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What is a good reccomended length for a first story? I am relatively new here and I've decided the first thing I want to do before making a first story is set a good page limit for it. This would likely be the largest thing I will ever write at that point and would like to know the reccomended length.

This depends on the story you're trying to tell (and how you're branching it). Pages can also be shorter or longer too. In fact, I don't think a page limit is the best way to go about it, but different things work for different people.

Anyhow, it is generally highly recommended to start small because of how quickly branching can make a story get out of hand.

I'd say, think of a story with a small scope, something that is relatively easy to get through writing (i.e. one conflict with some choices).

If you want a page limit, maybe someone else will offer a better one, but I'd say...15.


Why?

Imagine this, a story that always offers two choices on each page (until the ending pages).

With three total choices total (per playthrough), that's 15 total pages for the story (one of which is read in each playthrough).

Now, if we add just one more round of choices, you get 31 pages total. It is more than doubled!

This is why deaths/early-end choices are useful, they allow for longer playthroughs with more story whilst stopping the exponential growth you'd get without them.


Regardless of what you choose tho, 15 should certainly be doable.

And hey, you could always ask for feedback in the Writing Workshop before publishing to see if the story works within that page limit, and can expand it if it doesn't (or otherwise just polish it up).

Oh, do remember that proofreading is incredibly powerful!

Anyway, thank you for coming to my TEDTalk.

Thank you for the reccomendation! I already have a prompt of sort made up. I'll try and construct an outline

Welcome to the site!

The thing about a story is that it's done when it's done, so it's difficult to set a hard limit on things like page limit or word count. The latter being something the site itself tracks, I'd say something between 5000 and 15000 words is a pretty decent goal for a newbie looking to keep it simple, but as Zake pointed out, a lot depends on how many words on average you find yourself putting on a page. For some it's 300, for others it's 1000....

Something like 20 pages I guess is the minimum you'd need to include a decent amount of branching, but for planning it's really better to with from the other direction, just start with a small idea and break it down into scenes.

Of course don't feel pressured to write if you're not feeling inspired by any particular idea, readers and reviewers are just as important and honestly the best way to start out is just to spend some time browsing other stories to get an idea of community expectations and what the editor is capable of.

Anyway, good luck and enjoy your stay.

Shoot longest thing I've written was 1400 words. I might need to up my game and read some other stories to get an idea of a good amount. 

Well everybody has to start somewhere. I'd say it's possible to write a storygame of about 3000 words and still get a decent rating, but you'd need a heavy reliance on quality and style to make up for either the sparse amount of words per page or the lack of branching.

We did some tiny storygames with the theme of dystopia here, all under 2250 words, and it's easier said then done under those kinds of restrictions: http://chooseyourstory.com/forums/creative-corner/message/26405 (Although you're welcome to give it a shot for practice.)

Writing a normal short story of 1000-1500 words or so and then figuring out how to break it up and add more branching possibilities might be another idea.