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MervoZX In reply to Veilside-Aero [2021-04-02 05:28:54 +0000 UTC]

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Veilside-Aero In reply to MervoZX [2021-04-02 05:39:26 +0000 UTC]

As a young ex-yakuza once said: "I figured bat meets head is all I needed to know."

As long as the weapon works/a character can make it effective, I don't think it matters if it can fire bullets, even as a firearms buff. If you're creative enough to make someone use a weapon in an unintended way, go for it.

However, I think its time I bring up some small issues with your characters that you could work on.

I'm going to hit some pretty heavy points with a small essay I wrote, so don't get angry at me for it, I've had this saved up for a few days as I started to make comparisons and contrasts to Streetfall, "my" series (which is actually just a bunch of idiots making a cohesive story with the most off the wall characters), and yours, Powerphantasy, along with asking friends what mattered most when creating a character.

"Do not take this as an attack on you as a person, but rather a honest critique of your characters. I've been here for 2 years, and I think its time I do a proper analysis and critique of your work as a writer. I have high praise for a lot of your work, however...

I feel like, and this is my personal standpoint, you've done very well on specific elements of writing a story, such as the world building, powers and the unique fictional factions and species, but you've fallen short on a major component, which is the characters themselves. Specifically, their personality, as in their lack of range in emotion, and little to no proper interests/layers along with a build up to where (and who) they learn their more refined fighting abilities from. These are the biggest things they lack, and as a whole the characters themselves seem flat from a writing standpoint due to this lack of personality despite having a very capable artist behind them.

The primary thing I see lacks in your main characters (Karen, Chester, Arae, etc.) is a range of emotion. The general way they're portrayed seems to only be upset or angry unless it's some sort of pin up. A friend of mine concurs, and has even given me his own thoughts, however I will not exactly specify what he thinks as I do not think it relates to the topic at hand. Even when the drawing clearly shows them smiling, it's very hard to near impossible to read whether its genuine or not. The primary point is that "its very difficult to see these characters ever smile, even when it's drawn out for me to see, and its straight in my face." That's how little characterization is there for me, as a viewer and moreso, a reader, to personally witness, and that's because...

These main characters seem to lack an outside life other than combat. Karen herself has cars, yes, but... other than that, what else is there? I've read through a lot of the stories you've written to explain the plot points of their pasts, the buildup to the final battle, but you've never specified any outside interests or anything that gives them a... more real, more 3 dimensional look in personality. That's what makes people love characters like Majima and Kiryu from Yakuza, their odd hobbies and outside life compared to their main stories of being roped into the Tojo Clan's mess over and over again, Kiryu being basically portrayed as a comedically clueless man who has very little insight and knowledge of the modern world who can beat the actual shit out of people. The lack of these outside factors that give the reader a full view of what the character is like, in and out of combat is going to end up being a huge issue if you want to give people more of a reason to like them other than their strength in combat or other... sorts of things people like viewing. I won't specify since you know how DeviantArt is.

My final point is training. I've heard about Arae's training and how she seems to be much quicker and capable of dodging, but where did everyone else learn how to use their abilities to the fullest? Did they self train? This is a small nitpick, but I am genuinely curious. Is it ever explained how Chester managed to make use of that air weapon? There are a fair amount of plot holes in the "who" or "what" was able to make them so combat capable, as you can't just be programmed to fight well. Same goes with Arae being able to program the vuldrone, where exactly did she learn this ability from? I'm not exactly ragging on the ability to be able to, lots of my characters use automated flying drones or miniature unmanned ground vehicles, and I do think that having this giant ass robot on her side gives her an even bigger reason to be a threat, but... where did she even learn how to do that?

That ends my critique. If you want to debate these points, a dance of words in other terms, we shall. However... I will not object to any points you make or raise a hand and nitpick at your reasoning... because the creator is king."

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MervoZX In reply to Veilside-Aero [2021-04-02 06:48:59 +0000 UTC]

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Veilside-Aero In reply to MervoZX [2021-04-02 07:07:46 +0000 UTC]

The main thing that I think gives you and me a huge difference is how we end up organizing our ideas and make them come to life. I use words before anything else, while you're able to convey them using imagery.

While imagery can REALLY tell a story, sometimes a picture can be worth less than words if you're able to write AND portray your character well enough with those words, almost like most art in general. If the art can get the message to you better, it generally has more pure effort and love put into it, and it SHOWS, even with words.

The biggest advantage that starting with writing can give at an absolute is that you have a concrete base line, and you know you have to stick to the idea once you finalize it. You can switch things around later on, yeah, but as long as you know what you want to KEEP, you can keep going on with writing them and changing their abilites. (My brawler gal, Akane Amamiya, is a short, highly agile character, using the mentality that as long as you can't land a punch on her, you can't exert any force to hit her, and when she goes on the offensive she can either do some fucked up bone breaking level shit, counter firearms, or... y'know. Breakdance into people. She's probably my most recent and one of my favorite examples of a character I've made myself so far.)

With that out of the way... Its way easier to get it organized if you know a good place that isn't a digital document. Trust me. Those things get WAY too disorganized and you tend to lose them if you use stuff like Google Docs often.

Best idea I've had in years is using a Discord server to note down and secure character ideas, movesets, and their backstories. It's extremely powerful as you can bring it anywhere on mobile with no lag time, keep working, and other people you trust can view it easily and give you proper criticism and not just "muh boobies". I believe you've seen it, but we've come a long way in the past few months. It's definitely worth using to keep shit organized and not letting it spiral out of control along with adding more detail to your character as you go on.

TLR Discord for organizing ideas is really fucking powerful.

But yeah. I tend to notice shit after a while and I end up making some assumptions after a while as I notice it more and more, and when I see something missing after a while I want to point that out to make sure the creator themselves improves at writing. Don't just want an one trick pony, y'know? Gets boring after a while.

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