Hey Escaped! Hope you’re doing well, do you have any advice for someone that is currently writing an audio series that doesn’t involve a listener?
I'm guessing this implies you already have a firm understanding of writing audio roleplays, so I'll skip the basics. Writing an audio play is a lot more similar to writing a screenplay than writing an audio roleplay, so I do think you should study the techniques and conventions of screenwriting. The lack of active involvement from a listener means that pacing is going to be a lot more important, and that the focus is going to shift a lot more to the primary protagonist (as opposed to audio roleplays, where the secondary protagonist gets much more dialogue).
When writing an audio play, you should take advantage of the fact that you're not locked into a point of view. Change scenes more, write scenes where the primary protagonist is absent, and put more character and personality into the primary protagonist. In audio roleplays, you want to leave room to allow the audience to build a character or self insert onto the listener. In audio plays, you want to do the opposite.
Put more focus and effort into background sounds, since you're going to be setting new stages more often. Scene transitions should be very clear to the audience. Leave a couple seconds of dead air and change the scenery. Every single scene should sound distinct, be it an indoor space with the muffled sounds of passing cars and chirping birds outside the window, or a battlefield full of swords clashing and and horses galloping.
Proofread and edit a lot. Remember, you're going to be working in a medium where pacing is more sensitive. Make sure everything serves the plot and that you don't have characters repeat themselves or talk in circles. Try to replicate the pacing of a movie or a television episode.
That's about it! I haven't fully produced any audio plays yet so I'm far from being an expert, but I have written enough screenplays and audio roleplays to feel comfortable finding the middle ground between them, that's basically what an audio roleplay script should look like.
Oh! Use screenplay formatting. Trust me. You won't regret it. I know it's a bit of an adjustment to switch into that format but once you do, everything will be so much better organized and easier to both proofread and produce.
