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Out Of Frame: The Everyday Lives Of The Tenno - Feedback & Discussion

Jordan_McBeast

By Jordan_McBeast,
in Fan Art

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Darkwave1098

Darkwave1098

Posted
Posted

I got this message, and because I wrote AN ESSAY in response, I'm posting the whole thing here for anyone that's interested.

If you don't want to read an essay, ignore it and don't post about how it's a wall of text. That's Off the Island status right there. This is for people who want help writing.

 

 

 

 

BRUTALLY HONEST,

it's really dramatic and it doesn't actually tell us about anything, and you're full of grammar and spelling errors.

That's actually the biggest problem. I'm not published yet either, unless you count self-publishing garbage on amazon (and I don't) but if you're going to show your work to professionals and try to get an editor or a literary agent or just show it to anyone who has an opinion you care about, you can't make mistakes like that. There's no excuse for misspelling Rogue. Rogue means go solo, Rouge is a color. You have to keep your A****** wired shut on this one because the minute someone picks up your work and sees an amateur mistake, they just assume you're an amateur and flush you. There are people whose job is reading for a living, and they decide whether or not you get published. Don't ever hand them something that isn't finished, they hate reading errors.

For the story itself, we don't know who your protagonist is. You never introduce him. We don't know what frame he is, we don't know where he's from, he has no name and he has no personality. The only insight we have into his character is that he has to kill people and it makes him sad.

There is nothing about him that we sympathize with. He's just a blank slate, a brick wall.

There's an easy way to make people like a character, you have to have details that people identify with. There has to be things where they say, "yea, I'm just like that too!" And then the reader will say, "I like him, because he's like me." They'll do that subconsciously. The reader is a hostage to his id.

Once the reader decides they like the character, YOU ARE NOW ALLOWED TO OFFICIALLY SLAP *@##$ES. They might say, "I really like that guy, but man, he's a fuckin jerk!" Now there is a conflict, because its a character they think is like themselves, and people have egos and they always like themselves, but they know that the guy is a scumbag.

The way that you make the reader like the character is easy. Its all about stupid little details. The way you do things or something that &!$$es you off. Pet Peeves and quirks.

 

For example, if you write a story where a character has to put the toilet paper on the holder a certain way, then everyone who does the same thing will be like "OH MY GOD, I TOTALLY DO THAT TOO, I HATE PEOPLE THAT DON'T PUT THE TOILET PAPER ROLL ON THAT WAY." It doesn't matter how stupid or pointless it is, it can even be that exact thing. Once you establish that common ground, the reader will always come back to that character, even if they don't know why- They just see themselves in that character now, even if its something as stupid as how you put a roll of TP on the holder.

Your character doesn't have any of that. He's sad, we don't know who he is, and we start out hating him, because we know he's a badass ninja, but he's a crybaby. he doesn't want to be a ninja. he's a pussy. We don't know anything about him before he was a pussy, and we don't know anything about him after he starts crying. We don't know if he's sad because a shark ate his girlfriend or if he woke up 1,000 years later after being cryogenically frozen and all his family is dead, there's no reason why he's sad, he's really JUST A $#*(@.

There's nothing in that whole paragraph you wrote that made me have any sympathy for him, he's just a pouty loser that is bummed out because he's a badass space ninja, and everyone is super excited to be a badass space ninja except him. YOU WROTE DEBBIE DOWNER, AND HE SUCKS. I don't want to read a story about him, I want to read the story about his wacko sociopath friends that love killing badguys. They sound interesting.

There are 2 successful formulas for writing a dramatic or tragic character, and 1 crappy one.

The crappy one is the one you picked- The guy just starts out dramatic for no apparent reason. He's just the badass in the dark corner of the room drinking alone and nobody knows why. THAT'S BORING AND NOBODY CARES. HE CAN SIT THERE AND CRY INTO HIS OWN BEER, SAD AND ALONE.

The two successful formulas are as follows.

1) The character doesn't start dramatic. He has a quality I sympathize with, and then something happens to him, and because I'm already invested in him, it happens to me as well. I experience the drama with him, and now I forgive him for being dramatic because I KNOW THAT FEEL, BRO.

2) The thing that makes him dramatic has to be something I can sympathize with, and it has to happen when the character is introduced. It has to be an event that is so tragic and inevitable that at some point, everyone has to deal with it in their lives. Like if his mom died, I would instantly sympathize with him, because I would say, "Oh S#&$, someday my mom will die too, and I'm going to feel like that." Being sad because you are a tragic space ninja is not something that counts. Nobody is a space ninja. I want to be a space ninja, that's why I play this game.

 

I've got a lot to improve, that was just a random thing I wrote when I was bored. And yes Im aware of grammatical errors, I was too lazy to correct them when I posted it.

Thanks for your opinion anyway Doozy.

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Doozy84

Doozy84

Posted
Posted

Heehee. That movie/show was terrible IMO. Good thing it isn't on Netflix. I assume I am off the island for this?

you are more off the island than those 90s babies who haven't seen neverending story. Would you like to know more?

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Kalenath

Kalenath

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Posted

you are more off the island than those 90s babies who haven't seen neverending story. Would you like to know more?

 

Wait...

What?

 

Someone HASN'T seen 'The Neverending Story'???????

 

What heresy is this? Next you will say they haven't seen 'The Princess Bride'!

 

Inconceivable!

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McVolker

McVolker

Posted
Posted

you are more off the island than those 90s babies who haven't seen neverending story. Would you like to know more?

 

Well, at I am one of those 90's babies who HAS seen Neverending Story. T'was a great movie, when I saw it as a child. Now I find it childish, as would be expected. Starship Troopers was always a bad attempt at Star Wars, with unintended comedy thrown in. I will see myself off the island, and watch you from THE SHADOW VEIL ABOVE!

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Kinsaeda

Kinsaeda

Posted
Posted

I never read them, but the Starship Troopers series was based on a book, which I'm told was pretty good.  All I know is that I enjoyed every rendition of it I've seen, except for the second movie, that was just a cheap Alien knockoff.   ~_~  The cg series was fun, and the cg movie was really good :D 

 

Do we get to see more Mag and Excal soon?  Right now my favorite duo is Ember and Ash, I want to give their pals a shot too.  Besides that, Mag fills out her frame to well to have the body of a 16 yr old boy, unless she's padding everything.

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SLI-fox

SLI-fox

Posted
Posted

We've seen a lot from both Frost and Saryn. Banshee has only shown up once along side Loki, Loki just had a cameo, we've only heard Vauban called a weirdo (I kinda like the idea of Vauban being made fun of and never actually showing up).

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