The Fury of the Forest

Disclaimer: to the author, take everything in this review with a grain of salt. I’m not a professional writer and only somewhat of a seasoned reviewer. To the readers, this review will contain lots of spoilers, so I suggest you read the storygame first.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

The description is a minimalistic line about the central conflict in the story. On the first page, there's an introduction to two characters: Father Augustus and Sister Whiteoak. They're portrayed as rivals, though ironically, there's nothing in the description to distinguish between them. Both would rant about the other and both had peaceful followers. Lots of worldbuilding details were presented too; there's a Prodigal King who chopped down the Tree of the Covenant and two institutes with different teachings about the story behind the tree's origins. Perhaps it foreshadows a theme about the truth being altered or misconstrued as time goes on. A nitpick: there's no way to tell which church is Augustus' and which is Whiteoak's. Oh, and the two characters that readers are introduced to die at the start, implying it's a prologue of sorts.

However, this is essentially an infodump about the rivalry between Father Augustus and Sister Whiteoak. While this provides necessary context for the story, I suggest either implying this through a scene that shows their interaction or adding this to the storygame's description. The latter is not ideal, but you can get away with some degree of infodumping in the blurb. Yet, I would recommend writing it in the form of a flashback, with 'showing' instead of 'telling' and immersing the reader in the scene. This would be more effective, as the next scene aims to get the reader to empathize with the deaths of these two characters (which is slightly more challenging given their rather brief characterization).

WRITING STYLE

I enjoy the more descriptive tone on the second page. Concrete imagery---crafted through sensory details and specific nouns---paint a vivid picture of the scene. Furthermore, the choice of diction is consistent. The words 'dead', 'dessicated' and 'wither' connotes a sense of destruction and desolation. As the tree is said to be Risah, it's a nice touch to use verb-based sentences and personification; the tree "flowed like a waterfall", with twigs "fluttering down".

Whenever a new character begins a line of dialogue, this should be in a new paragraph. Start a new line whenever the dialogue is finished. At the moment, it's grammatically correct and slightly confusing to have so many different people speaking in the same paragraph, along with description too.

There's a typo on the page "Augustus's Funeral" where the deacon says, "Let us think the Potter for small blessings". Unless they were all collectively thinking of the phrase, 'Potter for small blessings', it should be ‘thank’. Thinkfully--- Ahem, thankfully, I didn't encounter too many typos or proofreading errors throughout the rest of the story.

A large part of the narrative is told through dialogue. This storygame treads the fine line between making it interesting because characters are speaking about this information and having characters deliver the infodumps instead. Still, it makes sense for the priest to deliver his teachings on the faith to explain the event. Same with Barroden; due to this, their similarities in conversational styles makes it hard to tell them apart.

I like that the characters disagree when interpreting what happened with the tree, as it's more interesting when they're offering contrasting viewpoints and using turns of phrase that hints at their personalities, e.g. "Enough of your lofty yammering" and "Don't call it Risah's blood, that's Vessel talk". This prevents it from becoming a group of yes men simply agreeing with the religious elders. However, this pattern of arguing and disagreeing occurs too often, slowing the pacing and making the story feel a bit repetitive.

CHARACTERS & PLOT

The protagonist doesn't appear to have much of a personality on the second page. They only observe the events---though to be fair, protagonists are often just the lens through which readers experience the world---yet this one doesn't seem to have opinions on the day's events nor interact with their surroundings. They retreat home, sick from the carnage, though as the deaths are merely summarized in half a sentence ("The soldiers forced all of you to watch the executions"), it still doesn't give them much of a personality.

Both the funerals have different atmospheres: Augustus's is filled with disagreements, while Whiteoak's is more peaceful. Yet both lead to the same continuation. And in both of these, the protagonist remains unnamed and un-participative in the story. They haven't said a single word nor done anything. Perhaps it'll be more interesting for the story to follow another character with more defined characterization.

