In need of writing critique

[Blue Sky]

I'm glad you enjoyed it! B)

I tried rewriting it in past tense and it just didn't feel right. Plus that's just the tense I revert to naturally (for whatever reason).

[Applegate]

I think that what you have written is not, by definition, "bad". I have not read the feedback of others and, as a result, my feedback may conflict or repeat what others have said. Please use your own judgment in determining whether the following is useful to you.

I will highlight a short snip from your story.

"Dammit..." I heave myself onto my side, and push the power button on the digital alarm, ceasing its noise. The clock reads 6:30.

"Who set this...?" Of course, nobody answers. Looking down I see that I'm still wearing my jeans from yesterday. My legs are stuck to the inner fabric.

I get up off the bed and pull my clothes off awkwardly, still half asleep. I fumble for the closet doors and grab some new jeans and a pair of plaid boxers. In an instant, it hits me.

There are a few problems I, personally, would highlight in this snip. Let's evaluate them one-by-one.

"I heave myself onto my side, and push the power button on the digital alarm, ceasing its noise."

When assuming that we have a narrator, we assume this narrator is telling us about his, or her, story. They are sharing their experiences with us. However, this scene is a case of "sharing too much". Let's review.

Our protagonist is on his bed. An alarm is beeping beside him.

Now, as a reader, I wonder what added value there is to know he "heaved himself onto his side"? There is no indication the precise way in which he lies on his bed holds any importance to our story, nor does it characterise him in any way. It is simply lying on one's side, and I regret to report that this is information no reader needs to read as it adds next to nothing. I recommend removing description of movement if the precise gestures are unimportant to the plot itself.

The second part that I dislike about this sentence is in the second half, the one where he details pressing the power button shuts off the alarm's alarming functions. As someone who lives in the 21st century, I guarantee that I am well aware of the functions of alarms. To add a description that describes the precise effect of hitting the alarm's button is to inform the reader of something that is important to know.

... However, in this case, it is not important what part of the alarm he hits in order to shut it off. "I get up and turn off the alarm", or even "I turn off the alarm" tells us everything we need to know in this particular instance. When writing, make sure not to make your readers read more than is necessary. As they say, brevity is the soul of wit.

"I get up off the bed and pull my clothes off awkwardly, still half asleep. I fumble for the closet doors and grab some new jeans and a pair of plaid boxers. In an instant, it hits me."

When we evaluate this line, we notice distance. The narrator seperates himself from the story by describing himself as "half-asleep". As it is present tense, I think this would work better if you could, somehow, work in a "half-asleep" vibe from his narration and actions, rather than describing it. Rather than tell us about it, show us this trait or particular status at the precise moment it becomes pertinent.

Another issue I take here is, again, over-description. The line previous to this one details how he notices his jeans being sticky against the legs. To detail he is grabbing new jeans and plaid boxers (the material of boxers is, again, quite irrelevant) signifies this is somehow important enough to tell us.

I can guarantee you that if I ever woke up in such a state and I would later relate the story to my best friend, I would not tell him I was fumbling around for new jeans and my plaid boxers. I'd be more inclined to tell him I took out a change of clothes. For example, I would rewrite your line as this:

"I stumble off my bed and awkwardly tug my clothes off. I clumsily open the closet, reaching inside for a change of clothes. Then, it hits me."

It is still not perfect, but as a reader I am informed of the most important things:
1) The protagonist has "stumbled" off his bed and is, in all likelihood, not entirely awake.
2) The protagonist awkwardly tugs his clothes off, and clumsily opens his closet... okay, he's very likely drowsy and uncoordinated.
3) He grabs a change of clothes. As his pants were wet and he was still wearing those, and they were what he noticed before reaching for the closet, I'll assume he msotly wanted to change into some new pants.
4) After reaching in, or while reaching in, he has a sudden realisation.

To highlight one more instance of this:

"She's right. I sit down at the table where Lynne eventually places a bowl and spoon, the cereal box, and a carton of milk. I pour in all the ingredients of a migraine-inducing meal and start eating. "

Again, you highlight the precise tools placed on the table, being a bowl and spoon, a cereal box, and a carton of milk. As someone who lives in the 21st century, it follows that I am aware that if cereal is eaten with milk, then it is eaten with a spoon, and from a bowl. There is no importance to the particulars; he might've eaten it out of a cup, at which point it is worth noting because it shows a characteristic of the protagonist.

