I mentioned on Sunday that storytelling in board games has come a long way. That’s not entirely fair.
See, back when I was young, games, whether board or video, were all about emergent narrative. You discovered a story that was crafted around the activities you undertook and the events that happened as a result. Games like the old Ultima series had fixed storylines, sure, but most of the things that happened in the game were about you and what you did as the player. Same for games like the original Twilight Imperium or Cosmic Encounter. The “narrative” was the game, and the way you told the game afterwards determined the kind of story it was.
We can contrast that with the rise of Japanese-style storytelling in the 90s. In these, you were playing a specific character who did specific things. You didn’t craft the story, you discovered it. The story had already been formed, and you were going down the path to find out what happened next. This created a bit of a rift for some people who would gravitate towards one ‘style’ of story over the other, but honestly they were both good. Japanese-style games could have much tighter narratives because the game always knew the order of the events that would happen to you, whereas American-style games were all about giving you a big sandbox with just a hint of story attached to it.
Board games have been veering into the Japanese-style of story for awhile. I kinda blame Kickstarter, since the rise of the KS-game means that more is always considered better. And being able to have a 20-mission campaign is better than a randomized setup, right? According to Gloomhaven and its 100-mission campaign… yes!
But while the designers are pushing towards longer and more elaborate stories… many of them aren’t being written by people who can actually write. The idea is good, but the execution is often lacking. Too much of Gloomhaven is binary Left-or-Right decisions with no real indication of why one is better than the other. Oathsworn has a massive campaign, but many of the story beats are almost free of player intervention (a branching narrative that always ends up at the same place, no matter what choices you make). And so on. There are exceptions: Legacy of Dragonholt is exceptionally written, and Forgotten Waters equally so, but games like that are still the exception, and they seem to be made by people who respect the craft of writing independent of the craft of game design. Very different tasks, after all.
Anyway, I have more to say, but I’ll give the topic a rest for a bit. Still so much editing to do! I’ve reached 25K words on the current draft… only 55K to go!
Writing for Board Games
I’m a big fan of board games. I think the industry is doing a lot of really interesting things, and one of the big changes over the last twenty years (more or less when I started playing games) is the drive towards narrative-style experiences.
A lot of older games had emergent narrative… there wasn’t really a story, but as you played you created a series of events that sort of implied a story. To take a quick example, the classic board game “Twilight Imperium” (which is now on its fourth, very successful iteration) had players trying to conquer a vast intergalactic empire, very much in the theme of Master of Orion or similar video games.
But there were no real “narrative” or “story” events. Instead, you would craft a tale based on which of players did what. So, for example, a story about how the sneaky Hacan betrayed the Jol-Nar might happen in one game, but there’s nothing fixed about either of those races or about that betrayal in the game itself.
Compare that to something like “Forgotten Waters” or “The Adventures of Robin Hood” or even “Legacy of Dragonholt,” which instead are games with fixed stories (with variable elements, sure) and the players discover the story as you go along. And originally, those were written very badly. But these days?
Well… these days they’re still often written very badly. But occasionally, like the games listed above, they are written very well.
More on this next post. I have many thoughts about board game writing!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Muggle Jobs
One of the podcasts I listen to likes to discuss non-creative jobs as “muggle work.” While I dislike many aspects of the Potter-verse (no judgment on those who love it: we’re all allowed to enjoy the fiction we enjoy), that particular term has struck a chord with me.
“Muggle” is the Potter way of saying “Mundane” or, more importantly, “Non-magical.” I love the idea of creative work being a form of magic, because it does feel that way sometimes. I’m creating worlds, people, and universes while I sit here at my table tapping on my little computer. It is a form of magic.
Which isn’t to say muggle work isn’t important. At no point are the muggles “less than” by anyone in the Potter-verse that aren’t racist, despicable people, even if some of the muggles themselves are awful people (Harry’s adoptive parents, for example). A lot of muggle work is very important. But it’s not magic, and that’s significant.
I still have my muggle job for now. I can feel it tugging at the edges of my consciousness, though. The thought that I should stop pouring so much time and energy into the regular, and really focus more on practicing my own unique form of magic.
Some day.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Editing Away
The edits are coming along nicely, all things considered. I’m about 10K into them, and the switch from third to first person is going quite well! The story is still flowing, and I’m editing up some of the looser bits while also making sure to seed in the elements that will end up being critical to the conclusion.
