The effect of "arcbleed" in branching VNs

[Kailoto]

Hey everyone.

So I don't know if this bothers anyone else, or if I'm just a stickler for details, but sometimes I'll notice contradictions between different arcs in a branching VN. Sometimes it's big, but most of the time it's really, really small stuff. I haven't encountered a term for it that I liked, so I started calling it "arcbleed," reminiscent of how a marker will bleed beyond where you initially draw.

My rule of thumb in a branching VN is that all events before a split in a path have to be maintained throughout all diverging paths, and that events that have nothing to do with player choice have to be held constant in the "world" of the VN, across all applicable arcs.

For example, let's say there's an event in arc A where a terrorist group bombs a building. Provided that the actions of this group were uninfluenced by the protagonist (or whoever's making choices), the same building should be targeted at the same time in every other arc. Or, to use another, if Heroine A is a yandere that's been stalking the protagonist since before the start of the story, you can't have the story ignore her if the player chooses to pursue Heroine B instead.

The inverse also applies; if choices by the player caused a change in events or a character's personality, those things should be unique to that specific path (unless you're trying to make a statement about determinism.) This one bothers me even more, like when you help someone through a difficult time but in another arc they overcome their problems on their own, rendering all of your "effort" null.

Basically, mitigating arcbleed is all about maintaining consistency throughout the fictional universe, and it applies to any story with branching paths, even if they're just dead ends. It's also the thing I struggle with most during writing because it's so hard to visualize - once I've got the characters, setting, and general arcmap created, I have to constantly check it to make sure I'm not conveniently ignoring something in an arc. I've been as much as ten months in to a project before realizing that there's a minor conflict between certain paths.

I guess I'm just posting this here to see if anyone else has noticed this as well, and if it actually bothers you when you do. In the same vein, I wonder if other writers spend as much time struggling with it as I do, and if so, how they go about it.

[RotGtIE]

G-Senjou no Maou violated this quite egregiously, but it'd be super spoileriffic to detail exactly how. I'm still not sure if it was done intentionally for some good reason or not.

[Kailoto]

G-Senjou no Maou violated this quite egregiously, but it'd be super spoileriffic to detail exactly how. I'm still not sure if it was done intentionally for some good reason or not.

Oh my god how that made the writer in me weep.

Although come to think about it, I tend to get less miffed the more it violates it. Like it passes a certain point and I just say "screw it" and include it in my suspension of disbelief. It's in the stories where it otherwise does quite well where it really sticks out. Like, off the top of my head, Fate/Stay Night (spoiler warning):

Once you've played the third arc and realize how shitty Sakura's life is, it sort of makes the other two arcs feel invalidated because you just know that while Emiya is off having fun with Tohsaka, Sakura's still getting violated and abused.

[Laniessa]

I know exactly what you're talking about and it nags at me. For ages. Just - a lot. When I'm going through the other routes, I'll have this constant notion of 'why isn't this happening now'. I loved Princess of Ruin and all, but that thing just kind of bothered me. A lot.

I recommend you make a linear timeline of the major events that a third-party caused - the ones that would actually effect other routes, for example, and use that as a reference, perhaps? It's how I would approach it.

[Hazel-Bun]

I notice it but it doesn't bother me. I consider all new paths to be different, therefore they don't have to adhere to similar events other than what's expressed in the common route (if there is one).

[YossarianIII]

This is a good post about something that I've also noticed about narrative in VNs but never really put into words before.

I noticed the opposite of this while playing the recent NaNoReNo game Western Destiny, which does an excellent job of avoiding "arcbleed"--the same general story happens every time, but you can change it organically, based on where you have the protagonist go and what choices he makes while he's there. I really liked this.

The inverse also applies; if choices by the player caused a change in events or a character's personality, those things should be unique to that specific path (unless you're trying to make a statement about determinism.) This one bothers me even more, like when you help someone through a difficult time but in another arc they overcome their problems on their own, rendering all of your "effort" null.

This is true, although I'd add that I think one of the most effective storytelling tools a VN writer has at their disposal is purposely varying how impactful player choices are. The Walking Dead game is a great example of this: some choices have a fairly significant impact on the plot, while others lead to the same inevitable conclusion. As a result, you never feel like the game is railroading you through on a linear path, but at the same time, you get the sense that the world of the game is bigger than you--that you're a relatively powerless individual in a giant, post-apocalyptic zombie world.

[Valduran]

I definitely agree in principle. Striving for at least basic consistency with the events of each route should be considered a foundational element of writing a branching VN.

You already mentioned the main offender that I consider to be unforgivable: Having the protagonist work hard to effect a change in one route, and then having the same change happen anyway in another route even without his influence. Stuff like that tells you that the writer doesn't really respect your investment in the story and the characters.

