The Post Your Thoughts of the Moment Thread 2

[Nebbles]

Cheap deaths, I'd guess?

[ThatHiddenCharacter]

Game of Thrones.

[Maelstrom]

When the story kills someone off and then turns to you and asks you if you feel sad. When the point of the death is purely for an emotional response and there were not deeper meanings or purposes behind it.

Or you could be Akame Ga Kill.

[Dudeman]

Basically what Maelstrom said. Going in some crazy direction not because the characters would do it, but because the author wants to elicit a response.

[mikey]

why you askin?

[E. Gadd Industries]

A friend of mine has asked me to team up with him* to develop mobile(?) games. He's learning all the programming stuffs and we're entertaining different ideas. Yesterday, I thought it would be an interesting challenge to try & build a feel trip game & seemed somewhat intrigued by the idea. So I started thinking of a possible storyline. But then it hit me how difficult it is to make a really good(?) one. After searching online a bit (to no avail), I thought I would ask here.

*back in 8th grade, but we were never really serious about it until now

[InsigTurtle]

You can make a feels trip out of any story, even something as mundane as a man walking to the grocery store. You just to make sure your audience can connect to it. If the whole plot is just *bam* death *bam* death *bam* death, then after a while, you start to become desensitized. Develop the characters enough so they mean something to the player. Stuff like that. Don't sweat about the plot, just start with an idea, and let it evolve naturally.

[mastersuperfan]

If the whole plot is just *bam* death *bam* death *bam* death, then after a while, you start to become desensitized.

Zero Escape

Or so it seems at first, at least.

[Zunawe]

Something that works for me, and this may not be the right approach for other people, is to just make the characters. Find a setting, the vaguest call to action, and a point of climax. You're basically just figuring out why there's a story and defining to yourself what could possibly happen. Then spend at least one session of brainstorming/writing on just describing characters. Write down everything about them. Their physical descriptions, skills, flaws, relationships, backstories, how they would react to specific or generic events, the difference between what they think and say, etc... Walk away and let them sit in your head for a day, and then come back and fix anything that came to you during that day.

Now you can write a story, let your characters interact, and drive the plot from your call to action to the climax. If you're ever stuck, just let your characters move the story themselves and work with it.

And to actually answer your question, don't try to make your audience feel something; give them something to think about. If a character just dies, people get confused no matter how attached they were. Maybe somebody's mentor dies and now they're alone and unsure. Your audience will feel the same sadness and anxiety. The death had meaning, and we don't necessarily feel for the person who died but for the person who lost (it's not always about death). But the most important part of that is that the character they relate to is believable. Not necessarily sympathetic, but believable.

[ThatHiddenCharacter]

That is the most beautiful advice I've ever heard. Do you have more?

[LeviR.star]

Something that works for me, and this may not be the right approach for other people, is to just make the characters. Find a setting, the vaguest call to action, and a point of climax. You're basically just figuring out why there's a story and defining to yourself what could possibly happen. Then spend at least one session of brainstorming/writing on just describing characters. Write down everything about them. Their physical descriptions, skills, flaws, relationships, backstories, how they would react to specific or generic events, the difference between what they think and say, etc... Walk away and let them sit in your head for a day, and then come back and fix anything that came to you during that day.

Now you can write a story, let your characters interact, and drive the plot from your call to action to the climax. If you're ever stuck, just let your characters move the story themselves and work with it.

And to actually answer your question, don't try to make your audience feel something; give them something to think about. If a character just dies, people get confused no matter how attached they were. Maybe somebody's mentor dies and now they're alone and unsure. Your audience will feel the same sadness and anxiety. The death had meaning, and we don't necessarily feel for the person who died but for the person who lost (it's not always about death). But the most important part of that is that the character they relate to is believable. Not necessarily sympathetic, but believable.

^ ^ That is pretty good advice.

In other news, I just took the time to add a bunch of NSMers on my old 3DS Friend List. I don't care that they haven't added me or that the 3DS is almost irrelevant now; I was really bored.

[Dude]

those words are probably the most experienced ever

[Olimar12345]

keep that next to your... dresser.

[mikey]

highs and lows

[Zunawe]

That is the most beautiful advice I've ever heard. Do you have more?

Stay in school. Like, just forever. Not until you've got a diploma or a degree or something. Just keep taking classes until they can't give you any more things and then find another school. That way you never have to pay off your debt because you're still a student and you don't have to join the real world.