I do love a good “sudden but inevitable” conclusion.
With some luck I can finish this up in the next few weeks, since I’m supposed to get it to my editor mid-Feb. And then she’ll probably have it for a few weeks, and then I can release it to all of you fine people! Huzzah!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
So Many Things
One of the writing podcasts I listen to talks a lot about “Hustle Culture,” and how toxic it is. This is something I know deep inside me… I’ve always hated the rat-race, and I hate the idea that I have to work my butt off or die.
It pervades throughout modern Canadian culture. It’s everywhere. Everywhere expects you to work harder for less. Longer hours, shorter vacations, more guilt.
I hate it.
But here I am with a novel I’m editing, a movie I want to shoot, a series of short stories I want to submit, and painting commissions to help pay for everything else. Plus a day job that pays most of the bills on top of everything else.
I don’t want to hustle. But I feel like I have to. Because if I stop, I may never be able to stop? Like, I have to “earn” the right to actually relax. I can’t remember the last time I had a day that was just… “off.” Like, a day I didn’t have to do a dozen things for a dozen different projects.
But I need one of these projects to start to take off. I need it to be successful enough that I can start dropping the stuff I dislike to focus on the stuff I like. Or, failing that, I need to have made enough money doing the stuff I dislike that I can actually focus on the stuff I love.
How do I do that? No idea.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Rewrites Are Difficult
I know I’m preaching to the choir here, but rewrites? They’re really hard.
I’m converting the novel I wrote from third to first-person. Usually, first-person perspectives are a little more intimate and tend to help readers engage directly with the characters in the story. I’ve written in first-person before (The Queen of the AIs is written in first-person) and, just like this time, that novel was originally written in third-person and then converted during one of the draft overhauls (I think between the fourth and fifth edits, in that case). Back then, like now, the goal is to make a tighter narrative suture.
But it’s a lot of work. You can’t just replace the character’s name with “I” everywhere and call it a day. It takes time and energy, and a lot of careful edits. I’m basically writing a new novel that just happens to be very, very similar to the previous novel.
Ah well! If this were easy, everyone would do it!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Started the Editing Process
It’s about time. Two weeks off of writing and I was starting to climb the walls. And I wouldn’t normally consider editing to be “writing,” since they are two very different things, but in this case I’m changing all of the story from third to first person. That’s a lot of writing, I tell you what.
I’ve done the first chapter so far, but the day is yet young so I may do more today. I’ll definitely do more soon… gotta get this finished by mid-Feb so I can send it to my editor, and I’d like to be on at least the third draft by then.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Paperback and Hardcover now available!
For the first time ever, I decided to make a hardcover version of one of my novels… sure, it’s a luxury item that not everyone will need or want, but the fact that you can get one at all isn’t something I thought I would do.
Turns out it’s not a trivial sort of thing to set up, but hey! It’s done!
So, if you want the brand new hardcover version of Caitlyn Morcos, Interplanetary Marshal Service… click on that link right there! Yee!
And for those of you looking for a less expensive way to read a physical version of the book, there’s also the more affordable paperback edition!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Paperback and Hardcover!
I don’t convert all of my books into dead-tree formats. It’s a significant amount of work, and most of it is time consuming, fiddly, and most importantly, very detail oriented.
I am not a detail oriented kinda guy. I’m just not. I can fumble my way through, sure, and I’m okay self-editor (I mean, after eight novels you kinda have to be), but the level of attention to detail I need to make sure that a physical edition of my novel “looks” right… well, it’s not insignificant.
But today, I did it for Caitlyn Morcos, Interplanetary Marshal Service. Did I pick that particular book for a reason? Maybe…
So hopefully in the next 72 hours or so, you’ll all have a few new ways to read my work!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Thinking About My Blog
You know, I’ve mentioned a few times that I don’t really have a “goal” with this blog. I don’t talk about a specific thing, although I probably should… consistency is important to people, and people who wander over to this website probably want “a thing.”
Hopefully that’s to buy one of my books, but even then, the subset of those people who bother to read the blog are probably looking for something specific. Advice, perhaps, or drama, maybe just a glimpse into the wandering mind of a writer who hasn’t really ‘made’ it yet (although I have published 7 novels and am working on number 8). But what they get is this… scatter-shot approach to whatever happens to pop into my head on that given day.
