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Author Topic: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___  (Read 312814 times)

TD1

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1155 on: January 07, 2015, 08:08:00 pm »

Yep.
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GiglameshDespair

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1156 on: January 07, 2015, 08:14:01 pm »

I'd go for the writing.
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bahihs

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1157 on: January 07, 2015, 08:29:45 pm »

I'd also go for the writing, simply because its the easiest way to measure the skill of the writer.

Its also the most flexible, you can write poetically and abstractly (like Joyce *shivers) or straight to the point (like Hemingway) or with preaching prose (like Steinbeck).

But, that's just me. If you are a genius poet, or the next Shakespeare, by all means pen your poems or plays!
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bahihs

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1158 on: January 07, 2015, 08:40:37 pm »

I'm a little confused as to the format of this thread. Do I have to respond to the prompts that are given? Or can I just post anything for critique (its what I did earlier, but I'm scared that's not what I was supposed to do)?

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GiglameshDespair

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1159 on: January 07, 2015, 09:31:01 pm »

You can use the prompts if you wish or not. Just posting it means it might not get critique, though (I'd also appreciate if someone gave their thoughts on the thing I posted above).
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Arx

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1160 on: January 08, 2015, 06:32:02 am »

So I got an email from my hopeful course in creative writing. To get in, I must:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
And then go for an interview.

Which one would y'all choose? I've semi made up my mind, but I want to see what the common opinion would be.

I'd write prose, but in my opinion your poetry is better than your prose.
I wouldn't touch the drama with a bargepole, but that's just me.

I'm a little confused as to the format of this thread. Do I have to respond to the prompts that are given? Or can I just post anything for critique (its what I did earlier, but I'm scared that's not what I was supposed to do)?

If you post something at random and I see it, I'll critique it. If you post something in response to a prompt, it will almost certainly be critiqued.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

You wrote "orphange" instead of "orphanage" once.

Otherwise, I like it. It's quite short, though, and doesn't reveal much about the setting you descibed - just that there's some catastrophe with screens and offworld production.

Edit:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)
« Last Edit: January 08, 2015, 02:15:01 pm by Arx »
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Emma

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1161 on: January 09, 2015, 05:35:04 am »

Uh... Hi,

I've been doing some writing lately and while I've always been interested in writing I've never really gotten the hang of it I suppose. Anyway, if you'd like to read some of what I've done have a look here and critique. Be harsh, very harsh.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Oh! I almost forgot what is your view on fanfiction?
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hops

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1162 on: January 09, 2015, 07:48:18 am »

Fanfiction is alright when it is used to actually add to the story. Too many people use fanfictions as an excuse to shove in their Mary Sue OCs.
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Arx

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1163 on: January 09, 2015, 02:18:19 pm »

Uh... Hi,

I've been doing some writing lately and while I've always been interested in writing I've never really gotten the hang of it I suppose. Anyway, if you'd like to read some of what I've done have a look here and critique. Be harsh, very harsh.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Oh! I almost forgot what is your view on fanfiction?

First, I like well-written fanfiction that doesn't alter the events of canon. It's a way to fill the gaping hole left in my soul when I finish something and know I will never get to have that particular experience again.

Second, your story.

* Arx cracks knuckles.

In dialogue, write each speaker's parts on a new line.

There are a number of minor grammatical errors and typos in your story. Things like "than" instead of "then", "quite" instead of "quiet". A couple of passes after writing it should clean up most of those, though, so no worries.

Your flow is the most glaring problem. It feels like everything is happening in one contiguous sequence, right on top of each other. That's partly related to not having the dialogue spaced out, though.

What's the peach wood table got to do with anything? It feels like unnecessary information that was just wedged in.

I liked the innkeeper's accent.

Your plotline is, unfortunately, fairly clichéd. I'm not sure how to redeem that.



There you go. That's by no means everything, but it's a start.
Keep reading, keep writing, keep reading.
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Urist McScoopbeard

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1164 on: January 09, 2015, 06:42:36 pm »

A couple of things.

First of all, and I think i'm probably guilty of this too, two words thrown together to create a new word usually results in a cheese-sounding fictional vocabulary. You're guys' opinions may be different, but I STRONGLY advocate either using portmanteaus, combining words based on their roots, or really just any other way than just sliding them next to each other.

Secondly, to just get some opinions here. If you ended up reading what I was posting did you like it? I get the sense that you fellows find it rather dispassionate. If not, would you continue reading?

Of course, in asking for a "review" of sorts, I'll leave one in return:

Quote
Uh... Hi,

I've been doing some writing lately and while I've always been interested in writing I've never really gotten the hang of it I suppose. Anyway, if you'd like to read some of what I've done have a look here and critique. Be harsh, very harsh.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Oh! I almost forgot what is your view on fanfiction?

