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NeoGAF Creative Writing Challenge #219 - "Resurgence"

Charade

Member
Theme - "Resurgence"

Word Limit: 2500

Submission Deadline: Friday, September 1st by 11:59 PM Pacific

Voting Deadline: Monday, September 4th at 11:59 PM Pacific.

Grace Periods: Each of the above deadlines will be followed by a 6-hour grace period. Submissions made after the end of the grace period will be ineligible, and votes cast after the end of the grace period will not be counted. Remember that these are grace periods, not extensions of the deadline--you should still submit your work or cast your vote by the deadline set above.

Optional Secondary Objective: The NCWCCU: Pick a world/setting that you previously wrote a story in, and write a new story in that same world/setting. This world/setting can be from a previous thread or anything you've ever written. So make a sequel, prequel, any-quel, successor-story, you name it. Bonus points to whoever deciphers the initialism.

Submission Guidelines:

- One entry per poster.
- All submissions must be written during the time of the challenge.
- Using the topic as the title of your piece is discouraged.
- Keep to the word count!

Voting Guidelines:

- Three votes per voter. Please denote in your voting your 1st (3 pts), 2nd (2 pts), and 3rd (1 pt) place votes.
- Please read all submissions before voting.
- You must vote in order to be eligible to win the challenge.
- When voting ends, the winner gets a collective pat on the back, and starts the new challenge.

Important side note: A lot of our regulars like to write out short critiques/comments for the stories, but you can always opt out by simply adding a note like "I'd prefer no critiques" in the post where you submit your story. We're an understanding group and respect that not everyone wants comments on their work. Above all, we just want to read your story.

NeoGAF Creative Writing Challenge FAQ
Previous Challenge Threads and Themes
 

Nezumi

Member
Yay, Bonus Points. So even if I once again fail to deliver anything I at least have those, huh?
NeoGAF Creative Writing Challenge Cinematic Universe

Funny enough, I've just now started to sort through my terribly chaotic writing folder, so this challenge comes at a most opportune time indeed.
 

Charade

Member
Ding Ding Ding! The bonus point comes in the form of a tertiary tie-breaker, after first-place votes and whoever hasn't made the most recent thread, of course.
Wait a second...

Also I can't tell you how long it took me to figure out those damn hotlinks in the OP weren't on my end lol. Edit: At least on desktop, it seems.
 

Plum

Member
Can I be exempt from the secondary objective seeing as I've only done one of these so far? That and my story didn't exactly leave much room for sequels unless I want to write some Fallout fan fiction.
 

Charade

Member
Can I be exempt from the secondary objective seeing as I've only done one of these so far? That and my story didn't exactly leave much room for sequels unless I want to write some Fallout fan fiction.

Oh it can be from anything you've ever written. But any case, it's optional as well.
 

Nezumi

Member
Ding Ding Ding! The bonus point comes in the form of a tertiary tie-breaker, after first-place votes and whoever hasn't made the most recent thread, of course.
Wait a second...

Also I can't tell you how long it took me to figure out those damn hotlinks in the OP weren't on my end lol. Edit: At least on desktop, it seems.

So what you are saying is I have to write something in order to get my bonus points? Damn, I feel trapped now :D
 

Plum

Member
Oh it can be from anything you've ever written. But any case, it's optional as well.

Well I'd rather not write a sequel to the Great Gatsby fan fiction I chose to write for my English A-Level so... yeah, I'll be sitting this secondary objective out :p
 

FlowersisBritish

fleurs n'est pas britannique
Can I be exempt from the secondary objective seeing as I've only done one of these so far? That and my story didn't exactly leave much room for sequels unless I want to write some Fallout fan fiction.

I wouldn't worry about it. Secondary's are always optional, and I might do a story in a universe I haven't written about yet. It's been in my head, and it's pretty fleshed out, I just haven't sat down and written something in it.

Then again, I might also do it in one of my other two fantasy universes I have written about. SO there will either be dickish mages or dickish were-monsters. Oh the options are too many to chose from!
 

