Flavored Introduction - Critique Requested

[Eiliya]

Five years ago, in a land far to the south, there lived a family of farmers. They followed the laws, payed their taxes as was expected of them and had faith in the wisdom of the rulers. They were an ideal family in a peaceful land and lived their lives as any sane person would long for; peacefully. The land they lived in was a small but wealthy one, blessed with fertile soil and unspoiled water. There were few mines, but they all procuded a nearly limitless supply of gems and precious metals. It wasn't long before the greed of others caused the flames of war to rage across the land.

The war was short and precise, causing almost no damage to the civilian population. The sheer number of the invaders, more than 10 times the size of the defending army, prevented most of the actual combat. The old rulers were exiled, the land became part of the invading country and a new religion started spreading. Most people did not seem to care one way or the other, simply staying true to their old faith, but for the settlement where the family lived this was a welcomed change.

The villagers quickly adopted the new ways, sending their children to live and learn among the monks and priests at the temple. Ceremonies and rituals to praise the gods were performed on a weekly basis, and the gods in turn blessed the land and protected the villagers. The villagers easily returned to the calm and peaceful way of life they had led before the war. But then one winter night, disaster befell the village.

For reasons no one could understand, one of the apprentices of the temple, the son of the afore mentioned family, ruthlessly murdered the entire temple and layed waste to the village. Not a single soul was left alive, including his own parents and younger sister. When the sun climbed across the horizon the next day, it shone upon a landscape dyed red by blood. The crows and ravens had food that would last them all through the winter. As for the young man, his trail led north and neither his death nor his capture has yet to be confirmed.

This is the current version of the opening introduction to a game I am currently developing. It is supposed to have four event cgs connected to it (one showing a small land of peace and plenty, another showing how war rages across that small country, a third one where religion is introduced, and the last one showing a winter landscape dyed red by blood), giving images to the story being told, but I am concerned that the text is too short. Would it be possible to request some constructive critique for this? I hope I have not made any errors in that aspect, but incase you find any grammatic flaws or spelling errors, please feel free to point them out as well. Lastly, in case you feel you have some extra time on your hands, suggestions as to how I can increase the length of the text without actually having to increase the length of the story being told would be greatly appreciated.

[Asceai]

First of all, I don't think it's too short. I'm a proponent of in medias res more than hitting the reader with a wall of text, but if you're going to wall of text the reader with exposition, it's probably better to make it shorter rather than longer. It's relatively snappy and to the point, but delivers most of the essential background and information, which is what you want.

Anyway, some pedantic grammar/spelling analysis:

They followed the laws, payed their taxes as was expected of them and had faith in the wisdom of the rulers.

payed -> paid.
'paid their taxes as was expected of them' feels a little awkward, perhaps because it's part of a non-Oxford comma-delimited list. Not too much of a worry though.

There were few mines, but they all procuded a nearly limitless supply of gems and precious metals.

I don't know if you mean 'produced' or 'procured' there, but 'produced' is more correct since the mines are the subjects here.

The old rulers were exiled, the land became part of the invading country and a new religion started spreading.

'and a new religion started spreading' is odd.
I'd suggest something along the lines of 'and a new religion began to spread.'

Ceremonies and rituals to praise the gods were performed on a weekly basis, and the gods in turn blessed the land and protected the villagers.

Remove the comma before the first 'and'; the clauses are not independent.

For reasons no one could understand, one of the apprentices of the temple, the son of the afore mentioned family, ruthlessly murdered the entire temple and layed waste to the village.

afore mentioned -> aforementioned
layed -> laid

Not a single soul was left alive, including his own parents and younger sister.

This feels a bit odd, because the subject is carried over from the previous sentence despite introducing a new subject (the single soul that wasn't left alive) in this sentence. I'd rework that somehow; either get the parents and younger sister in before 'not a single soul was left alive' or explain whose parents and younger sister were killed.

When the sun climbed across the horizon the next day, it shone upon a landscape dyed red by blood.

dyed red with blood

As for the young man, his trail led north and neither his death nor his capture has yet to be confirmed.

have yet to be confirmed.

Finally, the other thing I'll say that isn't grammar/spelling analysis goes back to this bit:

For reasons no one could understand, one of the apprentices of the temple, the son of the afore mentioned family, ruthlessly murdered the entire temple and layed waste to the village. Not a single soul was left alive, including his own parents and younger sister.

This is the most important passage in your text, but two sentences are devoted to it and it's really dying for either more explanation or less. Furthermore, the lead-up is kind of weak. If any part of this needs to be expanded, it's this bit.