Okay, I now see the main problem with this story. There are too many characters but not one that truly matters (except, perhaps, those who died on the first page). Our protagonist---supposedly the most important character---doesn't appear to be a character at all. None of their decisions influence the story aside from what information the reader finds out about. As for the side characters, new ones are introduced each page, without only as much personality as can be captured in one or two lines of dialogue. Some have descriptions of their appearance and character, but they never move beyond being archetypal. The story seems to be entirely plot driven though not in a good way.

The stakes of any story is defined by their impact on the protagonist/ main characters. When the protagonist has no goals, no struggle, and no personality---let alone any significance to how the story plays out---readers would find it difficult to care about the plotline and conflict. You've set up a good storyline here: a strange sign affecting two opposing groups of religious rivals, forcing them to work together to determine what it means before it is too late. Worldbuilding is a strength of this storygame. Yet, without a character to care about, nor a side to support, it's like reading about random people having arguments except with a more cohesive structure.

Unfortunately the story appears to be quite linear. One of the pages ends with the phrase, "you've made your decision" but there's only one link. Perhaps it's a sign of the contest deadline pressures?

Pacing is mostly done well. From new obstacles to the growing destruction caused by whatever is beneath the tree, the stakes are on the rise. One minor issue is that deaths are brushed aside too quickly---one line states that father Tobias and his wife have been crushed to death, then they're never mentioned again. This misses out on some potential emotional impact. Although when they reach the brambles, the stakes are outlined clearly: the protagonist's decision can be the difference between allowing them to continue on or being stuck. Edit: actually, no, his efforts are in vain. There's really only one thing he can do which is to move along.

Later on, there's the choice of choosing how to proceed with losing the fewest number of animals. Though it is a gauntlet returning to the same page, I like that there are 'better' options which result in losing less animals. As the weeks go by, there are more and more challenges the characters have to deal with. Some lead to premature death scenes. Each of these have realistic outcomes with a chain of causation, though it'd be nice to have a change from the structure of problem -> choose solution -> new problem -> choose solution, and so on. I would even prefer having new characters argue about the merits and cons of each choice. Though it does indeed "seem like the forest's curse intends to hound you to the ends of the earth".

It's a nice detail that poppies are flowers which symbolize death and are used fittingly. Moreover, something I enjoyed that others may miss is the use of delayed consequences and variables, where making less strategic choices reduces the number of people who survive. This makes the protagonist's choices matter a bit more. There's a bit more branching when they can search the village or bridge, and the death is well foreshadowed given the unnatural number of skeletons scattered around.

I can't believe it has taken me this long to realize, but this story parallels the Biblical tale of Moses. He leads the people out of slavery in Egypt; at first, they're hesitating to leave behind their home, despite the dangers and death that come with remaining there. When they finally leave, they wade across the desert, trying to outrun the Egyptians. There's even reference to plagues like death of livestock and insect swarms, until they cross the blessed water (possibly a reference to Moses parting the Red Sea). It's a clever re-enactment of this well known story. Barroden dies before he reaches the mountains, just like how Moses died before reaching the Promised Land.

The story ends on a bittersweet tone, as they've managed to outrun the ancient evil, but they're treated as second class citizens. Yet, they have hope, deciding to count their blessings and wait for divine intervention.

It’s a fun story with clever references, though it’ll benefit from a bit more focus on character development and how this impacts the plot.

This an inventive experience that has potential with some changes. The various locations and the horrors found there are creative, but the narrative suffers from an inflated cast of characters that get little to no development and a lack of true choices that lead a linear experience.

There’s some interesting exploration of religious themes here. I love the idea of the god of this world being a reference (I assume) to the Book of Jeremiah in the Bible. God told the prophet Jeremiah to go down to the house of a potter and likened His relationship with Israel to that of a potter molding clay. It’s cool to see a world committing to that sort of theological symbolism. On the other hand, the Druidism in this world isn’t explored that much. This problem could have been solved with a closer look into the two recently dead religious leaders. You could make a choice alter about which religion to follow based on the details presented. Unfortunately, here aren’t a lot of details about either religion and so the reader is forced to make approximations based on his/her knowledge of the real world counterparts, which limits how much they can be immersed into the story.