But something as mundane as eating cereal from a bowl, with a spoon no less, hardly seems a matter worth bringing to the attention of your faithful readers.



In summation, while your writing has no particular error in being interesting (I admit it was not a bad read), it suffers from a tendency to pad your wordcount with needless description and an unnatural narration.

[kinougames]

I'm gonna take this piece by piece.

It's 11:36, and in a few moments I'll be dead.

A pretty decent opener here, but you have to be able to follow it with some strength.

It's weird, but I don't care at all. It's like I'm the hail falling from the sky, just about to hit the asphalt below. Once I fall, I'll be just a puddle on the ground.

I wish I had something to say. Last words, I guess.

Well, there is one thing I can say, but it certainly won't be Shakespeare.

I raise my longest finger up to the sky, ready to scream.

"Well, here I am God. Out here saying fuck you. I don't know how many times I prayed to you; it never helped. The only thing that ever helped me was myself!"

This right here is a prime example of where people go wrong with first person prose. This sounds incredibly drafted. Not many actual people will be about to die and make a cheesy comparison about being hail and puddles.

If this guy is pissed enough to flip off god, I'm pretty sure he'd just say "middle finger" or "flipped god the bird" or something to that effect. In first person, you have to write like a person is thinking, not as if you're describing it from the outside.

I would do something more like:

S'weird, but I don't really care. I'm gonna step off the sidewalk into a bus, and if I'm lucky, I'll have a freaky hallucinogenic experience right before I die.

Heh. If I wasn't gonna be dead, I'd videotape that.

Don't really got much to say, but there's one person I'd like to make sure gets a good eyeful.

So I flip off God. Yeah, I know, but I think that considering I'm 'bout to die, I can afford a bit of edginess right as I go down.

Still, I keep my voice down. Maybe some left-over parental-brow-beaten reverence for the flying spaghetti monster.

"Here I am. S'what you wanted, right, you fucking asshole."

"D-don't say things like that... about the Lord."

This implies that your piece will have some heavy religious tones to it. If it doesn't, I'd be wary of going this far into the religious wording.

"Okay, I know what I said was... weird but it's storming out and you're just gonna stand there?"

She nods.

I've had enough. Pulling myself up from the bench, I march over to her and grab her hand. I can feel her entire body shaking with cold, her fingers numb beneath mine.

"God, are you even wearing a jacket? The hell's wrong with you! It's fucking below zero out here and you're just gonna walk outside like it's nothing? I would never let my sister go out in weather like this unless she was in a snowsuit!"

For some reason, I can't stop shouting at her as I drag her over to the bus shelter.

"Here, have my coat. It'll at least warm you up some."

"Um... t-thank you."

As I hand it to her, I truly see her for the first time. Her hair is a dark brown, reaching all the way to her hips and her bangs hide her eyes almost completely. But her smile makes me do a double-take.

It's an uncertain smile, a small smile, but it is altogether familiar.

"Your name."

"Eh?"

"What's your name?" I almost shout, and she flinches.

"S-sarra. Just Sarra."

"I'm Levi."

This whole scene reads oddly, and sounds rushed. I'd slow it down. Don't start out with such a strong introspective and then eliminate the introspection when another character comes along.

She smiles again and finally slips into the coat.

She puts it on slowly, as if it were alien.

These two sentences are broken up oddly. I'd make them a single sentence.

It fits her about as well as a potato sack.

"So what's a kid like you doing out here?"

"I'm waiting for a bus."

"I know that already! What I mean is, where are you going?"

She looks down at her feet again.

"... Away."

I sigh, and lean back against the glass. As a man, I can't let some young girl go off on her own. "If you really have to go out, at least let someone go with you."

"Do you mean t-that you want to come!? With me?" Her mouth is open in surprise.

"Yeah, that's kind of the point." She doesn't seem convinced.

This seems to change the character's personality VERY drastically from the original opening. He's gone from "I'm gonna die and fuck you, god!" to "Ugh, what a stupid little girl" to "I'm a man, I can't leave little girls by themselves." Either he's severely bipolar/borderline, or I'd rewrite some parts so that this makes more sense.

"B-but don't you have plans?"

I hesitate for a second. "They can wait..."

Sarra's shoes slide against the sidewalk for awhile as she thinks.

"I... I guess it's okay."

With that tiny, almost inaudible phrase, we are bound together for the night.