It is definitely flat out wrong to simply ignore elements of the story that were built up before the branch but beyond that I believe the writer has a certain element of freedom to adjust events to suit the story each route is trying to tell. That is to say; I don't really think that maintaining a strict timeline is the primary issue (though it's still a very respectable goal to work towards if that's the type of story you want), but rather that the important thing is respecting the reader's investment in each path and making sure that each path stands on it's own without negating or overshadowing the other paths by screwing with your perception of the events in those paths.

So pretty much I think it boils down to a few key points:

-Don't neglect character or plot development that happened before the branch.
-Don't negate the conflicts of another route by making them resolved easily in the current route.
-Make sure that each route tells a story that is worth reading even after all the other routes have been read.

Beyond that I feel the level of adherence to consistency between branches is pretty much entirely up to writer preference and most readers will be fine either way.

[truefaiterman]

I mostly agree with this issue, and the most obvious case I've seen so far is in Tsukihime, where the game just divides in two "main" arcs (from that point, you choose different routes) and almost everything in the plot changes completely. With that said, it does help to surprise the reader, and there is a point that I think needs clarification:

For example, let's say there's an event in arc A where a terrorist group bombs a building. Provided that the actions of this group were uninfluenced by the protagonist (or whoever's making choices), the same building should be targeted at the same time in every other arc. Or, to use another, if Heroine A is a yandere that's been stalking the protagonist since before the start of the story, you can't have the story ignore her if the player chooses to pursue Heroine B instead.

In this case, I think it's important to consider the entire "world". I'm thinking about Comyu, where there is consistency in the principle of things between every route, but nothing works the same way.

Example: In the common route you discover that character Smith is organizing a tournament. Then you go to route A, and the tournament is mentioned, but there are nothing special, because you're busy confronting Manolo.

Then you go to route B, and you enter the tournament. Then you end up fighting Smith since he, because of what you do during such tournament, decides to use the combats to organize an illegal betting network.

Then you go to route C, which is about you becoming a police officer, and suddenly there is a massive fight within such tournament. The reason? Manolo entered and Smith began his plans, so now it's them the ones fighting.

...

This was a weird example, sorry if it's not good enough but it's what first came into mind xD. My point is, the main character doesn't HAVE to be the only one influencing the story. If well handled, that makes the whole setting more organic, and gives the feeling that the characters ARE characters, and not simple plot-driving tools that pivot around the player. It also allows for certain surprises that make sense within the game's context.

[Kailoto]

This is true, although I'd add that I think one of the most effective storytelling tools a VN writer has at their disposal is purposely varying how impactful player choices are. The Walking Dead game is a great example of this: some choices have a fairly significant impact on the plot, while others lead to the same inevitable conclusion. As a result, you never feel like the game is railroading you through on a linear path, but at the same time, you get the sense that the world of the game is bigger than you--that you're a relatively powerless individual in a giant, post-apocalyptic zombie world.

Yeah, it's fine as long as it's and intentional decision. The design in that game was pretty solid, and you could tell what points they were trying to make, so it never felt cheap.

It is definitely flat out wrong to simply ignore elements of the story that were built up before the branch but beyond that I believe the writer has a certain element of freedom to adjust events to suit the story each route is trying to tell. That is to say; I don't really think that maintaining a strict timeline is the primary issue (though it's still a very respectable goal to work towards if that's the type of story you want), but rather that the important thing is respecting the reader's investment in each path and making sure that each path stands on it's own without negating or overshadowing the other paths by screwing with your perception of the events in those paths.

Actually, that's a much better way of putting it than how I did, and that's pretty much what causes me grief. I mean yeah, I still notice the trivial things, but the thing I actively try to avoid is a player learning something in one path that taints the view of another path. For example, in one of my VNs a character was supposed to die unless you help them out; what I realized then was that every time the player doesn't go that route, they'll know that they're letting the character die, which sorta dampens the mood.

So yeah, I can tolerate inconsistencies, but some are worse than others.

This was a weird example, sorry if it's not good enough but it's what first came into mind xD. My point is, the main character doesn't HAVE to be the only one influencing the story. If well handled, that makes the whole setting more organic, and gives the feeling that the characters ARE characters, and not simple plot-driving tools that pivot around the player. It also allows for certain surprises that make sense within the game's context.

No, it was actually a pretty good example, and one of the ways in which I think arcbleed can be manipulated to make the story more engaging. Deciding what to show and what not to show is the cornerstone of dramatic tension, and I really appreciate stories that seem to understand that they'll be played multiple times and therefore spread content evenly across the paths. It also ties in to what Hazel-Bun was saying; it's actually better if each arc is distinct and adds on to information instead of repeating it.

Again, an example of a VN doing this really well was Fate/Stay Night - except for that part at the end I mentioned above, the game was very clever in how you learned things through each arc, and changing the way the scenario unfolded due to the motives of the different characters.