Akashic Records: A Fanfiction Blog

The Fanfiction blog of James D. Fawkes. Expanded Weekly Updates and information.

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Why Fate/Grand Order (USA) is Actually a Terrible Game

Exactly what it says on the tin.

So, there are a few reasons, here, and some of them are more picky than others, some are more pedantic, but they’re all equally valid reasons why Fate/Grand Order, or at least the English localized version for the United States, is actually a terrible video game.

First, and pickiest, is that it’s a terrible localization. It’s been getting better with the updates they’re releasing almost once a week, but in general, the localization was very poorly done. The grammar is atrocious, some sentences are left hanging, some words are badly misspelled, and in some cases, there’s no ending punctuation at all. For the first week or two, the items pages that lists things like Saint Quartz and the apples you use to recover AP had the word “Onwed” instead of “Owned.” Every campaign I go through, I find so many mistakes in the spelling, the punctuation, and just general grammar and word choice that now, about three weeks in, I no longer bat an eye at them.

This gives the impression that Fate/Grand Order was rushed, that the publisher and the localization team didn’t take the time to check and recheck their work or even use spellcheck. It reflects poorly on the localization team, makes them look incompetent and frankly uneducated, because a lot of these are things that anyone who graduated middle school should have long since mastered.

Second, the Gacha. Oh lordy, the Gacha. This is already a horrible system for a game to employ, and the utilization of a randomized system where chance plays a bigger role in what you get than effort is a mistake that Bungie made and learned from with Destiny. Now, it’s not as terrible as it could be, because with the Saint Quartz Gacha, you are guaranteed a 4* or higher card, rather than just getting junk all day every day, but the chances of getting anything good are abysmal. It’s heavily weighted towards giving you Craft Essences, which can be nice when that’s what you’re looking for, but when the biggest pull of the game is getting to play with your favorite Fate characters, locking all of the best and most sought after ones behind a punishingly cruel RNG is just terrible.

From a business standpoint, it’s not a bad practice. It keeps the diehard fans coming back over and over to get their favorite Servants, and with Saint Quartz being in such limited supply, inevitably, the player will have to spend real world money on the Saint Quartz he needs to keep summoning, and therein, Delight Works makes its money. 

Again, though, the Gacha is cruel and punishing. You’re guaranteed a 4* from the Saint Quartz Gacha, but Craft Essences appear with much more regularity than Servants, and all the best Servants - the 5*s, like Artoria, Altera, and Jeanne - have only a 1 percent chance of appearing for any given roll. This means that you’d have to roll ten times - that’s 300 Saint Quartz - for even just a fair chance at getting a 5*. And somehow, in order to get the chance to trade in the shop for a 5* that, presumably, you don’t have, you have to get the same 5* Servant a minimum of 15 times in order to use that exchange. To do that, that’s some 150 rolls of the Gacha, or 4500 Saint Quartz, and that’s just assuming you get the same 5* Servant every time you beat the math.

Which leads me to my next point...

Third, no guaranteed good drops. Understandably, the Servant you get from completing a Singularity is only a 3*, and that’s actually fine how it is. However, there is no method of guaranteeing you get any particular 4* or 5* Servant, even though the game devs built difficult bonus missions into the Singularities that often include bosses with large amounts of HP. These missions would have been the perfect spot to offer a really good reward, in the form of a guaranteed 4* Servant or Craft Essence, to the players who completed them. I certainly would have been ecstatic to receive Saber Alter from clearing the Heracles fight in the Fuyuki Singularity or Siegfried from the Jeanne Alter fight at Paris in the Orleans Singularity, but that didn’t happen. There are no guaranteed drops like that.

Fourth, Delight Works did not implement the quality of life improvements present in the current edition of the JP version into the USA version from launch. There was no reason not to do this. There was no reason why they couldn’t simply have directly ported over the JP version, minus the Servants added in with special events. Instead, Delight Works released the USA version exactly the same as the JP version was at launch back in 2015, just in English rather than Japanese. 