And, hey, I am happy to have my little corner of the internet where I post my thoughts. Some of them I think are pretty interesting! Some of them I think are pretty scattered. Sometimes they’re intelligent and considered, sometimes they’re just whatever happens to transition from brain-to-keyboard, basically unfiltered and unedited.
I try to keep that last one to a minimum. Nobody needs unedited work. I’m looking at you, 95% of self-published authors.
Anyway, today I was again considering whether I should try to focus more on a “brand.” Like, a specific thing I do here that people can identify with. Perhaps I should focus more on the science-part of science fiction. After all, I do have a degree in physics. I could probably mention some useful and interesting stuff. Or maybe I should spend more time on bigger posts, talking about “the craft” and the nuts and bolts of how things are going? Like this morning I was considering increasing the price of one of my books by a little, see if that impacts sales (after all, it’s a new year and everything keeps getting more expensive).
For now, I’m going to leave it as its meandering nonsense that I’ve been doing for years. But I’m thinking about it!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Podcasts!
For years I recorded podcasts. They were always targeted at specific audiences (normally miniature wargamers for particular games), but I recorded hundreds and hundreds of episodes.
The upside is that I am pretty dang good with general audio editing and recording. Helps with all the audio stories and movies I’m going to be shooting in the future (I’ve done… oh… a dozen short audio stories that I’m quite proud of).
But it takes a lot of time and energy. It’s not a trivial sorta thing, and I admire anyone that can maintain their energy when they do long term projects like podcasts. These days I’m listening to a bunch of writing podcasts (“The Creative Writer’s Toolbelt” and “Unpublished” are the two big ones), and those help me think about writing when I don’t have time to write or have to do other stuff.
Big fan of both of those!
Anyway, just thought I’d mention that I love podcasts. Probably not going to do one myself… again… am I? Hmmm. Probably n…
Hmmm.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
And We're Back!
2023 is fading rapidly in the rearview mirror, and 2024 is upon us like a swarm of rabid boars. Nothing terrible has happened yet (in fact, I had quite a relaxing day today, overall), but I’m not letting my guard down for a few days yet.
Either way, I survived the holidays (such as they were) and am ready to jump back into the swing of things. I’m almost ready to start shooting the opening crawl of the series (it won’t actually be an opening crawl, but you know what I mean), and the novel is poised and ready for me to dive back into editing.
It’s an exciting and busy and terrifying time. What can ya do.
And without the constant barrage of work the holidays bring (working at a game store to pay my bills is an adventure around this time of year), I should be able to get back up to my 3x a week posting schedule! And the novel should be available by March, and the short movie should be done around the same time (assuming I can get the voice actors recorded!).
So until next I post in a few days: best wishes for a healthy and happy new year to all of you. Thanks so much for reading my little corner of the internet.
Happy Holidays!
From me to all of you, the best wishes for a safe and happy holiday season! I’m going to be taking a couple days to recharge my batteries, to visit with family, and to sleep an awe-inspiring amount… but after that? Right back at it! No rest for the wicked!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Scenery
I’ve been constructing scenery for the movie. It’s a neat little exercise in scale and quantity… I’m trying to make a medieval market, and I want it to look like it has a fair amount of stuff, but I don’t want it to be overly crowded. I think I’ve managed a good middle ground…
But now that I’ve built it, I’m probably going to shoot a different scene first (specifically the opening crawl). No specific reason, really, except that I think by getting that one shot finished I can have a better idea of the scope, time, and energy that will go into the full project. Just so I can budget time and resources appropriately.
Oh, and I built some viewing stands, and I’m wondering if I should make them have a forced perspective (like they did with Gandalf and Frodo for the LOTR movies… look that up if you haven’t, it’s a very neat trick). The problem is the minifigures I’m using are a fixed size, so making them appear smaller might be trickier than I’m capable of. But I’m going to think about it at least! Movie magic, ho!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
The Home Stretch
Okay, only a week of insane work remaining and then some time off, and critically a reduction in the general insanity. That will be a very pleasant change of pace!
I keep poking around at the projects I have on the burner, but nothing is making huge progress right now. Which is okay, it’s setting up stuff so I can make more progress later, I get that, but yeah, it’ll be nice to be able to do stuff again, rather than just think about and prep for doing more stuff!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Busy Days!
