Stories that left you disappointed for a reason

[f8butterfly]

I think it wouldn't be easy to do that because just the character customisation along makes it inaccurate. What would a white man be doing in Wakanda? Fine, let's say he's settled there with his family; IF writers wouldn't mention how different the character would be from other characters based off their skin tones, which would help with immersion. They don't want to offend anyone so they just go with the mediaeval fantasy settings everyone is already used to

I already gave examples of how to fix this. What you're saying is why it is boring to play them. An easy fix is a set main character with a set ethnicity. Yes, it wouldn't make sense for a white protagonist for a game set in a country or continent that they wouldn't realistically have been in at the time but the same should also apply to stories set in countries from Europe. Especially when they are explicitly said to actually take place in a country that is named, the most recent example I can think of is a IF that takes place in Romania but lets you play as anyone when it should probably only be limited to Romanians, Hungarians, and Roma. What authors typically go with is why they are boring!

 

[Parallax]

funny how these are all martial arts ifs lol. a true martial artist keeps grinding no matter what!

Too bad I hate martial arts. I barely have anything to read besides FH these days. Well, and Split mortal wound. They don't even have a Patreon as far as I know.

 

[seneya]

I think it wouldn't be easy to do that because just the character customisation along makes it inaccurate.

If you don't want to come up with separate backstories for different race/ethnicity MCs, then cut customization down to what makes sense.

I barely have anything to read besides FH these days.

As someone pointed out, martial arts IFs are not the only things getting updated. I just thought it funny that the mentality of grind apparently transcends to the authors of these works, too. Do you just not like the current WIPs?

 

[Parallax]

If you don't want to come up with separate backstories for different race/ethnicity MCs, then cut customization down to what makes sense.

As someone pointed out, martial arts IFs are not the only things getting updated. I just thought it funny that the mentality of grind apparently transcends to the authors of these works, too. Do you just not like the current WIPs?

Yeah most often. Even if one has an interesting idea, it's poorly written and there are a little choices. The opposite situation - a WIP that is regularly updated and the author tries to make it something that resembles interactive fiction, but I can't enjoy it because I don't like the genre/theme/ or the role the player is placed in.

 

[Zoklitsos]

I just saw that Infamous finally got updated so it's time for another complaint post from me lmao. This is gonna be a quick one bc I haven't actually read the update yet and I don't know if I will anytime soon... it's so damn long and the prospect of having to play through the entire game to rebuild my MC and choices again sounds absolutely tedious. But that's related to what I want to say and it's that I ****ing hate how much people have began glazing games purely based on word count!! And how these super long WIPs have become the norm!!! Just because a game has a hefty wordcount does NOT mean it's gonna be better and Infamous is proof of that lmao. Like yes sure it can be nice when a game is long and has lots of variation and you get to spend longer being immersed and reading it, but only when there is an actual point and purpose for it. But in Infamous it just feels like there is so much pointless bloat, it really starts to drag. I swear to ****ing god, you can probably cut half of the game and it would still have a good amount of variation while not being completely bloated. I feel like this used to be an unpopular opinion, but ever since chapter 4 released and now 5, I have seen quite a few people express this opinion too and it's probably only gonna get worse as it goes on. I have never seen an author need an editor more than Amy atp lmao, or at the very least beta testers!! But knowing Infamous fans, the beta testers are just gonna end up glazing the game and circlejerking instead of offering feedback and constructive criticism, just like Wayhaven beta testing goes lol, and it's gonna become even worse.

 

[Serpent]

I just saw that Infamous finally got updated so it's time for another complaint post from me lmao. This is gonna be a quick one bc I haven't actually read the update yet and I don't know if I will anytime soon... it's so damn long and the prospect of having to play through the entire game to rebuild my MC and choices again sounds absolutely tedious. But that's related to what I want to say and it's that I ****ing hate how much people have began glazing games purely based on word count!! And how these super long WIPs have become the norm!!! Just because a game has a hefty wordcount does NOT mean it's gonna be better and Infamous is proof of that lmao. Like yes sure it can be nice when a game is long and has lots of variation and you get to spend longer being immersed and reading it, but only when there is an actual point and purpose for it. But in Infamous it just feels like there is so much pointless bloat, it really starts to drag. I swear to ****ing god, you can probably cut half of the game and it would still have a good amount of variation while not being completely bloated. I feel like this used to be an unpopular opinion, but ever since chapter 4 released and now 5, I have seen quite a few people express this opinion too and it's probably only gonna get worse as it goes on. I have never seen an author need an editor more than Amy atp lmao, or at the very least beta testers!! But knowing Infamous fans, the beta testers are just gonna end up glazing the game and circlejerking instead of offering feedback and constructive criticism, just like Wayhaven beta testing goes lol, and it's gonna become even worse.

