Rise of a Hero

This wasn't the worst I've seen, but there were some issues which I'll write on below. But first an overall impression.

Probably the best thing about this storygame was the battle descriptions. Those weren't spectacular, but they did make a little bit of sense. For example, running away from the tree when there are a bunch of corpses present is obviously a risky move, because you might trip. Anyway, the full arc didn't have that much going on, but it is a decent single serving adventure.

Anyway, on to the problems with the storygame:

Firstly, there were some grammatical errors, however I'm assuming English is a second language here due to their nature, so I can excuse that. The use of apostrophes for quotation marks is weird, too, but maybe that is done in some European countries or something.

However, there were several plot and/or continuity errors. For example, there was a point in the story where I was informed about rebels I met in the forest that I never actually met. It seems I didn't follow the prescribed path the author wanted, which led to that plot hole. I skipped going to the Woodsher forest entirely in the beginning (going to the coast city instead), so I certainly did not meet any rebels there. In fact, the path I chose had the following statement: "You first head for the nearby monastery and from there you head to the coastal city, that way you can avoid Woodsher forest[.]", which means I definitely never encountered these rebels.

Then later in the story, Thran, the rebel king, says, "A pleasure to meet you again," even though I completely skipped meeting the rebels and had never met him at that point.

There were other weird issues as well, but the most perplexing thing about this storygame was the battering ram thing. As the invading army approaches, a rebel says, "The enemy is attacking, they have almost reached the rams with their battering ram, but we must praise all the gods that they haven't brought ballista's or battering rams." Do they have battering rams or do they not? Are they Heisenberg rams or something? And why would they be attacking rams with the battering rams they do or do not have?


Anyway, moving on. I'm not entirely sure how the merchant at the tavern suddenly was able to "ask anything" of the crowd (meaning, convince them to do anything) after that rather uninspiring speech he gave about his wife and kid being sold into slavery. In the kind of dystopian fantasy world the story is shooting for, most people would be like "and who gives a fuck?" rather than suddenly eating out of his hand because he was a wealthy merchant that had some misfortune.

Also not a fan of saying "Yes, I'm a coward," ending the story. I think it would have been cool to put a reluctant hero arc there, after you escape the mob. I'm especially disappointed in this because if you choose the "I'm not a coward" option you instead become a badass taking out a bunch of soldiers. I think it is possible that you could have escaped the mob, maybe by using a distraction and agility, like maybe Aladdin or Jack Sparrow, and then continued the story after declining to join them.





If you ignore the plot contradictions that arise if you don't follow the author's prescribed path, there is a mostly coherent plot (other than the Heisenberg battering rams). The overall arc isn't bad, but there wasn't much to latch on to emotionally speaking. However, I enjoy this type of story, so I'm willing to overlook the weird plot errors, and while I wans't emotionally attached to any character, a couple of them were somewhat entertaining.

Again, this certainly is not the worst thing I've seen here, and I appreciate what the author was trying to do.

This story really starts out great! It sounds like a classic fantasy tale of adventure and heroism – then it gets to the farm life of the every day kid who escapes to start a new life. Good stuff! I also like that as soon as the story starts out that you have choices that affect the story. I had a lot of fun working my way through the story and enjoyed all the different places that I could visit and see. There were not a ton of details for each location and each person, but there were enough to make the story interesting and to keep my interest.

I also really liked how the different options and choices led to different situations, yet they all seemed to tie together at the end (unless you died). I made it to the epilogue – and while the story was good and complete, I’m ready for the story to continue. At the same time, I think just about every page could be expanded with more detail and more description. There could be more descriptions of each person that you encounter. There could be more about the travel, the areas where you travel, and even individual buildings and places that you see on your travels. Overall though, a very good story, thank you for sharing it with the site.

What an exciting storygame this is. :)

The writing was quite good, and for someone who isn't a native speaker of the English language this doesn't seem to suffer from too many issues with grammar. Romulus, you're ability to set a fitting atmosphere with the words you weaved together is rather remarkable, and it really drives you into the very setting of the story. So this made for a rather immersive storygame in my opinion.

One other thing that I feel was done well was the branching that this storygame offered. There's a variety of choices and the effects of those choices leads to this storygame not feeling like one that was too linear or stiff in its storytelling. For a storygame that could be considered on the 'short story' spectrum of things, it definitely feels like not a single word is wasted on crafting a rather decent tale. There's some replay value to be had because of things like that, and I must say well done on that front.

The only slight things that I found were perhaps that the story could have flowed better in building up certain conflicts towards the end of certain paths. I feel that a more balanced pace in things would have helped in that slight awkwardness, but I suppose a story in which many things are happening is more preferable for me as a reader than a story in which it doesn't feel like a great many things are happening.

For a fantasy style storygame it feels like you utilize the foundation of what makes an interesting fantasy setting well enough. Though I imagine some more world-building would have perhaps made certain inclusions of fantasy elements feel more natural when they came up. I do feel that is something that is only minor and not too grave of an offense when regarding this whole storygame as a whole, and this was something that I found to be a good storygame at that.

This is some nice work, Romulus.

i wanted to kill them all but got killed, you could have made it so i had the choice to run away when i saw the odds.

This story was alright, it certainly seemed a lot shorter than I thought it would. Although I suppose the story is about the rise of a hero I was hoping to see more of what would come after it, like some epic struggle uniting people against the wizards and leading them to take their freedom.

What I liked about this story:
It wasn't overly elaborate in the plot, although some things happened a little too simply. It was kind of fun to read through in general and a lot of the choices outcomes made sense.

What could improve:
A lot of things seemed to happen way too quickly. Like there isn't any build up at all about the protagonists home getting burnt down. Even though he hated his father something more than shrugging it all off would have made more sense.

The way half the city attacks when you steal from someone is just weird, I suppose if people are angry enough then, yes, they could all form a mob but it just seemed weird how that happened.

It seemed weird that there wasn't much build up to the wizards attacking the city. The governor sort of left then they sacked their own city, even when they had their own guards in place. I could understand having them bring in a wizard and some torturers to crack down on rebels and find some information instead of just slaughtering everybody.

Another thing is lack of branching, it seems that no matter what you choose the story sort of pushes you into eventually joining the rebels, which I didn't really like. A few different and varying branches would have been cool.

Overall while this story was kinda fun to read through it could use some improvement.

Well pretty good

Pretty good start for your writing career! Although there are a few grammatical errors and the plot runs a bit too fast towards the end, it was a great story and was really enjoyable to read.

Could have used more background

Very nice.

This is a good story, I hope their is another part to it. I liked the battle at the end. It was well done with having to out wit the guy.