In honour of the dear dormant @if-confessions and the even older, beloved Story Hospital I am here with an advice blog to hand out cheerleading, encouragement, advice, and maybe even some writing and narrative design wisdom to interactive fiction creators and players.
If you have questions like...
I'm stuck on a branching scene that's turned huge and can't figure a way of getting through it.
I'm worried about players wanting to take actions in my IF that I don't want to include.
I've fallen in love with an IF and want to give critical feedback but don't want to offend the author.
I've made some characters that I LOVE but once I start the story I just don't know what to do with them.
Readers are saying my game doesn't take their choices into account and I want to change that.
Readers are saying my game doesn't take their choices into account... and how much does that really matter?
...or anything else, I am here to help out!
I hang out in @hpowellsmith's bathtub from which I dictate my many and varied thoughts.
I post an answer each Monday. You can find an archive of answers here.
Please send in your questions and I will share my sealy knowledge and experience!
A few notes:
If you're talking about a particular game in a negative fashion, please anonymise it. If you don't, I will assign it a comedically anonymous title
I am not much of a Tech Seal and it is unlikely that I can answer detailed technical questions, but I will try to point you in the right direction
I am not interested in answering "which scripting tool is the objective best" because unanswerable questions are beyond my sealy ken but I will have much more to say about "which scripting tool might suit this project best for which reasons"
If you send a non-anonymous ask, I will check that you're happy to have your name on it before I post an answer
i am working on a choicescript game, and it feels very sisyphean at times. since there are many choices/branches/diverging paths, sometimes its jarring to spend what FEELS like a long time writing, then see that it only fills a page or two of the game!
its not a bad thing, and im sure will get easier with time, but it is a big change coming from "regular" narrative work (i.e. not choice-based game writing) to ChoiceScript writing.
so, with all that said, i wanted to ask if you've worked in non-game writing spheres before, and if so how does the writing process differ from IF? also, regardless of what sort of work you may have done in addition to IF projects, how does it feel completing one of these sorts of games?
hopefully this is sort of a fun question, i just thought it would be fun to hear your experience with completing/working on different writing projects (and how it feels to call something Finished!). thank you so much!!
O hello Generous Friend, thank you for the fish!
I do very much relate to this, especially once the initial energy of the new project has dissipated and one has to deal with all the consequences of the narrative hooks one has put in:
So, yes, you are not alone! Sometimes in this kind of project it's a case of just trudging through, enjoying the smaller moments as much as you can, and not thinking too much about how far you are through a chapter.
...now, to break kayfabe for a bit...
For non-interactive writing I've written academic essays and have a bunch of unfinished novels hanging around. For both I often had trouble reaching a required wordcount (in the case of essays) and rushing through passages and not giving enough breathing room to ideas or scenes (in the case of both). In contrast I've developed better pacing for game writing, a sense of when I want to linger on especially important moments, and how choices affect pace.
I've also worked on non-choice/text-based games, choice-based-but-not-prose-based games, and done game narrative work that doesn't involve writing at all. All are very different: there was often writing lines into spreadsheets, discussions with other narrative folk and people from other departments, flowcharts, large-scale planning, and a variety of other activities. I realise that sounds a bit vague which, uh, it is because a lot of it remains under NDA or is from cancelled projects and such (the nature of working in the games field, unfortunately).
King of the Castle is one game that is easily accessible that I worked on in a writing and design capacity. Although some of the day-to-day writing work was similar to IF - I was writing mostly dialogue and some prose in ink - it was a very different experience due to being multiplayer and the shape of each story being very branchy.
All that said, completing a CoG game does feel different because it's a long process - at least 18 months, usually more - of mostly working alone but responding to player feedback. By the time the release comes, it can feel quite distant and I'm usually looking ahead to the next thing, but for players it's new. It's also a weird experience having been writing pretty intensely for a while and then it's...over. (But it isn't really over because there are fixes to make and sometimes updates to add if I want to, and questions and comments to answer and much more!)
