As a new author, I have been constantly trying to find topics in which people share what they like, and do not like in a story.
Most of them say they love a story with CCs, point system, choices that matter and decide the ending. However there are also people who do not like the entire point of âchoices that matterâ.
Again, many say they hate long dialogues and descriptions but when I read one of the trending stories, it contained exactly that! A not-so-required long description. The fact that it is on trending, just shows that people seem to like that just as much.
So, should I not follow what readers say they like and donât like and go with what I like?
Hey , Im a new author too trying to publish my story . Honestly though you are the author and I recommend you write your story how you are gonna write it because itâs your story that you are writing and are sharing with the world . Plus it might help with motivation to write it and continue writing with it because itâs the way you like it vs. a story your just trying to modify which you may not end up liking it as much .
What @Catniss said. It is your story, your brain child. If you make it the readers story you will likely loose interest. And donât forget that readers arenât all alike. Some like long dialogues and some donât. I believe most of the readers donât even use the forum so you will not really know most of their opinions to begin with.
My advice:
Write. For. You.
Write something YOU want to see come to life. Write about what YOU are passionate about. Write about YOUR thoughts, feelings, all that. Do it for YOU.
You are 100% going to put more effort and thought into a story YOU want to tell instead of trying to please a bunch of strangers. Iâm serious. You are never going to satisfy everyone all the time. Write a story you want to write.
Summary
CC? Your choice. If you want to give people that choice, do. If you want your characters seen only the way YOU see them, thatâs perfectly okay. Iâve never in my life picked up a book (a real, physical book) and thrown it away because the main character isnât a long haired white chick with glasses. The development of your story and characters should matter far more than the few handfuls of people who wonât read because âCC or I donât readâ. Those people make me wonder if theyâd ever read a printed, mass produced book because you canât CC Pride and Prejudice or any other novel that Iâve seen irl.
Point System: What is your genre? Will your story branch based on choices the character makes (e.i. friendship/relationship development between MC and LIs or a story about magic that requires certain âlevelsâ/points to access certain âabilitiesâ ) then add a point system. Theyâre handy if you plan to have double-digit episodes that require things to be remembered by the system.
Choices that âmatterâ? Yes, I put it in quotes because not everything has to have major impact on the core story. It can be an outfit choice, dialog choice, where to go on a date, etc. Choices just need to FEEL important because they affect something in the story.
I am not saying add or donât any of the things you listed. CC is a way to add interactivity (as long as the characters race/culture is not a prominent factor to the story). Gains/Point Systems are essential if you plan on a longer story (like 50episodes) because it keeps things/choices/consequences straight for each reader so their version/branch stays consistent. Choices that feel important matter far more to most readers than if every choice affects the whole story. Games? Theyâre neat, but can become very complex and can make you want to bang your head into a keyboard â but once you figure out how to code them, theyâre fun to create. If YOU want to. Okay?
Be original and write for yourself. Thatâs how you get a truly amazing story. The more you work on and believe in the story YOU want to tell, the more readers will be able to see how much thought and care you put into crafting a world for them to dive into. Youâll never make everyone happy and itâs okay to tell people who leave fanmail about this or that-- âThank you for the suggestion and giving my story a chance!â And mean âyour story sucksâ with no real critique or purpose says more about that bitter personâs soul and issues than it does about your story.
If you actually read this whole thing congrats and I do hope that it gets my point across. If you worry more about what people might think, youâre taking energy from the actual writing/developing of your story. Tell your story.
A lot of the critiques and tips that youâve mentioned do come about for a reason. When dialogue is consistently âtoo wordy,â it often becomes a harder read. This doesnât necessarily make it a bad read, though. There is nothing wrong with pushing the boundaries of what is considered standard or effective.
For example, when you look at many classical written novels that are known throughout our society and even the world (ie. The Scarlet Letter or writings done by Shakespeare), reading and processing the information in these may be more difficult simply because of the wordiness or the various high level/unique diction. Still, this doesnât mean they are bad novels. On the contrary, these are classics because they are considered of very high quality just as much as they are considered historical works of art. Despite being âhardâ reads, there is a great number of people who have enjoyed or enjoy reading these works. Of course, novels are a different media than interactive stories, but the same exceptions often apply among all sorts of entertainment media. An interactive story doesnât have to follow the step-by-step format of others in order to be successful as entertainment and an intriguing read.