We wait out the rest of the time without words.

Prose here is pretty awkward.

The bus is almost completely empty, save the driver and an older woman in the back. We sit ourselves down in the middle side by side. Thankfully buses in this city are free to minors.

"Where do you wanna go?"

Sarra looks up at me. She is sitting near the aisle, about as far away from me as she can get.

"There is... o-one place... but you wouldn't like it."

"It's fine - there aren't many places that I like, anyway."

"No, i-it's fine! I shouldn't have said anything!" She waves her hands around, blushing.

"No, really, I'm cool with it." Just what is this place?

"No, you'll be mad!"

"I'll put up with it."

"I don't want to go anymore!" Her voice has gone up a decibel.

"You don't have to be nice!"

"It's church!"

Really, really awkward dialogue that again, sounds fake. Actually try arguing/speaking this way, using the exact punctuation you've got here.

Her face is bright red and her hands come up to hide her head from view.

"I-it's church..." She says again, almost to herself.

"C-church...?"

She nods, not facing me.

God sure is a cheeky son of a bitch.

I sigh, and stare out the window. It's still hailing and I can't think of any other place to go...

"Alright. We'll go to church. Tell me when we get there." She gasps.

"O-okay..."

The girl character is becoming increasingly annoying, to be honest. He's agreed with her...it just seems like overkill to have her still gasping and stuttering everywhere like fanboys think Hinata from Naruto does.

We sit there for another ten minutes before Sarra speaks again.

"I-it's this stop."

Really, she doesn't need to stutter every single sentence.


I have a bit of work today, but when I return I shall edit the second half for you. Hope this half helps in the meantime.

[fortaat]

Use of language:
Apply everything Applegate said about descriptions.
As Kinougames said, the narration lacks personality. All the characters sound the same. Either English isn't your first language, or you should read more books to get a better sense of how narration works.


Characters:
Boy - He's unbelievable. It sounds like you made him suicidal because it's cool.
Bad things happen - some people are left with short periods of depression, some with a belief in God, others develop a burning hatred for the human kind. Most people just carry on. Teenagers always write suicidal characters, which are the least likely group, as well as unoriginal. This accounts for why people found him unbelievable.
As Kinougames pointed out, his personality changes too drastically - though he's wrong bipolar/borderline personality could account for such changes. These disorders affect the personality in periods, not seconds.

Girl - "I'm so we-e-e-eak and likable, MC-kun, please save me from standing like a retard in the rain. I wa-a-a-a-nt a strong man to protect me and love me, like I'm still in the Victorian Era."
Read less manga, meet more women. Try to write about your female friends, it will greatly improve her character.

Both characters are shallow, and aren't especially interesting. Topagae interpreted this as a lack of descriptions, but notice all his examples add some characterization to the inane\boring actions of the characters.


Plot - Nothing exciting or original happens. The main character is Emo, and finds an Asian-fantasy-chick to save him. We've read this too many times. Don't count on us to keep reading through the boring exposition, because of a vague promise for interesting things to happen later on. If you have a great idea for a plot, make sure we'll know about it while we're still reading.


In your credit, it's quite a solid piece. The pacing is good, and it didn't have any glaring mistakes beside the female character, which is almost a given in this genre. This is no small feat, as most stories posted here fail within the 500 word mark, while you managed to go past it without scaring the readers.
It's not bad, but if it had been longer, the mediocrity would have killed it.
For the next draft, focus on the narration, and add some meat to the characters, right now they're too shallow.

Good luck.

[Samu-kun]

There are a few problems I, personally, would highlight in this snip. Let's evaluate them one-by-one.

"I heave myself onto my side, and push the power button on the digital alarm, ceasing its noise."

When assuming that we have a narrator, we assume this narrator is telling us about his, or her, story. They are sharing their experiences with us. However, this scene is a case of "sharing too much". Let's review.

Our protagonist is on his bed. An alarm is beeping beside him.

Now, as a reader, I wonder what added value there is to know he "heaved himself onto his side"? There is no indication the precise way in which he lies on his bed holds any importance to our story, nor does it characterise him in any way. It is simply lying on one's side, and I regret to report that this is information no reader needs to read as it adds next to nothing. I recommend removing description of movement if the precise gestures are unimportant to the plot itself.

