Writing Humor -- how to get better? resources?

[Rosstin]

I've noticed that me and my buddies at Plus Ultra always seem to make satirical/humor games: http://plusultra.ninja/

I want to get better at writing humor, in the context of game dialog and game text.

i like that no matter how dark something is, no matter how dry a scientific paper is, a little bit of appropriate humor will always make it better -- humor is a universal skill, so i'll never regret learning more of it

the stuff we do with PlusUltra is always satirical / humorous but I also build everything with a frame that is self-consistent... i never build a universe where the characters don’t take the setting seriously — no matter how funny the universe is to the readers/players, the characters inside that universe take it very seriously

i think we’re gonna do another game this weekend so maybe if i have time i’ll study a bit since it seems to be a trend in my work with laura and kent

anyway, with that in mind, does anyone have advice on books to read? stuff to study? to get better at humor?

[CarrotyCat]

I've noticed that me and my buddies at Plus Ultra always seem to make satirical/humor games: http://plusultra.ninja/

I want to get better at writing humor, in the context of game dialog and game text.

i like that no matter how dark something is, no matter how dry a scientific paper is, a little bit of appropriate humor will always make it better -- humor is a universal skill, so i'll never regret learning more of it

the stuff we do with PlusUltra is always satirical / humorous but I also build everything with a frame that is self-consistent... i never build a universe where the characters don’t take the setting seriously — no matter how funny the universe is to the readers/players, the characters inside that universe take it very seriously

i think we’re gonna do another game this weekend so maybe if i have time i’ll study a bit since it seems to be a trend in my work with laura and kent

anyway, with that in mind, does anyone have advice on books to read? stuff to study? to get better at humor?

Watch Whose Line is it anyway?

[YossarianIII]

i like that no matter how dark something is, no matter how dry a scientific paper is, a little bit of appropriate humor will always make it better -- humor is a universal skill, so i'll never regret learning more of it

the stuff we do with PlusUltra is always satirical / humorous but I also build everything with a frame that is self-consistent... i never build a universe where the characters don’t take the setting seriously — no matter how funny the universe is to the readers/players, the characters inside that universe take it very seriously

This has always been my goal too!

FILM CRIT HULK has a couple of solid essays about humor (written about films but easy to apply to all writing). He's a thoughtful writer, and on top of that, his commenters are good at raising reasonable counterarguments. Here's a nice essay by him about transgressive humor.

Also, if you haven't already, I always find it helpful to just google your favorite writer/comedian/game designer with the word "interview" afterward to see if they have advice. Good do-ers aren't necessarily good teachers, but lots of creative people can explain themselves pretty well. At the very least, you're guaranteed to get advice from someone who shares your sensibility -- some writing advice I see is for an audience so different from me that it isn't helpful.

Not an expert here by any means, but hope it's helpful!

[RotGtIE]

I grew up on Dave Barry, and would recommend his books as examples of how to execute surprise and absurdity when restricted to a text-heavy format. If I were to write for comedic purposes, I would base my writing on his style. Aside from that, you really just follow the conventions of humor in general, and the core of that is in building expectations and then defying them to surprise and amuse the audience.

I don't agree with the notion that VNs need to be treated differently than text-only novels in the writing on account of it being a mixed media form, but if it helps to understand the timing between text and visualization for jokes which combine the two, I would recommend some of the older and longer-running webcomics on the internet, particularly 8-bit Theater and Order of the Stick. Both provide excellent examples of text-heavy humor and also cover a wide variety of tropes.

[YossarianIII]

I grew up on Dave Barry, and would recommend his books as examples of how to execute surprise and absurdity when restricted to a text-heavy format

Just wanted to cosign the Dave Barry recommendation. His "Mr. Language Person" bit is hilarious and a great resource for writers.

[Kuiper]

I'll also toss in a recommendation for Dave Barry, his non-fiction books and weekly column were both great. He also wrote three humorous novels ("Big Trouble," "Tricky Business," "Insane City,") about crazy things happening in Miami, which might be a more useful model to you if you're trying to apply his humorist sensibilities to writing fiction.