Fifth, it’s a resource hog. Fate/Grand Order is a large game that takes up not only a lot of space, but also draws on a lot of memory. My tablet, and it is a fairly old tablet, cannot handle the stress of playing FGO. If I try, it’s slow and clunky (even with the data install) with glitchy animations, and the worst part, it crashes every twenty seconds or so. FGO has similar performance to a handheld game for something like the Nintendo DS or the PS Vita, and it also has similar spec requirements, which lead to the next problem - 

Sixth, Delight Works refuses to allow the use of emulators. For those of us whose mobile devices struggle to play FGO, the only real option for playing the game is to find an emulator that works and use it for as long as possible, until, that is, Delight Works rolls out another patch that invalidates whatever method tons of players are using to emulate an android or ios device so they can play FGO. This means that all of those players will either be thrown off of their account when the latest emulator ban is enacted or will have to wait weeks until another workaround is discovered.

Okay, so maybe that last one is more a complaint about the company behind the game than the game itself, but it’s still valid.

Overall, the major appeal of Fate/Grand Order is that it contains all of the familiar characters you know and love and it’s more of that wacky brilliance for which Nasu has become famous. Ignore that, and it’s really more of a surprise that it’s still going, when it seems like the entire thing, from the story to the gameplay, seems like Delight Works took the overall grimness and darkness of Nasu’s world, complete with the faint ray of light at the end of a long tunnel, and forged the whole game in that image.

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Essential Material: Aite Láechrad

Aite Láechrad Mentoring Great Heroes  

The crystallization of Aífe the teacher, who mentored heroes in Celtic myth. The crystallization of her legend of teaching warriors the arts of combat.  

Sublimated into this Noble Phantasm, it is the ability to create “heroes” that are on the level of Servants and endow them with combat related skills. Any skill possessed by a hero, even some that are unique, can be learned and taught by Aífe.  

However, the difficulty of learning and the time required to do so will be increased as the compatibility of either Aífe or her student with the skill decreases. Furthermore, the further from her sphere of influence the skill originates, the more time and effort is required to acquire it.  

Normally, the maximum effective result would be the rank of A. However, if it is a skill originating in Ireland or Scotland, then it may be mastered to the rank of A++, no matter the era of its conception.

Aífe cannot create a hero more powerful than herself.

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Status Update

The past two months have been really busy - not in terms of other things going on, but in terms that I’ve spent most of them blitzing through the first two arcs of An Essence of Silver and Steel, a Worm and Fate/stay night crossover, of sorts, where Taylor Hebert basically has the powers of a Kaleid Liner from Prisma Illya. Yes, you heard that right, the first two arcs, totaling about 75,000 words, are all done and completed, and I did it all in about two months - I can hardly believe it myself.

Where does this put Miracle of Zero? Not abandoned, fortunately. For now, however, it’s in a bit of limbo, because I’m waiting for my editor, the same guy who helped me get characters and tone right for AEoSaS, to catch up with the whole thing. Once he does, I’ll be getting back in the saddle for Chapter 19, but until then, I’m afraid I have no idea when that chapter will be out. 

As for other projects, the only (fanfiction) one currently on my “might start it” list is Fate/Recursive Wisdom, a reimagining of the Fifth Holy Grail War with one major difference: Tohsaka Rin has a twin brother. It’s hard to explain it, because the simplest way to describe it is as a kinda-sorta SI, but that doesn’t do either the plot or the character (Tohsaka Yukio, for an almost painfully ironic name) real justice. 

I’d also like to give my thanks to my new patrons on Patreon for their support, especially Spencer Kay and Alias 2v10. You guys are awesome.

That’s it, for now. My week off was last week, last night was spent rendering images for my Patreon page. Today, it’s back to work.

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Patreon Goal Icons

The first of a series of icons for use on my Patreon page. They’re nothing exciting, just some stylized words.

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Samurai Jack: No Right Ending?

If there was one thing I felt Samurai Jack was lacking in its ending, it was catharsis, a satisfaction to how things were concluded. I’m sure other fans probably thought so as well, that the bittersweet final moments were a bit rushed and didn’t close out the series in a manner that resonated.