How did he murder everyone in a temple and destroy the entire village? He hasn't had any aforementioned special powers or anything, so I'm sure someone would stop him at some point, and single-handedly laying waste to an entire village is pretty hard work. Furthermore, if no-one was left alive, how is this even known?

I'd go two ways- either add enough context that this event is believable, or strip away details of what happened. In the latter case, I'd probably explain how everyone in the temple was murdered and the village was laid to waste, but the son's body was never found, or something like that. Adds an element of mystery and makes him clearly the suspicious character, but it plays up the idea that mysterious circumstances were involved.
Basically, if the narrator is God, we should be told how the son was able to accomplish this feat, or given the necessary information to deduce. If the narrator is simply whatever information escaped the village, we don't know that the son killed everyone, that he did it 'ruthlessly' or anything like that. I'd pick one of those two choices and go with it.

EDIT: Oh, another thing that was bothering me I only just nailed down:

Code: Select all

They followed the laws, payed their taxes as was expected of them and had faith in the wisdom of the rulers.

That sort of sentence is normally a prelude to an act of serious unfairness from above. They were good, law-abiding farmers, but then they were scapegoated to cover up some lord's plot or something. Instead, what happens next is that the village is taken over, but after a short while everyone is cool with it and nothing bad happens to the family at all. So I don't actually know why this sentence exists at all.
If you want to add description, I'd write something more personal about the members of the family, rather than the fact that they were good citizens. Where they came from, or how long they've been farming the land, or.... all manner of things could go here, really.

[Eiliya]

First of all, I don't think it's too short. I'm a proponent of in medias res more than hitting the reader with a wall of text, but if you're going to wall of text the reader with exposition, it's probably better to make it shorter rather than longer. It's relatively snappy and to the point, but delivers most of the essential background and information, which is what you want.

I'm sorry for being not as smart as I would like to be, but what does in medias res mean? I really don't want to slam a big wall of text in the face of the player, so it possible, I'd like some help to get around it. As it stands right now, I'm just using regular renpy coding, giving every two orthree sentences a dialogue box of it's own. Do you think that would work as a way to avoid the horrible TL:DR reaction?

Text concerning main part of the introduction, the events at the temple

Sorry for not quoting you properly here, it was hard to pick any specific place to quote and I didn't want to clog my message with a long quotation. On to the matter at hand.
Indeed, the event that happens at the temple is the most important part of the entire introduction, but at the same time it is one of the greater secrets that I want the player to discover while advancing through the story. As such, I don't really want to go into any specifics regarding what happened. I don't mind spoiling the secret here, so I will try to explain it as best I can.

This new religion that arrived along with the new kingdom is actually a sort of morbid demon worshipping where children are raised at temples until they reach a certain age, at which point they are evaluated according to preset statistics. Those that fall below the standard values are sacrificed to demons in exchange for demonic favors while those that have passing grades proceed to be scholared into priests or monks themselves. Simply put, the peace and wellfare of adults are bought by the suffering of children. Most adults in the country are aware of this but do not care about it, being too comfortable in their own life of plenty, and the few that do care either are not strong enough to do anything or are too afraid of the potentual backfire to even act. One might think this kind of behaviour would belong more in the realm of cults, but in this story, it has progressed to a rapidly expanding religion that covers most of the continent where the game takes place.

The main character, the young man in the introduction, learns of this when strange noises prevent him from sleeping one night. He follows the noise, finding a hidden door that hasn't been properly closed due to fallen snow, and upon following the pathway behind it stumbles upon a scene where his own kid sister is being sacrificed to a demon. This causes him to fly into a rage frenzy, which in turn lets the summoned demon possess him, giving him both a means and a motive for the brutalities that took place in the temple and village. The bloodshed was caused by the demon acting out in accordance to the negative feelings that ran through the young mans mind as he saw what had happened to his sister, which had pushed his own persona deep into unconsciousness. After this, the young man swears to overthrow this religion and secures the aid of the aforementioned demon in his quest to do so.

The two of them head north, where they know this religion is still being opposed, to look for possible allies in their quest and this is where the game begins, five years after the event at the temple. The problem I have is that I want the truth behind the event to be a secret that the player learns as they advance through the story, so I don't really want to give too much away in the opening. The main character is supposed to be portrayed as a scumbag who killed people for no reason and is now running from the righteous wrath of the land where he commited these horrible, horrible crimes. At least until the player starts doubting the story told by this so-called righteous kingdom and its self-righteous inhabitants.

I'd go two ways- either add enough context that this event is believable, or strip away details of what happened. In the latter case, I'd probably explain how everyone in the temple was murdered and the village was laid to waste, but the son's body was never found, or something like that. Adds an element of mystery and makes him clearly the suspicious character, but it plays up the idea that mysterious circumstances were involved.

