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Post by cardigenette of corn spoon not on May 21, 2015 10:44:43 GMT
anyone got any good tips for writing stories etc? im never happy with dialogue I write for my games or anything. i think im dumb, but I just realized a moment ago that I'm not happy with a lot of my writing because its in the wrong context. there was always clashing with what i wrote and the style/music of the game i put it in.
i often try to draw comics but usually not happy with the writing I do in them either.
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Post by cardigenette of corn spoon not on May 21, 2015 10:49:34 GMT
i know describe dont tell, and implying is good
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Post by orange08 on May 21, 2015 12:31:10 GMT
im not good at writing or storylines either
my dialogue writing is awful too
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Post by fawfulbeans on May 22, 2015 16:24:19 GMT
I always feel like a big dumb idiot when I write dialog for stuff. Jacob's Restaurant for instance, I'm not sure if I like the writing or not in it. I spent some time trying to think up vaguely interesting or amusing things to say, and rewriting lines a bunch of times. I find I'm most comfortable and inclined to write when I'm in bed prior to sleep so i keep a sketchbook there.
That's the best I can come up with. It's probably a good idea to read a bunch of books and try to absorb it like goku when he does sprit bomb
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Post by cardigenette of corn spoon not on May 23, 2015 4:38:44 GMT
I enjoyed your dialog in J restaurant, it's very brief and I didn't feel like anything was wrong with it. just had another go and got further than I usually do. cactus's' games always have good writing in them (i'm still amazed how cohesive all the elements are in his games more as i get older), i was playing akuchizoku. and catamites has good text too. but in most other games it seems to feel a bit cringey or pointless
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Post by cardigenette of corn spoon not on May 23, 2015 4:41:37 GMT
i mean not most other games, i have no idea, maybe just more recent ones generally
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Post by fawfulbeans on May 24, 2015 12:58:12 GMT
Akuchizoku is a fantastic game and I friggn love the cutscenes and the talking dog. I could barely beat the levels tho but everything about that game is awesome
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Post by nik on May 24, 2015 14:08:12 GMT
I recently went to a convention and attended a talk where they talked about writing story and dialogue for games. The best advice they gave was to make things in a spreadsheet with cells, not paragraphs. You'll be moving your story blocks around like pieces of the puzzle. I find that writing little bits at a time and then coming back to them helps; slowly making it more descriptive and expanded.
I'm trying to write a short book at the moment, and that's helping with my writing technique. I go outside in a quiet space and spend the day listening to ambient music whilst writing chapters. I'm still not happy with the way it is, but that's good because refinement is very important when it comes to writing.
The more you write, the better you'll get. Try to write a little tale, or something you have an interest in. Maybe start to write a few things for a blog.
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Post by cardigenette of corn spoon not on Oct 15, 2016 9:22:05 GMT
good to read this again. I think I'm becoming more confident with writing. I've been writing some streams of consciousness, basically writing whatever nonsense comes to mind, and it helps me to enjoy writing and just let out weird sentences that i could use for characters to say in games. i seem to have trouble when I have ideas for a story/world, and then go to write dialog for it, because i just can't think of anything good. but doing it the other way round, writing walls of nonsense and then building a story from that, seems to suit me better
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writing
Oct 16, 2016 14:23:30 GMT
via mobile
Post by crozier on Oct 16, 2016 14:23:30 GMT
Hey man, glad you found a way that works for you.
This is a problem that most of us seem to have in different ways, by the seems of things. I write a lot of comedy stuff for videos usually, and I have a tough time omitting things and keeping things fluent. Like, there are times where things are nonsense, that are legit funny, but the audience isn't sure if it is supposed to be funny, because I am not a clown/ super extrovert. It puts me in a tough spot. Not getting laughs or getting laughs just from friends is not a nice feeling.
There were some flaws early on in my latest video, where I used a computer generated voice and the voice was too weird with the acoustics of the room, so it was very tough to understand. That was the first voice in the piece (and the only source of verbal exposition), so I was pretty much screwed with everything to follow it. There was some great stuff in it, like this guy studying a McDonalds barbecue sauce packet, Steve Buchemi jokes, some voice dubbing, hundreds of cultural Easter eggs in the backgrounds of shots, and it was all ruined because it was too confusing/ surreal. The mechanical voice that was supposed to tie it all together was just icing on the shit cake.