So, we got resolution of the main conflict, the original premise: Aku thrust Jack into the future, and Jack has to get back to his own time in order to undo all of the evil that Aku has inflicted upon the world in the absence of someone to stop him. At the end, that does happen: Jack, with the help of Ashi, gets back to his own time and defeats Aku, thereby rendering all of that evil undone.

Unfortunately, this also renders just about every other episode in the series pointless: the only one who remembers the events and the people he met, the good he did, the lives he saved, and with Ashi gone, is Jack himself.

Of course, one might argue that Jack’s journey was not in vain, because he...grew as a character? Not really. Nearly all of Jack’s development took place in season 5, and even that was a pathway to regaining the person he once was, rather than becoming a new, better person. The counterargument is that the only season that even mattered was season 5 - sure, there were references sprinkled throughout to his previous adventures, but even without watching the previous seasons, you could still get the sense, “These are people he saved.”

And then, the end of season 5 happened, and all of that was undone. For that matter, it seemed like the writers went out of their way to kill off almost all of them, so that there was nothing left for Jack in the future.

I think it’s not inaccurate to say that I didn’t like how season 5 ended.

So, how would I have gone about fixing it, if I had been the one writing that ending? Well, there are two ways I think it could have been made more satisfying, one more involved and more drastically changed than the other.

Firstly, Jack could have had his happily ever after. Perhaps it was not the story the writers wanted to tell, but it would have given us more solace than what they did go with. Too, because Ashi says, as she fades, that “without Aku, [she] never would have existed,” if she had continued on, full and real and with Jack, then that meant those people in the future continued on, as well.

Might that mean that Aku in the future survived, as well? Well, yes and no. The writers could have delved a little deeper into the lore and stated that Aku was the source of “all” evil, and that if Aku died in one universe/timeline, he died in all of them.

That would have been a satisfying ending. The good guys win, the people in the future are left to rebuild with Aku now gone, and Jack returned to his own time, with Ashi in tow. They all lived happily ever after.

Of course, option two is the one I would have preferred: Jack and Ashi never went back in time.

In this scenario, for one reason or another, Jack and Ashi couldn’t or didn’t travel back, and Jack killed Aku and remained in the future, the curse of his agelessness broken (or perhaps not? Ashi, with Aku’s powers, would likely need not fear old age, either). Resigned to living in this new time, with the people he’s saved and the friends he made, and rebuilding everything Aku had destroyed, Jack continued on with Ashi. 

More bittersweet than the first scenario, but keeping more in tone with how the series felt. Jack never made it back to his own time, but he acknowledged and accepted that, choosing instead to keep moving forward.

I think that would have made for a better ending. More fitting, certainly, than the one we got.

What do you think?

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COMING SOON: An Essence of Silver and Steel

Something grand loomed in the distance, a great infinitude that did not exist in any of Queen Administrator’s data. The red shadow connected to it on the opposite end, and as the red shadow did, it existed only because the indigenous population — humans, homo sapiens sapiens — did.

“GAH ‘OO!”

But his grip felt weak, fragile, and his flames were like a sunbeam on a clear summer day. The Lung before me was probably a mid-tier Brute already, capable of splattering my base Breaker state across the pavement like a rotten tomato, but as strong as he was, as formidable as other heroes might have found him, I was stronger still.

“Do you?”

Lung snarled and growled, and it was still something that could never have come from a human mouth, but it was nothing like his previous roars. Was he feeling cornered? I didn’t know. But the idea that I could so terrify one of the most powerful, if not the most powerful, parahuman in the Bay gave me a kind of vindictive satisfaction that I’d been denied with the Trio for nearly two years.

“Are you afraid, Lung?”

“It wouldn’t even be an actual fight.”

“My condolences for Regent.”

She slung an arm over my shoulders, pulled me close, and even as I tensed up more, she planted a swift peck on the exposed part of my cheek.

I felt myself flush, and almost without realizing it, all of the tension drained straight out of me.

