Side-Write: Bringing Happiness (Patreon)

This one feels just a little embarrassing to publish, because it might sound like I'm exploring some stuff that sounds pretty basic and obvious. I've been frustrated with this aspect of my writing and how my work has turned out for some time, so I decided that an important step in figuring out what I want the story and world of Project Wild One to be was to stop and really re-evaluate some of the basics and force myself to question my own assumptions and habits.

So this is another one of my more abstract discussions/explorations of story-writing. I hope you find a little interesting insight into the nature of storytelling, or at least into my own strange mind!

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I've built a lot of my career so far on content that is, arguably, depressing. I try to approach my writing in a brutally honest way where the characters deal with a lot of difficult problems, both internal and external, and I tend to draw the reader to sympathize and commiserate with the character, and in this way, I draw you closer. To some extent, it's a character's flaws and suffering that make us feel comfortable identifying with them, and that can stir up the strongest and most meaningful emotions in us. Perfect characters are boring, as are happy stories where nothing is wrong.

But I've come to regret that this has become such a prominent theme in my work. Yes, the world is a bleak place, and there are a lot of very important lessons to be learned about how to deal with suffering. But stories are also meant to help us feel better about the world, to provide us escape and perspective, and especially so, arguably, for erotic content. I may have had the market cornered on games that make you cry and also masturbate, but I don't want to be so focused on the negative with Project Wild One. I'm sure there will still be bitter and bittersweet elements, but I want to do a better job of emotionally balancing the game.

The funniest thing about MVOL in that regard was that in the end, it turned out the setting was technically one that should allow for a very happy and carefree story, but our characters managed to turn it into a very bleak setting that pushed them to their limits. You could argue that the setting doesn't even make that much difference in whether it's a happy story or not, so much as the characters do, but I do think both contribute, and the broader themes we tend to focus on will as well. So here and now, when all of that is still up in the air, is probably the best time to stack the deck and give myself as many chances as possible to make this a more positive game than the last, despite whatever habits I may have as a writer.

So the question then is, what exactly makes a story happy? What makes for a positive-feeling experience? It can feel pretty hard to actually grasp and specify. Paradise and hell can have either kind of story. Broken and perfect people can have either kind of story. Stories about great evil, or blameless conflict, or overcoming natural challenges, can also go either way. What is the common thread, or are there multiple elements to it? Is it simply a matter of the characters being happy? Barring them being unsympathetic or insane, of course. Is it a matter of how "cruel" or how "just" the world itself feels? Is the very way the story is told the greatest determinant?

Is the answer different for different people? Will a positive story charm one person, but feel saccharine and fake to another? Will I still be able to be brutally honest with the characters and include some suffering and hardship without it spoiling the effect?

Hmm. I think those last two are the answer to each other. I do think some people would find an "all-good" story unengaging and unrelatable, and I would certainly have a hard time writing that way consistently. It may be that some people would find "mixed" stories not positive enough, but they probably wouldn't enjoy my work anyway. I do think that finding that right balance will be essential, where there is still hardship and suffering, but also hope and joy.

I do think the way the story is presented is important, and I do think I should work on making sure I show happiness as well as misery in my characters. It can work with just about any setting, but if there's more wonder and uncertainty in the world, more things that are left open-ended and up to the imagination, I think it tends to open the way for a happier story, or at least one that feels more special and less constrained by bitterness. Maybe to some extent, I need to embrace a "soft magic system" where not everything is explained or even fully governed by reason and common sense. That sort of thing is somewhat antithetical to me, but I might be able to sprinkle in a little of it here and there.

As for the characters... I feel like many kinds of characters can feel positive to read about or play with. I do think happy characters help, but that can manifest in many different ways. You can have a character in a miserable situation that just chooses to be happy and at peace with their life. You can have a character that's defined by their sense of hope even when things are hard, or a character that's always working to make things better for others, and even if they're miserable deep down, there's something admirable and positive in them. For that matter, characters with little or no hardship that aren't twisted by it but simply lead happy, virtuous lives can be charming as well. Somewhere at the center of all this is the archetypal hero, the character that never gives up and always fights for good and right, often bearing some exceptional talent that makes the difference but still rooted in memories of hardship.

Characters can inspire positive feelings in the reader by literally acting in an inspiring way-- something that often comes from dealing with hardship. Showing virtues that we admire, or even better, developing and growing and improving as we watch. Even a pretty miserable and unlikable character could be a positive note if they at least show a little growth and change, and even a constantly bitter grouch can be likeable if they keep doing the right thing when push comes to shove.

The more I think about it, the more it feels like maybe there is a more natural answer to this that I've been blind to. A lot of my writing has been about how "everyone is suffering," because that is an important part of one of my core philosophical beliefs. But maybe it's felt skewed because I haven't leaned enough into the other side of that same belief: "everyone is good, deep down." They're two mirrored facts about our world that supply answers to so many of our questions of why good or bad things happen, and I already try to show that all people have good in them in my work, even if sometimes it's buried or distorted, but maybe this project will be my chance to show more of that. Maybe that's exactly what it needs to be.

Maybe moreso than I need to make the world one with so much or so little suffering or strife, I need to make sure it's a world where nobody is "just an asshole" or "just evil," because that's exactly the kind of nonsense that creates so many harmful and misleading ideas in our world today, and in ourselves.

Well. I think it'll also be important to balance it out a bit so it doesn't feel overly preachy about the nature of people or anything, of course. But this already lines up with my goals to make NPCs feel more "real" and driven by actual emotions. I just need to make sure that in all my struggles to capture the breadth of emotion and thought, I don't forget compassion, honesty, and other virtues that make us more than just monsters.