Honest reviews for stories

Your request is accepted but it can take really long for me to complete like maybe 2 weeks.

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Hey Nika,

I’ve just finished your third episode. My reviews are structured a little differently to Sasha’s. It’s more like my live thoughts as I was reading, so bare with me…

  • I loved your splash for starters
  • I’d say get rid of the author note, especially because the only spelling error I did see was in your author note and your actually story was fine
  • You had a good use of sound
  • I wrote here “ooh overlays” because that was literally my thought when I saw “his powers”. But I would have liked to see a bit more of his powers. I’m going to guess that this will be answered in later episodes?
  • When Dante and Pius are outside the house, they’re spotting is a little off, just make them a bit smaller
  • I saw the same thing in the hallway with the Bg characters. They just need to be a little smaller. Use the door in the background as a guide for what size they should be
  • I loved that you animated the BG characters! I think I missed half of the girls conversation because I was watching the background character get bitch slapped, so I hope it wasn’t too important what they were saying hahaha
  • This is just a pet peeve of mine, but I think PROF LOLA should be changed to PROFESSOR LOLA
  • Is the class scene a flashback? Maybe change the filters if so, so readers can see a clear change in time?
  • I loved the shoulder angels and when the author peeps her head up a little bit. That was cute. I know before I said get rid of the author note, but I think you should keep that bit.
  • When Devon starts ranting at her dad, use other animations, not just arms crossed loop one the whole way through.

*After the fight with her Dad, Devon and Antara are kind of far apart when they’re talking about it. *I’d say either move them closer together or use some close up zooms so we can’t see the gap.
*Is there a reason Antara always has an ear piece?

  • Nice length for your first episode

  • For episode 2, the desk overlay has a millisecond of a delay every time you change the scene.
    I’m not sure on your coding, but I’d say to check all your overly commands start with & before you have the rest of the scene.

  • I wouldn’t tell readers which choice would be longer (for the record I chose to go to the party despite your warning)

  • But I do like that you told readers (or me, for choosing the party) what the consequence was.

  • I am getting the sense that choices matter. Whilst their aren’t many, I do feel like they have an impact

  • I like these funny scenes with Dante, but I’m struggling to make the connection just yet. Again, I’m sure it’s going to be one of those things that get revealed later on, but some breadcrumbs or clues would be helpful for readers to start making some theories

  • So his powers make people fall over? Or is this just because there’s a shortage of animations?

  • I hear that bang and I’m like “ok, now we’re getting into the action” and I’m thinking that everything I saw on the cover and in the description is about to start coming together and instead I get left on a cliff hanger?! Very cruel

So I got to the end and I overall like it and would continue… There was a few suggestions with spotting and animations I would suggest, as in my notes. And I guess one major thing I would suggest it getting Dante to tie into the story a little earlier? At the moment it feels a bit like I’m reading two different stories because they haven’t come together yet. But other than that your plot is intriguing and you’ve executed it very well :grin:

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So this was already on my list to read for Fantastical (and because of this I’ve only read episode 1, because your reads only count after Monday, so I’ll continue it then)

  • I love that you start of with zooms, then sound and then a transition that isn’t a fade out - to me, having those 3 things within the first 30 seconds is like a way of showing you know what you’re doing, so it’s a really good first impression
  • I’m guessing the auditions were something to do with singing? Unless there’s a reason you didn’t reveal what the auditions were for, I’d try and slip that in there somewhere. Is it an audition to join something or to be showcased or?
  • You have a good selection of clothes, and it’s nice that we get to do our hair and lipstick
  • Ah, it’s an audition for a role in a musical
  • After Leslie says “no” in audition, the speech bubble tails all start to point down, so you need to just add a speechbubble reset command. I’m pretty sure this counts as a minor change, so it won’t affect the contest
    And that’s the end of episode 1. My overall thoughts are that I really like it and will continue. There isn’t much I can flaw tbh. But I just thought I’d point out in your description, you say Arion is ready to risk it all to make her dreams come true… I thought Arion was the male character, so it should be his dreams. And whilst on the topic of your story description, I didn’t find it represented wht I was reading. Idk if that’s just a case of because I only read the first episode, I guess I’ll find out when I read the rest on Monday :slightly_smiling_face:
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Oh my gosh. Thank you so, so, SO much! :sob::revolving_hearts: Considering my reader retention and choosing to read the rest of the story after Monday was so very kind of you.