Some for the characters have potential to be interesting, given more time for development. It’s not bad to have a large cast, but you have to give them time in the spotlight and ways to distinguish them from others. Apart from Augustus, Whiteoak and Barroden,and some side characters like the butcher, I can’t really remember much of the other characters that well. This could have be solved through more exploration of the factions and their disgust for each other. I don’t feel that I as the reader fully understand why the protagonist is the one to lead the mass exodus. Not that I’m complaining about the idea in of itself, but it didn’t feel earned.

The narrative presents a lot of options that are either inconsequential or false. You basically attend the same funeral. I collecting the honey inconsequential. The appeal of a storygame format like this comes with being forced to make hard choices for survival, like the Oregan Trail or Banner Saga. However, leaving the player with a linear route of only right and wrong choices takes the fun out of the experience. There should be multiple choices that can lead to victory that all still have noticeable drawbacks. Understanding how my choices can affect how many people survive and which of the survivors are people that I care about. This concept has great potential, but the story has a very truncated version of it. The nightmare scenarios shown in the story are great, but need more variety on how to deal with them.

Barroden’s self-sacrifice at the end comes off as a deus ex machina that also doesn’t feel earned. I like that he has presence in the story, but I was still left with many questions and was looking for an opportunity to explore this character because he’s very important to the narrative. When he dies, Inwas left wondering why I should care. As the leader of the exodus, I was only left with the feeling that I was glad that the group got to the end. I felt nothing for Barroden’s sacrifice.

All in all, while it is a finished story, it does need a bit more work. There’s some good ideas and prose here, and I like an Oregan Trail type of game, but this doesn’t quite reach that level for me.

Review 14: The fur(r)y of the forest
I planned to go in publishing order, but I misread the title so much that I couldn’t help but read and review it.

Let’s start with the things I liked about the story, because I think that I’d been a little too negative in my notes. Your prose is passable, though I do caution against using overly long sentences in places where it isn’t needed. There had been a few times where I genuinely couldn’t follow your prose anymore. I didn’t spot any egregious grammar mistakes, so you’re okay on that front.

The religious theming was very fun and I do enjoy the idea of characters debating about theology. These discussions reminded me a lot of real life people discussing whether Jesus is a half-god or a human. Fun stuff. Having the forest also enact revenge on the band of characters and unleash biblical plagues is also a fun idea. Like, if one of these ideas was properly executed, then I could have easily given this story a 6 or even higher.

Onto the negatives. You have two big problems you have to work on and I have also touched that many times in my notes. But in short: you have way too many characters and don’t have a specific hierarchy of importance between them. You also don’t know which details of worldbuilding to feature and which thing is irrelevant to the story and there is also very little thought put into where to place your infodumps. (Most egregious one was about the heroine Risa whose mythos ended up almost irrelevant to the story and even what was explained about her was too vague to be interesting.)

The story had a lot of potential, but I honestly didn’t enjoy reading it. It was a struggle to get through. Still better than warrior cats though or any other furry story, but that bar is in hell.