On the more sardonic side of things, I'm a big fan of Scott Adams, who's most famous for writing the Dilbert comic strip, but I enjoy him most for his non-comic writings. "The Dilbert Principle" (not actually a comic book, though it does contain some illustrations from the Dilbert comic strip) is a classic, and "The Way of the Weasel" is also a fun read, albeit a bit of a rehash if you compare it to The Dilbert Principle. I like Scott Adams as a model specifically because he takes a "craftsman's" approach to humor and makes deliberate efforts to "engineer" humor for his daily comic strip. Here's a post I made in another thread that summarizes Scott Adams' approach to humor. If you're interested in learning more about Scott Adams' approach to creative work, check out his latest, "How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big," a book that is not a "humor book" but a fascinating read nonetheless (though I would take some of his "actionable" advice with a grain of salt--though the book does contain some nuggets of wisdom, it's more interesting to me as a character study, rather than a self-help book).

Oh, and here's a university lecture by Howard Tayler on how to write funny, given as part of a curriculum on writing fiction. You might know Howard Tayler as the author of the webcomic Schlock Mercenary, and I think he's especially pertinent to this discussion for the specific reason that he's a big proponent of the "technique, not talent" school of thought that I'm such a fan of (as in, "humor is a skill, so let's learn it, study it, practice it, and get good at it.")

[truefaiterman]

I've only read two comedy writers, but I had such a great time, and they were so good, they even influenced my drama.

Tom Sharpe
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Sharpe

Terry Pratchett:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_Pratchett

[Katy133]

Honestly, I think the best way for you to learn how to write humor is to go and watch/read/listen to different writers of humor.

I'll give you some recommendations. Since you want to implement humor in visual novels specifically, I'll focus on narrative and dialogue-specific humor (instead of, say, physical humor, etc). If you don't want to play the video game examples (or can't), then try looking up Let's Play videos of them.

1. Mike Falzone (short You Tube videos, observational humor mixed with heartfelt life/relationship-advice)
2. On Being Idle by Jerome K. Jerome (short story, satirical comedy; narrator gives a "serious" lecture on how to be lazy.)
3. Jeeves and Wooster by P.G. Wodehouse (novel series, comedy in Bertie's 1930s narration style, also parodies romantic comedies because the plot of each book is mainly Wooster accidentally getting engaged and him trying to get out of marrying the woman.)
4. Also, the 1990's tv series of Jeeves and Wooster is a brilliant adaptation of the books.
5. Skulduggery Pleasant (novel series, black comedy/snarky comedy with the main character, who's a skeleton detective.)
6. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger (novel, observational humor with the main character's narration.)
7. Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and (novel series, humor in the narration and bizarre/surreal situations that mix the mundane with fantasy.)
8. Undertale (RPG game, has quirky characters, funny responses when you explore areas, and the game plays around with meta/fourth wall elements.)
9. No One Lives Forever (FPS game, parodies Spy films, you can also eavesdrop on funny conversations that baddies have among themselves. Also, you can collect funny memos/documents/notes.)
10. The Darkness II (FPS game, humor in the dialogue, especially with the Johnny Powell character.)
11. Portal and Portal 2 (Puzzle game, dark humor in the dialogue and in an environment where everything's trying to kill you.)
12. Rick and Morty (adult animated series, each episode humorously deconstructs a cliché/staple in sci-fi or animated kids shows. For example, the episode "Rick Potion #9" deconstructs how gross and amoral the love potion idea is in a way that other animated series that have used it don't.)
13. Men in Black and Men in Black III (films, takes a bizarre, fantasy-secret-service-type job and treats it like a mundane, civil-servant job)

Seriously, I could gush about all of these for ages. (If you want me to, PM me.)

Hope you check them out, and hope they help!

[qualifiedbadger]

First off, I played all your plus ultra games and it has to be said, your team's pretty funny already! So feel free to ignore all my thoughts as you may know more than me already. However I thought I'd just comment on some patterns you keep using in your games, just to bring an awareness of where you might want to go next with your humour studies.

I also played your most recent game, the GGJ 'ritual' game, but as it wasn't really a comedy game I won't comment on it, I'll just be talking about Detective City, SlaughterTrain and Monstr.

