Hello there !
First, I would like to thank everybody out there for doing such an amazing job with your stories and your enthusiasm. You have brought great joy to my boring life, and in the process, help me figure out ‘stuffs’.
Now, to the topic. I have decided to become a writer here for quite sometime. And that’s way before I have any story idea. But now that I have one, I realized that I’m new to everything! So I would like to have some of your advices and opinions. For the coding part, I think everything was covered thank to everybody here so I would very much like some of writing advice.
When you have an idea, do you write it out and build a strong plot or you just sort of let it be and see where it goes ?
How much you let the choice affects your plot line ?
With this IF style, the reader/player can make the choices that will affect the plot line, how do you cope with it ? You write down different routes before coding or…?
I think that should be it ? Everything is still pretty much a blur so sorry if some of the questions aren’t clear enough.
Oh and, since English isn’t my native language, I can use some help with the grammar things… because I suck at it xD nobody really teaches me or anything.
Well then, let me congratulate you for reaching an important milestone to begin writing (coding)
Alright, let’s get into the nitty-gritty part.
This part is where every writers having a different opinion. But the point is: neither is better than the other. (IMO)
At first, I personally go “let it be”. I let the story tell themselves. And it somehow feels “forgiving” if you choose this path as you won’t feel much “burdened” when you’re writing your story.
However, now I left that method behind and decided to go in-between; I let my stories tell themselves, but I’ll write 'em down when they do. This way, I will no longer forgot “what was the story again?” and I can put a quick flowchart of these pieces in case I want to tell them in coherent manner.
IDK. I go with the rule “if the player can do it, why not?” But of course, the choices should be relevant to the story
I mean, there’ll be never stuff like
The dragon attacked the capital.
With the castle crumbling, houses burning, and smokes billowing, what will you do?
*choice
#I'll sit down and enjoy a cup of tea
Nope. Just nope
Or… should it be?
Plot it down on the quick flowchart first, and then I code-in the *choice, and then I begin writing each branching on its #Option.
I prefer to write it down on a notebook. After writing all the plots, characters and history, I then look for a friend who I can discuss it with. I tend to make an original story first, so that I can grasp my characters’ attitude and personality.
Then I make it in ChoiceScript, where it is like a parallel universe.
As much as possible. I would like the players to have the freedom of choosing a choice, but it should be relevant to the story.
I’m more of Go with the flow author. I think of the possible consequences when I code rather than making a diagram of the choices.
First I think the general idea of the plot…like an outline and afterwards in writing process and coding the ideas flow themselves and make shape of the story.
As I’m still in my humble beginnings, in my game they are “flavors” that change things, but in the end come all together. But as further I go into the story the more different and more impact the choices would carry, making whole lot of changes.
A bit of both. I like to have a strong plot as a backbone when I write. I know how it’ll end, I know the major points/what needs to happen for it to get there, I know how it starts, and I know each character’s motivation, goals, and how they got to where they are. I take those as the skeletons and then start to build upon them while I write.
So… I always want to create large diversions that may always mean a lot more work for me. But the thing that attracted me to interactive fiction was the idea that you could read practically two different books in two sittings. Which is extraordinarily ambitious but I love the idea that small choices can give you a different page of text, even if the result is the same it happens differently. That being said- I also love different results of different actions. So I’m a big fan of leaving my plans more open than not to let the plot branch and flow in different ways depending on the choices the player makes.
I make different bone structures. I keep in mind the many different possibilites by writing down the major changes and different outcomes in a separate document that I can refer to. Then when I write I keep in mind ‘Okay, if X did Y then they can do Z, but if X didn’t do Y then Z wouldn’t be available/would lead to A instead of B.’
