Your Writing Process, And/Or Problems with Same Options

[Lena Wolf]

Thanks, everyone.

I have no problems generally writing about events that I don't quite remember. After all, history books have been the biggest fiction genre going since humankind invented writing. And yes, I do switch to other characters, but my problem (if it is a problem) is that in my mind, it's one world... All these games I played and the majority of books that stayed in memory, they all feature in this one interconnected world where everything exists at the same time. Lena is the usual protagonist and gets the bulk of the adventures, but there have been others too. Mostly when the protagonist had to be male... She isn't up for surgery just yet, so I had to pick someone else.

The thing is, I have a few episodes written since already a year or more, and they are yet to take place in the main story, some are even quite far in the future. Of course they will be edited a bit and adjusted to whatever the world looks like then, but they serve as beacons as to where we are going. I don't know the whole future, but I can see some glimpses of it. Hmm... Perhaps I should just stop thinking about it and just get on with it. Yeah... right after I finish that mod that I started making...

Most of my playing and storytelling is happening inside my head. Writing it down as Lena's diaries (and also Lena's friends' diaries) helps me give it shape, it feels like it is becoming solid. Then I can build new adventures on that foundation. Now with making mods, I can also express some of it as visuals - and it is exhilarating to see it on screen, and even hear the characters speak, even though xVAsynth is not quite as good as human speech, but it's uncanningly good enough for me! And once I see and hear those stories becoming "real", I have so many new stories spinning off of that... It's a rabbit hole that I'll never come out of, that's for sure.

[Acadian]

Time travel is helpful and Buffy mastered it long ago, eliminating any challenges about moving among 3rd, 4th and 2nd Eras. We also don't believe it has to be presented via fiction in a linear manner - as long as some sort of introductory comments make it clear where and when the adventure takes place.

Like Lena, she has also mastered traveling between worlds but I don't figure that will ever make its way into her Elder Scrolls memoirs.

[SubRosa]

As others have noted, I gave up on trying to play the game and write what happened a long time ago. I moved on to simply creating my own stories set in the game world. But without going to all the work of creating mods and then playing that out. I just thought it, and wrote it, and that was that. The game world was simply a setting I used rather than create one from scratch.

Then finally I discarded the game worlds too and created my own settings, so it was all 100% my own creations. I found that to be much, more more satisfying, as I was no longer being constrained by creative decisions made by the game developers. Instead it was all mine to make what I wished of it.

[Lena Wolf]

Thanks, SubRosa, that does sound like a logical evolution. Writing is then the most important part for you. But for me, written word alone isn't "solid" enough. For the story to become "definite" in my head, it has to be converted into images, movement, spoken word. I used to paint things in the past, than act out my own plays for an audience, even though with the onset of teenage years and associated awkwardness, it became an audience of one (myself). That was before the time of video games. I require a certain minimal quality of image for the trick to work, and it simply didn't exist before the year 2006, give or take. So yes, making mods, playing them out, playing other people's games and mods, weaving their stories into my own - this is not a constraint to me, this is an integral part of living the story.

[Renee]

My turn to complain write about the writer's block! I am blocked.

How do you deal with being less excited to play your own mods than to make them?

Eeesh. Not sure if you'll like my answer, hon. During the rare times I lose interest in gaming I just let it happen. I lose interest in gaming, that is. Find something else to do, for as long as it takes.

I've been taking a lot of walks around a nearby park lately, talking to strangers if my housemate is not with me, and so on. For me this is a reverse Catch 22 though; because going for long walks actually causes me to want to game, especially if the weather is moody.

So it isn't so much a writer's block, but a player's block! Anyone suffering from one of those?

Never! Guess I'm lucky. I have heard this from a lot of other modders though. They have more fun making the sets and writing the lines and delivering the plot than actually playing the game.

It sounds as though you need a break from it all, honestly. Don't force yourself to play.

[Lena Wolf]

Renee, you're right on both accounts - that I need a break and that I don't like to hear it. I suppose I already knew I needed a break from this gaming PC altogether - modding, gaming, everything. I suppose I needed someone to say it. So thanks.

Off to do something else now. Let's see how long it lasts.

[Renee]

I forgot to add Part II of Renee's Gaming Blues Cure. Which is, eventually you'll just get that *urge* to get back into Tamriel again. You stay away long enough, and it'll strike when you least expect. Maybe it'll be at work, maybe while you're out for a walk. Maybe at your in-laws' place, playing with their dog or whatev. It'll strike, and then you can't WAIT to get back into your favorite alternate worlds.

Here's an amulet for your Luck Attribute, Lena. 🏅 Worked for me way back in 2013, when I finally got bored of playing Oblivion (5 years on consoles, but hey)!

[macole]

Lena, you have been very busy for a long time. Sometimes a pause to reflect on what has been done is a good thing.
This time of the year has always been a difficult time for me. The stress of the tax filing season coupled with the urge to be outside in the flower garden leaves little time for gaming. There's just so much distraction at this time of the year.

Renee, It's the old "Time to go save some rats" feeling. It hits you when you least expect it.

This post has been edited by macole: May 8 2023, 06:11 AM

[Lena Wolf]

Yep, catching a cold did it. I'm in bed with a cold, my head is about to explode with my brain coming out of my nose... So, what do I do? Make a mod "Shivering Isles Property Ladder". Feeling better already. If this cold persists, I'll be playing Tribunal DLC for purely medicinal purposes.

[macole]

Now that’s a novel way to recharge.

[Renee]

I think Lena needs some sort of Gaming Potion; she's still making mods, from the sound of it. Have we got an Alchemist in the house? Perhaps that what is needed: an Elixir of Persistent Gaming: 30 seconds or some such. That'll get her started.

[ghastley]

I could make a mod that provides one, but then I would have the same problem.

[Lena Wolf]

Yep, mod making is highly contageous.

But I did go away to do something else as I promised: I painted a wall in the kitchen. As in: real kitchen, real paint. That needed doing, so I've done it! Then woke up with a cold the next morning.

[Lena Wolf]

Ok, I figured out the root of my weariness towards gaming: crashes. Morroblivion is really not a stable system. It crashes to desktop on average every 10 minutes (every cliffracer or netch, that is). This is so discouraging. I think my computer is just not powerful enough to run it well. And then there are the bugs. I'm really thinking that I'd be better off going back to TES3 Morrowind, installing those mods natively and playing it there, but then I'd have to face the music (literally) which makes me depressed, and the walls of text...

Anyway, if Lucien never makes it to the end of Tribunal, that'll be why. I might just slip into SubRosa's mode and simply invent his adventures instead of actually playing them, especially since I was going to have him do his own stuff anyway.

[ghastley]

Let’s hope the wall in your kitchen doesn’t crash!

[Lena Wolf]

Oi!!!!

[SubRosa]

I have struggled with crashes in Morroblivion too. I think using the Purge Cell Buffers mod has helped the most, and placing it dead last in my load order so it takes precedence over everything else. The last time I was having a lot of CTDs, I regenerated all the LODs from scratch, and that helped a lot.

[Lena Wolf]

I've done that... Yeah, it did help. I got it down to crashing every half an hour or so now - with the latest Oblivion Reloaded. The latest version has memory management, and this is the one feature that I use, everything else must be disabled, or else it crashes even more... Altogether this tightrope walking is simply too annoying. Still, I want to look around Mournhold, so I suppose I'll stick with it for a bit longer, and then move back into Oblivion proper to continue the story.