Player Comments on Blackbirds Close In

This storygame tries to be a poetic dark and shocking narrative, but it lacks the depth to carry it out properly.

The idea has potential, and could have been good if decent effort was put into it. Even though the story starts with a horrific crime and a criminal that enjoys it, this narrative can't hold the mood, even as short as it is.

It would have been much better if the story stayed with dark imagery and poetic language, but this was broken by bad grammar and phrases. In the middle of what is supposed to be some dark emo poetry, the police "search every nook and cranny" - I mean, really. That line just lost the whole thing for me.

Overall, this game is good for a laugh or two at the ridiculous attempt to be deep and brooding.

Heavy stuff. Then again, what else would I expect from an LP fan? Despite everything, this was fairly decently written and certainly reflects your edgy, oppressed soul. Onto my favourite part: criticism.

This severely lacks depth and I don't know who the main character is or what the story is behind the girl. Sure, maybe you wanted an air of mystery, but this is really more like a hastily written segment of something bigger than a story in itself.

The options given were oddly presented, though I didn't particularly mind that. A big problem with how you laid them out, though, is that they obviously give direct insight into consequences of the player's choices... because you just tell them what's going to happen. Maybe you wanted that; it's not like the story was anywhere near long enough to really invest the reader or make them consider their actions carefully to discern the outcome seeing as the MC basically has no boundaries. Still, it gives a kind of uncaring feeling about the MC, which is probably what you were going for, even though it does compromise tense and perspective integrity.

The length is an obvious fault. I'll put this into perspective for you; my Notepad has 2387 words, and that's the main of of five total collections of notes for the one story I'm working on. Your story is about a third of that, making it one of the smallest I've ever seen. I didn't really see the point in writing such a short story that's basically about one event in a sick freak's life, unless you were going for a nihilistic message. Even then, a few more thousand words, more options, and some more effort could make a much better 'Oh-God-Isn't-The-World-Miserable-We're-All-Going-To-Die' kind of story.

To emphasise how little effort you put in, I even found mistakes in a story that would take about 10 minutes to proof-read. A few samples:

- "Bullets pierce through the rustling wind, each missing it target."

- "All you want is money, and pain in other's eye."

Some of the endings lacked significantly in detail or depth. For example:

- "Little do you know what fate has in store for you..." Yeah. You're dead on there, because the story ends and I don't get to find out. I feel like this was meant to be expanded upon.

Overall, a well deserved 2/8; you wanted constructive criticism.

I enjoyed myself. I'm actually surprised I did.

The writing was quite bloody and gruesome, but it didn't go way goo far over the line. You fleshed out the writing quite well with the detail and situations you provided.

I was a bit confused, because I got to make decisions for more then one character and decide situations rather then make choices in the storygame. However, I don't think this would really qualify as a problem :)

Character development was actually pretty average, but that's actually pretty good compared to the hundreds of storygames on the site with little to no development for the plot, characters, or situations.

I didn't really understand the whole "blackbirds" thing, though.

This was also quite short, and I wish i'd gotten to play more because I enjoyed it.

4/8.

WORST STORY I HAVE EVE HEARD

Uhhh.... and I thought my stories were dark.

Only 4 Endings

This was defedently an interesting game I think.

wow. such dark stuff. I'm surprised you could fit such dark shit into such a short Storygame and still have it look unrushed.

General Recommendation: I don’t recommend this game. It’s going for a very specific tone, but doesn’t have the length or dedication to its concept to adequately pull it off.
Preview: After committing a crime, will you escape or receive your comeuppance?

=SPOILERS BELOW=

General notes:
If you’re going to write a game like this and pull it off with the right amount of poeticism and craft, it needs to be longer and more in-depth. At this game’s current length, the premise just comes across as shallow and gratuitous.
Love SICK has a very similar concept and handles it much better; albiet with a humorous tone rather than the serious flavor this game is going for. It pulls this off by exploring the concept in a wider variety of ways, and being long enough to supply the reader with background information and character development beyond the bare minimum. This game is just too short to go into any kind of meaningful detail that would be needed to pull off its concept.
As things currently stand, the game just feels pointlessly edgy. Without any plot or character details, the plot essentially amounts to “You did this horrible thing and died, or maybe you didn’t, who knows”. Okay, this happened. So what? Why, as a reader, should I care?

Grammar:
Not great, there are numerous typos and sentence structure issues. “You cripple on the damp floor”, did you mean crumple?
Mastery of Language:
Could be worse. The poor grammer takes away from it, but there are glimpses of real linguistic cleverness between the typos.

Player Options/fair choice:
The choices you make have nothing to do with the narrator’s actions, you instead control events determined by other characters. I actually think this aspect of the game works well with the tone it’s going for, it emphasizes the randomness and lack of control the narrator has, while allowing aa wider variety of paths to be explored.

CONCLUSION: 2/8. It would need to be seriously revised to pull off its premise.

A bit early for End's Edgelord Contest...a few years too early.

That wasn't great. There are good stories that start with a murder and without names. This isn't one of them.

Hilariously bad. Negative was quite the edgy faggot back in the day, no wonder he got banned half a dozen times.