So it's a weird combination of pride, tiredness, satisfaction, and nerves. Mostly nerves, I'll be honest. I never really get less nervous, but my strategies of dealing with it have got better over time.
Thank you for the question, friend! I hope it was interesting!
IF seal, I have so many questions but my main one would likely be; do you have resources you could give us? Especially related to learning coding and how to start making and planning your IF. I'm not new to the IF community, ive been around for around 2-3 years and ive finally gathered the courage to try and make my own and im starting planning basics like the ideas and plot lines and whatnot but I don't have any idea of where to go from there. What do I do, am I meant to go on and start writing it like I would a fanfic or do I make characters first, do I make the plot and worldbuild first?? I'm very lost, IF seal and i don't know where to start...
Another question would be; how do I make IF friends? I wanna talk about my plot ideas with others who enjoy IF's, maybe even create a baseline Tumblr account where i can just gather ideas to look through and chat about it but should I? What do I do for that? I like rubber ducking with people and bouncing ideas and such between me and others, but none of my current friends enjoy IF like I do.
Dear Lost Friend,
I do hope you are enjoying the new year. Some of what I say will be rather "how long is a piece of string" so I apologise in advance for that, but I hope it will be useful regardless.
Here are some resources for practical basics:
For ChoiceScript, I recommend looking at the introduction to the basics and working through the tutorial step by step. The ChoiceScript wiki is also excellent.
For Twine, I recommend the Twine Grimoire Volume 1 and Volume 2 by Grim Baccaris. There are various UI templates around as well - a quick google showed me this collection, and there will be plenty more to find on itch as well.
For ink, there's a basic guide here.
I understand that you are also looking for advice on structure and process, though, which is a rather larger topic.
My first suggestion is to try making something small: the equivalent of a short story, or if you have characters in your mind that you like, try sketching out a branched conversation or short scene about them.
If you are making something big, my friend @/hpowellsmith has a blogpost here about writing longform IF. Paul Wang has a large archive about his writing process here. Some of it may be useful for you, some may not - take what you like and leave the rest.
Interactive narrative benefits from outlining your ideas before writing so you have a sense of the different endings you're aiming towards. What could the PC be aiming for that explores what you want to explore about your setting? How could characters help or hinder that, and how could the PC's actions change the world around them?
As you start to flesh out your ideas, you will learn more about your own writing process and whether you like to start with characters, setting, or plot. What I do recommend is to always keep the PC's place in the world, and their actions, in your mind. A static setpiece or characters having long conversations outside of the PC's activity may be just what your story needs, but consider how it affects the PC and how the PC is able to engage with them.
As for IF friends, I think getting in touch with writers whose work you enjoy is the first step! There have been various discords around the place although I am not sure which ones are currently active, but others may chime in on this! If there are IFs that you especially love, then chatting with other fans of them is also a way of getting involved with the community.
I hope this is useful, Lost Friend, and that you find a fun way of getting started with your project!
Question: I’m not really motivated to do marketing after I finish my game. However, I would like to make it as easy as possible for readers who enjoy it to tell their friends about it! What would be most helpful for this?
Dear Marketing Friend,
My strongest recommendation is to put your energy towards the things that bring you satisfaction.
While your game is in progress, marketing might look like writing regular devlogs, sharing little peeks at what you're doing, or putting up playable sections of the WIP.
IF communities are rather scattered in various directions but as well as the Choice of Games forums for ChoiceScript games, there are a fair amount of writers on Tumblr so you may like to make a blog for that, or an account on itchio where you could host a WIP. Accounts here on Tumblr such as @/interact-if often share writers' work; the @/neo-interactives discord is wider-ranging and focuses on a variety of IF genres, as does the intfiction forum.
(I note briefly that intfiction and neo-interactives are predominantly non-commercial-focused: jumping in with an eye to purely market a commercial product is unlikely to be much fun but chatting about IF craft and play will be much more fulfilling. This is good to remember across the board, actually.)
