Josh Grams's Spring Thing 2023 thoughts

Ooh, that’s tough. I mostly go barefoot. :stuck_out_tongue:

Seriously though, I’m way more interested in “how does this thing work, and how could it work better?” than in oohing and ahhing. I don’t remember ever doing any sort of fandom whatsoever: my brain just doesn’t work that way. And it goes both ways: I remember having a conversation with my Mom after a piano recital as maybe a 10-year-old where I was like, what do I even say to other kids’ parents and grandparents when they come up and gush about how well I did? I can never thing of anything to say that isn’t either an outright lie or very rude. They’re not even giving any useful positive feedback – saying “I really liked this part” – it’s just empty “oh, I loved that so much!” and I’m sitting here thinking “well, I guess I know what your opinion is worth, then.” And I think it came up because that year one of the other kids was kind of derogatory about my playing and I was like “See! That’s what I’m talking about! I mean, ok, a bunch of what they said was wrong, but some of it… they were the only one who had anything helpful to say!”

But ok, what delights me? I often like short things that have something to say, and they say it and then stop. And it feels a little hard to really gush about the really short ones sometimes. Hmm. Maybe it’s not short, but that all the words and choices are there for a reason.

OK, yeah, maybe that’s getting at it a little. I’m a programmer; I can do fancy complicated things all day long, no problem. What gets me is writing craft of a certain kind. Using, say, basic hyperlinks to do something that enhances your story, your themes, in a way that you couldn’t in static prose (of course I can’t think of any examples at the moment, but there have been a couple that made me go “oh. yes”). Why is it important that your story is interactive?

And I like evocative prose, but concise evocative prose? I need to believe that you’ve thought about whether each word contributes to what you’re trying to evoke or if it’s just too much as I quoted Annals of the Parrigues earlier in this thread, about “a goatherd named Leofrick the Seditious hears the voice of a flaming mare who was
defecating while standing in shaft of moonlight on a hilltop.” I think…I need some of the prose to fade into the background to let the special moments stand out?

Not necessarily, though. Chandler Groover’s Eat Me mostly works for me. And the deliberately “ungrammatical” awkward text of Claire Furkle’s SPY INTRIGUE actually works for me too, but there’s something about it that makes it clear… these aren’t the mistakes people make when they’re not comfortable with traditional English grammar. I have absolutely no doubt that it’s 100% deliberate. But mostly I like story: if you’re going to do something like these two where the text pushes itself in front of the story you’d better be toweringly certain that a) it’s central to the story you want to tell and b) you’re a good enough writer to pull it off.

And I don’t know how many people can do that. I can sort of appreciate, say, Cat Valente’s The Difference Between Love and Time but emotionally I’m still kinda “you could have told this story in fewer words: why are you making me read this many words for this?” Even though there are some really good bits in there:

Ocean Shores is hollowed out like a gourd someone meant to make into a drum for a beautiful party. But they wandered off and maybe even forgot what drums are to begin with so now it’s just an empty scraped-out dead vegetable lying on a cold beach nobody would ever hold a party on.

And then a seagull shits in it.

I’m getting distracted. Well, maybe that bit is a good example, actually. I like specific details that are like…the things that occur to you but maybe not to other people, rather than digging through a thesaurus or quotation/idiom dictionary for things. Ursula Vernon does this really well, let’s see: A Wizard’s Guide to Defensive Baking, where Mona is identifying the customers by name and also by their bakery order, and they kinda feel unique and specific to the story but also haven’t we all had this experience with some older neighbor or relative?