The second part that I dislike about this sentence is in the second half, the one where he details pressing the power button shuts off the alarm's alarming functions. As someone who lives in the 21st century, I guarantee that I am well aware of the functions of alarms. To add a description that describes the precise effect of hitting the alarm's button is to inform the reader of something that is important to know.

... However, in this case, it is not important what part of the alarm he hits in order to shut it off. "I get up and turn off the alarm", or even "I turn off the alarm" tells us everything we need to know in this particular instance. When writing, make sure not to make your readers read more than is necessary. As they say, brevity is the soul of wit.

"I get up off the bed and pull my clothes off awkwardly, still half asleep. I fumble for the closet doors and grab some new jeans and a pair of plaid boxers. In an instant, it hits me."

When we evaluate this line, we notice distance. The narrator seperates himself from the story by describing himself as "half-asleep". As it is present tense, I think this would work better if you could, somehow, work in a "half-asleep" vibe from his narration and actions, rather than describing it. Rather than tell us about it, show us this trait or particular status at the precise moment it becomes pertinent.

Another issue I take here is, again, over-description. The line previous to this one details how he notices his jeans being sticky against the legs. To detail he is grabbing new jeans and plaid boxers (the material of boxers is, again, quite irrelevant) signifies this is somehow important enough to tell us.

I can guarantee you that if I ever woke up in such a state and I would later relate the story to my best friend, I would not tell him I was fumbling around for new jeans and my plaid boxers. I'd be more inclined to tell him I took out a change of clothes. For example, I would rewrite your line as this:

"I stumble off my bed and awkwardly tug my clothes off. I clumsily open the closet, reaching inside for a change of clothes. Then, it hits me."

It is still not perfect, but as a reader I am informed of the most important things:
1) The protagonist has "stumbled" off his bed and is, in all likelihood, not entirely awake.
2) The protagonist awkwardly tugs his clothes off, and clumsily opens his closet... okay, he's very likely drowsy and uncoordinated.
3) He grabs a change of clothes. As his pants were wet and he was still wearing those, and they were what he noticed before reaching for the closet, I'll assume he msotly wanted to change into some new pants.
4) After reaching in, or while reaching in, he has a sudden realisation.

To highlight one more instance of this:

"She's right. I sit down at the table where Lynne eventually places a bowl and spoon, the cereal box, and a carton of milk. I pour in all the ingredients of a migraine-inducing meal and start eating. "

Again, you highlight the precise tools placed on the table, being a bowl and spoon, a cereal box, and a carton of milk. As someone who lives in the 21st century, it follows that I am aware that if cereal is eaten with milk, then it is eaten with a spoon, and from a bowl. There is no importance to the particulars; he might've eaten it out of a cup, at which point it is worth noting because it shows a characteristic of the protagonist.

But something as mundane as eating cereal from a bowl, with a spoon no less, hardly seems a matter worth bringing to the attention of your faithful readers.



In summation, while your writing has no particular error in being interesting (I admit it was not a bad read), it suffers from a tendency to pad your wordcount with needless description and an unnatural narration.

This sounds like personal bias to me. On the other hand, I once had a creative writing professor who drilled into our heads that you could never have too much description. I remember her telling us that if we describe something with two of our senses, it doesn't exist, if we use three, then it's a shadow, and it's just barely there with four. If you wrote minimally in her class, I don't think you would have survived. XD You're probably doing the same thing here. Some writing styles are just more adjective heavy than others. I don't think it makes any difference either way.

[Blue Sky]

First of all, thanks for your honesty! These are the most helpful critiques I've gotten in my whole life.

It seems like most of the issues in the opening were found with the two main characters, so I will definitely work on making them less shallow and all over the place.

@fortaat:

I have to admit, when I read that part about English not being my first language I felt a literal pain in my gut. Seeing as how it's the only language I speak, my narration must have been pretty bad! I'll definitely work on that, haha.

Bad things happen - some people are left with short periods of depression, some with a belief in God, others develop a burning hatred for the human kind. Most people just carry on. Teenagers always write suicidal characters, which are the least likely group, as well as unoriginal. This accounts for why people found him unbelievable.

At this point it would probably be best to have him and Sarra out there for a completely different reason.

Girl - "I'm so we-e-e-eak and likable, MC-kun, please save me from standing like a retard in the rain. I wa-a-a-a-nt a strong man to protect me and love me, like I'm still in the Victorian Era."

This just had me laughing. I made her way too timid.

Anyway, I really appreciate the advice. I'll try to come back with some solid characters.