Ah yes, thanks for pointing out the speech bubbles—I’ll definitely fix those. And ah, the description. It’s actually supposed to be: “Arion’s ready to risk it all to make Leslie’s dreams come true. Leslie sees Arion every day, yet fails to recognize who he is.” Sorry about the confusion. :sweat_smile: And I think the description isn’t really going to make perfect sense until the end, but I promise it’ll all come together eventually.

Anyhow, thank you so much! I really appreciate your feedback! :smiley:

Have a wonderful day! :blue_heart:

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Aha, no problems. I never read contest entries until it counts anyway.

Ohhhh, that makes so much sense now. I have a theory on how it will end/come together and I think now knowing that I could be right so I look forward to seeing if I am.

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Hey Alex

Here’s my live thoughts/notes as I went through your story…

  • First of all, my advice to anyone will always be to not apologize for it being your first story and for english not being your first language!

  • I noticed at first, the narration was third person, as if it was telling the story, but then it started using first person. So I know this would be a pain to change now, but I think if all the narration bubbles are supposed to be MC’s “thoughts” or “voice over” then it’s worth going the extra length to attach the MC’s name to the narration bubble.

  • Now I’m noticing the narration bubble is switching from first to third person, so I definitely think it’s worth putting MC’s name whenever it’s a first person sentence.

  • I like the overlay you’re using for the FATE scenes. I think it’s an overlay? It looks like you’ve got your own custom filters, so it stands out compared to other stories

  • So does MC want to go on FATE as a guest or she wants to get a job there? Because I feel like the latter makes more sense with her goals in life

  • I think I’ve actually seen another review of your story, and someone said you made the choices obvious for which was good and bad. I must say that I agree. I get that it’s supposed to be that way though, but maybe including some not so obvious good-vs-bad choices in addition to the obvious ones would help the story and kind of add an level of mystery to the reader. Especially if you go from having two obvious choices to a blurred lines kind of choice, I think it could really make the reader think about what to pick and they would anticipate the outcome.

  • When the character puts on her lipstick, add the prop lipstick. It’s only a small thing, but looks so much better when she does

  • Actually, know getting up to the choice where I can beg for the interview or get angry-- I think that choice isn’t so obvious with the good vs bad debate. Because personally if someone begged for an interview at my office, it would be just as damaging to them as if they got angry at me

  • Another painful task I would recommend you do is add background characters to the club scene. Especially because the ones in the background are all black shadows, so they don’t really look like episode characters, so you don’t get the impression of a packed club. One thing I did in my story, was I actually downloaded the club background, and placed screen shots of characters doing dance poses and wearing club outfits into the background and re-uploaded it as a new background (I’m sorry if I worded this complicatedly), so when it came time for the scene, I only had to code in 4 or 5 characters and the club looked packed. It saved me trying to work out layers and creating all the background characters, and so if that was the reason you didn’t put BG characters in, I would suggest trying i this way to see if it works for you.

  • Mini game was harder than I expected lol

  • I really like that when you steal the phone, the background you used doesn’t include dates and times. I personal pet peeve is when a phone says like 13 Jan, 2014. So whether you were aware of not included a date stamp or not, I liked that you didn’t

  • Good length for your first episode and I feel like you covered a lot to set up the plot which is exactly what the first episode needs

  • So I chose to be a bitch and cancel the appointment, and now as a start episode 2 I am wondering how different it would have been if I just showed up at 8. I assume I would have still learnt this information, just a different way? But I think that’s really good that I can tell there’s already 2 different paths

  • Just careful with looping animations, because that was 7 speechbubbles in a row that had sit arms crossed loop. So maybe add a different one for the 4th and 7th line, just to switch it up.

  • I like that you went to the effort to show the computer screen and the password required screen

  • Ok, so I thought the idea of her favorite coffee being the password was a bit unrealistic, but in saying that you did catch me off guard and I’m cursing myself for not remembering

  • The way you lead up to choices reminds me of the guide episode sent everyone when gem choices got around to everyone, so that’s a really good way to word it.

  • Now as I’m getting on to episode 3, I’m feeling like all the “evil” answers are the better ones. I don’t know if you’ve made the transition on purpose, or if I’'m just imagining it, but I like it anyway

  • It’s very well thought out how you give the Mr Fox a backstory that links to why he’s running his business the way that he is.

  • I think the proposal is a little random. Just because, with the choices I’ve made, I never had a romantic moment with him.

  • Also I’m a little confused, because I chose to expose him? So did I not expose him because of my points? Or was that an error?

