If you end up pulling Starling, I may end up entering that one manually because I’m really attached to that one for some reason. Starlings are cute little birds! Of course I’d like that as a name.
Aw, don’t be too down on yourself.
Nothing you wrote ever came off as illegible. Not once!
I’ll be glad to help if you want me to. Did you want me to place the screenshots, and offered fixes here, or in a DM to keep from cluttering this WIP thread? Either/Or would work for me, but the plus for here is that anyone can double-check my recommendations, and make a few suggestions themselves in case there’s something that sounds better than what I put forward.
If that doesn’t work with your confidence level, though, plenty of authors here on the forum do these kinds of checks/fixes through DMs instead.
Oh, but fair warning: part of my “editing style” is that I like to give the author options as far as possible fixes go so that there’s room for maintaining the author’s personal flair in both word choice, and cadence.
I just looked up the bird, they’re so pretty I’m the same way with Wayhaven, I’m utterly attached to Langford.
You can post your options here, I don’t mind.
Tbh I don’t like it to feel this powerless. Is it just in the beginning? It feels like being a puppet which Taylor and Nyx can play with and throw around how they like. For example the MC can’t protect themself against Nyx (while training) or even Taylor. The MC is saved without making an effort to do something.
Don’t take it personal. Your writing is great but it’s just a subjective complain
@Bizimo Guess you didn’t read my previous Nyx’d nuts comment. You’re not that defenseless, believe me.
Though I do hear you on feeling that particular cornered moment. On the other hand, the MC isn’t all that powerful, either, and Taylor is an actual hunter with the skills, and training to show for it. The description of how two-faced the guy is should make it clear that the mc–at least in that moment–didn’t fully know how to react. Still, you’re not suddenly a damsel just because you got saved once.
Back onto my proofreading for @PrismaticSpace I’m going to be nesting these so that the page isn’t stretched to an overwhelming length. That said, there won’t be a lot of these all at once.
I think I'll do just one chap at a time starting with the beginning portion
On what I believe is page 2 of the prologue, or 'story time with dad'
The first sentence highlighted presents an interesting quandary in that I’m not sure if there are missing words, or not… Specifically the “of which we learnt from” half of the sentence could probably be changed to be a little more clear, as the half before is still on the topic of humans and supernatural beings all being children of the two Gods.
The second highlighted thing on the screenshot God’s is playing that possessive plural S game, so it would be Gods’ instead to show that there is more than one God being affected.
Eh? Zombies built and burned pyres? No! (slaps own wrist) On a less teasing note, you might’ve meant that as many dead as could be managed were burned to combat the plague. It does slightly sound like the dead were building up pyres post-humus though.
The past tense tone of this sentence overall seems a bit distant since this is the first moment you take control of the mc in the present. So instead of the past tense for stride, it would probably work better as “strides” which is a present tense action. Same as could for can. You can leave the sentence as is, of course, but if you do change it both “strode” and “could” would need to change to keep feel of the sentence all on one tense of present or past.
Still more to come with chapter one, but I think this is a fairly good starting chunk. What do you think of my findings so far?
I said I want to defend me not be chaotic evil! hitting someone in the nuts isn’t something I can do. Even in a book the only time when you are allowed to do this is when you are threatened big time. That’st the holy bro code which can’t be disregarded.
Also to be a bit more serious now:
If we dye our hair why does it say “Pink is a hair color strictly for cosplay and anime girls.” My hair aren’t pink. Is this like a general thing? Did I miss a joke? It seems kinda weird to me
I’m not hundred percent what you mean with the hair part. But I’ll say this if it means anything?? MC tried dying their hair pink the past, and it didn’t go over well. Regardless of the hair color you chose MC to have, cuz, well, dye fades and such. Does that make sense?
Although I can see why it would be weird if you put in your own hair color and said it was pink…
Oh now I get it. I was confused because I chose the dye option but with a different color. I didn’t realized it was meant the MC dyed the hair pink before the color we choose. My mistake sorry!
I always struggle with " 's " and just “s”. It’s almost depressing. I can work on wording though, so it’s clear, of course.
Summary
oh wow, in page 3, I forgot the word “in”. W o w. Along with “making”, as you pointed out. I have tendancy, and sometimes I realize it, to switch between tenses. I’ll try to catch them as a write, but of course, they’ll be fixed too. Might edit the “next” buttons too here and there. Thank you for pointing all of this out!
@Bizimo Don’t worry, I should probably find a way to clarify when going back in!