@kinougames:

I was really afraid to describe everything that forward, but you're right: it's from Levi's perspective, and everything needs to be told from his mind.

This really helped point out the odd sentence structures and scenes. Thank you very much for doing this! I'm looking forward to seeing your perspective on the second half. :)

@Applegate:

This really helped me see what parts of the story need to be described less. I think the main thing to keep in mind here is that it isn't my perspective, it's Levi's. Your post really helped shape that idea in my mind.

Thank you very much for this, you don't know how much it will help me!
--------

Also, thank you all for being completely honest about my work. Nobody else has ever done that, so I really appreciate it. B)

[Topagae]

"Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit..."

[Blue Sky]

@Blue
Can't read it all, not a lot of time, BUT. Be sure to note, a lot of this stuff is NOT bad ideas, but BAD execution.

Like you said you made the girl too timid. No you didn't people are that timid ALL the time, you just need to portray it more realistically.

Alright, I'll keep that in mind. Thanks for the support.

[Samu-kun]

My overall impression was that the writing style still feels amateurish, but on the right track.

The narrative tone sounds immature and unpolished, but a lot of writers intentionally try to find an immature and unpolished tone when telling a story about adolescence. I think you should just go with the current tone, since probably eight years from now, you might not be able to create the same tone that you can now. At least that's what I feel anyways. If I look at things I wrote eight years ago, it comes off sounding extremely childish and immature, but there's a certain honesty and lack of fear about how others would react to the tone that I can't replicate any more.

The rest, I guess depends on mostly on what kind of story you want to tell. If you're trying to tell a story about an emo protagonist and a girl with no self confidence, then the goal is to write a good story about an emo protagonist and a girl with no self-confidence, not make the protagonist less emo and the girl more self confident. If your goal is to write a story about some regular, every day guy and a normal girl, then yes, I would advice that the protagonist comes off as sounding too overly suicidal and the girl too feeble, but if you actually intended it that way, I would suggest ways to make it so that the protagonist's desire to commit suicide and the girl's lack of self confidence comes off in a more emotionally moving way, or something to that. There's no ideal model that I can change your story into and make it better. All doing that will do is just make it more readable for myself and will probably have little effect on everyone else. All I can do is just suggest ways to fix mechanical issues that are more closer to simple questions of right or wrong, and give you suggestions to make your story more closely reflect what you want it to be. So, what exactly is this story about?

If you say that you want a particular scene to convey a certain feeling/emotion, or some character to feel like a emo/self doubter/coward/hero/snob, then I can try to suggest ways to improve your script to meet your goals more.

[Blue Sky]

I'm running on about three hours of uninterrupted sleep, so this might not make sense.

The narrative tone sounds immature and unpolished, but a lot of writers intentionally try to find an immature and unpolished tone when telling a story about adolescence. I think you should just go with the current tone, since probably eight years from now, you might not be able to create the same tone that you can now. At least that's what I feel anyways. If I look at things I wrote eight years ago, it comes off sounding extremely childish and immature, but there's a certain honesty and lack of fear about how others would react to the tone that I can't replicate any more.

You know what, I really agree with this. I'll enjoy being an amateur while it lasts.

So, what exactly is this story about?

This story, to put it simply, is about the redemption of mankind. That premise alone can have several angles, but I want the mood to be one that is dark and depressing, with just a hint of hope (utsuge). Levi himself is a boy who has finally been able to escape his abusive parents after fifteen years, never having known what real life is supposed to be like. Obviously, the guy is going to have some issues, mainly in his attitude towards other people. The only one he is kind to is his little sister, since she's been through the same situation. In a nutshell, I don't want him to be apathetic, but kind of an angrier, bitter guy who isn't afraid to be brash and reckless.

He didn't really come across that way at all in my introduction, haha.

Sarra on the other hand, is extremely timid and quiet. She's committed her fair share of sins in the past and wants desperately to atone for them. Also, don't think these sins were done by accident and that she's really a saint. She did them of her own mind. Thinking on it, I don't want her to act like a regular, quiet teenage girl. Think of a girl that is totally out of social activity - like a stereotypical d&d player, minus the nerdy obsessions and with psychological damage. Gah, she's a bottle of stereotype, but that's kind of what I want here.