“Uh-bwah?”

“Consider that a down payment,” she said, grinning, “as a thank you for saving our butts, tonight.”

I was going to be a superhero. Things like indecision had to go.

COMING JUNE 3, 2017

AN ESSENCE OF SILVER AND STEEL

7 DAYS

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Historically Accurate Jeanne [Type Moon]

So, about a year ago, I did a thing where I listed off a bunch of facts about Jeanne. I can’t quite remember if I talked about exactly what she looked like, and I can’t be asked to go and check, right now, but I’m fairly sure I at least hinted about the issue at one point or another.

That lead to this. If Type Moon (coughTakeuchicough) had wanted to portray Jeanne in a way that was historically accurate, this is essentially what she’d have looked like. Note the guards on her elbow and knees - well, her elbows; you can’t really see the ones on her knees, that well - designed for better articulation, with a spike on the end. Note the skirt of mail she’s wearing to protect her thighs, and the armor she is now wearing over her legs. Note the tabard, in France’s colors with a fleur de lys on the front and a cross over her chest. Note the...well, you can’t actually see the chest plate, but it’s an actual thing rather than just that halfway there boob window of TM’s original Jeanne design.

And most importantly, note her bronze skin, her short, dark hair, and her brown eyes. Jeanne was a French farmgirl who was probably descended from Roman settlers. She was not a German princess or a delicate English rose. 

Everyone will have their own opinion, but I happen to think this version (if you ignore the obvious deficiencies in my drawing skills compared to Takeuchi) is just as beautiful, if not more so, as that blonde piece of fanservice TM put out into the world.

As usual, Patrons got this first. 

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Miracle Material: Ogrenix [Armament]

Ogrenix [Armament] Wrought-Iron Greatsword

A blackened greatsword, patterned along the flat of the blade with a design akin to smoke. It is one of Shirou’s experimental alloy designs, fashioned in the image of the sword wielded by the Black Knights in a certain video game series. Other than its unique alloy and an enchantment to help maintain its durability and sharpness, it is an ordinary blade with no real special attributes, which makes it a perfect weapon to wield against less dangerous foes.

The origin of the sword is simple. As a consequence of studying under a certain Lord of the Clock Tower, Rin came to possess knowledge of video games through no will of her own. During the time he spent with her in that place, the suggestion was inevitably made that Shirou hone his skills with swordsmithing by forging blades designed after weapons from popular cultural icons.

In that manner, many of Emiya Shirou’s personal projects were born.

Truly, the influence of the King of Conquerors continues long after he disappeared.

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Miracle Material: Apeiron [Person]

Apeiron [Person] King of Light

The alternate persona of Emiya Shirou, the “Emiya who is a king.” It is the nascent Elemental which was transplanted inside his body, a kind of reverse Guardian Spirit. In terms of rank, it is undoubtedly below that of regular Elementals and Nature Spirits, owing in no small part to its young age and dependence upon a physical body to exist.

However, the advantage of Apeiron is its attachment to Emiya Shirou, allowing it to acquire knowledge of human values. As a result, he possesses a demeanor closer to that of a human being than an Elemental, and his nature as a separate but conjoined entity allows for synergy and a combining of powers that would not be possible under other circumstances.

It should go without saying: Apeiron possesses the sense of self that Emiya Shirou lacks, and so he is incompatible with the Unlimited Blade Works.

Undoubtedly, the intention was for a cleaner merging. However, because the ego of Emiya Shirou himself had to be preserved, the result was this split in personalities, though the line between them has blurred somewhat over time. Given a few more centuries, the separation of “Emiya Shirou” and “Apeiron” will eventually cease to exist.

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Miracle Material: Fairies [Term]

Fairies [Term]

The Fair Folk, the Fae. Cousins to the Elves. Spirit-like entities that have approached the realm of demons. Originally, nature’s sense of touch on the continent of Halkeginia, but as a result of the rapid and merciless destruction of other Nature Spirits in combination with the hatred and antagonism of the invading humans (Brimir’s people), they were transformed irreversibly. They have, instead, become something close to that of true demons, but have not quite stepped over that line.