Being easier to understand and process or take in is something that the majority of readers can find enjoyable. A story will flow without long contemplation or analysis on the readerâs part. This makes it more likely for a good number of people to enjoy because it provides relaxing forms of entertainment that can still elicit thought-provoking ideas or themes without perhaps as much breakdown or deep reading. However, reading interactive stories may be something that certain readers looking to relax and cool down may not want to put as much analysis into. This kind of media as well as other forms like novels, movies, plays, etc. are meant for these reasons. The various stories that are told and the various styles they are told in provide different experiences for their audiences, and each and every one of them is valid for their own reasons.
Being less wordy and keeping dialogue shorter or including customization and unique choices may appeal to wider audiences more easily than that of the other form, but that doesnât mean that good stories canât come about with styles that would typically go against what seems to work. Usually these stories have merits for different reasons that make they just as if not more enjoyable than others. I believe the part of writing and being an author is to be able to write a good story however the writer chooses to.
All in all, strategies and suggestions and tips that other authors give you from their experiences as writers and readers come about because they are no doubt effective. They have come about because they have proven to be such after the compilation of thousands of unique stories that are both entertaining and thought-provoking in their own ways. However, the merit of being a unique individual who writes oneâs own stories is that the author has the choice to work within the boundaries of the effective in order to enhance their own writing as well as push them in order to create something new. It is important to consider both options and also to understand how using both will affect oneâs writing. There is a balance between trying new things and using what is known, just as there is a balance between pushing oneâs limits to build oneâs own wisdom and listening and heeding the wisdom of others. I suggest to heed the advice of fellow authors and readers, but do not restrict yourself to purely their preferences. Build on top of strong foundations and expand outward into new horizons. Find both what works for you based on your own trials and from what has worked for others. That is the privilege and difficulty of being an author.
What I really try to do all the time is strike a balance b/w what I want and what the readers like. Thatâs why added limited CC in my last story! xD
As much as I love coding and making mini games, I also want to do it quick and release the episode quick.
I used to do this back in the day and read somewhere that a not-so-big effect annoys them and I changed it : ) thinking it is the mass opinion. Clearly not.
If youâre talking about the plays, they contain interesting characters and dialogues that are of some use to the plot: maybe itâs just me, but when I say long dialogues, I mean the ones with character description. While I thought good, slow and long descriptions are great for emotional bonding, no one seemed to like that.
I get it, and agree that there should be a balance.
Iâm saying that it doesnât make sense to me to sacrifice the story you want to tell because it might not be a trending story. I think that when you put a lot of effort into the planning of a story, then working out where a choice can be made/etc the stories end up more understandable/readable and come out to be much better quality than trying to write a story to please everyone which is an unrealistic expectation to put on yourself (writers)âŠ
Should people work to add interactivity and diversity, yes. Should they give up the story theyâre passionate about telling because some people put it down or wonât read because the MC doesnât look like them? No. Thatâs why, in my opinion, you should write for yourself with the goal of it entertaining/speaking to readers.
No, I should follow what your authorâs heart says during writing. Donât ignore the readers advices, but remember: You are the author, so you decide what you want in the story or not. Make your own decisions, because you canât satisfy every reader that reads your story.
Write the story you want to write regardless of what people say they want or donât want. You are never going to please everyone. While I can understand looking to these various forum posts as a way to understand what people do and donât like to make your story more appealing in regards to functionality (CC, point systems, mini-games, ect.), itâs important to realize that only a small percentage of Episode readers actually use the forums. In fact, if you look at what people say they like or donât like on the forums versus whatâs actually trending, itâs pretty clear thereâs a disconnect there. Itâs important to write with your own voice rather than writing what you think will be successful. If youâre constantly writing to make use of trends and popularity youâll just end up with a giant headache and a lot of frustration.
as a long time writer, my advice, just write what you wanna write, someone is always gonna dislike it.
me I dont care for CC, others has it as a most or els wont read. and I love choices but some are no thanks I get anxiety
so the most important thing writhing is its something you enjoy. sure their is advice to follow their can make it more popular, but in the end they are just advice. and with advice you take what you can use and leave the rest.
your the one writing the story the only who shall like it is yourself.