Edit: Oh yeah, plot! There is an overarching plot line, but every girl's route will be different. I'm embarrassed to say this, but there are going to be a lot of girls to choose from making the grand total 10, with a bonus non-romantic route with the older sister. Some of the routes focus on Levi, but the majority are geared towards the girls themselves.

To be honest, I haven't figured it all out yet. I originally wanted to make a series of games featuring different characters and situations with different themes played out in each one, but I'm not sure anymore. Either way, The Perfect World itself is a world in the imagination and dreams of every character. But whether or not it will be made reality or accepted as just a dream is up to one person watching all of the scenarios come together.

[Samu-kun]

This story, to put it simply, is about the redemption of mankind. That premise alone can have several angles, but I want the mood to be one that is dark and depressing, with just a hint of hope (utsuge). Levi himself is a boy who has finally been able to escape his abusive parents after fifteen years, never having known what real life is supposed to be like. Obviously, the guy is going to have some issues, mainly in his attitude towards other people. The only one he is kind to is his little sister, since she's been through the same situation. In a nutshell, I don't want him to be apathetic, but kind of an angrier, bitter guy who isn't afraid to be brash and reckless.

He didn't really come across that way at all in my introduction, haha.

Sarra on the other hand, is extremely timid and quiet. She's committed her fair share of sins in the past and wants desperately to atone for them. Also, don't think these sins were done by accident and that she's really a saint. She did them of her own mind. Thinking on it, I don't want her to act like a regular, quiet teenage girl. Think of a girl that is totally out of social activity - like a stereotypical d&d player, minus the nerdy obsessions and with psychological damage. Gah, she's a bottle of stereotype, but that's kind of what I want here.

Mmm... Don't you think it'd be good if Levi misses Sarra's emotions most of the time? Overall, I get the feeling that Levi is an impatient, edgy, and rough boy who wouldn't be able to catch onto Sarra's softer, quieter, and introverted feelings. It'd be a good idea to make her inner emotions just barely visible to the reader, but to make Levi always miss it completely. And then it'd be a good moment if one day, he finally does realize what she's been thinking in some appropriately dramatic fashion and sees what a fool he's been, etc, etc, etc.


I *am* extremely worried about the 10 end girls though. That's waaaaayyyyyyyyyyyy to high a number. Not even most commercial visual novels with budgets of hundreds of thousands of dollars have 10 end girls. I recommend giving more people the Sacchin treatment and lowering the number of end girls to no larger than four at the very, very most, since it's just realistically too much work for one or even a small team to finish without a much larger budget.

[kinougames]

This sounds like personal bias to me. On the other hand, I once had a creative writing professor who drilled into our heads that you could never have too much description. I remember her telling us that if we describe something with two of our senses, it doesn't exist, if we use three, then it's a shadow, and it's just barely there with four. If you wrote minimally in her class, I don't think you would have survived. XD You're probably doing the same thing here. Some writing styles are just more adjective heavy than others. I don't think it makes any difference either way.

I gotta disagree with this. Writing professors have different styles (and I would be exceptionally wary to listen to writing professors as far as style, since professors are often people who couldn't make it in the field themselves: "those who can't, teach") and tend to be more into classical work. Furthermore, the principles that apply to 3rd person writing do NOT apply to first person flow-of-consciousness writing, and that's another mistake a lot of people make.

The mistakes pointed out as far as flow are completely correct for first person consciousness prose. When speaking from the first person, you need to sound like a person speaking, or it comes off as a person reading from a script.

[Jake]

Furthermore, the principles that apply to 3rd person writing do NOT apply to first person flow-of-consciousness writing, and that's another mistake a lot of people make.

True, but not all first-person writing is stream-of-consciousness.

The mistakes pointed out as far as flow are completely correct for first person consciousness prose. When speaking from the first person, you need to sound like a person speaking, or it comes off as a person reading from a script.

It's true that first person writing tends to read better when it sounds like someone recounting a story rather than reading from a script, but - for example - things like deliberate mis-spellings and colloquial words to get accross accent and the spoken running-together of words and so on are difficult to use well, and generally speaking should be used sparingly. For every person who thoroughly enjoyed A Clockwork Orange there's another five - or more - who got put off reading it because of the writing... and that's a good example.

