Forums » News & Updates » Read Thread

Thank goodness, now I don't have to kill all those baby animals.

Woot woot! Go Sherbster!!

Oh hey, that's me!
Wow. When I published I really didn't expect to win, things were looking kind of bleak for a while there when my first attempt at a fishing story went up in flames. Even if it's not what I initially planned, I thoroughly enjoyed writing Siren and it's probably for the best that it's what I ended up with. I'm glad it's been well-liked!

I'd like to issue the grandest of thank-yous to Mizal, the greatest Texan in CYS history, for running this contest, and congratulate her for managing to get some stories out of us during the deadest time of the year. Even if one of them was, well, whatever Darius submitted. Hey, speaking of which, my storygame got bumped off of the new games list because of that 900-word monstrosity of his, and he still ended up shamed! That dutchman sure is lucky I don't yet have access to nuclear weaponry.

Anyway, congratulations to everyone else who avoided shame, and of course, I'm so happy for the KAE-goers. This contest was a big step for them, what with Nautilus meeting site standards and all.

Had fun reading through all the stories, and I hope you lot give it your all for MHD's contest! That is all, glory to CYS.

Congrats Sherb!  Great work.

I'm very happy to have gotten second place and the Edge award, I'm going to drink a comical amount of tea in celebration.

Congratulations to Sherb as well, you deserved the win.

Congratulations Sherbet! You deserved every bit of it. Like mizal stated, it was painfully obvious from the beginning that you were going to win.

For you, Sherb!

And congrats to everyone else for managing to submit a storygame on time! I'm glad we were all able to find the motivation to finish them. Except Darius, of course.

That is ridiculously cute, thank you!

Congratulations to Sherbet and TypeCat. You deserved it.

I think I came third. Thanks to mizal for hosting and all the people who have bothered to read it so far. Here is my reflection for those with nothing better to read:

When I entered the contest I thought I'd have loads of time to write. I did some brainstorming: however, my original story was completely different to the one I published. My entry actually began life when I was messing around with ideas, so I wrote a few sentences then moved on to something else.

The story I was planning to write wasn't 'fishing enough' for my liking, as the references to fishing seemed tenuous at best. So I shelved that idea and went back to the flesh-eating fish idea.

By this point I was in the exam period. I used this as an excuse to procrastinate everything, while doing as little revision as possible.

When exams finished, two weeks before the deadline, I decided the procrastination had gone on long enough. I sketched out a basic plan of the story. That was all I did that week.

Soon it was only a week before the deadline, and I still only had those first few sentences from the beginning of May. I thought to myself, 'Well, this isn't good,' and began linking all the pages of the story together, leaving the writing for later. 

The weekend came. I saw the meager 1000 words of my story and felt guilty enough to properly start writing the story. I've never procrastinated to this extent before, but there's always a first time, right?

Monday morning: 4000 words, when I'd planned for 16,000. I started typing like a maniac, forcing the words out at some points (I have to admit that writing the gorey stuff was the most enjoyable part). In all I spent 12 hours writing that day, only stopping for meals and the occasional toilet break. At the end I published the story, then went to bed.

Yes, I had no time to proofread. Yes, I should have started way earlier and avoided rushing. Next time, maybe...

Again, congratulations to the winners. SHAME to those who submitted nothing. Thanks for the contest.

(I've wanted to do one of these for a long time.)

*cheers to mizal for actually reading every single one of the stories*

Congrats on the win Sherbet!

Congrats on the win, Sherbet! Well done to TypeCat and Goodnight_a, along with everyone else who managed to submit an entry. 

And or course, props to Mizal for not only reading every story, but also leaving reviews. That's probably something I should start doing sooner or later (probably later).

I initially planned to join this contest and even designed a cover page (my favourite so far), but real life got in the way. My laptop died, I nearly missed a flight, important stuff went missing, etc. Then I returned and have been relaxing too much lol. But I'll eventually become so unproductive that getting first class grades in my first year of university wouldn't be able to justify this procrastination, and I'll be back to being a machine, hopefully in time for MHD's contest. 

Oh yeah congrats to Sherb! I'm glad that you won, so that I may write more stories with gay characters! I'll read yours when I'm finished with Will's open map game. Absolute madlads you two are.

As for the story, Crap, okay, now it's completely finished. I forgot to toggle off variables and it bothered me a lot (and then I find more things to nitpick at and then I worry that no one was reading it because it kept crashing on them, so then I want to head back and fix it and then the cycle continues), but it should be done. I perhaps pinged everyone to death by now, so no more fidgeting at this thing anymore.

As for trigger warnings or other content that people find distressing, there are only portrayals gore, excessive violence and child murder. The little romance that is present is optional and this time very much skippable. 

.....is my art this bad? I actually rather like it. You know, the wonky crayon like lineart makes it more cohesive.

Given these statistics, of the 14 people currently entered in MHD's contest, we can predict around 6-7 storygames. Also, it'll be super cool to see a completion rate above 75% one day.