Notes:
- I don’t like the first page as it is one of those very dry infodump pages. It reads like a history book and not in a very cool fire&blood GRR Martin kind of way. The reason is, is because there is way too much telling the readers stuff and too little of the showing part. Augustus and Whiteoak disagree on religion stuff; why not write their argument out and sketch it like a debate? If it’s too much work, why not have two scholars; one from the Potter’s wheel church and one from the Vessels of the Wildlands argue their case? Way less dry and you introduce the main conflict in a more natural way. Plus; you were also not doing the telling that well either. Is Augustus the leader from the Potter’s wheel church or is it the other way around? (That’s told later on, but this is way too important information to have it be on the third page.) I also don’t even know why Risah is so friggin important and how important. That would be nice to know too.
- AUGUSTUS’s FUNERAL. Oh my gosh, stop with namedropping everyone like that. In one small page of 500 words we have; Deacon Clemmons, Vicar Kent, Father Tobias, Melia, Warbin, Wayton, Renson and Barroden. Look, the general rule for characters is to not name them when they are not important to the story. Tolkien can do that because his stuff is literally the foundation of modern fantasy, yours isn’t. So stop with these name lists. Just ask yourself which of them are plot relevant and devote extra time to familiarize the readers with them before you launch into this barrage of names. I bet you, you can cut at least half of them and the readers wouldn’t be bothered. (In general the shorter the story is, the less characters you can flesh out and include. That’s the reason why winning short stories in the thunderdome often only have one, two and max three named ones.)
- It’s funny that I still have no idea who the main character actually is after reading so many pages.
- Tobias and his wife have been killed pages later. The story devotes as much time as I have thinking about them. Their deaths did nothing to me. You didn’t give me enough time to care about them and their deaths didn’t have enough impact on the other characters that it is memorable.
- The following exodus obstacles does give me lots of Moses and the 7 plagues vibes. That’s a thing I do like and the kinds of obstacles are fun and creative; lots of insects that chew on things and animal sacrifices.
- Hahaha, found an easter egg around the bridge. H’terro Malk. Lololol
- The sacrifice of Barroden felt just like the death of Tobias. I had barely any time to connect with him. So I also didn’t feel much when he died. You know, in order to make me want to care about these characters dying and being miserable, I need to know what they want, what they desire and what holds them back from achieving their goal, but beyond that I want to know their personality. I think the story would improve by a lot if you make your characters have some down time and have time to chitchat and banter and unwind. So far after that whole debate, no one seemed to talk anymore with each other.
- Plus, you gave me even more names of characters I don’t care about. So many, so many.
- There are also lots of false choices. I would have rather you just giving me end links and a properly written death scene instead. For example, the honey seemed to do nothing and also the animal sacrifice choices. ☹
- WHITEOAKS’s FUNERAL. Sikes, it’s a lie. There is no new route. I lied to you, just like the author implicitly did. I really expected to have this choice lead to a new route, but it didn’t do that. Imagine my disappointment when I clicked on it.

This story game really drove home the weight of leadership and how it can be particularly unpleasant when all the choices you have are bad.

I did feel like there were a lot of cases where you either choose the right option or you die. I would have preferred it if there were choices mixed in that didn't have immediate effects but rather put you at an advantage or a disadvantage later on. As it is now, the game is a bit trivialized by the "Go Back" button.

It was definitely worth a read though. It effectively conveyed the desperation of getting away from a forest that is out to get you.

Finally got around to finishing the story. Overall I give it a 4/8

I think as a writer you have tremendous potential, I genuinely think you did well, ijust found the concept very hard to work with.

Characters: nobody in the story was especially relateable, charismatic or fleshed out enough for me to route for them or get attached, not even the protagonist. We don't really hear us speak, or make any kind of dialogue except for inner thoughts as extrapolstion to explain events. The most memorable character and well described character was actually the 5 foot tall silver humanoid with translucent wings. 3/8.

Worldbuilding: we don't really know much about the kingdom, the king, or the axe men, except for the fact that they're cutting the tree down to build a yacht. It would have enriched and made the world more vivid if there was some greater detail into how this world looked in that aspect. We often ran into people on our oath to the dwarves kingdom, but it likewise doesn't give ant greater detail into this worlds politics, it fell flat in that regard, all we do know is that the dwarves live in the mountains and treat humans as lesser, and that the human kingdom "fell". 3/8

Grammar: grammar was good, not many flaws that I could see, only one typo where you missordered " The" 6/8

Overall I think you showed a lot of potential with this piece, you clearly have a strong grasp of writing. it just lacks the main aspects that make for an enjoyable read e.g. likeable and charming cast and a vivid setting. A bit descitptiveness and personality would have made this story a 5/6 out of 8. At times some sentences or prose could be quite convoluted and it would be hard to follow what was going on, this problem faded away in later pages, but I noticed myself having to reread certain sentences in the first page or two to figure out what was actually being conveyed. Really it was just small issues which added up that you could easily improve on, so don't be discouraged, I look forward to reading your next story, but for this one my final rating is a 4/8.