Forums » Writing Workshop » Read Thread

A completely unnecessary motivation thread, given that I only have one story and people barely know who I am.

Passed Away: I haven't worked on this in literal years, but I guess I should finish it at one point. It's about a ghost learning to use his powers to find his killer to complete his unfinished business, but also teetering on the line between heaven and hell through his obsession in finding said killer. Will work on finishing after The Hounds Grow Near.

The Hounds Grow Near: A story about a woman who gets turned by her fiancé into a werehyena. Right now I'm working on the extremely long prologue for the first three routes, and after that I'll work on the coalition route. After that, I'll work on the prologue for the fourth route and probably finish the entire route before moving onto the two remaining routes. Current progress is about a ten paragraph page per day, but I'm trying to increase my pace and move onto two pages per day. The whole thing is probably going to be around 500 pages.

Untitled Modern Thing: Something inspired by my real life experiences with ASPD about a violent criminal and their treatment in society.

There's no such thing as an unnecessary motivation thread. If people don't really know who you are, this is a good way to get yourself known. Even if nobody else reads it, it should help you record your progress and motivate yourself.

What do you plan on posting here in future? More details about the plot? Or just progress with things like number of pages?

OK then well since I can't update the OP mine as well make this reply the post where I actively edit shit instead of making a new reply for every update.

I have a sort of rating system to determine the order in which I write these, so here it is:
PENDING: will work on it after any completed ACTIVE projects. PENDING projects turn to ACTIVE after my current cue of ACTIVE projects have completed.
ACTIVE: actively working on each day I can until they're complete.
ON HOLD: complications or just plain disinterest have basically shut down these projects for good. I might come back to them in the future, but... ehh...

School Contest Story: ACTIVE

Passed Away: I actually wrote a page on this for once, surprisingly. Guess I got some inspiration or something. Now you can lift a guy's hat as a sort of introduction to telekinesis, but I'm not too keen on the writing there. I'll probably rewrite it later, but until then consider it PENDING

The Hounds Grow Near: PENDING. Prologue for chapters 1-3 about 30% done. Will work on after contest.

Untitled Modern Thing: ON HOLD

and hey two new projects!!!111!!11! yay

Neverending Darkness: PENDING. A lot shorter than The Hounds Grow Near because the prologue is almost done! woo! (hey, if a game has like seven romance options but the romance isn't the main focus of the game, is it meant to go into the love and dating genre or can it still go into the genre more fitting to its story?) This was a bigger priority, but now I've decided to finish my writing contest story.

Exiled: PENDING. honestly I dunno this might turn to an On Hold story?

Here's an excerpt from my new story Just Animals I'm writing for the contest.
Note to self: read this anytime you need motivation to write another page, Swed. This is gud stuff.

"Please, please don't do this! You heard what he said. One more strike and there's no guarantee we'll stay together," your sister pleads, tugging on your sleeve. You growl, pulling your arm from her.

"Get the hell out of my way! Let me have my own damn life!" you yell, and do something you regret. You push her. Hard. She falls to the ground, her elbow bleeding. You're still angry; too angry, and so you storm off. You can hear her sob as you walk off to the warehouse, unaware that would be the last time you saw her.

---

"Ay, Sam, yo? You in there?" a young tanned boy asks, brushing his oily blond hair away.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm in there," you respond. You must have dozed off after class had ended. At least you still remember walking with Pete, the blonde haired boy, to lunch.

"So like I said man, I saw Jess and 'Lil whispering about you back in english! It's crazy man. You got the hottest girl in school talking about you."

"Right... who are these Jess and 'Lil people again?" you ask.

"You don't remember man?!" Pete smacks you on the shoulder in a playful manner, but you quickly shove it away. "Woah, uh... sorry. They're just, um, t-the blonde girl and that one in a ponytail that always follows her."

Oh, right. Them.

"A-anyways, I wish I could get Jess to notice me. She's so damn hot man."

You eye Pete up and down as he says this. He's a scrawny little boy, wearing a gold chain and a wife-beater. Atop his head lies hair reminiscent of a field of corn having been doused with lighter fluid, and his skin reeks of cheap deodorant. Not a single strong muscle sits atop his light brown skin, and neither does any bodyhair.

"Aren't you only fourteen or something, kid?" you ask, with no hints of sarcasm or intonations of humor.

"Yeah haha man, nice one." There is an awkward silence, before he realizes you're serious. "Wait, you're serious man? Nah, hell no I'm not fourteen!"

You eye him up and down once again, raising an eyebrow.

"I'm thirteen man! Man thanks for the compliment about me being mature, I'm sure Jess'll notice me now!"

Pete continues prattling on, greatly annoying you but at the same time bringing a hint of normality to your life. A few tables behind him, however ,a familiar figure is sitting. You squint, trying to focus past the blurriness of the distance, leaning your head to the side past Pete.

Holy shit.

It's my sister.