I think the later version here is the one to go with, considdering the wall of text just above here.

Oh, another thing that was bothering me I only just nailed down

I added the text mentioned here simply to give extra information about how calm and peaceful the country was, to indicate that everyone cared for the rulers and all was well, but yeah, I guess it really isn't neccessary.

Thanks for the feedback

[Asceai]

First of all, I don't think it's too short. I'm a proponent of in medias res more than hitting the reader with a wall of text, but if you're going to wall of text the reader with exposition, it's probably better to make it shorter rather than longer. It's relatively snappy and to the point, but delivers most of the essential background and information, which is what you want.

I'm sorry for being not as smart as I would like to be, but what does in medias res mean? I really don't want to slam a big wall of text in the face of the player, so it possible, I'd like some help to get around it. As it stands right now, I'm just using regular renpy coding, giving every two orthree sentences a dialogue box of it's own. Do you think that would work as a way to avoid the horrible TL:DR reaction?

It's not long enough to provoke that reaction. You're probably fine.

In medias res is just a pretentious way of saying that you start in the middle of the story. Rather than loading the reader down with exposition at the start, you just skip all that and provide enough clues in the narrative, interactions between characters etc. for the readers to make the connections themselves. This makes it easier for the reader who doesn't care about any of your characters yet and has no reason to really care about (and therefore internalise) intricate background details of your setting. Passing along this information at a more graduated pace once the reader is invested is a much better strategy.

However, a relatively short introduction to the setting is not loading the reader down with exposition, so this doesn't apply to you. The reason I said it was more to discourage you from trying to make this too much longer.

[Omniknight]

As someone who has analyzed F/SN, CLANNAD, KS, and a bunch of other commerical VN's line by line, here's probably the most useful advice I can offer you right now......

My hands need to be sweating within the first three minutes, and you should prefereably leave me wondering and nervous.

If that's not the case, the intro will basically be seen as a misplaced prelude in the middle of nowhere.

Proof:

1. Kono Oozora ni, Tsubasa wo Hirogete

-Something happens to Aoi Minase within the frist 15 lines of the script, causing extreme tension to rise.

2. F/SN

-The whole VN starts with a near-death Shirou, and Saber suddenly appearing to spare him from lancer.

3. Katawa Shoujo

-Hisao faints in front of Iwanako within the first 15 lines

4. CLANNAD

-A girl is freezing to death in the snow, and an unknown narrarator lies by her side as they both die


[Rant]Is this some kind of a gospel that will curse your VN for generations if not followed? Of course not. But there might be a reason successful VN's follow this trend with respect to the introduction......

IMHO, you can't create a story. The stories are already hidden in select places...you merely write them out for everyone to see, because normal people can't see the countless tales hidden amongst our lives. Famous/renowned works are usually excavations of such hidden stories combined with daring technique. Think of it as if you're refining a diamond--you aren't making a diamond. You're just cutting away the unnecessary pieces so other people can admire its beauty.[/Rant]

[Eiliya]

Five years ago, in a land far to the south, there lived a small family of farmers. They were an ideal family in a peaceful land and they lived their lives as any sane person would long for; peacefully. The land they lived in was a small but wealthy one, blessed with fertile soil and unspoiled water. There were few mines, but they all produced a nearly limitless supply of gems and precious metals. It wasn't long before the flames of war raged across the land.

The war was short and precise, causing almost no damage to the civilian polulation. The sheer number of the invaders, more than 10 times the size of the defending army, prevented most of the actual combat. The old rulers were executed, the land integrated into the invading country and a new religion introduced to the populace. Most people did not seem to care, having had no faith from the get-go, but for the settlement where the family lived, this was a welcomed change.

The villagers quickly adopted the new ways, sending their children to live and learn among the monks and priests at the temple. Ceremonies and rituals to praise the gods were performed on a weekly basis and the gods in turn blessed the land and protected the villagers. Life became bountiful and the same kind of peace that had been enjoyed before the war once again returned to the village. But then one winter night, disaster befell the village.

During the course of one night, the temple and village were laid to waste. When the sun climbed over the horizon the next day, it shone upon a landscape dyed red with blood. The crows and ravens had food that would last them all through the winter. As the royal inquisition arrived, they found piles upon piles of battered corpses and a single set of bloody footsteps leading to the north. It was quickly confirmed that the only body missing was that of the most promising disciple at the temple, a young man named Theodore.

Sorry for taking so long, RL has been busy. I've made some changes, trying to reflect the feedback I have been given through this thread. What do you think of this one, might it work better than the last one? Comments, corrections (grammatical and spelling) and critique would be greatly appreciated.