  • Anyway, I played your bonus scene and I loved that when Mr Fox shows the tape, I’m wearing the outfit I chose! A lot of people forget to do that in flashbacks.

So overall I have 2 questions… 1. Why was it limited customization. I generally don’t like customization anyway, but I didn’t think there was an obvious reason for the limit, other than one time Brian complimented my eye color.
2. Why was the show called FATE? I get your story was called FATE, because that was the show name, but why was that?
And my last kind of note is that if you’re not too attached to the H&V in the title, take it out. Before I started writing my own stories, I thought all contest entries were different episodes in the same series so I avoided them like the plague because there was just too many! So I think getting rid of the H&V would attract more readers

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Dear Amberose,

Thank you SO MUCH for your review! I think it’s the most detailed one I have received so far, so I immensely appreciate your time to read the story and put all the comments together.

In answer to your questions:

  1. I think that’s the only thing I am going to change as I’ve had tons of negative feedback due to the customisation being limited. I had a certain type of the MC in mind but was trying to find a compromise with the reader audience letting the reader customise only certain things. I guess I will kill that now.

  2. I agree that the proposal was off. I was rushing the story for the contest deadline so I didn’t quite elaborate that ending, the idea was to show that you get the ending you don’t deserve, which is your fate, basically. So, it’s fate because you end up where you wanted to be all from the start and it’s fate because it’s a game with either win or loose. And it’s fate because after all, it’s not about the show, but who you are, or rather who you become to achieve your dreams (that’s why the choices are a bit obvious since the idea was to trick the reader so that he/she gets that unexpected ending)

Even though I guess I will not change the story (except for full CC) due to the legacy reasons (it’s my first story and I want the mistakes to still be there to see how I developed) I still take into consideration every suggestion for my future stories, so your feedback is extremely helpful. Thus, for example, my Fantastical contest entry so far has every single background created by me (I might add some Episode ones in chapter 3 but only if I really need to), I also went through the process of putting background characters, I’ve created tons of custom animated overlays, I’ve put more effort into character development and similar. So, thank you very much again for your highly useful feedback, it really means the world to me!

:blue_heart::blue_heart::blue_heart:

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You’re welcome.

I think customisation isn’t such a big deal. It’s just most times if it’s limited it’s due to MC being a certain culture, so I just couldn’t figure out why it was limited.

Name makes sense now. Thanks for explaining.

And I guess with contest deadlines, I expect endings to feel a little rushed. But still very good job for your first story. I would not have attempted half that stuff for my first story, like points and gains, etc.

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Yeah, I guess I was quite ambitious with that :joy::joy::joy: The funny thing is I am even more ambitious with my next contest entry and now I have 2 days to write chapter 3 with 3 possible endings :joy::joy::joy:

Life teaches me nothing…:woman_facepalming::woman_facepalming::woman_facepalming:

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@episodeofnika @aprilish @Alex_Af I hope you are happy with longer and detailed reviews. Thank you @amberose I am really greatful to you.

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Absolutely, that was very worth waiting for! Feedback like It was a great story and you did a good job are nice but aren’t really helpful. So thank you very much, girls, for creating this thread and @amberose for giving me such a detailed analysis!

:blue_heart::blue_heart::blue_heart:

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Good to know you are satisfied.

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Title: The Man inside the Gang Leader
Author: tammyire
Episodes: 3 (ongoing)
Genre: Romance and Action
Style: Limelight
Plot Summary: The gang life is the only life that Blaire penelope has ever known. No-one really ‘falls in love’ so when the gang leader falls for her,she doesn’t know what to do.
Link: http://episodeinteractive.com/s/5525068051775488

& it’s also lgbt+ friendly meaning that you can choose your sexual preference. I’ll do read for read and review for review just comment. Thanks.

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Your request is accepted. Thank you for requesting.

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@BadassSaasha, what about my request?

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It’s being completed. I was inactive so I couldn’t complete the requests and when I came back I had so many things to do so I waited to find someone to partner with me for the reviews. I am so sorry for the delay.

Understandable. You are forgiven :slightly_smiling_face:

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Thank you I was so stacked.

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Thank you so much @amberose for your detailed review! I will definitely pay extra attention on all the notes that you have written me while writing. I truly appreciate it, thank you once again, it really means a lot to me! :black_heart: :black_heart:
And thank you @BadassSaasha as well for creating this thread. :blush:

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I am glad I could help in any way.

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