Charade

Member
So what you are saying is I have to write something in order to get my bonus points? Damn, I feel trapped now :D

This is your chance to rise above your tag!

Well I'd rather not write a sequel to the Great Gatsby fan fiction I chose to write for my English A-Level so... yeah, I'll be sitting this secondary objective out :p

Ahh, gotcha. Also damn that was pretty solid stuff for your first real story then.
 

Mike M

Nick N
Hmmmmmm...

In the interest of trying something new, does anyone have any requests for follow ups to anything I've previously written, be it stand alone stories or some recurring characters I use?
 

Nezumi

Member
Hmmmmmm...

In the interest of trying something new, does anyone have any requests for follow ups to anything I've previously written, be it stand alone stories or some recurring characters I use?

Well, I was listening to some Powerwolf a while ago and thought how this would make a cool soundtrack for an Order of Theiss story.

I think I actually might revisit that troop of warmongering orcs trapped in a time of peace and happiness once again. It's been a while since I thought about those dudes and I guess I never really did end their story properly.
 

FlowersisBritish

fleurs n'est pas britannique
Since it's a new thread, going to mention this early. For awhile, the writing hangouts have mostly been me, Cyan, and Nezumi shooting the shit on Sundays, but now that Cyan might (or might not) stop showing up, me and Nez decided to open up a discussion about them, namely a change in time in case there are people in the thread who really want to show up, but our usual Sunday at 5pm Est has just been too inconvenient for them. Are there any times times or days that work better for peope?

We're also thinking about changing it over from Google hangouts to Discord, but we're still unsure of starting our own discord channel for the hangouts or using the general writing gaf discord
 

choodi

Banned
I think I'll be in for this one.

I've started settling in to my new job and my overseas visitors have now gone home, so I should have time to write.
 
I read all entries of last round, but I've very little useful to say about them, other than being sound stories. It does surprise that nobody else is mildly bothered by LaMagenta's MC's having the same name, except with the -o and -a suffix for male and female in Spanish (if I'm not mistaken).

I do feel that Mike's entry, despite being disturbing, was the most engaging (perhaps due to that quality). Difficult to make any real choices when all entries are agreeable though.

@Charade: Did you recently watch Star Trek: TOS as well? Because obviously Yeoman and Helmsman are only used in TOS, and somewhat randomly between episodes, most of it being in the first season. (I did not grow up with this show, but TNG)

edit: on hangouts: definitely switch to Discord. Hangouts never worked for me, and Discord is more convenient and supported on more platforms.
 

Cyan

Banned
I read all entries of last round, but I've very little useful to say about them, other than being sound stories. It does surprise that nobody else is mildly bothered by LaMagenta's MC's having the same name, except with the -o and -a suffix for male and female in Spanish (if I'm not mistaken).

Abuela and Abuelo are Spanish for grandma and grandpa. ;)
 

Charade

Member
@Charade: Did you recently watch Star Trek: TOS as well? Because obviously Yeoman and Helmsman are only used in TOS, and somewhat randomly between episodes, most of it being in the first season. (I did not grow up with this show, but TNG)

I've seen a decent amount of TOS episodes so I pulled from that. Did it more as a parody than actually being something set in the universe, at least that was my intent.

It was Galaxy Quest fan-fiction all along!
 

Mike M

Nick N
Hmmmmmm...

In the interest of trying something new, does anyone have any requests for follow ups to anything I've previously written, be it stand alone stories or some recurring characters I use?

Any takers other than Nezumi wanting a spin off from a couple characters in a book no one else here has read? Heh heh.
 

FlowersisBritish

fleurs n'est pas britannique
Any takers other than Nezumi wanting a spin off from a couple characters in a book no one else here has read? Heh heh.

I always enjoy escapades of that band of three with the wooden magic mechanical owl even if i could never be bothered to remember their names.

Edit: Phew, it only took me all night, but I finally got a rough draft for the challenge instead of only a few days before! Now to edit this... 3,400 words..... F&%*!
 