AGH FUCK

CHECKED OUT THE CONTEST POST SOME MORE AND IT SEEMS LIKE MOST PEOPLE ARE DOIN' COOL POWER STUFF N SHIT

Now I'm worried my game's gonna be too artsy-fartsy and character-driven!

Character driven is a better thing for this one than you might realize.

Well, things are getting more complex as more and more variables for each route come into play. I feel like the lies you can tell characters will bite the player in the ass eventually if they don't watch it, but that's exactly the type of tone I want.

Chapter 1 is almost done, which seems to contain all the major choices that give you different routes in Chapter 2.

Ugh. For some reason no matter what I write, I'm unsatisfied with it. I know I don't have time to rewrite it and yet I'm unsatisfied with continuing to write what I have.

I hate this.

I just deleted the entire cafetaria scene, or at least all the parts not including Sam's sister. It makes me feel a lot better now that a lot of the fluff has been trimmed down and more of the raw story is there. Lets me set my own tone better so I can avoid turning this into some kind of highschool dating sim.

Hopefully now with a darker tone, I can incorporate more of the prison themes I was hoping to and bring attention to not only the stricter nutrition standards in prisons than schools, but also the psychological effects on juvenile hall offenders returning to society.

I had to research juvenile hall before writing this story and it uh... it's not a nice place. More brutal than regular prison because there's less attention on juvenile offenders than adult offenders. The lack of proper funding or attention leads to poor conditions and more brutal prison fights.

Another thing to note is that the average highschool has less nutrition standards than prison. Prisoners receive higher minimum caloric intake and more nutritional value than your average highschool student, and also have longer mandated exercise periods to promote a healthier being.

Hopefully I can use this entire post I just wrote out as a reminder of the tone of the story, and come back to it regularly in case I start slipping into a lighter tone.

Despite my household's internet being on the verge of getting shut off, I've actually managed to get some work done. There's this cool scene which I don't want to spoil where Sam is being kept up by a domestic violence situation, goes down stairs, and beats the crap out of both the man and the woman before going back to bed. How is he not arrested, you ask? The man is comatose in the hospital and the woman is too terrified to tell anyone that Sam did it.

It's getting really interesting and I'm finally setting the tone right. Hopefully I'll meet the deadline, but the fact that my thumb is really sore and makes a weird popping/cracking sound still arouses worry.

It's great that you were able to make progress. Don't hurt yourself though, kay? (When I haven't had home internet for sites like this, I generally walked to the library as a kid. Do you have one nearby? Or any other relatively free source?)

The only library is five miles away and neither me or my family owns a car. My brother owns a bike, but he won't let me borrow it. Also, it's in gang territory.

I think there's a McDonalds close by that has wifi though???

OKAY, I've figured it out. If I work on one route per day from tomorrow til July 2nd, I should be able to get it done by the deadline.

Awesome, good luck. ^^

FUUUCK MY THUMB SPLIT OPEN

FUCK THE CONTEST FUCK MY HAND FUCK WRITING FUCK THE WORLD FUCK MONEY FUCK EVERYTHING I CAN BARELY TYPE NOW I TYPE LIKE 10 WORDS PER MINUTE AND I HAVE A BANDAGED STITCHED UP THUMB

AFWFAGFEJALGJWGJLAGNNLW

But it's fine. I'm not giving up yet. I'll get this done. I have to. Writing is very personal for me as well as entertaining, so to give up on it is to give up on myself. To give up on myself is to give up on the life my parents gave me, the love my siblings gave me, and all the opportunities I'll have later in life to make myself into something worth while.

I WILL GET THIS DONE AND I DON'T CARE IF I HAVE TO CHEW MY THUMB OFF TO DO IT! Actually, I do. BUT I DON'T CARE IF I HAVE TO CHEW SOMEONE ELSE'S THUMB OFF TO DO IT!

fun aside i'm in a lot of pain but i'm still forcing myself to complete this. Note to self: give up and you're a failure. do you want to be a failure? no? then work through it.

going to have to cut out thursday and skip straight to friday, i.e prom night. thursday was boring and didn't add much anyways so im fine with this

well Chapter 1 is now done and thus all the interactions that lead to the five different routes are also done.

kind of falling behind but ok. might have to scrap the delinquent route even though i really don't want to

or i could trim the sports route, since it's kind of boring to write. really boring to write actually, but I already added too many options to get to it.

Yay!

Good job!

You're great!

Keep going!

.

..

...

....Well, good job with the storygame so far. With those different routes, just know your timeframe with each route, and see what you can do with each. Know how much work you still have to put into each route, and choose what you really need to work on that pleases the people, or finish the stuff that you already have going good. That's what I'd do anyways, but you do you man.

thanks. this is actually some pretty solid advice.

