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Are there any storylines or aspects of drama that you consider too cliche and overdone so that it's difficult to empathise with the characters? I want to know since I don't want to do a dramatic storyline that has less power to it because it's been done before to death

It's not about clichés, it's the way you tell the story that makes it good.
Some pieces fit good together, others don't... It's kind of hard to explain but this is what shows the difference a good storyteller from a bad one.

Anyway, one cliché that's very popular nowadays is "a arrogant character whose tragic TRAUMATIC past explains why (s)he is so mean and ohh because of this his/her personality so deep"
This was... really been overdone to death. You can often see it often in characters with mary sue/gary stu traits.

I usually dont have any problem with cliches as long as its done well. Although, sometimes a cliche storyline can make me avoid a VN if I feel like I've seen it a thousand times before. There's no point in reading the same story twice after all.
I do have two cliches I really hate though.
1) The protagonist has amnesia/memory loss.
Unless you add a really creative spin on it, that's extremely overdone and should be avoided at all costs. XD
2) The protagonist moves to a new place and meets someone they feel is "familiar", but they don't know why. And the person turns out to be their childhood friend.
I've seen hundreds of stories like this. ^^;;

Is "Slice of Life" cliche? 'Cuz I'm tired of seeing it. No drama is worse than cliche drama, in my opinion. =P

Aleema wrote:Is "Slice of Life" cliche? 'Cuz I'm tired of seeing it. No drama is worse than cliche drama, in my opinion. =P

As far as I understand the term, you can still have plenty of dramatic cliches in a slice-of-life story... SOL more means that there isn't an overarching plot like a mystery to solve, a war to fight, or a demon to banish. Discovering that your classmate is actually your childhood friend that you forgot because of amnesia and then discovering after you kiss her that she's actually your half-sister and also dying of cancer is still slice-of-life, as far as I know.

Cliches are not necessary a bad thing, it can actually work in your favor if you do it right. Just look at the popular drama shows with lots of seasons. They have so many cliches to them and people spend hours being addicted to it! Cliches that seems to be forever in fashion are the supernatural kinds (Ghosts, Vampires, Magics, you know the whole enchilada...). Some writers can pull it off and some can't, you never know if your one until you try it once.

I'm going to go for the American high school "Glee" cliches that overly exaggerate a groups of kids but have enough truth to them so adults can relate it during their high school days. My suggestion is just do whatever you want. Whatever idea you thought of, somebody at sometime, someplace, some point, thought of it first. You can never avoid cliches in writing.

papillon wrote:

Aleema wrote:Is "Slice of Life" cliche? 'Cuz I'm tired of seeing it. No drama is worse than cliche drama, in my opinion. =P

As far as I understand the term, you can still have plenty of dramatic cliches in a slice-of-life story... SOL more means that there isn't an overarching plot like a mystery to solve, a war to fight, or a demon to banish. Discovering that your classmate is actually your childhood friend that you forgot because of amnesia and then discovering after you kiss her that she's actually your half-sister and also dying of cancer is still slice-of-life, as far as I know.

From the wikipedia page, slice of life is not very appealing: "It may or may not contain any plot progress and little character development, and often has no exposition, conflict, or dénouement, with an open ending." If there are SOL games with those things, I might be inclined to say they're mislabeled? If not, then my cliche should be re-classified as: "stories without a story." I guess I'm not artsy-fartsy enough to enjoy avant-garde storytelling just yet. I just hate sitting through a movie where nothing happens for 90% of the movie. Oh internet, what haven't you ruined for me?

I like the other definition Wikipedia offers: "the realistic description or representation of events and situations in everyday life in literature, film, journalism, etc" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slice_of_life

The idea being the you just grabbed a section of someone's everyday life.

I do agree that "Stories without a story" are dull. Mind you, one of my novels is titled "The Girl with No STORY."

Susan

I think maybe Slice of Life can be incorporated to begin with so that it makes the impact of the drama much better. Like a buildup with nothing happening practically then suddenly something very interesting and dramatic happens. Tension is important

clannadman wrote:I think maybe Slice of Life can be incorporated to begin with so that it makes the impact of the drama much better. Like a buildup with nothing happening practically then suddenly something very interesting and dramatic happens. Tension is important

I agree with this completely. Some of the best horror films work like this. Granted, something eventually does happen, so I wouldn't consider it story-less. But just opening up the word processor and just BSing day-to-day stuff and hoping you run into something interesting isn't very exciting to anyone but yourself. =P I'm exaggerating, but yeah.

Uhhh, this isn't really being on topic anymore. So here is another cliche: teleporting a normal person into another world/time period, and then that person becomes their savior.

clannadman wrote:Are there any storylines or aspects of drama that you consider too cliche ...?

It's not the Plot people are tired of, it's reaching the same Ending over and over and over... Go ahead and write a cliche' story, just END it in a totally different way. THAT'S what makes something Not a cliche.

The number one most common --and most popular-- cliche' is "Girl Gets Boy." There isn't a VN out there that doesn't use this. However, if we change the plot to where the cute boy she kissed at the beach and decided to pursue turns out to be her teacher, or her brother's best friend, or her best friend's brother, or even a girl in disguise, this changes "Girl Gets Boy" into: "Girl gets WRONG boy."

Some more cliche's: from Love Tropes

> Anguished Declaration Of Love
> Hopeless Suitor
> Caught With Your Pants Down

The trick is to take that cliche and end it in an Unexpected way.

> Anguished Declaration Of Love - It wasn't a declaration of Love, it just looked that way.
> Hopeless Suitor - He already HAS the girl, he just doesn't know it.
> Caught With Your Pants Down -- They weren't down by Accident.

Changing the Ending is what makes a familiar --and favorite-- story Fresh and New.

Terminal illnesses meant to make me cry. Do not be wasting my time and my tears. I don't mind crying, and I don't mind terminal illnesses, but I do not like it when people use them just to jerk tears from me. It's cheap. If you want to make me cry, put some effort into it, and if you want to depict a terminal illness, please realize that it's not all gloom and depression every second.

OokamiKasumi wrote:

clannadman wrote:Are there any storylines or aspects of drama that you consider too cliche ...?

It's not the Plot people are tired of, it's reaching the same Ending over and over and over... Go ahead and write a cliche' story, just END it in a totally different way. THAT'S what makes something Not a cliche.

The number one most common --and most popular-- cliche' is "Girl Gets Boy." There isn't a VN out there that doesn't use this. However, if we change the plot to where the cute boy she kissed at the beach and decided to pursue turns out to be her teacher, or her brother's best friend, or her best friend's brother, or even a girl in disguise, this changes "Girl Gets Boy" into: "Girl gets WRONG boy."

Some more cliche's: from Love Tropes

> Anguished Declaration Of Love
> Hopeless Suitor
> Caught With Your Pants Down

The trick is to take that cliche and end it in an Unexpected way.

> Anguished Declaration Of Love - It wasn't a declaration of Love, it just looked that way.
> Hopeless Suitor - He already HAS the girl, he just doesn't know it.
> Caught With Your Pants Down -- They weren't down by Accident.

Changing the Ending is what makes a familiar --and favorite-- story Fresh and New.

Would you say a Hopeless Suitor is decent for a start until he finally realises?

I'm going to go against everyone and say that there are cliches that I would immediately dismiss.

Anything in which the point is to get a date. I instantly pass those games by. School stuff. It's old, it's been done five million times, there just aren't any new ways to do it. I don't even watch anime with heavy school portions anymore, that's how tired I am of school. Anything that lists romance as a genre. Once again, I pass them by because that's usually code for "shameless fanservice".