One important aspect to remember: you cannot please everyone.
cc brings more trouble than help if the characterâs origins (family, race, ethnics) are important to the story. One mishap and the readers will see mismatching family members or a blonde pure blooded African-American.
But cc makes immersion a lot easier to achieve. Itâs just a device to make the story feel reader-friendly.
If you hate making small, unnoticeable changes every now and then, skip it. No reasons needed. If you want the immersion, add it.
If youâve played choice-based games before, theyâre nerve wrecking on the first playthrough for one reason: you have no idea whatâs in front of this event. Some likes to predict what they can or will see because they want to be in control.
However, a predictable story doesnât work well with suspense, action, shock, jumpscares and drama. The added layer of choices (success and failure) tops the excitement.
If you want your story to be like a roller coaster in the hands of the readers, add it. If you donât want to, just donât.
Keep in mind youâre the one coding. You need to code the failure branches too, should you add it.
Description. Some wants it long, others want it short.
It has by far the simplest answer in my opinion: if you feel like it, do it. If you donât, give them nothing. If you want it long, so be it. Whatâre they gonna do anyway?
Iâd say it really depends on who you want to write for.
Some authors focus more on what they want as the writer and others focus more on what their readers want or would like to have. Thereâre also those too that are somewhat in the middle and compromise a little bit of both (sometimes letting go of what they want in order to cater to the reader and sometimes letting go of what the reader wants in order to add smth they personally want).
This doesnât only apply to all of an authorâs works as a whole, but also to individual stories too â because one story by an author may be directed towards readers wants and needs whilst another story by the same author might be their passion project that theyâre writing how they want to.
You can also ask yourself if missing out on potential readers matters to you or not e.g not having cc will cut out the readers who only read stories that have cc.
At the end of the day, not everyone can be pleased and what matters most is that youâre happy writing what youâre writing.
Iâve been an author for quite a long time, and I would advise you to do whatever the h*ll you want with your storyđ not trying to be mean!!
if you start a story based on the readerâs preferences, you wonât feel motivated to keep going
do whatever you want and donât worry about reads, do it for fun and some readers will come along the way!!
thereâs ALWAYS a bunch of readers that are going to like your story!! likes are diverse
Hello! Obviously following the likes of one reader, youâll somewhat âdisappointâ the other one, so it canât become a fair game anyways.
As for me, when the story is trending, whatever the author added into it made it work in total. Itâs not just long dialogues or cc, itâs dialogues AND cc AND the plot of course. Sometimes one thing pays off another. Some people donât like it when there is limited cc. Iâm not gonna feel sorry for skipping on a story that doesnât contain cc at all, another reader will like it, it just means that there is another story for me out there and answering another one of the comments, it doesnât mean that Iâve never read a book in my life, I read a lot actually, but episode is another sort of platform that allows you to make such an interraction and since it became so common, I see nothing wrong with wanting to make a chatacter. In a word, whatever the story lacks of, another aspect should pay off for the lacking. Limited cc? Okay, I have great directing and plot, so it doesnât matter. My plot isnât really thought through or directing is not as good as it could be? No probs, Iâll make the story as personalized as I can. But my point works if weâre talking in terms of âwhat will my readers likeâ, which was your question all along.
Couldnât agree more with the following advice.
What I also think is that I usually try to write a story that I would love to read, I get inspired from others, which is more than okay, I get my experience not only when Iâm writing, but when Iâm reading as well, so try to remember what you personally liked in other stories, believe me that youâre not the only one that liked this thing, so your story will find itâs readers.
Good luck!
Make your own decisions, because you canât satisfy every reader that reads your story.
