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Hi Storygamers! 

For those of you looking for a new and interesting storygame, I've released a new one! It's called "The Shortcut Home". 

http://chooseyourstory.com/story/the-shortcut-home

Feel free to check it out. If you run into any issues with the game, private message me and I'll fix it as soon as possible. See if you can get the "Secret Ending". It might take more than one play through. Reader discretion is advised.

Note: Ever since the giant mammoth of the MyVacation games, I've decided to settle for writing shorter stories. This is going to be the first of a collection of short stories.

Very good. I enjoyed it a lot. ^_^

Well Done!

I appreciate the comments! Thank you! 

I would love to see the initial choices you all did. I was thinking of eventually tallying them up and making a global percentage for storygamers on this website. Similar to what Tell Tale Games does. 

Copy and paste it if you can! 

Also, I'd love to hear some criticism and reviews. Anything helps! 

Very nice! I liked it.

It did take me a second try to find the secret ending. I didn't get it, but I found it!

My only criticism that I can think of right now is that you shouldn't include an instant end-game link on the first page. If you can't think of a story for one particular choice, then you probably shouldn't include it, not even for the sake of realism.

That's a good point! The first page is the main menu, but you're right. I should probably take it down since people can quit and exit their browser anyway.

I thought that link was there for those too lazy to read the story, but who wanted a free point. :)

People shouldn't be allowed to skip out on this kind of quality, especially since we just started recovering from a 12-year-old fanfic deathplague.

I took out the choice that ends the game prematurely. That way players must exit the browser. 

I would like to apologize to the one person that saved their game. I've been frantically un-publishing the game whenever I come across a bug or an error and fixing it on the spot the moment I see problems. (And while the view count and saved games are still low)

Don't worry, most people around here don't take it too hard. I've had to take down my game and replace it a couple times.

It's true, but it never stays unpublished for too long, as Kiel writes like a maniac. If he pulled a Stephen king and did crack, he could jump out of a plane and finish half of a novel before he had to pull the parachute. Granted, it would probably be a jumbled-up mess of thoughts, but Jack Kerouac did that all the time.

I loved it: very interesting read. Thank you.

I even commented how much I loved it. Read that!

Thank you, 3173v3, for you thoughtful review! I really appreciated reading it. I'm actually back on the workbench for another short story, and reading your thoughts will definitely help me on how I approach the new one.

As for the choices, I have an idea. Instead of "doing all the right things" to get the secret ending, I'll just make it so that the player must find 6/7 clues to get the secret ending. I'm being a little generous for making it 6, but there is one choice that may be a little unfair that will prevent you from finding the clue.

As a general tradition, I also like to connect the universe of my stories. There will be a Studio 5 reference in Shortcut Home. 

So not to spoil anything, but there's a few things you can do now that change the course of the story, but you can still win. This game has about 14-15 endings. It's really, really tough trying to wrap your head around the questions you have to ask yourself. Like "What if the player did this, but didn't do that?" "What if the player took that item?" "What if the player found this?" "Who survived in the end?" 

I still read the story and check to see if my connections make sense, even after I published it. 

Lots of spoilers in here.

Thank you. I just felt like there wasn't enough branching out. See, if you wait for the killer to come around and then save the girl you seem to get a pretty similar story compared to knocking on the door, using the machete, hiding in the bedroom and then saving the girl. What most bugged me was the first choice. When I choose to investigate, I had a pretty different story with the fox and all, but then you get back to the clown with the machete. That's exactly what you get in the first choice, other than the fact (spoiler alert) that the fox helps you escape when you're tied up in the fire. I wasn't able to find another way out of that scene while choosing the first path without losing my items. And I needed those, the charm at least, to show to the killer. Correct me if I'm wrong on this, it was definitely fun to figure out the paths..But I might've missed something.

I also found it a bit illogical as to how investigating a strange noise somewhere deep down in the woods while climbing down a rusty ladder is good for me. After all, it does help me continue further in the story.

I wasn't sure about the clear hint you gave me not to pick up some items because they might be annoying in the end. This might've influenced the endings I got, that's why I'm saying, correct me if I'm wrong. Otherwise, your use of the advanced editor is great (how else could it be :P). But, yes, yay references :)

EDIT: I noticed that it says "PSTD" and not "PTSD". Sorry, the grammar nazi in me. I also found 7/7 clues (I know what you mean with the one tricky one.. It's kind of a strange thing to do in a CYS storygame, because usually when something says "do not go here" actually means there is a danger. In this case it just brings you to a clue. I would say that the secret ending is only the real "true" ending because in the other dozens of endings it says "boy, I wish I got some closure". They're good endings, but not the best.) and the secret ending.

More news!

Update 6.1:

+I just added a "Profile Sticker" for those that get the secret ending.

+Major plot lines, lore, story scenes, characters, and other plot holes have been resolved. 

+Minor grammatical errors have been fixed.

Now you can show off proof that you won the game!