Narration has problems, e.g. the inclusion of a blackbird as symbolism even though it has no connections made to the story. There are a few spelling or grammar errors, not that they're important. There are mentions of wanting only money and "the bridges you burned", but with only 791 words to the story, there's so little elaboration that it becomes pointless. There's frankly a lot of other things to read that beat this story.

after reading the description, I had to listen to blackbirds by linkin park.anyway, this game was great, however, my only criticism, is, in the first part, there was only one choice, there should have been at least two choices, given the fact, that, the others had two choices. other than that, the game was pretty good.

Impressively disturbing. Well done. ^_^

The most demented story game I've ever seen... I love it!!!

uH.... You have achieved the White ending.

The End.

sO THAT WHAT YOU MEAN BY BLACK? BIRD?

i think you need more info on the character, maybe a reason why he did all of this and if no reason then maybe when he started doing this or how, because he did not just walk into a room and they were being killed. but besides that it was great!

Not bad. Like some of the other readers, I think that we need more details of the main character. Maybe not so much their history, but I think we need a little more of the protagonist's warped mindset. More insight into how disturbed the protagonist really is. More victims perhaps. Also why is the protagonist afraid to be alone? That's never addressed. Why is their face disfigured? Did they do it themselves? What is the symbolism of the blackbirds? You could definitely build this story into something great. With more detail.

Nice idea....but the story was kind of strange bad pointless.

Well this was not what I expected with a story entitled 'Blackbirds' but I was pleasantly surprised in a strange sort of way. The story was very different to what I've read before which is a good thing. The imagery was very good, especially at the start, and overall it was written pretty well. There was one slip where you wrote "what this man has did" which isn't quite right but I think that's just a typo.
The problem lies with the length. There's no backstory on any of the characters and very little explanation of how you escape the police. I'd also have liked to have seen an explanation for the title of the story, as I think the word blackbird was only mentioned once, and only in one of the endings.
As far as stories of this length go, this was a really good attempt and I hope you consider writing a longer piece in the future!

Not bad grammar was good and the story was short yet strange. Not every story starts out with "You rape her" and that is a good thing, but it made sense here. I would love some longer stories in this darker style. Over all 6/10 Ya boi Dragon like it!

Okaaaaay.......

It indeed is too short. You could have written it a hell of a lot better if you took more time. The rapist/serial "protagonist" doesn't seem to have a background. Correction: he HAS no background. Details were near nil. Like let's say I *SPOILER* chose to escape the cops. My choice doesn't say much on HOW, it just says I DID. Nice picture on one ending though.

To summarize, your storygame is like a skycraper undergoing construction at the foundation level. You can clearly see the potential for this game to make it big, but it has yet to be fleshed out, like a beautiful woman whose been stripped of all except her skeleton.

Occupied me from homework for 3 minutes. 4/8.

I was disturbed and scared but the imagery was amazing.

I got the black ending?

Not bad at all... I liked the introduction. It started with just enough for me to understand who I was, without going into too much detail.

Very, very short, and very, very weird, but not bad.

Not bad.

Very dark. Well written though and it would be interesting if it was longer to explore the main character a bit more. 5/8

Must find secret page! #rabid

Awesome! Got all the endings yhanks to dat inhenious reser button o.o

I love this story, I love the feel, and the slight gore is always appreciated. Maybe a bit more depth, make the story longer, and you have a winning combination!

Very sick and twisted but....I liked it. The grammar is also good.

That was, dark.
I don't know why the maturity level is PG-13, you should edit the maturity level.

... Well, that was disturbing... But also well written, so well done! Am sure you can do better if you take your time and put more effort into your stories. ^_^

Good attempt, if it was made in 20min. Wish it was a bit longer and more branchful.

I like the plot, and the writing style's nice and dark (great for this story). It'd be an even better piece if it was longer.

Really?! Total only 8 Frames?!

Lol. Well, I intended to add another major branch by giving an option to kill her instead but it didn't quiet...em...worked out!

Well... That first choice was... yeah.
*Ahem* So anyway, great story, grammar was fine, especially to say English isn't your first language. Well done :)

I found the style of choosing my own fate to be an interesting one, but there was no real story path in place I felt and that would have added to the experience.

Some very interesting ideas, especially for a 20 min thing in your 3 rd language! Too short though, as it had a good amount if potential!

it was really awesome as you wrote it in 20 min .

I don't no the theme of the game, its a good seen in a larger story though.

It was very poetic. I would love for you to extend some paths and make this a full blown story.

I enjoyed how poetic the writing was, and the story was good. I'd love to see version 2 with a little more detail and greater length!

Where were the black birds?

Grammar wasn't that bad as a problem, so bravo for that, but it was short, and not detailed. If you're going to write a story on a murderer/rapist, you might have to go the extra mile, not necessarily "Endmaster" gruesome, but at least verbose and interesting.
Writing a story in shouldn't take 20 minutes, unless it was made to be simple, or the author thought about the plot before hand and was amazingly skilled on the keyboard. Take your time, think about your premise, it's not like you have a time limit on this site. :)

I know, it sucks. Well.

Oh well.