the LBGTQ community. Hopefully they will inspire, although they are not part of this community.

There are elements in this upcoming game which touch upon themes found in my Patchworks project. Which is why it is an inspiration for me.

This team is an inspiration, because they push for more inclusive customization. This game is much more lighthearted and fun, so it is not related to my Patchworks project directly.

For me, inclusive games like this are important to learn from, because they help me figure out how to write characters as a whole better.

Just so I provide something else of use, I will link a couple of name resources I have found very helpful.

and

Thank you, everyone that continues to participate in these threads – it helps others when you do participate, sometimes more than you think.

If anyone has specific questions or concerns I may help with, please let me know.

:open_book:
:books:

If anyone else has something special going on in June, let us know.

:two_hearts:

My June goal is to continue to work on my Patchwork’s project and stay well.

As last month, I have a lot of work to do on Patchworks still, although I did receive fabulous feedback on work I did do in May.

Happy writing for the month of June.

22 Likes
2

These two are in the wrong order. Please prioritise your life in a way that pretends we don’t live in an extremely capitalistic society where your worth is tied to your productivity. Management will hate you for it, and isn’t that a goal we should all strive for?

12 Likes
3

I had to spend 15-20 minutes debugging because of errors in the scene where the MC’s sexuality is determined, not including the time spent realize an asterisk was missing at one point (then it’s 40+ minutes) .

I feel there’s a lesson or allegory there, but I’m not seeing it.

6 Likes
4

That just tracks. After all, sexuality is (haha) fucked. Unless you’re ace. Of course, if you only had aces, you wouldn’t need to debug.

3 Likes
5

As an asexual, I beg to differ. :joy:

2 Likes
6

Welcome to June, everyone :heart_eyes_cat:

I expect to spend most of my writing time this month on the Noblesse Oblige beta, which is still going strong and is bringing incisive and helpful feedback every day. I’m immensely grateful for those who are taking the time over it and their efforts are invaluable in polishing it up. I have also made a doc of pure positivity from beta testers that is four pages long already and it is truly lovely to look at it when edits are tiring.

Right now I’m triaging a selection of fairly chunky pieces of feedback - figuring out what’s highest priority and what edits will give the most bang for their buck. In particular I’m due:

  • dropping various hints earlier on, because mystery is all very well but there’s a need to hook attention initially before reveals
  • giving more breathing room for said reveals, because again I don’t want them to be too squashed
  • some close examination of the final chapter and making it feel like a fully satisfying conclusion. I’m delighted when people want more of a story because they enjoyed it and would like to linger, but that doesn’t mean I want things to feel glossed-over or abrupt!

At some point I want to write a discussion thread about ending a game, because every time it comes around I feel like I’m relearning and reremembering each time…

18 Likes
7

May has been a bit of struggle - in addition to many IRL distractions and concerns, I’ve hit a bit of block with my WIP. I’m currently writing an Interlude where the MC can get married to their RO if they want, and I’m finding that a ton of pressure. In some cases, this wedding will cement a relationship that’s been developing for three whole books, and writing a wedding that can do that justice is very scary. (Romance isn’t the main focus of my books, but it’s an important ingredient, and I really don’t want to screw this interlude up). So I’ve only been able to make slow progress, partly because of my own fear of failure on this. But I think I’m getting there now: I’ve almost finished the multiple possible “happy” wedding paths, I just then have a couple of less happy outcomes, and some stuff for the players who aren’t getting married this Interlude, and then I’ll be done. Fingers crossed for a June update!

Good luck everyone. I hope you’re having an easier time of it than me!

17 Likes
8

Well, they DO talk about June weddings a lot, so maybe that’ll help!

(I haven’t played the R3 demo, so, as a side note, is Dominique the marrying kind or nah?)

:confetti_ball:

3 Likes
9

Yep, they’re one of the possible spouses!

3 Likes
10

Hello everyone, first time poster here. I am a long time enjoyer of Choice of games and Hosted games. I recently started to write my own, based on a world that’s been in my head for years. My goal for June is to finish my prologue/ get it playable and to start research for chapter 1 and get my outline for the game done. I also hopefully want to get chapter one started this month. I expect progress to be slow because I’m still learning to code.

12 Likes
11

Well, I wrote about 4000 words last month for my story, which is not the word count I wanted but at least it’s something. I had a hard time with the code, so this month I might try just ignoring that and writing like it’s a novel and not interactive fiction (and fixing it later lol). I did spend some time working on my game’s conlangs and characters, so I’m happy about that.

Otherwise, I’m also taking a statistics class this summer. I’m enjoying it a lot more than my previous math classes. Don’t have anything special planned for this month, but because I am (unfortunately) a gamer, I am somewhat eager for the video game news.

Good luck with your writing, everyone, and happy Pride month!

9 Likes
12

All progress is progress!

Perhaps some folk who’ve tried both methods (write+code at the same time versus writing, then coding) could weigh in with their experiences? It might not be transferrable to your own process, but, on the other hand, it might. :thinking:

Wooo, world-building!

3 Likes
13

I write like a novel with half-pseudocode in suitable locations and a lot of notes for variations, but that may not work for other people.

5 Likes
14

I went AWOL from these threads last month pretty much by accident, but I am back! (I know, I know, you all missed me terribly).

Anyway, I’ve got a chapter release scheduled for 7 June. In addition to hopefully getting that out without a hitch, my goals are what my goals always are:

  • 30k words of forward progress in Fields of Asphodel
  • Some kind of progress every day on Diaspora

Happy Pride to my fellow community members, all and sundry. :agender_flag:

17 Likes
15

Happy June and happy Pride Month to everyone!

This month I’m excited to keep working on writing and developing the People’s House! I just recently was awarded the New User of the Month badge and am super excited to keep contributing to the forums and to help support other first-time writers as well.

I’m still getting the hang of regularly posting updates and keeping myself on a good writing schedule but it is still so incredible how I was able to get 30k words worth of progress while learning ChoiceScript on the go. To anyone wondering if they can start a project on ChoiceScript – it’s possible! If I can do it, I really do believe that anyone can.

Best of luck to all writers!

17 Likes
16

Happy Pride Month as well! It is amazing how supportive all of these corporations are all of a sudden!

June is going to be a really important writing month for me. I have two creative goals:

  1. Finish my rewrite of “Last Monologue,” focusing on giving players MUCH more agency and flexibility in their nefarious journeys. If I can just get back to the 50k-60k word mark, I will consider that a huge win.
  2. Meet with my friend and start outlining a series of books we plan to co-author.

Vacation plans and kid stuff will eat up much of July, so yeah I need to make June count.

11 Likes
17

I hope this is a friend with whom you’re willing to form associations of stress for multiple decades!

3 Likes
18

I heard a queer dude refer to June as “oh, is it Rainbow Profile Pic Month already? Meh.”

2 Likes
19

I think we both know what we’re in for. We’ve discussed myriad pros and cons and I’ve been reading heavily in her genre for months now. We are ready for the stress and disagreements. We both bring something to the table that the other person wants. Fingers crossed! :crossed_fingers:

4 Likes
20

Happy June and happy Pride month! :rainbow: :rainbow:

I’ve a few goals this month, and am excited to embark on them:

  1. Proofread what has been written, in preparation for (hopefully) a demo release in mid-June.
  2. Start on the first part of Chapter 1, and hopefully complete it before the demo release.

Good luck to all writers! May the creative juices flow strong.

9 Likes