In other words, a shred of their original nature remains and ties them to their “humanity.”

In a sense, it might be accurate to say they were driven insane when Gaia weakened and the connection between them was all but severed, and in their insanity, they have become monsters that prey on humans for their own amusement. But it might also be accurate to say that they haven’t really changed much, it’s just that they’re more likely to act on their destructive whims than they used to be.

In any case, these Fairies are one of the few species of Halkeginia to have maintained a large portion of their Mystery (which means they’ve only lost a part of their power instead of nearly all of it), and in fact, they’ve removed themselves so completely from human interaction that they’re regarded mostly as myth and folklore. On the other hand, if any Fairy happens to be spotted by a human, even a high level mage, either killing him or modifying his memories would be trivial, so it’s not hard to see why their existence has remained such a secret.

In Tarbes, the relationship between the townsfolk and the nearby colony of Fairies is particularly antagonistic: despite living somewhat peacefully and minding their own business, the people of Tarbes were still tormented by the Fae, up until they asked a priest to set up the protective fence around the village. By the time our intrepid Siesta was born, all that remained of Tarbes’ interactions with the Fae were the stories and the occasional missing livestock, and, of course, some children or caravans that disregarded the stories and foolishly entered the forest the Fae called home.

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Miracle Material: Gavilain [Noble Phantasm]

Gavilain [Noble Phantasm] Shining Sword of Salvation

The radiant sword of light possessed by Emiya Shirou. A holy sword forged from the human prayer “salvation,” crystallized within the Earth. It’s a Last Phantasm on the same level as Excalibur that sees excellent performance as both a sword and a Noble Phantasm. Originally held by the fairies, it passed into Shirou’s hands from the Lady of the Lake as a sign of their contract.

Like Excalibur, Gavilain converts the user’s Prana into light, and as it is swung, the light is released from the edge of the blade and annihilates everything in its path. In form, Gavilain resembles Excalibur, but in action, it more closely resembles Noble Phantasms like Excalibur Galatine and Caladbolg. Like a precision scalpel, Gavilain does not burn, but simply sears away everything it touches.

Though it is of the same scale as Excalibur, however, Gavilain’s strength lies not in its attack power, but in its speed and ease of use. Requiring a small charge time and less than a third the amount of energy of its sister, its most deadly attribute is the fact that a modern magus is capable of utilizing its full power.

With such an incredible advantage, it’s easy to see why Francis Drake’s fleet was wiped out so effortlessly.  

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Miracle Material

The encyclopedia pages detailing terms from Miracle of Zero: Kingdom of the Forsaken. They'll cover a wide range of topics, all relevant to the story in some way, from Noble Phantasms to persons of interest to important terms used throughout the story.

No profile pages, yet, but those will come later. For now, it's just these short encyclopedia entries.

For patrons on Patreon, those pages which have not already been released into the wild will retain exclusivity for at least one week.

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MoZ Commentary: “For Someone’s Glory

First, let’s get the most important part out of the way: Karin got curbstomped.

Undoubtedly, a lot of those who read Gabriel Blessing’s The Hill of Swords will have thought that Karin is a certified badass — and she is, make no mistake about that, because she is one of the few mages of modern Halkeginia who will definitely become a Heroic Spirit after she dies — and that she should have at least put up a better fight. However, THoS vastly overestimated Karin’s ability and the strength of her magic. The magic of Karin the Tempest (or Hurricane, or Heavy Wind, whichever version strikes your fancy) is certainly of exquisite quality and strength, capable of tearing apart entire armies at once...

But it isn’t an Anti-Fortress level attack. Rho Aias is the most powerful defensive Noble Phantasm in Shirou’s arsenal, a barrier seven layers strong, and each layer is as sturdy and resilient as a fortress wall. Cuchulainn’s Gae Bolg, the thrown version, is so powerful that it makes it through six of the seven layers before being stopped, and Archer comments that he had never known as spear capable of piercing the Aias as far as Gae Bolg did.

