How do you guys outline your scripts?

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meowworkstm
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How do you guys outline your scripts?

#1 Post by meowworkstm »

Hey everyone! I wanted to know how you guys outline your scripts and keep your story on track without losing the pacing? I always find myself writing way more than my desired word count but I've read branching stories that feel complete that are under 30,000 words.

Right now I'm struggling with my script because I tend to use broad events as an outline and I always find myself writing way more between each event than I should. Writing the extra parts are burning me out and at this point have become central points to the story due to poor planning. I've tried to minimize the scope of these extra events but I'm too far in and I'd prefer not to rewrite the bulk of my script but I'd appreciate any advice for future reference!

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Re: How do you guys outline your scripts?

#2 Post by wolfofanarchy »

What I tend to do is open up a separate document (Word, Google Docs, Notepad, whatever works!) and write the story as if I was telling it to a person in front of me. No dialogue, no narration, just summary. "MC is being driven to their new school, vehemently opposed to the idea. Their mother tries to convince them that she did this to try to help them, but MC is unconvinced. The two reflect on MC's problems, the reasons they're even going to a school for "troubled youths", and either make peace with it or continue to be at odds." < Excerpt from one of my current projects for example.

This helps gets the big ideas down first and quicker without the details bogging it down, unless those details are important.

What I also find helpful is outlining my primary, and sometimes secondary characters. Their full name, age, gender identity, etc etc as well as their hopes, fears, goals, and critical flaws. Having this at hand helps to keep the character's identity in mind not just in the big picture outline, but when going in with the script.

That said, I usually do my big picture in chunks or chapters, even if the novel itself isn't quite broken up that way, just to make it easier on myself. Consider a sort of quarterly-report kind of thing; write a chapter, or an act, depending on your scope, take a break, and then go in and script that chunk. Breaking it up is helpful because when you DO end up with those in-between points that become central, you can keep them in mind when you go forward, instead of having to rework everything going backwards. Frankly I think trying to plan out everything ahead of time hurts more than it helps. Sometimes you start somewhere and finish in a different place than you expected, and that's okay. A good story is the one that's going to take you somewhere; your only job is to set it in motion.

I also find it helpful to separate side-plots from main plots where possible. For example, in one of my novels, the player is given the choice of where to sit during first-day school orientation. You can choose Group A, Group B, or Group C. In my outline, each choice's branch is indented from the main plot, to make it visually easier to differentiate them in the document. When these choices come back later, it makes it easy to find. "If you picked Choice A last chapter, this part of the story happens". Kind of like old book-bound adventure games!

I hope these tips helped, and I bid you good luck with your writing in the future!

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Re: How do you guys outline your scripts?

#3 Post by parttimestorier »

I think having it semi-outlined but then ending up straying from the outline when you start writing is a pretty normal thing to have happen! It doesn't mean your outline was wrong, just that your ideas changed and developed more as you worked. A bit of that is probably bound to happen to everyone.
wolfofanarchy wrote: Mon May 11, 2020 10:34 pm That said, I usually do my big picture in chunks or chapters, even if the novel itself isn't quite broken up that way, just to make it easier on myself. Consider a sort of quarterly-report kind of thing; write a chapter, or an act, depending on your scope, take a break, and then go in and script that chunk. Breaking it up is helpful because when you DO end up with those in-between points that become central, you can keep them in mind when you go forward, instead of having to rework everything going backwards. Frankly I think trying to plan out everything ahead of time hurts more than it helps. Sometimes you start somewhere and finish in a different place than you expected, and that's okay. A good story is the one that's going to take you somewhere; your only job is to set it in motion.
I find that this is something that helps me too. Even if I'm not really putting thought into strictly following a certain kind of act structure, I still have things split up a bit like "act 1", "act 2", etc. in my head, and I'll focus on one of those chunks at a time instead of jumping all over the place.
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meowworkstm
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Re: How do you guys outline your scripts?

#4 Post by meowworkstm »

parttimestorier wrote: Tue May 12, 2020 10:52 am I think having it semi-outlined but then ending up straying from the outline when you start writing is a pretty normal thing to have happen! It doesn't mean your outline was wrong, just that your ideas changed and developed more as you worked. A bit of that is probably bound to happen to everyone.
wolfofanarchy wrote: Mon May 11, 2020 10:34 pm That said, I usually do my big picture in chunks or chapters, even if the novel itself isn't quite broken up that way, just to make it easier on myself. Consider a sort of quarterly-report kind of thing; write a chapter, or an act, depending on your scope, take a break, and then go in and script that chunk. Breaking it up is helpful because when you DO end up with those in-between points that become central, you can keep them in mind when you go forward, instead of having to rework everything going backwards. Frankly I think trying to plan out everything ahead of time hurts more than it helps. Sometimes you start somewhere and finish in a different place than you expected, and that's okay. A good story is the one that's going to take you somewhere; your only job is to set it in motion.
Thank you guys so much for the input! The extra perspective is really reassuring. I never thought to plan it chapter by chapter since I usually have my story planned from beginning to end with specific events marking the end of a chapter/act. Sometimes the writing follows but other times its hard to meander back to where I wanted so I'll definitely try the quarterly-report method and see if it works better. I guess I was just afraid a more flexible approach would detract from the story, but it certainly sounds less stressful.

And Wolf, your tips are super helpful and I'm definitely going to try all of them! The most difficult part of vn writing has definitely been the different choices/outcomes so this advice is really useful to me :^)

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