You may also like to create a mailing list or a blog with subscription capability to keep people up to date with what's going on with your work. This is also a good way to let readers know when your game is released.
In general, especially in this niche space, ratings and reviews are incredibly helpful so reminding readers of this is useful. You may like to review games that you've enjoyed and/or get in touch with other authors to let them know what you've liked about their work.
I hope this is useful, Marketing Friend! I will also point you towards a previous marketing question and answer here.
i do not have a question, but i hope this is the right place to put this! thank you for combining my two favorite things ever and also providing many amazing nuggets of if wisdom. much love, many hugs, and many fish 🐟🐟🐟
O you are so very kind, thank you! YOU are one of my favourite things as well!
i want to make a blog and drop an intro post for my wip, but then i think of the general wariness some people have towards new blogs, since there have been countless no-demo blogs that go inactive without ever posting anything. i guess i don't want to be overlooked, or some part of me is afraid I'll end up ghosting. i Could wait until I've written at least ch 1, but i feel like that's several months away and I'm anxious to get the ball rolling, you know?
I'm aware i shouldn't worry about others' opinions so much, but what would you do, if-seal, if you were making a new a blog right now?
Dear Anxious Friend,
I do hope you are still feeling good about your game idea! I entirely understand the sense of excitement that comes with new ideas and the burst of energy that happens when we want to tell everyone about it! And perhaps part of us wishes that part of it was already here so that we could show off something concrete.
However...
While sharing thoughts about your idea is a great deal of fun, I recommend caution - simply because if you are several months away from a first chapter being ready to share, you may not have written much (or maybe not anything at all). That means that there's the risk of a few things:
When you do start writing you may realise that some of the details you shared are not actually what you want to include. This can result in worry about whether you should change things to go with what now feels right, or whether you should leave it because it is now "fixed" in stone.
You may realise this project is not, in fact, what you want to be writing at this point in time and you want to make something entirely different.
There may be a huge flurry of interest which inadvertently puts a lot of pressure on you because it is very hard to be writing when you are trying to live up to the excitement people have about something that only exists in their minds.
There may be not very much interest (for any reason: it does not necessarily correlate with how good the idea is!) which can put a major dampener on enthusiasm and make you feel as though it is not worth pursuing this piece of writing.
Talking to people about the idea can take away your time and energy from making the idea a reality.
For all these reasons I recommend writing a chunk of your game before making a grand introduction. Once you feel confident in your writing, you can then make a decision about how much you want to share straightaway. There is nothing wrong with writing a chapter, making an introduction, and then putting up the chapter a short while later. That approach does three things: it helps your momentum because by that time you'll be working on the next chapter, you will feel more grounded and comfortable in your work so you may not feel so compelled to make changes in response to feedback, and it makes readers more confident that your project is one that will see the light of day.
If you have energy that you want to put into a blog, I recommend setting something up and making it private for now - or putting the energy into writing your project or fleshing out your characters, mechanics, or world.
Best of luck with your writing, friend! And have a happy new year!
This is solid advice but I'd like to offer an additional point, based on my own experience.
If you're anything like me, you may find that working on the project entirely in silence is... just kind of a bummer! You want to share the idea with people, or snippets of what you've written so far, or the slick UI you designed.... if you don't want to commit to a formal development blog yet (for any of the reasons IF Seal listed), there's nothing wrong with posting about the project in a less formal way, either on your already active blog OR still on a dedicated blog for the project, but one where you make it clear it's still in the early conceptual stages and a lot is still potentially subject to change.
I do think people are a bit gun shy about elaborate, flashy intro posts for no-demo games that never actually materialize. But a less structured peek at the process of something you ARE in fact currently working on might be more likely to draw some attention (especially with some strategic tagging), and when you are ready to launch your intro, you might already have some people ready to help hype it up for you!
