Having written in almost every medium out there (and done so quite poorly, I might add) I think different mediums cater to differing things. I love storytelling because of the interactive nature, but even while I have end-games in sight, most often when you are dealing with roleplaying of any variety, you are focusing on creating story potential rather than a finite story.
A finite story must be complete in of itself, a central theme and emotional affect on the reader carefully planned. These things are easily graded, even though art is subjective, we can objectively rate how effective one is in these endeavors. I am far more self conscious in traditional fiction because the reality of that finite story is never as good as I imagined it could be.
A character presents that possibility of the untold story, even as we write tomes of backstory.
Because my dear, when you are writing character info, you are the being. When you are writig traditional fiction, you are merely an observer. Be one with your fiction young padawan. For example, what kind of underwear did Chloe wear? What kind of perfume made Jenna sneeze the most?
That's actually a pretty fair point. I *do* tend to attempt standard fiction from the 3rd person while my character backgrounds are generally 1st. Hrm.
I don't know why it is either. I can hammer out most school projects in a night and be pretty satisfied with them. On the other hand I have 4 year old stories that have been sitting on my harddrive to finish, because everytime I write, I keep on going "I don't like how that sounds" If you find an answer, please pass it along.
destiny_heaven has suggested that in a character history the background world has already been written for me and I'm familiar with it. Maybe I just need to write a world first and *then* put characters in it. :)
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A finite story must be complete in of itself, a central theme and emotional affect on the reader carefully planned. These things are easily graded, even though art is subjective, we can objectively rate how effective one is in these endeavors. I am far more self conscious in traditional fiction because the reality of that finite story is never as good as I imagined it could be.
A character presents that possibility of the untold story, even as we write tomes of backstory.
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I *do* tend to attempt standard fiction from the 3rd person while my character backgrounds are generally 1st.
Hrm.
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If you find an answer, please pass it along.
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