Your basic understanding of humour is great, all 3 games had laugh-out-loud moments, and you were using loads of different techniques to elicit humour so I don't think you need to study the basics of comedy. Your choices for future study are either focusing on what you already know to master those skills, or trying to learn new and more interesting techniques to broaden the types of comedy you can do. I'll give some examples of both below.

Your strengths involve nonsense, surrealism, parody and joke-basket sketches. You said you always make the characters take the situation seriously, no matter how random it feels to the audience, and that totally comes across in your work. Whether it's the paranormal detectives of Ghost City arguing whether ghosts exist, or the people from the Grammar Nazi Train arguing about where to put the comma, the crazy situations always felt grounded and realistic to the audience, and that's something you should keep doing in the future.

By joke-basket sketches, I mean you keep creating a structure or formula where you can just keep chucking different jokes into. Think of David Letterman's 'Top 10 Lists'. It doesn't matter what topic the list is about, the writers can just keep chucking new jokes into the structure and it'll always feel fresh and funny. In all 3 games you use a structure, like:

Detective City: "Go to [crazy thing] City to investigate"
SlaughterTrain: "Get past [crazy thing] Train without dying"
Monstr: "Look at [crazy thing]'s profile to find your perfect match"

Each [crazy thing] situation takes up a portion of the game, and the entire game has like, 40-100 [crazy things] and then it's over. Each [crazy thing] rarely interacts with another, except in passing. This is in contrast to an actual narrative, where the characters and situations are more 3-dimensional, and the comedy comes from the interactions between everything. It's good for 10-15 minute playtimes, but is the audience being invested in the storyline and characters? Can it sustain a 1-hour playtime? I'm not so sure - not without additional techniques, at least.

This is obviously a formula that works well for your team, and it creates great comedy, so I'm not criticizing! There aren't many game designers who use that structure so you can either focus on that and keep pumping out similar games until you're the best in the world at it, or can you try to broaden your writing.

The following things I wouldn't say are a weakness, but they're definitely things that are missing from the above 3 games. You may be secretly great at them, you just haven't used them in your games yet. But I'll point them out nevertheless:

Narrative/storyline, Characters/Character comedy/Character arcs, heightenings, slice-of-life humour.

Narrative/storyline: In each game, you're given a goal, given dire consequences if you don't achieve your goal, and then you run through 10-ish [crazy thing] situations, such as 10 cities, 15 trains, 20 monstr profiles and either win or lose. This is fine, but it's notoriously hard to sustain for long lengths of times. Think of joke books - funny in small doses, but are you really gonna read it end-to-end in one sitting? Even most stand-ups or sketch comedies introduce slightly longer story-based bits, although to be fair there ARE some artists who are just joke-joke-joke. I'm just saying there's a choice to be made here, an opportunity to learn different skills that may come in handy in the future.

To learn narrative and storyline competently, you really have to read up on it or take workshops. This is the domain of feature-length films, plays and sitcoms, where they know the audience gets bored if you don't satisfy them by the end, and they have loads of formulas and 'tricks' to analyse and fix story problems. 2-act structure, 3-act structure, platforms and climaxes - there's all sorts of jargon and it'll take years of practice before you feel like you 'get' story, but in my opinion it'll be totally worth it. (Of course I'm still learning myself!)

Tying into this, all your characters are also pretty one-dimensional - which again, allows for a bunch of great jokes to be delivered in fast succession. Think of cartoons where over-the-top people pop in, say something crazy and then leave again. It's hugely popular but there are other options. You can get just as much comedy from characters with goals, feelings, relationships, that feel really human and relatable. I don't think I ever looked at one of your games and thought "I know that person!" - because they're all crazy. (Which is funny!) Again, if the characters learn something or are changed somehow, that gives the audience interest and emotion that isn't really there when everything's in crazy-town. There's no easy way to learn about characters, and it'll take a long time. So good luck(!)