You guys do a lot of surreal stuff, do you have any tips? Cause I feel like I would have to make my videos obvious and unoriginal in order to make them more approachable.
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Post by fawfulbeans on Oct 16, 2016 21:43:23 GMT
i ain't got no legitamate advice because this isn't my field by any means, but having heard people talk about writing comedy and where to draw the line between comedy being too surreal or appealing to the lowest common denominator, all i can say is that having a third opinion or imagining yourself as someone with no context for the work are ways to try to evaluate what is and what isn't hitting.
Having heard animators and people talk about it, having a third opinion can really help you understand how your work is viewed.
some random offhand advice: comedy is about breaking expectations, so if sometihng is off the wall or makes no sense to some, perhaps the 'reference point' hasn't been set up. maybe you have the punchline but not the set up
idk, this is incoherent rambling HOPE IT HELPS XOXO
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Post by cardigenette of corn spoon not on Oct 20, 2016 5:00:34 GMT
hmmm not sure if I'd be able to help much, i'd need to experience the work. i suppose audience is the most important thing? if I try to make something funny, i do it with a small audience in mind who i think will probly get it, like making jokes about Fine Art or something, but most of the time I'm thinking about what I want to do and if people laugh, then that is a bonus, but i think about what else could this do if people don't find it funny... like give the work a few different layers of content so its not relying on being hilarious and so doesn't make u feel shitty if no one laughs. what else could this be if it wasn't funny? i guess
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writing
Oct 22, 2016 16:10:04 GMT
via mobile
Post by crozier on Oct 22, 2016 16:10:04 GMT
MmmK, thanks guys. I think that helps a bit. Like, I want to be funny but I dunno, I feel like I have certain ideas in mind for the tone that would change too much if I made the stuff more coherent. My main inspirations are Monty Python and Whitest Kids You Know, and they are really good at being odd and have borderline nonsense, but also have quick exposition to put you into reality. And, yeah, I really like mixed genre stuff, Jake, but comedy is just so fun to make, it's tough to not have that as the focus. I guess it's something I am gonna have to work on. Here's 2 of my videos. I'm not that great of an actor, but most of the story, cinematography, and general mood was handled by me (with a few cameos in Porcelaine Dreams, and being one of the 3 roles in Father, Son, and the Holy Cord). Can't remember if I posted these to TPT (also, all my videos are in a shared universe. Just thought I'd mention that). Any honest critique would be great. youtu.be/9-sTCgUT6yQyoutu.be/yUNNBFgJ58w |
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Post by cardigenette of corn spoon not on Oct 30, 2016 5:31:11 GMT
I found Father, Son, and the Holy Chord more amusing, the interview with the first guy was funny to me. Porcelaine Dreams felt like a very rough sketch of some ideas for something, and didn't crack me up. i dunno, that's just me, I suppose comedy always has a very particular audience because, for example, I don't find stand-up comedy funny at all (from what i've seen of it). there was one guy on youtube doing stand-up awkwardly on purpose, which I thought was amusing but also good in other ways like it makes me feel less put off the idea of going up on stage myself, and I just like how he goes against the general stand-up thing everyone does the awkward stand-up guy if you want to check it out: www.youtube.com/watch?v=G--XzXQTFmY |
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Post by crozier on Oct 31, 2016 2:53:57 GMT
Thanks dawg. That first guy was me btw.
Thanks for posting that video. I think that guy is really something unique, serious props to him. When he looked at the audience after the "punchline", it really got me.
And, yeah, I sometimes like some stand up. I like sketch comedy a lot more, but satire like Stephen Colbert or dry/ dark humor like Stephen Wright is pretty good.
Give this guy a listen, he's kinda weird.
I also find laugh tracks very hard to listen to. That's the one thing I can't handle, comedy wise. Apparently the European version of M*A*S*H didn't have a laugh track- shame cause it's so tough to find in the States. But, still, that's the one show that's the exception to me hating laugh tracks (and maybe Drake and Josh, because it's nostalgic. Everything else kiiiinda sucks).
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