She said that she didn't have beta testing due to some death in family? Not sure why those two would correlate but whatever, so yeah, she should have some for ch6?
Also, yeah, I agree with you. Big word count is good if there is sense to having it. But if there is no reason for it, just don't do it?
Hell, if she wants to do it, then switch to Twine, because there is no way in hell you can adapt cside game to not corrupt a save file, meaning we always have to speed run through the whole ****ing thing, to build our characters from nothing time and time again, and that **** takes time, since there is over half a million word count by now.
I understand that most of the words go on branching for the ROs, since there's like 6+ of them, but like, don't make the bits in between boring?
Still, I can't say much, since I am also yet to play the chapter, and am NOT looking forward to having to speed run so ****ing much

 

[Zoklitsos]

She said that she didn't have beta testing due to some death in family? Not sure why those two would correlate but whatever, so yeah, she should have some for ch6?
Also, yeah, I agree with you. Big word count is good if there is sense to having it. But if there is no reason for it, just don't do it?
Hell, if she wants to do it, then switch to Twine, because there is no way in hell you can adapt cside game to not corrupt a save file, meaning we always have to speed run through the whole ****ing thing, to build our characters from nothing time and time again, and that **** takes time, since there is over half a million word count by now.
I understand that most of the words go on branching for the ROs, since there's like 6+ of them, but like, don't make the bits in between boring?
Still, I can't say much, since I am also yet to play the chapter, and am NOT looking forward to having to speed run so ****ing much

I haven't been keeping up with the author's social media presence for a long time now because she sounds kind of annoying lmfao. So I didn't know that info.

The whole beta tester thing is bizarre to me, because when I wrote my previous post I remembered sth. I might be wrong, but like... I am preeetty sure I remember her saying she'll get bets testers like 2 YEARS AGO, yep. It was exactly around this time of the year too. The reason I remember it so clearly is because I was still in university back then and I remember seeing her tumblr post about beta testers just as I had arrived to one of my game development lectures which is pretty ironic lmao. But yeah that's how I remember the timeline. She had even posted a google form/survey thing to fill out and I remember filling it out and applying to be a beta tester myself lol. I was much more enamored with the game back then and looking at it through rose tinted glasses, there's no way in hell I'd agree to beta test a mess like this now haha.

But yeah I never heard anything back from her and apparently neither did anyone else? A few months after this I stopped keeping up with her social media and stuff and I never heard anything about her picking out beta testers from those initial applications she sent out??? I only remember seeing her dozens of update posts where she's always pretty much like 'Haha I'm so funny and silly you guys, oh btw I still don't have beta testers, I'll totally pick some out soon xoxo promise', rinse and repeat every update. The whole thing is just really odd to me because why wouldn't you want to get beta testers for a game that's ballooned to such a massive size?? I lowkey feel like at this point she just wants people to keep glazing her about how fast she writes and how she does everything herself lmao.

 

[Serpent]

I haven't been keeping up with the author's social media presence for a long time now because she sounds kind of annoying lmfao. So I didn't know that info.

The whole beta tester thing is bizarre to me, because when I wrote my previous post I remembered sth. I might be wrong, but like... I am preeetty sure I remember her saying she'll get bets testers like 2 YEARS AGO, yep. It was exactly around this time of the year too. The reason I remember it so clearly is because I was still in university back then and I remember seeing her tumblr post about beta testers just as I had arrived to one of my game development lectures which is pretty ironic lmao. But yeah that's how I remember the timeline. She had even posted a google form/survey thing to fill out and I remember filling it out and applying to be a beta tester myself lol. I was much more enamored with the game back then and looking at it through rose tinted glasses, there's no way in hell I'd agree to beta test a mess like this now haha.