Let me be a bit more clear on that: Gae Bolg|Soaring Spear that Strikes with Death, a spear that combines the homing function of Odin’s Gungnir and Brionac’s carpet bombing, managed to equal the feat of Hector of Troy’s unblockable spear and tore through the equivalent of six fortified fortress walls. Archer then stated that nothing he’d come against before had made it through more than the first layer.

I’m sorry, but a wind spell, even a high class one, designed for tearing and slicing is not going to equal, let alone surpass, that feat. In the first place, Gae Bolg, the thrown version, is a B+ Noble Phantasm, nearly equal in power to an A++ regular attack. Even if Karin’s spell is A+ magic, it’s still vastly inferior, conceptually and in terms of power, and it’s not designed for breaching fortresses besides.

Now, with that out of the way...

On the Lancelot scene, that one wound up being much longer than I anticipated, but the more I wrote it, the more I wanted to do it justice — a fight between titans. This was the first bit of combat where two fighters of that level — that of a Heroic Spirit — finally fought each other head to head. Perseus cheated, the fight with Not-Lancelot in Albion wasn’t a proper fight since both of them were focused on other things, and Drake was never going to be someone who fought with swords. This was the first showing of two swordsmen with superhuman ability crossing blades without much held back, and I wanted to convey that sense of overwhelming strength and speed, the way the 2015 UBW anime conveyed the Servant battles. 

Did I succeed?

Of course, your mileage may vary regarding how faithfully I captured the relative skill levels, but even though Lancelot is generally hyped as one of the best swordsmen to ever live, certainly the best in King Arthur’s era, I wanted to also make it clear that the Gandalfr runes, especially at EX rank, are a huge friggin’ deal. They’re basically the same as Lancelot’s Knight of Honor Noble Phantasm, only without that nifty side function of “turns whatever he grabs into a Noble Phantasm.” In some ways, they’re also superior, because they let him do things like recreate sublime sword skills, such as Tsubame Gaeshi. 

Let me also make it clear, however, that both of them were holding back. Lancelot’s natural skill versus Shirou’s Gandalfr enhanced skill came out mostly even, but neither of them was using all or their best Noble Phantasms. Lancelot might still lose, especially at range, but if he played it right, if he forced it to a battle between swordsmen, it’s a different fight altogether. 

Lastly, I thought about tagging on an appearance by Not-Lancelot at the end. It even made sense, from a story perspective, and if you know who Not-Lancelot actually is (let’s be real, here, is there anyone reading who doesn’t, at this point?) you should be able to figure it out pretty easily. Having said that, even though it made sense, it felt like I was trying to pack too much into the same timeframe, and that just didn’t work.

Not-Lancelot isn’t gone, though. He’ll be showing up again, pretty soon.

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Miracle of Zero Ch 18: For Someone’s Glory

Chapter 18 is now up, everyone. Enjoy.

Commentary will be available shortly.

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The Problem with Fanfiction

There are several, really, but here, I’m focused on one in particular.

Complacency.

Now, there are a lot of things tied up in this - among them chiefly the fact that fanfiction readers are less willing to suspend their disbelief than if they were reading a book or the original IP - but I’m not especially concerned with delving into those, here. That’s not what this post is about and that’s not what I want to talk about. 

No, the problem with fanfiction is how it has trained readers to be complacent, to expect certain things and to (quite often, but not always) stop reading if they’re not given those things. Granted, some of the best and most popular stories don’t, but it’s equally true that some of the best and most popular stories also reinforce this complacency.

Readers, now, are expecting to have everything handed to them.

Well, okay, not everything. People would get bored very quickly, in that case. It’s still true, however, that a lot of fanfiction readers expect the author to give them more than they really should, and this comes not only from the authors giving it to them, but often from the original media, as well.

Anyone who’s been on Fanfiction.net for long enough is well aware that the anime/manga section is the most bloated.