Firstly, in a very general sense, i'm against fanfiction. There are times when I don't mind it (this, presumably, being one, because I have no connection to its universe), but generally fanfiction is just more-of-the-same. I don't want to read an extremely similar story with similar characters doing similar things in the same universe. I find fan fiction okay when it adds to the atmosphere and helps you imagine the larger world... ESPECIALLY when it doesn't mention the main/side/tertiary characters of the canon too much/at all. (but when does that ever happen?)

Anyways, review stuff:

As a reader, I'm drawn in initially, but like Arx said, "Your plotline is, unfortunately, fairly clichéd." However, if that's what you like who am I to judge? The REAL problem I think lies in the pace of the story. It's fast. It's Barry Allen fast.

First of all, give us more background. I want to know EVERYTHING about this village, even things I didn't want to know about it. Then, develop this whole "bullied" thing a bit. Make me hate this Stephen fellow. Ya know, character development. Same goes for the rest of the non-POV characters, and especially Aaron's family. Aaron himself is at the same level of "needing more describing", but being the POV main character, you have a lot of time to explore his background/character, so it's OKAY not to give it all up at the get go.

Dialogue. Besides what Arx said, I like it. It might be cliche, but for the most part it's good. The few things that stand out are it's halting nature (god so many commas), and the sometimes awkward phrasing (most noticeable in Farren's lines).

To sum it up, it's fine, but it needs work. Despite the Cliches and the writing-side problems, if you keep at it it can be great. Of course, it's not without it's good parts: The way you describe magic is pretty good, and gives you a good indication of what it means in that world to be a magic user. Also, Ferran is a good character. (And also the stuff Arx said)
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WillowLuman

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1165 on: January 10, 2015, 03:58:08 am »

You know how ideas always seem to come as you're lying in bed, but then you go to sleep and never do anything with them? Well for once in far too long I say screw sleep, I'm writing these down. These are random and disorganized, pseudo-poetry, but maybe they're worth something.

Spoiler: love (click to show/hide)
Spoiler: father (click to show/hide)
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Emma

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1166 on: January 10, 2015, 06:46:52 pm »

Thanks Urist McScoopbeard and Arx for looking at the piece.

A couple of things.

First of all, and I think i'm probably guilty of this too, two words thrown together to create a new word usually results in a cheese-sounding fictional vocabulary. You're guys' opinions may be different, but I STRONGLY advocate either using portmanteaus, combining words based on their roots, or really just any other way than just sliding them next to each other.

Secondly, to just get some opinions here. If you ended up reading what I was posting did you like it? I get the sense that you fellows find it rather dispassionate. If not, would you continue reading?

Of course, in asking for a "review" of sorts, I'll leave one in return:

Quote
Uh... Hi,

I've been doing some writing lately and while I've always been interested in writing I've never really gotten the hang of it I suppose. Anyway, if you'd like to read some of what I've done have a look here and critique. Be harsh, very harsh.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Oh! I almost forgot what is your view on fanfiction?

Firstly, in a very general sense, i'm against fanfiction. There are times when I don't mind it (this, presumably, being one, because I have no connection to its universe), but generally fanfiction is just more-of-the-same. I don't want to read an extremely similar story with similar characters doing similar things in the same universe. I find fan fiction okay when it adds to the atmosphere and helps you imagine the larger world... ESPECIALLY when it doesn't mention the main/side/tertiary characters of the canon too much/at all. (but when does that ever happen?)

Anyways, review stuff:

As a reader, I'm drawn in initially, but like Arx said, "Your plotline is, unfortunately, fairly clichéd." However, if that's what you like who am I to judge? The REAL problem I think lies in the pace of the story. It's fast. It's Barry Allen fast.

First of all, give us more background. I want to know EVERYTHING about this village, even things I didn't want to know about it. Then, develop this whole "bullied" thing a bit. Make me hate this Stephen fellow. Ya know, character development. Same goes for the rest of the non-POV characters, and especially Aaron's family. Aaron himself is at the same level of "needing more describing", but being the POV main character, you have a lot of time to explore his background/character, so it's OKAY not to give it all up at the get go.

Dialogue. Besides what Arx said, I like it. It might be cliche, but for the most part it's good. The few things that stand out are it's halting nature (god so many commas), and the sometimes awkward phrasing (most noticeable in Farren's lines).