[Rinima]

There were few mines, but they all produced a nearly limitless supply of gems and precious metals. It wasn't long before the flames of war raged across the land.

This seems like a rather sudden change, there is no build up.
Other than that, it is much much better.

[Taleweaver]

There were few mines, but they all produced a nearly limitless supply of gems and precious metals. It wasn't long before the flames of war raged across the land.

This seems like a rather sudden change, there is no build up.

I don't quite agree. It makes it sound as though the peaceful and wealthy nature of the country was the reason why it didn't take long for a war to start.

If this is what the writer had in mind, well done.

[SundownKid]

In my opinion, your introduction has way too much "tell" and not enough "show" (the expression is "show, don't tell".)

For example, you could easily eliminate this intro and "show" the reader the same thing by starting with the villain standing over the corpses of everyone saying something like "Hahaha, those simple fools didn't even see it coming. In the name of ___ Cult, I will cleanse this land of the greed of the ___ Empire!" Not only is it more mysterious, but it's more exciting and dramatic than reading an old narrator or a text scroll.

This kind of narration is what's known as a plot dump and it makes for a really boring introduction. As a general rule, the reader should be hooked immediately. For example, 1984 doesn't start with "Once upon a time, there was an evil government that controlled the thoughts of their citizens." It starts with "It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen." This tells you nothing about the setting but sets up a mystery in the reader's mind.

Another example: Skyrim doesn't start with "There was once a rebel group known as Stormcloaks who tried to fight against the Imperials..." it starts with you in a wagon with some dude you don't know, and you gradually learn that they are rebels of some kind sent to be executed and you are among them.

[Asceai]

I disagree. It's a short block of text that quickly establishes the setting so you get an idea of what the universe knows before the story starts. I definitely think this is a more effective approach than throwing in discontiguous scenes with unclear POVs / POVs different from the main story.

I would tend to agree that it could be replaced by just scrapping the intro altogether and proceeding as you would have anyway, allowing the reader to learn everything from the story itself, but a small bit of background doesn't hurt and this is a perfectly acceptable way of going about it.

[Eiliya]

The intention was to give the impression that the country was attacked because it had little military power and lots of resources, yes.

As for the opening, the [Harharhar, I am evil guy of doom, come to conquer empire!] ain't gonna work all that good, but I see what you're getting at. After this introduction, we've intended to have the main character wake up from a dream (the introduction is basically him dreaming) by a thunderclash just as a storm assaults the camp he's set up, forcing him to leave (thus pushing the player into the first dungeon in the game). I'm considdering trying to transforming the introduction into a scene that's seen from the main character's point of view, because I don't think removing it all together and just tossing the players straight into the first dungeon without any kind of explanation or anything would be all that good... What do you guys think?

[SundownKid]

If you want to really do it in medias res, you can just make him "wake up" in the middle of the dungeon, after having these flashbacks, because he was knocked out by a monster or is currently under attack. That seems more interesting than making the player start in the middle of a camp ground. Then transition that into the tutorial of battle where he tries to fight whatever attacked him. After he escapes the excitement dies down again and the player gets introduced to the other stuff.

[Cith]

I agree with Sundownkid that this is an info-dump. And in a prologue as well, which is probably the worst kind (they have a terrible reputation for being ... dull. Sorry. )

I like Asceai's suggestion of revealing everything as the story unfolds and just canning the introduction. Also instead of just tossing the character into a dungeon, consider starting with the very end scene of a trial 'With the considerable weight of the evidence against you, the crown finds you guilty of *such and such* and sentences you to *la di dah*. May *insert sexy God or Goddess here* have mercy on whatever it is you're currently calling a soul.' Or, maybe begin with a short scene detailing his arrest. 'AH! A murderer ey? We have a comfortable, out of the way place we like to keep your kind.' That way you don't throw the reader right into the dungeon, you have a short scene introducing his current circumstances (he's been arrested as a murderer and is in the dungeon.)

As for introducing the prologue stuff in the story: 'a new religion introduced to the populace.' If you ever search the wreckage of the village, you could find many artefacts of the new religion that was introduced, but also come across one or two items, in isolated houses, of mysterious symbols which had been modified to look like ordinary items. Symbols of an older religion. This starts to hint at several possibilities, and it's a little bit more exciting than some info in a prologue because it immerses the player into the setting more

I hope I'm not being confusing ...

[Omniknight]

What you're trying to do is tell a story. As in, reading from a fairy tale book.
This is very possible and can even be very effective--
--if you do it correctly.

Fate/stay night makes excellent use of this, but if this is your first VN, following the advice of other ppl in this thread might be easier for you XD

If you're still interested, I can provide you with some help/techniques though.