unforum

[5_pak]

One very prominent feature I'm really tired of at this point is the characters.

All characters are either white college age males or white college age females. No minorities, no very young, no older or old, no handicapped. I mean, the reason I actually started my (now defunct) Slenderstory in the first place was so I could actually ensure that the mythos had characters who weren't Aryan youth.

I mean, at this point doing anything to mix it up would be nice. Even if you're doing a vlog and you are a white, college age youth, there's still easy fixes. Go out to a medical supply store, buy a hospital eye patch, and tell your viewers that you were blind in one eye at birth. Instant handicap. Buy a sling, say your arm was recently broken. Borrow a wheelchair from a friend.

Anything to spruce these characters up.

[TheWorld]

^ Not to sound like a smart ass but there's plenty of people who look white, but actually are more ethnic than white...just saying.

[Das Omega]

[Compulsory Basket]

[Lunasa]

[Sumias]

Exactly. I've already got poor eyesight. I don't need any assistance in losing the rest of it, thanks.

Another thing that I'm on the fence about: ...I have a hard time believing that SM needs humans for anything. I mean, yes, we see him mess with people. We see him scare people. He may use that fear to his advantage, and he may even feed off of it(I've considered the possibility that he's a psychic vampire/incubus several times), but to use human beings to do his bidding? I've got a hard time following that one. I'm pretty sure that as a huge monster with multiple limbs, the dude doesn't need to use humans to do his dirty work. When I see blogs like that, part of my brain is like, "Rofl, do you seriously think so highly of yourself that a mythical beast as old as time seriously needs YOU to perform simple tasks for him? Srsly?"

[Das Omega]

[NoMoreGaems]

[LurkingWriter]

I'm working on my own Slender Man story (novel form) and I just wanted to assure everyone that what's been said about the characters has been taken into account, by me at least, though I know a lot of friends who are writers who have noticed the same thing. In my story, although my main character is a twenty-three year old male, his best friend is of Native American descent and another one of the main characters is only seven years old, and she plays a very prominent part.

Hopefully, there will be more diverse stories to come in this subject.

[Sumias]

You know what else I'm really sick of? --And let it be said that I am not a prude, not some little old lady or anything, but...

The vulgarity. Don't get me wrong, I use curse words every day, but there are some of these blogs where every other word is a vulgar term and it just gets OLD. To me, I break out the foul language when I've just screwed up(I've said 'Shit!' many a time when I've cut myself, or screwed up in the kitchen), or if I am VERY angry. To me, vulgarities are meant to be shocking, if used it writing. You whip one out once in a blue moon to surprise your audience. When every other word is a cuss word? It just gets old and boring and, after a while, downright boorish and in bad taste.

[Atomyk]

[Sumias]

It's not that I'm against cussing. It's just that in writing, too much vulgarity just...I don't know, turns me off. To me, the written aspect of these blogs is just as important as the characters. If someone can't think of better words to use than a bunch of cuss words? They shouldn't be writing in the first place, in my opinion. Good writing means articulation and delivery. Give me something descriptive. Give me something meaningful. Don't give me: "I'm going to kill this bitch-ass motherfucker if it's the last fucking thing I ever fucking do in my fucking life."

[Atomyk]

[ForgetWhatYouWrite]

It's been said before, but it bears repeating. Having really important plot based tid-bits buried deep into the 32894732894732 comments on your video. And if you're going to do that, at least recap that important thing in your next upload. Because seriously, I don't want to skim thru 20 people trying to game jack, 12 fake "hallowed" personalities, and a bunch of penis jokes, to find out something critical.

[jackofnotrades]

Honestly I'm glad that the whole Core Theory Cluster of blogs kind of blew up on themselves and are now dispersing. I will admit that white elephants was probably one of the best written blogs that are out there (despite the story completely going off to a mystical fairy land that kind of ruined it), but once it started spreading to other blogs and having interactions and communities I feel that it hurt them all for a few reasons:

1. The reason Marble Hornets was so infectious was because it created this sense of being alone and dealing with unknown problems and confusion, all while being isolated and ALONE... having 20 people chiming in on every post and acknowledging them as characters in the story just completely shatters that, even if the character is alone and only communicating through the internet.

2. Now I'm not sure if this is the case or not, but I highly doubt that all of those blogs were "in" the original idea for the story. It was kind of a neat way to include players by giving them titles, but it seemed like everything eventually de-railed and people were just starting up blogs and dropping plot fracturing bombs and having interactions everywhere. It started to feel like the end of that one episode of the Office where they are playing that murder mystery game, and one by one everyone decides to reveal that they were a double agent...except not as funny.

I don't think that the white elephants blog was a bad idea, just that too many people saw it and said "i wanna play too", and honestly if the whole idea was to get everyone marching to that beat just to reveal that the writer was insane all along, well I actually kind of like that, even though I feel that that part of the story is more of a reaction than some xanatos gambit (but bravo if it was!!)



TL;DR Keep an in-universe cast with only minimal acknowledgements of online comments/interactions ("one of you guys decoded that puzzle, thanks - now we're going to deal with it ourselves"),

and actually have a story/character/premise planned out somewhat before you start - something beyond "oh hey i'm starting a blog my name is -ZOMG SLONDORMONS" or "So I read/watched XX, and slendy is also stalking me". It's cool to have player interaction, but they shouldn't be the ones making up the story...



still tl;dr - Have a plot.