A second smaller point: take things at your own pace, and don't assume a long lull in development is a death knell for your project. I have a game I launched a demo for and then halted for like... three years. And then I came back and made a bunch of progress on it, and people who had played the demo were excited to see it! And you know what... it's still not done lmao I know @zorlok-if is in a similar boat. But I fully intend to keep picking at my story, and knowing that everyone didn't just jump ship and give up on me makes me more confident that I can do that in whatever way comes naturally 🤷
Indeed, writing not-in-isolation is very rewarding for many people!
I entirely agree that giving readers looks at what you are doing is a great way to get people interested and also show off progress. That is something I did not cover as much as I could have in my answer! I do think that writing at least some privately is good as well before starting an 'official' type of blog, to get some foundations in order. Then you will have something to share (whether that's a large demo or snippets and such) while hopefully feeling confident about what you are making.
Thank you for the additional thoughts, @antisocialxconstruct!
i want to make a blog and drop an intro post for my wip, but then i think of the general wariness some people have towards new blogs, since there have been countless no-demo blogs that go inactive without ever posting anything. i guess i don't want to be overlooked, or some part of me is afraid I'll end up ghosting. i Could wait until I've written at least ch 1, but i feel like that's several months away and I'm anxious to get the ball rolling, you know?
I'm aware i shouldn't worry about others' opinions so much, but what would you do, if-seal, if you were making a new a blog right now?
Dear Anxious Friend,
I do hope you are still feeling good about your game idea! I entirely understand the sense of excitement that comes with new ideas and the burst of energy that happens when we want to tell everyone about it! And perhaps part of us wishes that part of it was already here so that we could show off something concrete.
However...
While sharing thoughts about your idea is a great deal of fun, I recommend caution - simply because if you are several months away from a first chapter being ready to share, you may not have written much (or maybe not anything at all). That means that there's the risk of a few things:
When you do start writing you may realise that some of the details you shared are not actually what you want to include. This can result in worry about whether you should change things to go with what now feels right, or whether you should leave it because it is now "fixed" in stone.
You may realise this project is not, in fact, what you want to be writing at this point in time and you want to make something entirely different.
There may be a huge flurry of interest which inadvertently puts a lot of pressure on you because it is very hard to be writing when you are trying to live up to the excitement people have about something that only exists in their minds.
There may be not very much interest (for any reason: it does not necessarily correlate with how good the idea is!) which can put a major dampener on enthusiasm and make you feel as though it is not worth pursuing this piece of writing.
Talking to people about the idea can take away your time and energy from making the idea a reality.
For all these reasons I recommend writing a chunk of your game before making a grand introduction. Once you feel confident in your writing, you can then make a decision about how much you want to share straightaway. There is nothing wrong with writing a chapter, making an introduction, and then putting up the chapter a short while later. That approach does three things: it helps your momentum because by that time you'll be working on the next chapter, you will feel more grounded and comfortable in your work so you may not feel so compelled to make changes in response to feedback, and it makes readers more confident that your project is one that will see the light of day.
If you have energy that you want to put into a blog, I recommend setting something up and making it private for now - or putting the energy into writing your project or fleshing out your characters, mechanics, or world.
Best of luck with your writing, friend! And have a happy new year!
i havent been on tumblr in a hot minute but im sooooo glad youre back!!!! i loved this blog and was so sad to see you discontinue it
O thank you so much! I was very pleased to begin it back then and was sorry to put it on hiatus. Doing it this year has been most lovely indeed! I am so grateful for people sending in questions and messages, I would not be doing this without that.
First of all, thank you for existing, because just finding out this blog exists has brightened my day considerably!
I'm messaging seeking advice on sticking with projects and finishing them as well. I've had so many ideas for stories that I've simply let fall by the wayside or left on a backburner for too long and worry that trying to start something I don't dedicate enough time to will erode my passion for the story, or demotivate any readers I might pick up along the way. Is it just about practice?