“Sidney Weatherfort wouldn’t run away to sea,” piped up the tiny Widow Holloway (one blackberry muffin, two ginger cookies, and thank you so much, dear Mona, you’re getting to look more like your poor dear mother every day, you know…)

And that goes for the whole story too: tell me a story about something you’re really into, whether you’ve experienced it personally or spent tons of time digging into it for fun. I feel like it’s often obvious when someone is talking about something that they don’t know about and haven’t done enough research on, and vice versa. Take… Jean George’s kid’s book Goose and Duck: it’s goofy and over the top and definitely not an accurate representation, but you can tell that it’s abstracted and stylized by someone who has a good idea how it does work and loves and cares about it. Versus, say, the bird scene in January, which starts “From the well-water-blue circle of sky descended a bird.” And well water isn’t blue. Deep open expanses of water like an ocean and maybe a big lake are blue or green, but if you’re looking down into a deep narrow hole in the ground, it’s black or brownish, regardless of whether it has water in it. And most people won’t know or care, but there’s always going to be that one person… I live in rural Maine, plenty of people have dug wells here; this is a part of my life; you’ve just thrown me right out of your story and making me wonder what else you’re drastically misrepresenting.

And so many IF pieces these days (well, any day, really) are kind of the same old fantasy or sci-fi stakes and settings. It feels like… how exciting can we make this? Tell me a story you wouldn’t find on r/WritingPrompts. Tell me a story about ordinary people getting by (maybe in magical circumstances, sure). Or just with smaller stakes, maybe? Not everything has to be “you’re going to die” or “you have to save the universe.” I think I do prefer external problems rather than internal emotional ones: we never have a shortage of The Absence of Miriam Lane or The Grown-Up Detective Agency where people are lost, or trying to find their way, and that’s great, but I feel like we have fewer characters who are comfortable in who they are but then something happens or hey, the world is just an ugly place a lot of the time, and they have to go deal with it. Give me the forty-something black single-mom social worker who has a portal appear in her laundry room and thinks “nope, I know better than that” but then has to grab the toilet plunger and dive in after her “sweet, loveable, dumbass son” (By the Works of Her Hands, LaShawn M. Wanak, Never Too Old to Save the World Anthology).


Gah, that’s hopelessly long. “Let me explain! No, is too much: let me sum up.”

  • Yeah, use evocative words, but keep it concise, keep it specific. Make me believe that every word is necessary, is pulling its weight and helps to tell your story.
  • Tell me something that’s not a usual sci-fi or fantasy trope, don’t make me think “this sounds like something you’d find on r/WritingPrompts.” Something you are really into, whether it’s a hobby or just a pet research area.
  • Make me believe in your characters as real people. Specific details, specific things they want?
  • Don’t get distracted by shiny tech: why is this form of interactivity necessary to tell your story, how does it support and enhance the story you’re trying to tell?
12 Likes

I think at least one of the obstacles had multiple solutions (?) which is cool: I found one and then realized there was probably a less drastic way.

Several of them did! Glad you found one of them. I really appreciate your thoughts. If you happen to play it again for any reason, just type “SETTINGS” to change the font :slight_smile:

6 Likes

Oh man, I remember seeing SETTINGS and totally didn’t think to try it. Thanks!

3 Likes

This is definitely on my list for post-comp! I haven’t worked out how to exclude meta actions from a timer in Puny/I6 yet, but I’m sure there’s a way. Thanks for playing :slight_smile:

5 Likes

See, I saw the same thing, but my reaction was “YOU GO BOIIEE, SET UP CAMP IN THAT THESAURUS BABEE!”

Not to make it about @JoshGrams and me, but (ignore before the but) I am delighted by how often I see the game artifacts you describe, but place opposite value in. We are all different! We are all individuals!

image

(Ok, that image is pretty much the opposite of my point, but I just love it and am powerless before pavlovian responses to phrases I recognize.)

7 Likes

I shall perhaps write another mystery game, in which the victim is shorn from this mortal coil by being bludgeoned on the skull with an unwieldy thesaurus.

The hero will obviously be named Ira Nee.

(In all seriousness, I appreciate Josh’s review and concede he is correct: I just have too much fun with fantasy 1885 London indulgences.)

6 Likes

Well, I disagree with both of you. You do not have ENOUGH. :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes:

3 Likes

Hah, yeah, its great. @rovarsson too: so many times I think, ehhh, this is annoying… but he’s going to LOVE IT!!!

3 Likes