Cat stories and story stories
Jul. 1st, 2011 10:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gbGood morning! I am a bit snoozy, because one of the cats woke me up at 5:30 AM. I let him into my room because it's so dang cold, but this morning he sat at the door of my bedroom (my room's an extension off the main house) and meowed planitively. I must have pulled myself out of bed four times to open the door for him, and he ran around the veranda in a circle and came right back in.
When I gave up on sleep and went into the house proper, I sat down to play video games and he sits there STARING at me, still meowing. I was just about to get up to see if cat biscuits would do the trick, when he pissed all over my leg.
Everything I might have said about becoming a soppy pet lover I TAKE IT BACK arseholes the lot of them.
But speaking of which, if you haven't read Ito Junji's Cat Diary, fix this immediately.
Among other things, I've been working on the Nier fan project I keep alluding to. I've gone over it (Most of it at least. Certainly the chunk I'm working on now.) in my head and in notes enough that I know what happens and the impression it's meant to give. Getting the words down is not hard at the moment; the words SUCK but that's what revision is for. Keeping it vaguely in character isn't even so tough (it's not something I'm inherently bad at, but I live in terror of failing)... though I think the darker bits kick in too fast and I'll revise that. You know, it's like a shower. You gotta turn it on gently and let it warm up or people will dive out shrieking. Or, uh...
Anyway, what's bothering me (aside from how damn LONG it is taking, yeesh!) is, hmm... I suppose you could call it pacing.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
madamluna referred to it as 'space', creating the feeling of a scene through the words and the composition of the text on the page itself.
I have an extra complication in that I'm writing it as a Ren'Py game, I have to take into consideration how the lines will appear on the screen, if the story is too wordy to keep attention when reading it on the screen, how often the reader has to click the button, when to use images and music... and how to code in Ren'Py for what I've planned. The documentation makes my eyes glaze over. (I am the worst CS student).
The story as I've written it now, barring the required editing, is the plot I wanted, and it has the general vibe I wanted, but it reads completely wrong. I can't see how anyone is meant to see the images and the characters as I see them in my head, as it stands now.
I used to attempt writing a lot and then have big sads at how my ambition didn't match up to my skill level and stop. In theory, I could work all of the above out through shorter stuff, but I don't have the time, I don't have the inclination and I want to be writing THIS.
The fact I'm writing at all is an improvement, though. Thinking as I write this entry has helped me determine two or three things that will improve the writing already. I'm hoping to have a beta-version of the first bit made soon, so I can see if this is worth pursuing as I imagined it, or if I should save myself some stress and write it as a standard fan fiction instead!
I've spent far too long bashing away at this entry, I'm so gone.
When I gave up on sleep and went into the house proper, I sat down to play video games and he sits there STARING at me, still meowing. I was just about to get up to see if cat biscuits would do the trick, when he pissed all over my leg.
Everything I might have said about becoming a soppy pet lover I TAKE IT BACK arseholes the lot of them.
But speaking of which, if you haven't read Ito Junji's Cat Diary, fix this immediately.
Among other things, I've been working on the Nier fan project I keep alluding to. I've gone over it (Most of it at least. Certainly the chunk I'm working on now.) in my head and in notes enough that I know what happens and the impression it's meant to give. Getting the words down is not hard at the moment; the words SUCK but that's what revision is for. Keeping it vaguely in character isn't even so tough (it's not something I'm inherently bad at, but I live in terror of failing)... though I think the darker bits kick in too fast and I'll revise that. You know, it's like a shower. You gotta turn it on gently and let it warm up or people will dive out shrieking. Or, uh...
Anyway, what's bothering me (aside from how damn LONG it is taking, yeesh!) is, hmm... I suppose you could call it pacing.
madamluna referred to it as 'space', creating the feeling of a scene through the words and the composition of the text on the page itself.I have an extra complication in that I'm writing it as a Ren'Py game, I have to take into consideration how the lines will appear on the screen, if the story is too wordy to keep attention when reading it on the screen, how often the reader has to click the button, when to use images and music... and how to code in Ren'Py for what I've planned. The documentation makes my eyes glaze over. (I am the worst CS student).
The story as I've written it now, barring the required editing, is the plot I wanted, and it has the general vibe I wanted, but it reads completely wrong. I can't see how anyone is meant to see the images and the characters as I see them in my head, as it stands now.
I used to attempt writing a lot and then have big sads at how my ambition didn't match up to my skill level and stop. In theory, I could work all of the above out through shorter stuff, but I don't have the time, I don't have the inclination and I want to be writing THIS.
The fact I'm writing at all is an improvement, though. Thinking as I write this entry has helped me determine two or three things that will improve the writing already. I'm hoping to have a beta-version of the first bit made soon, so I can see if this is worth pursuing as I imagined it, or if I should save myself some stress and write it as a standard fan fiction instead!
I've spent far too long bashing away at this entry, I'm so gone.