Dear Motivation-Seeking Friend,
Thank you so very much for your loveliness, you have also brightened my day a great deal!
The first thing I would say, and which sums up much of what I say below, is try not to bite off more than you can chew.
Which is perhaps a little glib (I do love to be glib sometimes) but is very much true. I wonder whether any of your story ideas would work as a short game - perhaps with a slightly more linear approach, or with a less customisable player character, or simply a shorter play length. You could try making something that has a few branching scenes, the equivalent of a short story rather than something more on the scale of a novel.
This can help you get in the swing of being in a project from start to finish, and can also help you concentrate on what are the most important places in which you want to spend your energy. Does this game perfectly suit a structure in which the player character can choose between three different magical powers, and therefore you might like to make the player character non-customisable? Maybe it has a complicated timeline going on with scenes that are very different depending on the order they're played in, so each individual scene is linear when played.
I recommend having a think about this before you start the project, and it'll help refine what you want from it as well.
I also suggest sticking to one project at a time if you haven't finished one already. This may not be entirely your method: some people genuinely work best hopping from one to another and back again. But since you are asking about avoiding falling-by-the-wayside, I have an inkling that this may be good advice for you to try.
Of course you will get new ideas as you go, especially when the project you are working on is proving to be a challenge. In those cases I recommend taking a little bit of time to conceptualise and maybe outline the new shiny idea, then set it aside. This means you will have it stored on the backburner for when you'd like to see it again, and at the same time it will help it not take up so much space in your brain. It's been freed! It can be used! But in the future, not right now.
Best of luck, Motivation-Seeking-Friend. I hope you settle upon something that brings you much joy!
Hello! Aspiring if writer here! I'm not here to ask for any coding and writing advice (yet that is) however I am a bit insecure w the story I have in mind bc well.... the plans that I have plans is that they're not very... conventional? And I wanted to do an interest check if anyone else even wants to read/play it other than my mutuals who already know me way too well to even be surprised atp 😭
The basis of the story (keeping it very spoiler free) is that you play as an assassin turned glorified babysitter for the kingdom's princess after a failed assassination attempt on the king's life there are bigger things at play here ofc. According to my mutual the tags are: Fantasy, Horror/Thriller(?), and Mystery.
but... yeah that's generally the basis.... Uhhh for more information these are the vague spoilers I can give without spoiling too much, there's a timeloop where the loop resets differently after "CERTAIN" events take place (which also kind of serves as a sort of point a to point b thin) and also a countdown to the world ending with increasingly weird and horrific things happening the closer that clock turns to 1
There's also only a small number of cast members with only 4 that I consider to be the "main characters" and only like 6 other NPCs (so a total of only 10 characters in total if we don't count 5 other mysterious characters who's roles are beyond the story itself)
The most unconventional thing here I think is that it's not a romance based if in fact if anything romance is the last thing it has, while there's ONE character I can consider an RO—to put it vaguely as to not spoil anything—but they're already inexplicably intertwined with you the mc from the very beginning. Yes you can date them but it's not needed or even necessary in the first place. (In fact you can even hate their guts!)
The MC also already has a sort of semi-set personality which is that they're sensitive and soft to the point of tears, yes you can at least choose for why and how in situations and even not cry, and also be introverted/extroverted, etc but the mc I had in mind are that they are an easily shaken and emotionally volatile person. The only two stats in this game are literally emotional volatility (which by default to the MC is already at 60) and self awareness which acts like insight similar to bloodborne (which at its default is at 0)
The MC having a semi-set personality and the not-really-an-RO thing are two key factors that are very important to making my story and its themes work and quite frankly I won't change it regardless of how many asks I get sent but I also understand as a result that many people might get put off and not play it which is kind of depressing to me but I do really want to share it with others..... I'm just not very sure if people want to see this sort of thing.....
Dear Aspiring Writer Friend,
I do hope you are well. This lovely message has been a while in my inbox, but I would like to share some thoughts I had anyway, and if it is of use to you that is wonderful!