The problem is that anime and manga often have side stories or interludes or just cuts to other characters’ perspectives as a sort of shortcut for worldbuilding or plot laying. In Bleach, for example, we get several moments in the earlier chapters (Soul Society arc, but it’s present throughout the whole manga) of Yoruichi’s inner commentary about Ichigo’s learning curve, Byakuya’s inner realization that Ichigo’s true enemy was the laws of Soul Society that had sentenced Rukia to death, Rukia’s inner monologues about Ichigo, and later on, Ulquiorra’s commentary about Ichigo and the human heart, Rukia’s reflection about, “Those aren’t the eyes of a winner,” and so on. That’s just what I remember off the top of my head.

And Naruto? That manga has not only shots from characters like Kakashi and Sakura giving commentary on Naruto himself, but loads of flashbacks for basically every character that comes into Naruto’s orbit. Kishimoto devoted tons and tons of flashbacks to the perspective of his villains, showing what made them who they were and why they were villains. Kubo eventually jumped on the bandwagon and gave backstories to Nanao’s family, Bazz B, throwaway Lieutenant Sasakibe, Haschwalth, a whole arc for the Visoreds (Turn Back the Pendulum), and whoever struck his fancy. 

This is great, for the medium. Since we rely so much on the visuals and don’t have a direct line into Ichigo’s head and thought processes the way we would in a novel, the subtle cues that readers would normally pick up about any given character’s personality or motivations almost have to be supplemented with flashbacks and side stories. 

Well, I mean, you could also just have them be evil or villains or whatever, but that’s boring, and while a plain, old-fashioned bad guy can be refreshing every now and again, these days, people want their villains to be people first, villains second. 

But I’m getting off track, a little. These flashbacks and side stories can be good for an anime, a manga, or a movie, because they make characters more three-dimensional, but it’s a bit more of a problem in a novel (or long form prose in general).

Why? Because you’re giving too much away. It’s less of a surprise, and therefore less compelling as a plot twist, if your readers know the villain is plotting dastardly things before he actually springs his trap on the progatonist. It would be less of a surprise, for example, when the eagles come to rescue Frodo and Sam if Tolkien had written Gandalf calling for them before Frodo and Sam are trying to outrun the lava. 

(Maybe that’s a bad example; I’ve never read Lord of the Rings, only seen the movies.)

Okay. Better example. The rescue run at the end of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban wouldn’t have worked out nearly so well, narratively speaking, if Rowling had revealed the Time Turner to the readers earlier in the book, because it would have removed the tension of “how are we going to rescue Sirius?” As she does in all of the books, she dropped hints, she set that gun on the table, and after everybody has decided it’s not important, it’s just a fancy laser pointer, she picks it up and fires it. 

The problem is that fanfiction readers are too used to having so many perspectives from which to draw their information. When you combine this with the preconceived notions readers have about the given fiction you’re working with, it’s incredibly hard to branch out, because you will lose readers when you deny them one and go even slightly against the other. 

This is only exacerbated by the meta knowledge readers have about the story. Everyone reading Bleach fanfiction already knows that Aizen’s a traitor and megalomaniac. Everyone reading Naruto fanfiction already knows that it’s Obito behind that orange mask. Everyone reading Harry Potter fanfiction knows what a Horcrux is and how many moldy Voldy has. And so on.

And that is the real problem. When they’re so used to being given things upfront and having tons of knowledge the characters don’t, readers tend to take things at face value. The fact that your narrator is unreliable, especially if they’re extremely biased, makes it exceedingly hard to have him say or do anything that overestimates, underestimates, or is just plain wrong, because the reader will take it far more seriously and with far fewer grains of salt than you meant for them to. 

Am I the only one who wants to read more stories like Harry Potter, where some of the biggest, most important secrets aren’t revealed until the very end?

[vortexofradix-blog]

MoZ Commentary Ch17: “Each Choice, Each Step”

There are parts of this chapter I wasn’t incredibly happy with, and as the long delay probably says for me, parts that I really struggled to get written. Especially that scene in the tavern, with all those people swarming Louise, I felt like I didn’t know what Shirou should do or how he should react. Well, nothing to do about it, now.

