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[Impossible Realms]

Hello, I want to start training myself in story writing for games, as its pretty much the only part of design I'm not confident in myself with. Unfortunately, I have no clue where to start. Any suggestions?

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

i'd suggest two things:

first, buying and reading books on writing. there are a ton of great ones. i can give you a list if you like, but everyone has their own favorites. i like john gardner's books on writing the most, but i've read a few dozen, and each was worth reading. most of these will be about writing novels rather than writing for games, but that's okay, a lot of the skills transfer over

second, practice. write very short, time-limited stories. for a long time i was with a group of writers who held events (both online and in person) called blitzkreig fiction. someone picked a theme, and we all had 30 minutes to write a short story about that theme. then we read our stories to the group and people comment on each other's stories and suggest ways to improve it and describe what they liked and didn't like about the stories. i have a couple dozen stories that i wrote for that, and each event improved my writing -- if you're curious what they are like, see here: http://rinku.livejournal.com/tag/bkfiction

[Capntastic]

Read a lot.  Good books, bad books, classics, obscure new things, things you love, things you hate, etc.  And think about them.

I think books on writing are stall-tactics after a certain point.  If you want to get good at baseball, a book on pitching will only get you so far.  Throw the ball.  I dislike John Gardner because he asserts, flatly, that you can't be a good writer unless you get a degree in it.  He's full of shit.

Get into the habit of trying to write something every day, and learn to not edit while you write.  Writing and editing work best as discrete phases, otherwise you'll get bogged down fiddling with words over and over.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

from what i remember, john gardner didn't say you need a degree in writing, he said you can't be a good writer unless you have a degree in *something*, but that that something can be anything. he says that good writers are educated, whether that's as a doctor (chekhov) or whatever else

and i'm sure there are exceptions but i can't really think of any great writers post-18th century who don't have a college degree in something

[Evan Balster]

I wrote a gigantic reply, but I was afraid it would derail the thread so I made it separate:
http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=30623.0

[Capntastic]

I wrote a gigantic reply, but I was afraid it would derail the thread so I made it separate:
http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=30623.0

Namedropping tea to get the Eres vote I see.

from what i remember, john gardner didn't say you need a degree in writing, he said you can't be a good writer unless you have a degree in *something*,

I don't have the book in front of me now but I distinctly remember being turned off by the imperious nature with which he made the assertion itself, that mastery of writing can only be derived in a formal environment.  He was a literature professor, of course.  It was good business sense for him to be biased.

Either way "where do I get started with writing?" is a super open-ended question.  If your goal is just to write better game stories, try making a list of a few games you found to be especially effective at storytelling, and a few you saw tried hard but failed.  Then try to figure out what made them effective or ineffective.

[Impossible Realms]

Either way "where do I get started with writing?" is a super open-ended question. If your goal is just to write better game stories, try making a list of a few games you found to be especially effective at storytelling, and a few you saw tried hard but failed.  Then try to figure out what made them effective or ineffective.

That's probably one of my bigger problems. I don't really play a lot of games that are even remotely good at storytelling (I play a lot of platformer games), so the ones that do try to tell a story usually fail. Mind pointing me to some better examples (preferably something thats F2P so I can play it myself as opposed to searching on YouTube)? Also, okay, I'll try being a little less vague about my problem area. Its not really ideas that are hard for me to come up with, my main problem is putting it on paper. I've actually come up with some pretty creative stuff, but when I try to write it out, it usually falls flat.

...practice. write very short, time-limited stories. ...

That probably would be the best place for me to start, (don't know why I didn't think of this, as that's how I do everything else...)

I wrote a gigantic reply, but I was afraid it would derail the thread so I made it separate:
http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=30623.0

Seems like that actually might be useful. I should try that sometime.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

I don't have the book in front of me now but I distinctly remember being turned off by the imperious nature with which he made the assertion itself, that mastery of writing can only be derived in a formal environment.  He was a literature professor, of course.  It was good business sense for him to be biased.

from what i remember some of them were only published after he was dead (they were originally just lecture notes or something), so it didn't personally help him to hype up going to college or anything

also i think having a direct tone is a good thing, it helps to see clearly what someone thinks instead of having to wade through qualifying things like 'opinions differ on this, but this is what i think...' instead just reading someone say 'this is how it is, and here's why' makes things easier to evaluate

two more 'on writing' books that i can recommend are stephen king's and orson scott card's -- even if you don't like their books, their books on writing are good

[King Hadas]

“One learns from books and example only that certain things can be done. Actual learning requires that you do those things.”
-Frank Herbert's Children of Dune

[Graham-]

Write a lot.

[Panurge]

There are loads of good serious writing sites around, some general and some genre-specific. Join a couple and start giving critiques of other people's work - you'll learn a huge amount just by considering and voicing your reactions as a reader. When you're ready, you can start posting your own writing. Just remember to be gracious when receiving criticism and honest when giving it. I would recommend avoiding sites which seem overly nurturing because you won't learn as much from them. Pain is good!