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So, as many of you already know, I’m working on a contest storygame. I’m about 600 words in right now, and I officially started building it yesterday. Here’s the prompt I’m working from: “A story involving tales from the Bible and do whatever you want with it. (Do not simply use the Book of Mormon for this fanfic)”.

On the surface, the objective is simple. The storygame should feel like a straightforward fan-fiction retelling. Something clean, almost innocent. But if you know me at all, you know I rarely stop at surface-level ideas. I tend to use the full extent of my creativity, sometimes more than I probably should. Because of that, I’ve chosen to layer the story with a creeping horror theme.

You play as Adam. Through each choice you make, you gain Faith with God via a variable system. At first, this Faith behaves exactly how you’d expect. Obedience is rewarded. Trust feels safe. The world reacts gently. But later in the story, depending on how much Faith you’ve accumulated, cracks start to form. You begin to suspect, and eventually realize, that God may not be divine in the way you were taught. Instead, He is something eldritch. Vast. Incomprehensable. A presence that *requires* belief and cooperation to fully enter the world.

As the story progresses, the narration itself begins to shift. It moves from “You walk to…” to “You read on.” The text starts addressing the READER directly, not just the character. The boundary between Adam and the player thins until it’s barely there at all. By the end, again depending on your Faith value, one of two outcomes occurs: either you resist and defeat this God-thing, or you, both as the reader *and* the character, willingly allow it to enter Adam’s world… and ours.

I’m planning for this to be a fairly large project. As my first storygame, you could say I’m coming in with a bang, maybe a bit recklessly. This thread is mainly for general thoughts. How I should structure narrative branches, how to tweak the ones I’ve already written, and how best to develop and pace the variable interactions without making them feel mechanical or obvious.
 

>>>But if you know me at all, you know I rarely stop at surface-level ideas. I tend to use the full extent of my creativity, sometimes more than I probably should.

Examples?

I don't think "clean" or "innocent" describes any story in the Bible really. Though shaking it up a bit more than a simple fanfic retelling was probably more what End had in mind anyhow so good call there. Making something essentially stat based seems like the most ambitious part though so good luck with that.

Well, if you know me, you'd know that I can get pretty deep into debates and any idea I have I tend to follow through with. But unfortunately, you and I have not had any conversations in PMs, on this site or not, therefore you wouldn't necessarily know that or not, so your questioning is valid.

I don't think anyone here knows you.

You'd be surprised.

Neat idea. Reminds me a bit of the Book of Job, and Harischandra in hinduism. Just like Job and Harischandra both suffered enormous hardships for the sake of the thing they believed in(faith in God for Job and keeping his word for Harischandra), Adam could also have a similar narrative arc.

I think you got a really good idea going, and what's even more interesting is that you're adding in an element of how God may not be what Adam traditionally thought. I like the layers to this idea.

With regards to your specific question, I would say that you should learn the traditional patterns for storygame branching. Do you know the difference between a gauntlet and a tree? Are you familiar with false-choices and bottlenecks?

Check this article out: https://troypress.com/design-patterns-in-choose-your-own-adventures/

Hmm, story of Job, but plot twist: you are Job's brother. That would be an interesting horror story.

Sounds kind of gnostic.

Wasn't even aware of that "religion"! Thanks for the mention, I can take inspiration from it.

I googled one of the names for him, and found this cool wiki for some fanfic community or game I've never played. Cool lore though: The Demonic Paradise Fandom: Yaldaboath.

>>>This thread is mainly for general thoughts. How I should structure narrative branches, how to tweak the ones I’ve already written, and how best to develop and pace the variable interactions without making them feel mechanical or obvious.

I will say though that these questions would be difficult for someone else to answer without more specific detail as to the issues you're having. You seem to know what you want to do already from the way you describe it though, sounds like you're just lacking the actually writing it part. Might be best to come back to this once you have more than your first page.

I intended this thread to be a communicative, cooperative kind of suggestion-based conversation. Although I do have a good idea of where I'm headed, I would like a bit of feedback on the idea and overall some general reccomendations on how I should go about making this thing. Like I said, this is a big project, and I want it to involve not only Adam but the reader themselves. That requires some input from you guys!