Some of you may have noticed the absence of a crowning ceremony for Henrietta, and there’s a reason for that: Louise didn’t attend. You might think that’s strange, but it would actually be stranger for her to be there — officially, Louise is an agent of the Crown, but that doesn’t automatically mean she would be invited to the ceremony. Actually, it means she wouldn’t: those who were invited, and attended, would be various high ranking nobles and maybe their heirs, not third daughters like Louise or fourth sons like Guiche. Mazarin officiated and the myriad of chivalric orders and palace guards were in place to protect everyone. Other than that, it was not an event that just anyone, childhood friend of the Princess or not, could show up for.

Theoretically, Henrietta could have made Louise part of the ceremony, but it would have been a very powerful statement about Louise’s importance to her, and Henrietta has not yet made her the official heir to the throne. Since she’s already pushing an unpopular policy (equality under the law, for both nobles and commoners) among the peers, trying to be too ambitious in everything would backfire.

Those of you who paid attention may have noticed the wine I chose, too. It’s a really high quality bottle, the sort of thing that goes for $200+ in the real world. However, you won’t find a Chateau Leoville in the real world — you’ll find several. Because of a series of events, Chateau Leoville was divided among separate owners. The actual wine the bottle mentioned in the story is based on is Chateau Leoville-Las Cases, which I’m told is very good, and according to reviews, it’s generally one of the best wines in the world.

What I was looking for in that scene, however, wasn’t simply “one of the best wines in the world,” but “a moderately expensive” one. Eleonore and Louise are likely used to something much more expensive at home — the Halkeginia equivalent of a Lafite. In case it wasn’t completely portrayed, I wanted it to come across as “this is a really good wine, but it’s not the best, and this was the best the inn had in stock at the time.” It just goes to show that the de La Valliere family is on a whole other level when it comes to opulence.

Some of you might feel that Eleonore was bashed in this chapter, and I can understand why you might feel that way. Some of you will agree that this was actually mostly in line with how she acted in canon. The thing with Eleonore is, I wanted her to somewhat adversarial, yes, but I wanted her to be a three-dimensional character, with wants, needs, and a personality. I tried to balance those out, but I feel like she came off as being a little more of a bitch than I wanted.

Why? Because she didn’t get to be very nice, this chapter. She might not get the chance later on, either. The problem with Eleonore is that she’s a “successful Louise.” She’s very much similar to Louise in personality, but she never went through the same doubts and uncertainties, because she’s a talented mage who always achieved what she set her mind to, unlike Louise, who couldn’t do the simplest of magic before she got her hands on the Founder’s Prayer Book. From the beginning, her personality was going to be abrasive and haughty.

Unfortunately for Cattleya, she didn’t get much screentime, and unlike the canon Cattleya, who basically decided, “I’ll support Louise’s decisions, no matter what,” MoZ’s Cattleya is the doting older sister who wants very much for Louise to be safe and happy. If given the chance, she might have tried to smuggle Louise and Shirou out of the castle so they could go fight the war, but since Shirou and Louise are executing their plan to win approval...

For those who caught it, yes, the Duke’s name is the same as the real life Louise de La Valliere’s father. I needed a name for him, and it seemed appropriate. 

Also on the Duke, I actually imagined him as a blond Odysseus Eu Britannia in the Duke’s clothing, because holey sheets, that mustache and beard on the canon Duke. I mean, technically, it’s not strange, because Halkeginia is basically Victorian era, culturally speaking, but just...wow. Colonel Sanders on steroids. That’s why I didn’t draw any attention to his face or facial hair, because if you’re a stickler for canon, then you can picture him like that, but if you want my official unofficial word on the matter, MoZ’s Duke de La Valliere is blond Odysseus. 

[vortexofradix-blog]

Miracle of Zero, Chapter 17

So, it’s been mentioned that posting full chapters here, especially considering the size they tend to get to, is ungainly. With that in mind, I’m just going to post a link.

Here.

Commentary will be up shortly. I suggest you read the chapter, first.