Heightenings - I couldn't help but notice that in every situation in every game, everything's "Always turned up to 11". When someone breaks a coffee pot in Detective City they immediately open an investigation to catch the criminal. Everyone always takes things super-seriously. Again, this is funny stuff, but you never have anywhere to go afterwards. What if someone breaks a coffee pot, but no-one cares. Then someone stands on one of the shards and has to go to hospital. Then when someone's cleaning the coffee pot shards they knock over a statue of the boss and break it. Everyone starts to get worried. While they're arguing over what to do someone gets angry, slams a table and the fridge falls over and causes a fire. During the investigation tempers get flared and people start shooting each other. It's a pretty lame example, but by starting with something small and innocuous you can slowly build up to more crazy situations - you may still end up with the investigation bit, but you've stretched out that comedy into a much longer and more satisfying timeframe. (For very little effort!)

Slice-of-life humour - Again, a combination of all the above things. Sometimes comedy doesn't have to be over-the-top all the time. I think a study of slice-of-life humour would bring a lot of depth and humanity to your work. You HAVE to focus on the characters and situations. You CAN'T just have over-the-top reactions to everything - they're still a big part of this type of comedy, but it has to be justified, and possibly have a build-up to it. The obvious exception is the Nichijou anime, which is utterly crazy all the time, and people still seem to like it. Like I say, just different choices, no right or wrong, just personal preferences.

This post is already way too long, but as you asked for books to read I feel I should add some. Of course everyone learns comedy differently, some like techniques, some like games or exercises to play to practice those skills, others like intuitive thoughts and personal reflections... I'll try and give a varied list for each technique, but try to read before you buy and Your Mileage May Vary:

Some stuff you probably already know but will sharpen your skills greatly:

Joke structures:
Comedy Writing Step-by-Step - Gene Perret (A strong focus on techniques and learnable skills rather than inspiration. Strong focus on jokes, one-liners and sketches, but useful for all sorts of comedy.)
Mel Helitzer's book (Not read it, but some prefer it)
The Serious Guide to Joke-Writing - Sally Holloway (Another strong focus on techniques and exercises for jokes and one-liners, but different enough from Gene Perret's book to recommend)

Joke-baskets:
Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV - Joe Toplyn (Technique-based, lots of discussion on joke-baskets and similar structures for getting good laughs very quickly with very little narrative)

Clowning:
Ignore what you think you know about clowns. The essence of clowning is getting laughs no matter what, at the expense of story and sense, which your games remind me of a lot. Expect to learn a lot about nonsense, surrealism and parody.
Why Is That So Funny? - John Wright (Exercise-based. Actually has very little analysis of why things are funny, and concentrates on teaching how to get laughs in as many ways as possible. Also has a gentle introduction to clown, and a small section on the Japanese Noh Theatre, which may interest anyone interested in the influence and inspiration behind a lot of Japanese media and culture.)
The Tormenter (Les Gegeneur(?)) - Phillippe Gaulier (Nonsense-based. Mostly incomprehensible to me, but some people love it - including Sacha Baron Cohen - and it does have some good thoughts mixed in there.)
Angels Can Fly - Alan Clay (Although it has exercises in it, there's a strong focus on finding inspiration and growing as a (comic) artist, which may appeal to different people)

Now some more narrative-based books to broaden your approach (unless you already know about it(!)):

The Hidden Tools of Comedy - Steve Kaplan (Has techniques but not many exercises. Definitely worth a read. Nails the 80's and 90's comedy blockbuster aesthetic (Groundhog Day, Big, Forrest Gump etc.), if that's your thing.)
The Improv Handbook - Tom Salinsky and Deborah Frances-White (Chock full of techniques and exercises. In my opinion the best book on story structure, whether drama or comedy - but a lot of people disagree with me and don't like how analytical it is(!). Ignore the word 'Improv' because it analyses and applies methods to anything with a narrative.)
kenlevine.blogspot.com - Ken Levine (All sorts here - mostly techniques, inspiration and occasional reflection. But as a huge proponent of story and character-based comedy, there's a lot to learn here you'll find it hard to get anywhere else. He worked on M*A*S*H, Cheers and Frasier if you like those sorts of comedies.)

Well, this is a big post. But you did ask, so hey, I hope at least someone reading learned something!

[Rosstin]

Qualified, thanks for the in-depth feedback. You guys have given me some great stuff to consider.