There are a few different aspects to think about from this letter, and I will tease them out as I go.
On unconventional stories: stories and games that go outside a shape that a majority of narratives stick to can bring many people plenty of joy, whether or not they thought they were "their thing" at a glance. I am sure that whatever you make, there will be those who fall in love with it. I do not believe that a large cast of romanceable characters is a core requirement for interactive fiction, and I believe an interesting structure, such as your time loop idea and the scary countdown, can bring a lot of intrigue and tension!
I do think as well that because IF is a relatively small niche, there is so much space for innovation. What might be considered a "typical" narrative shape - eg, a fairly forgiving, stat-light story that branches occasionally before convening for a big climax, and has a selection of romanceable characters to choose from - is not actually a vast majority. (Choice of Games titles for instance are structured in a way that has more plot branching than some of the Hosted Games titles or non-CoG ones.) I would recommend having a look at other kinds of IF, such as those seen in the IF Comp, Spring Thing, or Ectocomp archives, or from the @/neo-interactives game jams, as well as other work from the authors who have entered their work there. You will find lots of complex and varied narrative structures there!
(Certainly I do enjoy the thought of a scary clock that increases unsettling phenomena as it counts down!)
On that note I do not think you need to worry too much about having a small cast: it will mean you can really dig into what makes those characters tick.
Where I would sound a note of caution is in combining a set personality with certain personality stats. I do not think it's necessarily a bad thing to have a PC who is always emotionally volatile, or to start high as default, but it will give readers pause if they see a stat called Emotional Volatility and the narrative always includes a great deal of sensitivity even if their Emotional Volatility is marked as 10. So I would advise being careful not to assume that the PC is in a highly emotionally volatile state - when you're writing their inner voice, feelings, or speech, picture how an Emotional Volatility 5 PC might be behaving. If that does not feel right, and you feel very drawn to an always-highly-sensitive PC, I would recommend rethinking that stat.
On the interwined possibly-romanceable character: there can be an expectation of a selection of romanceable characters, so you may lose some readers in having only one. But if that character is intensely entwined with the PC and you feel drawn to write this kind of story, why not? All of your decisions when writing will either pull in or push away readers (and sometimes might even do both to the same reader, depending how they are feeling!), so embrace owning your choices and go for what speaks to you. I rather suspect that you will find a wider audience than solely you and your friends - but if that ends up being the case, is that such a bad thing? Not every piece of writing has to be for all readers. You will learn from the creative process either way.
Best of luck with your project, Aspring Writer Friend! I hope you are having a good December.
Today I've had a planned medical procedure in hospital (which was a long time coming and very much wanted!) which so far has gone pretty much the maximum amount of success; I'm feeling groggy but chill and positive, and all the staff have been wonderful. I'm going to pause my queue and take some time to be less online for a bit while I'm recovering. Take care all 💚
In case you hadn't seen, this is why there wasn't a question answered this week - it'll probably be a couple more weeks before I get back into it. Please do send your questions as usual if you have them, they'll be answered in due course!
Dear Seal,
How do you feel with the feelings of discouragement and depression at having your story be invisible? I keep getting followers but all the interaction and discussion comes from my friends. I know my demo should be longer but then I think about WIPs which don't have a demo and gain more traction. How? Maybe there is nothing I can do and I should move on with another WIP.
Cheers
Neurotic in Seattle
Dear Neurotic in Seattle,
I am sending you a flippery hug right now across the internet. I am so sorry that you feel discouraged or depressed, it is very hard to push back those feelings when also trying to be creative and it does make it more difficult to get into the writing frame of mind.
Questions along these lines are some of the most common theme that I see, so I will say that you are very much not alone in this, even if you are feeling alone <3
Here are some questions and answers that I have given before on this subject:
How can I feel less isolated when writing?
