The First Wielder (WiP)

Hosted Games Works In Progress
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Every once in a while, I’ve tried to write a CoG story. While a couple of attempts did make it to this forum, most of them died before they got anywhere. And as I relapse again, I hope this one has a different ending, or an ending at all.

If I had to pitch the First Wielder in an elevator, then I’d say it is about the founding of the Jedi Order in a fantasy setting. I think it’ll be around 10 chapters long with passages of time between some of them. Here is the opening crawl -

The Great Eclipse has ended. The Long Age of Ice has ended.

After decades of hibernation, humanity has spilled out from it’s battered strongholds, from deep under-cities and dark holes to a green, fertile and unclaimed world. But all is not peaceful. Infant Kingdoms, nomadic tribes, belligerent races and a dying Empire struggle for their place in the world. Old hypocrisy, new hysteria and the familiar lust for power brews new trouble and there is even talk of a Scourge from the Steannish heartlands. The world is on the precipice of violent change again.

You are the student of a famous wanderer and explorer, one who has kept the meagre outposts on the far edge of civilization safe from the encroaching of malignant beings. And you are now about to stumble onto a talent that will change the shape of the world.

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Comments, criticism and any thoughts are sincerely appreciated. Your feedback will be very valuable to make write because anything beyond the first chapter is uncharted territory for me.

Without further mumbling, here is the link for the opening and the first chapter.

UPDATED - https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/avzaxs9eys3zvsq/The%20First%20Wielder%20V2.html?dl=0

Disclaimer -

It’s been a long time since I’ve played around with choicescript and my hours working on this has only reminded me of how bad I’m at the whole thing. So, expect more than a few errors.

There is a lot of work to be done, the transition to choices need to be handled more naturally, a lot of editing and cleaning up. Apologies for that.

25 Likes
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…At an initial glance, I’d thought this said “The First Welder”. I was confused, and oddly excited to play a choice game about welding.

That said, this sounds like an interesting concept, and I’ll poke through it shortly. What sort of feedback, if any, are you looking for?

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I really enjoyed playing this demo! I can’t wait to see how it develops in the future. There are some things that were brought to my attention when I was playing and those are:

trap the Norgothalen warband on the far side of the bridge - Karston and $(name) will see that this is done

You seem to have it all chalked out, $(name).’

I also want to point out that I created my own name. Other than that I can’t wait until the next update.

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Very cool and interesting but sometimes people would say (A Name) instead of saying my actual name. Still liked it can’t wait for more.

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Wow! This world is incredibly beautiful.

I think this is one of the most well thought out CS settings I’ve seen in a long time-- actually, it’s one of the cooler worlds I’ve seen in fantasy period. I love the idea of hibernation, and I’m always a suckers for sad, crapsack worlds. The Noldowhatevers seemed really cool, I liked all of the place and character names. Your demo left me wanting to know more about the lore!

Gameplay was pretty interesting too. There didn’t seem to be a lot of choices, but it’s the beginning of the game… and writing choices is hard lmao. Is there a way to get Sodden to arm the prisoners? I tried with both charisma and insight. Is there another variable?

Anyways, I look forward to seeing more of this! Thanks for sharing.

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I really like what you’ve written so far. It has a nice atmosphere.

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Seems good so far can’t wait for more

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A good start but a criticism ( same one I receive) is a lack of choices at the beginning will turn some off.

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Thanks for the responses.

At least, I can relieved that I haven’t gone horribly, horribly wrong. I was rather concerned that there was limited choice - I think that and pacing is one of the hardest to get right when writing a CoG. I’ll look to rectify this going forward.

@BK64 - First Welder? Heh. Perhaps I should write one about welding…

@Nvswift @Cammister - Thanks for catching that. Will change it in the next update.

@iris - Thank you for the very kind words. Hope the rest of the story retains your interest.

As for arming the prisoners - I was actually thinking of adding a third option…still might…but I also didn’t want each choice to be equal or balanced. I think the game should have some where there are some objectively good ones and some bad, without making it too obvious. Sometimes that breaks the immersion for me in games because there can’t always be multiple legitimate options for every problem.

In this case, arming the prisoners without restraining them would easily allow some of them to flee or turn on the people of Sodden.I guess I need to make this a little more pointed.

Not totally certain about this though. Will need to figure it out more.

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But the prisoners are going to have just as much desire not to die as everybody else. Leaving them locked up puts them in even more danger. They might turn and flee afterwards, but during the fight they wouldn’t have much choice other than to fight or die.

Very interested in your game, by the way. Didn’t want to just stop in, insult your decision, then pop out. XD

Maybe allow people to free them, but use a charisma check to determine whether the slaves/prisoners attack or help during the fight.

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I’m sure your game will keep me interested! You seem to be a very good writer.

I second DarthDovahkin! There are reasons for them to fight, and reasons for them to not. Some may wish to join for a sense of redemption, or in hopes that they will be released afterwards.

But of course, having some decisions be lesser than others is a cool thing to do. It might be less confusing if you let people make the decision and then watch it fail. Since there’s only two decisions, and only one of them works, it makes me wonder why there’s a choice at all.

Anyways it’s your game, haha. And I know how annoying it is to keep track of that stuff… it’s why I’m not writing choice games right now :sweat:

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I really hope you follow through with this its a really cool game so far

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@iris I think that’s a point that I missed. If there are some choices lesser in value than the others, then the reader must be first cautioned about the possibility and then must be done in such a way that the choice doesn’t feel redundant. Will need to reassess this choice.

Writing a Cog is definitely a difficult endeavour. But I guess as with anything it gets easier when we keep at it.Not that I’m any expert at both though.

@Kideike I certainly aim to continue and finish this. Am working on the next chapter.

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At first I though this was a story about welding. So I immediately clicked on the link and started reading. Soon I realized that the plot was rather interesting for a story about welding. After finishing I figured out it was not about welding. Nonetheless, Ireally enjoyed going through this, you weiting style is lovely and is the most important thing for me when it comes to a story. For example, Harry Potter is an amazin book series, except I really don’t like tge writing style and it’s not comfortable for me to read, so I never read the series.
But a story might be bad but if it just feels really nice to read through then I will keep reading.

Luckily for you, your story has both a nice writing style and managed to catch my attention as for the plot, in a good way.

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So far it seems focused - a gardener approach is hard; that much is correct. More than that, I can not say for now. Fight scene was written well; characters introduced were interesting and the river town interesting.