Most of the time, you should probably lay off that kind of writing for your protagonist, simply because it makes it harder to read. And this approach fits fine within the inside-the-protagonist's-head paradigm because - honestly - who actually thinks to themselves with dropped aitches and initial vowels and run-together words? People don't think to themselves in words at all, generally, just concepts - and it's generally going to be better for your reader to make those concepts readable. If the reader knows your protagonist is a cockney (for example), they don't need reminding outside of dialogue. By all means keep the prose simpler for simpler characters and bend the tone to fit the character and so on, but getting deliberate mis-spelling right is - frankly - too difficult for most writers to do well.

[kinougames]

It's true that first person writing tends to read better when it sounds like someone recounting a story rather than reading from a script, but - for example - things like deliberate mis-spellings and colloquial words to get accross accent and the spoken running-together of words and so on are difficult to use well, and generally speaking should be used sparingly. For every person who thoroughly enjoyed A Clockwork Orange there's another five - or more - who got put off reading it because of the writing... and that's a good example.

xD I wouldn't quote a book as popular as that when trying to make an argument against the style. Also, even outside of flow-of-consciousness (where the character is in his own head and doesn't really describe what he is doing so much as what he is thinking/feeling WHILE he was doing), speaking directly to the reader like this character is requires a voice.

Most of the time, you should probably lay off that kind of writing for your protagonist, simply because it makes it harder to read. And this approach fits fine within the inside-the-protagonist's-head paradigm because - honestly - who actually thinks to themselves with dropped aitches and initial vowels and run-together words? People don't think to themselves in words at all, generally, just concepts - and it's generally going to be better for your reader to make those concepts readable. If the reader knows your protagonist is a cockney (for example), they don't need reminding outside of dialogue. By all means keep the prose simpler for simpler characters and bend the tone to fit the character and so on, but getting deliberate mis-spelling right is - frankly - too difficult for most writers to do well.

This character is not thinking to himself, though. He's explaining himself. Furthermore, people tend to think very similarly to the way they speak. I know when I'm thinking in my head, it's all full of colloquialisms. Which yes, is not easy to do correctly, but for the approach being attempted here, it seemed much more logical than having him wax poetry about hail and puddles at the reader, which seriously, very few real people actually do on a regular basis, unlike slurring.

I disagree that the specific slurs I used above are difficult to read. If you're not at least a near-native English speaker, well, you're going to have trouble in any language that uses common dialogue colloquialisms (and pretty much EVERY first person written Japanese games use them for some character at some point. Manga uses them as well, if you want to argue on strict reading. Guaranteed, and it IS hard if you don't know where Japanese people tend to slur in real life, but you can bet your butt that the Japanese see no comprehension issues.) in which you're no extremely familiar already. But, I'd be quite damned if even your idiotic native/near-native/extremely fluent English speaker couldn't figure things like "gotta" or "shoulda" or "s'a weird world out there".

Accents DO get over done, but I think there's a really large difference between expecting someone to understand "s'a'ri' debil thin' ye got isside'a'ya" and feeling comfort in them understanding "No, you GOTTA go."

Lastly, this is not a story all in the character's head, where only his thoughts matter, where's musing to himself. You don't say "I got out of bed and turned off my alarm" to yourself. He's clearly speaking to the reader, to someone, and the voice should be of the character. If he's not the sort of person to slur ever at all, it might be different, but it gives a certain air for a character when you write them with no slurring/no conjunctions/minimal conjunctions.

[Blue Sky]

Mmm... Don't you think it'd be good if Levi misses Sarra's emotions most of the time? Overall, I get the feeling that Levi is an impatient, edgy, and rough boy who wouldn't be able to catch onto Sarra's softer, quieter, and introverted feelings. It'd be a good idea to make her inner emotions just barely visible to the reader, but to make Levi always miss it completely. And then it'd be a good moment if one day, he finally does realize what she's been thinking in some appropriately dramatic fashion and sees what a fool he's been, etc, etc, etc.

This is a great idea and fits greatly with the characters. Thank you!

I *am* extremely worried about the 10 end girls though. That's waaaaayyyyyyyyyyyy to high a number. Not even most commercial visual novels with budgets of hundreds of thousands of dollars have 10 end girls. I recommend giving more people the Sacchin treatment and lowering the number of end girls to no larger than four at the very, very most, since it's just realistically too much work for one or even a small team to finish without a much larger budget.

Don't worry, I've known all of this since the day I started working. I most likely will take characters out or add them as sides, but for now I'll just see how things go and how I feel about the workload.

Also, this game is going to be free. I don't expect people to have to buy some teenager's work.