No problem m8

So if anyone actually reads this, I want people to vote on which route they'd pick to be cut out if a route HAD to be cut out due to time restraints. here are the two I'm deciding between:

Sports Route, where ye become a football player and it plays out mostly like a sports movie

Delinquent Route, in which ye become a gang member and act all criminallyo

I'd prefer the delinquent route, tbh.

prefer to see it cut, or do you mean you prefer it overall compared to the sports route?

Sorry, didn't mean to confuse you. I think I prefer it overall against the sports route.

I'd sooner read about criminals than jocks any day.

god i really like this scene:

Wednesday afternoon. School has just ended.

You stand outside taking a smoke. You found them discarded somewhere near the dumpsters, and they absolutely taste like crap. You drown it out against the wall and toss it to the ground, crushing it.

She's still not here, you think, as the rest of the students leave. Quite a few minutes go by with no sign of Lucy.

"Sam?" Lucy's voice asks. You stretch your arms and come around the corner, waving.

"I'm here." She doesn't respond. You're about to ask her what the point of this was before she starts walking, so you shut up.

Buildings softly slide by along with the warm glow of the sun. A gorgeous twilight highlighted by storm clouds in the distance fills the sky.

"Sam?" Lucy tugs on your shirt, like she did when she was little. You've always found it funny how you've played the older sibling when in fact she's two years older than you. She'll be graduating soon, in fact.

You want to ask her why she hates you; why you hate her; why the world seems to hate the both of you, but only then do you notice your surroundings.

The buildings in this neighborhood are disgustingly run down, several of them obviously rotting with many condemned notices pinning the doors. Bottles shatter every few moments along with a loud howl, a human howl, which comes from the alleys.

Lucy grips your arm tighter while you escort her through the paths. She still mostly leads, but seems more confidant so long as you're close.

"Look!" a voice yells. A group of men, adult men, creep out from the shadows. They're obviously members of a gang, as evidenced by their matching face tattoos. They hoot and holler at her as she walks by, shouting vulgarities about what they'd do if she came over.

"I'll show you what a real man feels like!"
"Why don't you come on over and get something hard?"
"Lookin' hot, mama! Don't be shy, warm us up!"

You feel disgusted, but do nothing to stop them. The two of you walk by and, for the first time since you left juvy, you refuse to make eye contact with the men.

A block or two later, and you've walked Lucy home. She says nothing, simply reaching for the door knob to what seems to be an apartment building.

"Wait," you say. "Tomorrow's the prom. I don't know if you have a date, but if not I'd really like to catch up."

She briefly glances at you before looking back to the door.

"I'd like that."

The door closes, and you walk back home.

You laugh. "Come on, it'll be fine. I haven't been to a fair since... ah, it'll be fun."

She makes the biggest, fakest pout you've ever seen. "Fine, but I get to pick the games!"

"Fine," you relent. "But no balloon popping."

"No fair, that's my favorite!" she yells as you start to walk off. "Sam? Sam?!" she calls out, before hiking up her dress and rushing to catch up.

---

The pier is abuzz with carnival games, but only a dozen or so people in the entirety of it all. String-lights cover almost everything like your dad's old man cave.

Your dad. Someone you wish you didn't remember right now.

"Geeze, this place is a ghost town!" Lucy exclaims, lacking the type of enthusiasm you expected her to have.

"Isn't that a good thing? No lines." You shrug.

"I guess," she says, pouting the same way as earlier. "Oh, balloon popping!"

"Hey, I said that was off-limits!" you yelp with the ferocity of a chihuahua before chasing after her.

---

"Hey, Sam?"

The two of you are walking down the pier, watching as the various carnival vendors close their stalls.

"Yeah?"

"What was it like in prison?"

---

Men corner you and start kicking mercilessly, not stopping even as your ribs crack and shatter. The guards pay hardly any attention until one goes for your head, where upon the inmate is shot dozens of times with tranquilizer darts. He drops to the ground, foaming at the mouth and clearly overdosing. You know his death will be covered up easily.

Juvenile Hall is not a nice place.

---

You're caught off guard in a moment of weakness or maybe strength, you allow yourself to feel fear.

"It was cold. Terrifying. They say prison is bad but Juvy is worse. Underfunded, understaffed, and not a damn rehabilitation class in sight. People were animals there, and just animals. You either turn out like them or you die in there," you say, hesitating for a moment. "I wouldn't call them human. I can't call them human. Not after the beatings."

Lucy stares at you with what you can only assume is disgust at what her brother has... had, become.

"If they turn into animals, why didn't you?"

You stop in your tracks.

Your beat beats faster than you've ever felt it beat before.

You grab Lucy as tight as you can, bringing her to a hug. She groans in pain from how tight you've latched on, but returns the embrace. "Sam, you're hurting me..." You finally let go, dropping her a good foot back down to the ground.

You don't apologize. Words would be meaningless right now. You told her everything you needed to just through actions.

"Sam... Sam, look behind you." You turn. A stall vendor is being beaten on by the men that harassed your sister from earlier.