[Image description: A light blue banner that reads, “A global community digital pride parade!” Beneath this text are 15 flags. Starting from the left: Agender, Aromantic, Asexual, Bisexual, Genderfluid, Intersex, Lesbian, Nonbinary, Pansexual, Philadelphia Pride Flag/Queer People of Color Flag, Polyamorous, Straight, Straight Ally, Trans, and the standard Rainbow Flag. end description.]
If you’re a writer looking for a productivity tool and sad about cancelled Pride events this month, 4thewords has got you covered!
In the interest of full disclosure: This is a paid site. Full cost is $4/month, though there are periodic sales and crystal bundles (crystals being the premium currency on the site) that mean that if you wait for a 15% off sale (we had one in February and again at the end of April, and there’s historically been at least 25% off after NaNo), $34 will get you a full year with a handful of crystals to spare. You can also opt into a community pool that other users can donate to and occasionally get some extra subscription time that way. You’ll get a handful of crystals as you play the game--not enough to support your subscription, but enough to occasionally buy an extra month or splurge on the crystal wardrobe items that come out with each event. (Don’t worry; there are tons and tons of free wardrobe items in the game, too. Including a total of six items available in all the various flags above (five are available within the current event; one more from last year has already been added to the main game.))
There’s also a 30 day free trial, so if you’re not sure, come try it out, collect some Pride swag for your avatar (Look at all those flags!!), and get some writing in while you do so!
I cannot tell you all how much I love this site. It’s a great productivity tool that gamifies writing, full of millions of words worth of quests and frequent events and new content releases to keep the words flowing. Monsters range in size from 50 words all the way up to 5,000. Quests may be as small as a few hundred words or massive investments that will take months to finish. Not to mention occasionally user-created challenges on the forums. I’ve been on this site for more than two years now and I still haven’t run out of things to do.
More than that, though, 4tw has one of the best, most inclusive communities I have ever found. The dev team is small but incredibly responsive and respectful; the community is diverse and surprisingly drama free. (There are disagreements occasionally, and discussions sometimes get heated; we all have different needs and sometimes those needs conflict, but it’s very, very rare for things to turn petty or personal.)
What makes it so amazing is not only the other users, who come from all walks of life and are on the whole ready to learn and willing to admit when they’re wrong--and eager to share their experience and expertise--but the devs who go out of their way to make the site as amazing as possible for all users. We had a user earlier this year make a comment about how she covers her hair and so a recent influx of new hairstyles wasn’t terribly motivating as rewards. The very next wardrobe item set included a hijab and a turban--free in game and available now for any new user who can write just a few thousand words.
A Jewish user whose Shabbat observance includes staying off the computer commented before the Leap Day Celebration that theoretically would only be available on that Saturday. That celebration ended up covering two and a half days to give everyone a chance to participate.
The avatar system when I started was codified as male and female, with some exclusive wardrobe items for each. You could change between them at will, but it wasn’t truly gender neutral. In the years since huge strides have been taken to mitigate that: the avatars are now labeled as “body type 1″ and “body type 2.” Hands (open vs closed fists) and eyebrows (thick vs thin), both items that used to be part of the gendered avatar bases, are now interchangeable, and every single wardrobe item can be used on either body type. Want a curvy avatar in a tux with a beard and eyeshadow? Go for it. Want a flat-chested avatar in a lavish gown and a buzz cut with flashy earrings and a sword? You can do that, too!
Click the link above to view the public Digital Pride Parade (a beautiful preview of the looks other users have created for this celebration) and click the 4thewords logo in the upper left, or go to 4thewords.com to check it out!
After creating your account, the next page (where you can watch a video tour of the site and select your starting avatar) has a space for a referral code. If you use mine and end up purchasing crystals to continue your subscription, we’ll both get a small crystal reward. The code: ZIZIN84547