But yeah I never heard anything back from her and apparently neither did anyone else? A few months after this I stopped keeping up with her social media and stuff and I never heard anything about her picking out beta testers from those initial applications she sent out??? I only remember seeing her dozens of update posts where she's always pretty much like 'Haha I'm so funny and silly you guys, oh btw I still don't have beta testers, I'll totally pick some out soon xoxo promise', rinse and repeat every update. The whole thing is just really odd to me because why wouldn't you want to get beta testers for a game that's ballooned to such a massive size?? I lowkey feel like at this point she just wants people to keep glazing her about how fast she writes and how she does everything herself lmao.

Yeah, I think that she also made some new beta tester surveys like a year ago? Maybe less? Idk, but I do recall seeing it, and still no beta testers.
Honestly, idk wtf she is trying to do, because people are glazing her left and right either way, so yeah.
I also do agree that she's become quite annoying, what with her teehee, I'm so silly, I accidentally wrote 100k words, oopsie, I also ****ed the variables a bit, hehe, like common.

 

[f8butterfly]

why wouldn't you want to get beta testers for a game that's ballooned to such a massive size??

She's said this previously but the people who 'beta-test' for her are friends and family so I doubt they'd give plentiful amounts of constructive criticism. Also to consider that some of these friends are also IF authors and or fans turned friends. Whenever she has spoken about cutting something out of a chapter she says that she decided it.

 

[Ireth313]

it's so damn long and the prospect of having to play through the entire game to rebuild my MC and choices again

Me but with the Shepherds of Haven, only to see like half of the choices I want to make and NPCs I want to talk with be unavailable. No, I do not want Blade interlude 4398579, lemme talk to Lavinet and Red...

 

[Chuu_Chuu_Train]

90% of infamous ch5 is you being forced to interact with Vic, G and their family

At this point, my PC would prefer being waterboarded or thrown in one those cool brazen bulls where you get roasted slowly. At least then there would be some sort of stimulation...

 

[Zoklitsos]

Me but with the Shepherds of Haven, only to see like half of the choices I want to make and NPCs I want to talk with be unavailable. No, I do not want Blade interlude 4398579, lemme talk to Lavinet and Red...

Oh yes 100% same, that one is a culprit too lmao. A lot of the choices/story branches I wanna play are unavailable as well. I enjoy the game but I gave up on reading the updates probably like a year before the twine port. I'm just gonna wait for it to be finished atp. I used to get super excited to read the new updates and used to be a patreon member but it also got to the point where the game got way too long to replay every time. I swear to god I could probably recite the first 5 chapters by memory lmao, that's how many times I've had to play them. I don't know if this is a thing in the twine port, but I do remember the author had a 'Skip to the newest chapter' option where you could set your choices and variables, which was good I guess. Infamous has that too I think. But it's not entirely the same because there's just so many small variables and choices that there's no way for an author to cover all of them when you're setting up your save before skipping to the new chapter, so you miss out on a lot of flavour text and other details or branches or even dialogue options.

 

[denytherocks]

Well Infamous ch5 made my mc a raging alcoholic which was unfortunate and annoying. It was like crackhead levels a true fiend that damn bottle of brandy i wish there was a way to chuck it out the window. I ended up having to edit stats because I refused to play from the beginning and there was still so many problems. I'm empathetic to the fact she lost a family member but i think she should've paused patreon and delayed

 

[Citizen soldier]

I started ch5 Infamous and got locked out by one scene, where you can look at G, Blake, 7 or no one. And from 4 options i can choose only one, which i do not want to. Fu**ing hate this bs. Either i need to replay from ch1, not knowing, where exactly i made mistakes, either... Idk. If it wasn't such convoluted if, i'd do it, but with Infamous, replaying it only for being met with a wall in choices, is a so damn chore. Gaining more reasons to hate this if with each update.

 

[Mondy]

coming here to add on the infamous rant. almost 2h spent on going through all those chapters just to end up dnf by the first two pages of ch5. idk if I'm the only one who thinks inflated word counts end up falling flat? this is the same case as shepherds of haven nd jolly goods. all that fascinating writing and progress only to not feel it when ur playing.