When you choose that option, it goes morning instead? Weird, i can’t see why it would do that so that’ll take a bit to fix.
Also, what do you mean it lets you choose the color twice? Like the choice comes up twice?
Hey, sorry I’m not sure if this is an error or not, but when MC meets Taylor at their job, I get the first two choices and then it just immediately goes to Hannah’s scene. I dont know if that’s intentional, it just seems very sudden and cut off. It happens with any option after Taylor grabs MC’s hand and tells them he was in a bad place ‘back then’.
I haven’t played much past that, but just wanted to make sure if it was a bug or not.
I think I understand where you were coming from when you wrote that part. You wrote that part and then also offered for people to input other last names. But since there offered ones aren’t that diverse, it can look like minorities are but an after thought.
It might seem small, but small stuff like this an make others feel so much more welcome.
Another suggestion is that you could also add another option where players can input their own pronouns. You do include the option of choosing nonbinary in the demo. But again, what might seem a little thing could make others feel very welcomed and like they count. Because most of the time they are an after thought.
Here is a recent thread where the latter is talked about.
Anyway, it’d be nice to see some first nation people’s last names too! I can’t recall games with thar option (maybe Tinstar, but can’t remember).
Some last names to have in mind are: Ahenakew, Ramirez, Flores, Wang, Chang, Kim, Park, McLoughlin, Nguyen, Tran, Fernando, Chernyshevsky…
I understand!
I did think about allowing pronoun input but I’m not sure how to do that when it comes to writing the… code? Like, ${heshethey} is easy, but what would I put for those wanting their own pronouns? If there’s a thread for that, please link me. There were a lot of gender-neutral pronouns I wanted to use but felt they/them would be easiest. Apologies if that sounds like a cop-out.
gonna be honest, Tinstar almost sounds like a tire brand??? but I love it so
I can definitely add a few of those in exchange for others. I thought about Nazario earlier, but that may be because of a certain character from a game that I love too much.
Those *if statements don’t actually do anything at present. You’d be perfectly fine deleting them and then reducing the indent level of the *set commands by one tab. Is that what you planned, or did you expect something else to happen there?
Edited to add:
That is an excellent reason to do things. Don’t let it get you down!
Also, I think my example is now “good enough.” I’m forseeing something along these lines:
*choice
#Boy.
*set gender "male
*set mc_himherthem "him"
*set mc_hisherstheirs "his"
*set mc_heshethey "he"
*set mc_manwomanperson "man"
*set mc_sondaughterkid "son"
*set mc_hishertheir "his"
*goto kiss_scene
#Girl.
*set gender "female"
*set mc_himherthem "her"
*set mc_hisherstheirs "hers"
*set mc_heshethey "she"
*set mc_manwomanperson "woman"
*set mc_sondaughterkid "daughter"
*set mc_hishertheir "her"
*goto kiss_scene
#Kid.
What are your pronouns, kid?
*choice
#They/them.
*set mc_himherthem "them"
*set mc_hisherstheirs "theirs"
*set mc_heshethey "they"
*set mc_manwomanperson "person"
*set mc_sondaughterkid "kid"
*set mc_hishertheir "their"
*goto kiss_scene
#Let me type my pronouns for you.
For the "subject" pronoun:
(Example: And then [b]she/he[/b] bought a car.)
*input_text mc_heshethey
For the "object" pronoun:
(Example: The car belongs to [b]her/him[/b].)
*input_text mc_himherthem
For the "dependent possessive" pronoun:
(Example: That's [b]her/his[/b] car.)
*input_text mc_hishertheir
For the "independent possessive" pronoun:
(Example: That car is [b]hers/his[/b].)
*input_text mc_hisherstheirs
*set mc_manwomanperson "person"
*set mc_sondaughterkid "kid"
Part of me really wishes people would stop looking at the code, but at the same time, I know it’s helping me learn
I think I just did it thinking I’d have to.
I’m even more confused than I was before- @LadyUmbreon89 I didn’t expect this to be so confusing.
Yeah, I was specifically trying to find this, as I know that there are published games that have this option. It’s a tad convoluted because to get it entirely right, you’d need four separate fields of entry minimum, just to ensure correct usage for each one…
Oh, Minnow’s code has room in it to add in those pronouns with a fill/replace function-thingy! At least, in theory.
I mean… By having an extra slot after one such as the *set mc_himherthemreplaceme
Starlings are cute little birds! Of course I’d like that as a name.
options 
options 