So I’m working on the stop motion short, I’m editing the novel, and I’m thinking about how to rework my Patreon a little (I try to refresh it every few years). On top of everything else, it’s of course the busiest time of year. Whee!
I’ve also been trying to figure out why exactly I want to be a writer. I mean, I am a writer, but why I want to make a living by being a writer. It’s certainly not fame or fortune… while I would love to be respected and rich, I also know that’s almost certainly not going to be my fate. No, I just need enough money to live on without constant fear of starvation. But there are definitely easier ways to do that! In fact, there are only a few harder ways to do that! So why writing?
A part of me loves the theatrics, obviously. But I think a bigger part of me really just wants people to not struggle with the same things I struggle with… loneliness, sadness, depression, anger. My stories are written to be uplifting. They’re about overcoming hardship and evil. They’re… nice.
Ah well. “If you can do absolutely anything else, do that. If you can’t, be a writer.”
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Building Sets!
One of the nice things about creating a stop motion movie is building the sets that the movie will take place in/on/with. It’s fun! It’s neat!
It’s a lot of work! But that’s okay. I’m currently working on building an archery field and a tournament grounds for the medieval story I’m shooting, and coming up with scenery is a neat challenge. It would be easier to just buy everything, but like everything else in life: money is super tight, and I already have a lot of LEGO, so the real goal is to come up with clever ways of using what I have, rather than doing brand new stuff.
It’s a nice challenge. It’s really interesting working within the limitations of the medium, rather than doing whatever I might want to do. And my vision is ambitious, but that’s just the way I am… I don’t do things half-assed. I only whole-ass stuff.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Back to Once A Week, Apparently?
December falls like a tonne of bricks at my house. It’s not my favourite time of year, it’s among my least favourite weather, and everything is just… worse… until around February. Nothing I can do about it, just buckle down and do my best until it passes.
One of the side-effects is the inability to post here as often. I’m going to focus a bit harder in the next couple weeks, try to keep my strength up and my output consistent, but it’s definitely tricky.
Oh well. Work on the stop motion movie is still moving forward (ha), and that’s nice, and I’ve finished all the most pressing “Other Stuff” I have to complete for the season. I think we might even dodge the horrible “Your brother is coming sometime but we don’t know when but be ready to drop everything the moment he does” dance we usually do, since this year he seems less… awful. We’ll see if that holds out.
Anyway! Moral of the story is that there will be more than weekly posts again, now that I’ve sorted out the Things(tm), so thanks for your patience!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Storyboarding
Sorry for the radio silence for the last few days (although, again, if anyone is reading this it’s almost definitely much, much later). I’ve been doing the storyboard for the next short film I’m working on, and it’s pretty involved. When I get this done I have to dive into the edits for the novel, and I’m still trying to give that time to rattle around in my head, see if I can’t smooth out the last few issues.
I think ideas, to some extent, are like rocks in a rock tumbler. If you leave them long enough you get all the jagged bits out, sure, but you also lose all the sharp bits. It’s kind of like how “Hollywoodified” you want a story… the longer you let it bounce around, the more slick and smooth it gets, sure, but correspondingly the less unique.
Now, “unique” isn’t necessarily a good thing on its own. A unique idea can be unique because it’s bad, after all. But, that stated, I don’t think I need to worry about where I am with my writing… I’m just trying to build a consistent, happy audience, and for that I need good stories that people want to recommend to others. It doesn’t have to be brilliant for that… brilliant would be nice, but I always aim for good, and then sometimes I’m pleasantly surprised!
I should get back to the sketches!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Low Traffic
Not a lot of visitors these days (read: none). That’s okay, I suppose… the blog is mostly my own rambling thoughts on nothing in particular. Maybe someday when I’m successful and less worried about dying a starving artist people will come read my thoughts just to see what I was thinking, to get an idea of what’s going on in the grey matter I have between my ears.
Probably not. I mean, I love Scalzi’s work and I don’t read his blog, so I suspect that even if I become way more successful than my wildest expectations there still won’t be lots of people who come here.
But that’s okay. This is mostly for myself, after all. Sort of like my writing… I hope other people enjoy it, sure, and I’d love to make a living by doing it, but at the end of the day I’m going to write no matter what. It’s a part of who I am. It’s what makes me… me.
For whatever that’s worth.
Hope everyone is staying safe and healthy!