Lack of audience engagement makes me want to quit
What might encourage people to ask questions about my work?
And a little more about engagement, and comparisons with other blogs below:
So much about audience enthusiasm it is about random luck. A blog with a large following happens to mention your project. A popular artist happens to draw one of your characters. Your project happens to do something a bit different that gets people fired up. Your project happens to crest a wave of enthusiasm about a common theme.
It is not just about the length or quality of your writing. It simply isn't. We know this because blogs describing a writer's idea, with no game present, sometimes get a lot of buzz. It is so tempting to be disheartened about this and I want you to know that I understand.
I wonder if you might benefit from filtering some words or phrases from your dashboard so that you do not feel so downcast by these hype cycles going by about nonexistent WIPs (or outlier-level-wildly-popular existing ones). There is nothing to be ashamed of about doing this if it improves how you're feeling.
I do not necessarily suggest moving onto a different WIP, as that's a major decision, but perhaps taking some time offline to focus on writing that brings you joy in yourself might help also.
And I would also say: it is truly lovely that you have friends who are excited about your work! Do listen to them and pay attention to the fact that they're hyped as well. They may have a better perspective about the quality of your work than you do when you are feeling low.
Take care, Neurotic in Seattle, and I wish you all the best with your writing wherever it takes you.
hello seal! I would like to ask where do if writers put their codes in? I'm trying to make a game as well but I'm unsure where to put it all down..... Do I put it in twine or somewhere else? Please send help I'm unsure what to do....
Dear Coding Friend,
I am not entirely sure what you mean! With Twine, you can either use the graphical interface, which looks like a mind-map or flowchart, or you can use a text editor to write.
I would recommend taking a look at the Twine Reference and Twine Cookbook for more detailed and accurate information.
Thank you for answering my ask even with the second one.
I too, prefer to eat octopi rather than kiss them. Thank you for the reassurance on the wrong-to-assume-author-is-secretly-into-written-romantic-trope. And thanks for the other input as well!
About the nonshapeshifting love interest:
All the love interests are nonbinary. Since all 5 of them are also deities, they can change their looks, but the 4 of them are rather satisfied with their human form and will not be shapeshifting. There are many nonbinary human nonshapeshifters, but they are not love interests. (Though, the gender binary and "traditional categories" do not exist in the worldbuilding so no one would use the "nonbinary" label or similar wording to describe themselves.)
I don't mind the tangents (I've also rambled a lot, thank u for indulging me)! And thank you for mentioning them too! I just learned of the unfortunate trope where every non-binary character is a shapeshifter and I can definitely see why it would be tiring (at the very least)!
I hope you get the freshest of fishes!
O hello again Customising Romance Friend, how lovely to hear from you again! (For those reading, this is in relation to these questions)
I too, prefer to eat octopi rather than kiss them. Thank you for the reassurance on the wrong-to-assume-author-is-secretly-into-written-romantic-trope. And thanks for the other input as well!
Hee! I am so glad. I do find it can sometimes feel nerve-wracking or exposing to write certain things and to be concerned that it will reveal some hidden truth about oneself. But ultimately creativity is sparked by any number of things and while people tend to write what they want to see in the world, that does not necessarily mean one desire or another applies directly to them of course.
About the nonshapeshifting love interest:
All the love interests are nonbinary. Since all 5 of them are also deities, they can change their looks, but the 4 of them are rather satisfied with their human form and will not be shapeshifting. There are many nonbinary human nonshapeshifters, but they are not love interests. (Though, the gender binary and "traditional categories" do not exist in the worldbuilding so no one would use the "nonbinary" label or similar wording to describe themselves.)
I don't mind the tangents (I've also rambled a lot, thank u for indulging me)! And thank you for mentioning them too! I just learned of the unfortunate trope where every non-binary character is a shapeshifter and I can definitely see why it would be tiring (at the very least)!
Your story sounds so delightful and I hope that it is going well. Please accept my warmest wishes for your progress!