FlowersisBritish

fleurs n'est pas britannique
Does that say flowers is not british? Cyan is on a roll without his normal writing to do.

A callback to that "not a pipe" thing?

Oh neat, a tag! Now I too am a cool guy!

And it's more a callback to me constantly ranting about the Queen and the one time I got exiled for like a year and a half. If you want to hear more of my storied history with the British government, come to the writing hangout at TBD via discord!
 
I'll never be a cool guy.

But please determine the TBD and i'll come listen to your storied history. Someone has to be an audience, if I'm not going to successfully complete projects in the timeline, I can do that instead.
 

Ashes

Banned
Oh neat, a tag! Now I too am a cool guy!

And it's more a callback to me constantly ranting about the Queen and the one time I got exiled for like a year and a half. If you want to hear more of my storied history with the British government, come to the writing hangout at TBD via discord!

I might join up this weekend... What time is it GMT/bst?
 

Plum

Member
Fuck, I've got nothing. I'm at a complete creative blank here. Least I've got a week to finish; means I can rush a 1,000 word story on the last day again!

EDIT: Actually, scratch that, I've come up with something. What's good is that it (tangentially) relates to my previous story! Now time to write.
 

LaMagenta

Member
Works for me, but I'm not sure about our American friends.
That's noon here in LA pst, which is fine, except I have my good friends kids bday party to attend.
I think I have an idea what to write about, but I'll let it marinate in my mind for a bit.
 

Plum

Member
Was wondering what you lot thought about stories with a "present - past - present - past" structure? The one I'm writing for this challenge has flashbacks every few paragraphs that reveal the backstory of why the protagonist is doing what she's doing in the present. Thought it might be a little too cliche, I'm not entirely sure.
 

Dongs Macabre

aka Daedalos42
Was wondering what you lot thought about stories with a "present - past - present - past" structure? The one I'm writing for this challenge has flashbacks every few paragraphs that reveal the backstory of why the protagonist is doing what she's doing in the present. Thought it might be a little too cliche, I'm not entirely sure.

I was actually gonna do this for my story (with a bit of a twist), but I decided against it since I thought it might be too jarring.
 

Plum

Member
I was actually gonna do this for my story (with a bit of a twist), but I decided against it since I thought it might be too jarring.

Hmmm, yeah, that's kind of my worry. I could try and put the backstory in more naturally but the story I'm going for makes it kind of difficult, and I don't want to go all "tell don't show."
 

Plum

Member
I think it could be fine as long as it's clear from the start that you're switching between separate narrative threads. That's kind of what I'm doing with my story now, with the perspective switching between two characters. Dunno how well it'll work but at least it's immediately obvious that it's not the same story.

I'm not too worried about it being unclear that there's two narrative threads, more that it'll make the pacing too fast. It's the same structure as The Disaster Artist (currently reading it, it's great) but that has sections seperated by chapters instead of just a few paragraphs. However, if I don't put it in it might not be clear what happened before the story started. I'll see if I can figure something out.
 

FlowersisBritish

fleurs n'est pas britannique
Hangout in about an hour in a half. For those of you not familiar, its a good time to do some writing! We rotate between 10 minutes of casual chatting (great time to bounce some ideas off people if you want, or just tell us about your day) into half an hour of silent writing. We do this for two hours, but if you need to leave early or show up late no worries. We typically use camera or mics, but if can't/don't want to reveal yourself like that you are more than welcome to use the text chat. If you've got time, drop on by!

Will post the discord link about half an hour before it starts. (Warning: we're using discord for the first time, so I'm expect some technical errors)
 

Nezumi

Member
Wait, I thought it was in about twenty minutes, not that it really matters though.

Also, discord does not yet support video chat (but it is coming apparently) so no cameras at the moment anyway.
 

FlowersisBritish

fleurs n'est pas britannique
Hangout in 15 minutes

Here's the link to the discord server If it doesn't link you to the voice channel, look at the various channels and scroll to the bottom. If you have trouble joining, just mention it in the general chat and I should be able to fix it.
 
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