 

[Serpent]

I started ch5 Infamous and got locked out by one scene, where you can look at G, Blake, 7 or no one. And from 4 options i can choose only one, which i do not want to. Fu**ing hate this bs. Either i need to replay from ch1, not knowing, where exactly i made mistakes, either... Idk. If it wasn't such convoluted if, i'd do it, but with Infamous, replaying it only for being met with a wall in choices, is a so damn chore. Gaining more reasons to hate this if with each update.

That's the problem with big, complex works. You can't make a skip option to skip to the new content, because there is a million small choice that need to be accounted for, and there is no way in hell that any writer can put those in some speed run options, such as a skip option. So yeah, since it's cside, you literally have to speed run through the whole thing again and again with each update, which is very ****ing bothersome.
Honestly, I'm just thinking of playing it once it's fully done, if I'm not completely out of interest for it by then

 

[LosLorento]

I just saw that Infamous finally got updated so it's time for another complaint post from me lmao. This is gonna be a quick one bc I haven't actually read the update yet and I don't know if I will anytime soon... it's so damn long and the prospect of having to play through the entire game to rebuild my MC and choices again sounds absolutely tedious. But that's related to what I want to say and it's that I ****ing hate how much people have began glazing games purely based on word count!! And how these super long WIPs have become the norm!!! Just because a game has a hefty wordcount does NOT mean it's gonna be better and Infamous is proof of that lmao. Like yes sure it can be nice when a game is long and has lots of variation and you get to spend longer being immersed and reading it, but only when there is an actual point and purpose for it. But in Infamous it just feels like there is so much pointless bloat, it really starts to drag. I swear to ****ing god, you can probably cut half of the game and it would still have a good amount of variation while not being completely bloated. I feel like this used to be an unpopular opinion, but ever since chapter 4 released and now 5, I have seen quite a few people express this opinion too and it's probably only gonna get worse as it goes on. I have never seen an author need an editor more than Amy atp lmao, or at the very least beta testers!! But knowing Infamous fans, the beta testers are just gonna end up glazing the game and circlejerking instead of offering feedback and constructive criticism, just like Wayhaven beta testing goes lol, and it's gonna become even worse.

A lot of the pacing issues could have been solved by just tucking scenes behind romance point thresholds instead of requiring players to interact with all the ROs every single chapter (and for Infamous specifically it should have happened way sooner than chapter 5). Even if you actively avoided the RO (like the dad RO who is somehow a main RO over Blake lmao). It's one thing if it happens in the context of the competition they're all apart of but the individual down-time scenes should definitely have taken into account whether the player has been pursuing an RO or not.

Shepherds of Haven on the other hand every single time I play the Twine version it has me wishing the author had just ported to Renpy and made a visual novel out of it. Would be a much better reading experience than what she has now with the added bonus of having a much more robust save system (and the ability to skip past read text).

 

[f8butterfly]

Well Infamous ch5 made my mc a raging alcoholic which was unfortunate and annoying. It was like crackhead levels a true fiend that damn bottle of brandy i wish there was a way to chuck it out the window. I ended up having to edit stats because I refused to play from the beginning and there was still so many problems. I'm empathetic to the fact she lost a family member but i think she should've paused patreon and delayed

I haven't played the chapter yet but she's let people know since at least chapter 1 that MC's vices are going to get worse if they already weren't bad/subdued due to being busy. That's personally why I avoided picking options about drugs or drinking.

 

[Mondy]

A lot of the pacing issues could have been solved by just tucking scenes behind romance point thresholds instead of requiring players to interact with all the ROs every single chapter (and for Infamous specifically it should have happened way sooner than chapter 5). Even if you actively avoided the RO (like the dad RO who is somehow a main RO over Blake lmao). It's one thing if it happens in the context of the competition they're all apart of but the individual down-time scenes should definitely have taken into account whether the player has been pursuing an RO or not.

Shepherds of Haven on the other hand every single time I play the Twine version it has me wishing the author had just ported to Renpy and made a visual novel out of it. Would be a much better reading experience than what she has now with the added bonus of having a much more robust save system (and the ability to skip past read text).

the dad RO reminds me of this Pic, so irrelevant nd so insignificant. i burst out laughing everytime I see the option of thinking abt him or looking for him in the crowd because he's so out of place in this entire game, like I only saw u three times throughout it all.
Just wasting space istg

 

[seneya]

so irrelevant nd so insignificant

Blake should have been a full RO instead of him fr.