To sum it up, it's fine, but it needs work. Despite the Cliches and the writing-side problems, if you keep at it it can be great. Of course, it's not without it's good parts: The way you describe magic is pretty good, and gives you a good indication of what it means in that world to be a magic user. Also, Ferran is a good character. (And also the stuff Arx said)

Thanks for the review and you have some interesting thoughts on fanfiction. Anyway, yeah I know it's a bit fast (who am I kidding it's way to fast and I need to harness this power to travel through time) and I think that this stems partly from the fact that I've never felt that I'm good at writing introductions and tend to speed through them and also laziness, so yeah I'll go back and try to fix this. Also, two many comma's? I guess I agree, how do you think I should fix this? Should I just brush up on my grammar?

Uh... Hi,

I've been doing some writing lately and while I've always been interested in writing I've never really gotten the hang of it I suppose. Anyway, if you'd like to read some of what I've done have a look here and critique. Be harsh, very harsh.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Oh! I almost forgot what is your view on fanfiction?

First, I like well-written fanfiction that doesn't alter the events of canon. It's a way to fill the gaping hole left in my soul when I finish something and know I will never get to have that particular experience again.

Second, your story.

* Arx cracks knuckles.

In dialogue, write each speaker's parts on a new line.

There are a number of minor grammatical errors and typos in your story. Things like "than" instead of "then", "quite" instead of "quiet". A couple of passes after writing it should clean up most of those, though, so no worries.

Your flow is the most glaring problem. It feels like everything is happening in one contiguous sequence, right on top of each other. That's partly related to not having the dialogue spaced out, though.

What's the peach wood table got to do with anything? It feels like unnecessary information that was just wedged in.

I liked the innkeeper's accent.

Your plotline is, unfortunately, fairly clichéd. I'm not sure how to redeem that.



There you go. That's by no means everything, but it's a start.
Keep reading, keep writing, keep reading.

Thanks for the review, Arx. I did believe that I had fixed most, if not all of the grammatical errors that you pointed out, so thanks for pointing them out. With the dialogue on a new line thing, I actually thought that you only did that if there was dialogue on the same line, but I suppose that you learn new things every day. Yeah, the peachwood table wasn't needed and probably shouldn't be there but I did like it. I do have some ideas for making the plot non-clichéd so I'll write a few of those up to see what you guys think. The tip about reading and writing is good too, one only gets better with practice.

Oh, btw I asked about fanfiction not because this is a fanfiction but because I'm interested in it at the moment.
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Urist McScoopbeard

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1167 on: January 11, 2015, 12:05:51 am »

Thanks Urist McScoopbeard and Arx for looking at the piece.

snip

Thanks for the review and you have some interesting thoughts on fanfiction. Anyway, yeah I know it's a bit fast (who am I kidding it's way to fast and I need to harness this power to travel through time) and I think that this stems partly from the fact that I've never felt that I'm good at writing introductions and tend to speed through them and also laziness, so yeah I'll go back and try to fix this. Also, two many comma's? I guess I agree, how do you think I should fix this? Should I just brush up on my grammar?

snip

Thanks for the review, Arx. I did believe that I had fixed most, if not all of the grammatical errors that you pointed out, so thanks for pointing them out. With the dialogue on a new line thing, I actually thought that you only did that if there was dialogue on the same line, but I suppose that you learn new things every day. Yeah, the peachwood table wasn't needed and probably shouldn't be there but I did like it. I do have some ideas for making the plot non-clichéd so I'll write a few of those up to see what you guys think. The tip about reading and writing is good too, one only gets better with practice.

Oh, btw I asked about fanfiction not because this is a fanfiction but because I'm interested in it at the moment.

No probs. The way I would go about fixing it would be to reread the story and ask yourself, "can I describe more?" If you can: do so. However, having just told you that you should describe more, also know that description is a two way street. When you describe something, you give the reader a picture. If you don't, the reader will draw their own picture. So you need to keep the information you give out in the story in balance. Too much, and you've bored the reader. Too little, and you have a multitude of problems (including a quick pace, confusing the reader, frustrating the reader, and muddying-up the writing in general.) Basically, give enough info to keep the reader hooked, but not too much that it becomes a description rather than a story.

(A good rule of thumb is to only include what your POV character knows or thinks, and then only what he's thinking at that moment.)

As far as dialogue goes: Read other people's dialogue, see what works. I don't want to really stifle you here, because writing dialogue is a big part of a (fiction) author's style. Also the dialogue can get awkward every now and again, after all imagine how much we as human beings stumble over our words on a daily basis!

and on another note: the only real 'type' of 'fan fiction' I like are AARs from games, if that counts in your books.
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TD1

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1168 on: January 14, 2015, 03:35:48 pm »

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hops

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Re: ___/The Writer's Apprenticeship\___
« Reply #1169 on: January 15, 2015, 08:46:48 pm »

« Last Edit: January 15, 2015, 08:54:15 pm by Objective »
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