/v/ - Video Games

OP, you fucked up your title

Because western fantasy writers nowadays are a fucking joke, just look at the garbage hamburger helper wrote during dragon age 2

>>14829106

>even if it's cliche as fuck, it's still infinitively more interesting than what games have to offer.

How so?

>>14829120

It's something I can't really put my finger on. It just seems like in games you're always grinding out levels and getting unlocks/loot until you can fight the boss at the end. Books/movies/novels can throw a weird twist on it, and even don't have to be centered around constant fighting. Anything can happen really. The Odyssey (from what I remember) was mostly centered around avoiding fighting, because everything was so fucking ridiculously powerful that taking it head on wasn't even an option. At least until the end. I suppose there's a level of mysticism you don't really see in games, unless it's early 90s late 80s.

Western fantasy is (((pozzed))) because guess who runs every (((Western))) gaming company. That's right.

Games would actually be a lot more creative if they copied DnD. The problem is that people think DnD is just Forgotten Realms Sword Coast.

Modern western fantasy anything is garbage. Soyboys, faggots and trannies are the ones who usually produce such trash and the average person is barely literate nowadays. Long gone are the creative writers of the past who made interesting and compelling stories.Hell if I was one of those greats I'd drink myself to death just looking at the garbage that is produced by this generation.

>>14829234

This thread was a sobering reminder.

>>14829234

What the fuck is that?

>>14829234

I'd be willing to bet those books probably still have better writing than any AAA game released in the past 20 years.

>>14829245

I am betting shitty Warhammer books for children, they look way too small and juvenile to be anything but.

Because all western devs are marxists.

When we kill them all, everything will improve.

>>14829220

>Games would actually be a lot more creative if they copied DnD

Not if they copied anything related to Dnd after 3.5 and even then that's a stretch. Everything has been dumbed down to cater to people with nigger-tier intellect. Back then a great DM could integrate a ton of interesting shit in his campaign if he had the creativity and will to do so. You only had to tweak a few things for the most outlandish elements but it was possible. Now everything is made to be as simplistic as possible so idiots don't have to think much. 4E felt almost like vidya, that's how dumbed down it was and 5E barely fixed the mess. ADnD 2nd edition was probably the best DnD ever was and that was released almost 3 decades ago.

>>14829200

Also this.

Killing jews also improves everything.

>>14829269

I'm talking specifically about the writing here.

>>14829193

Have you tried NetHack? It's a dungeon crawler, but it puts more focus on lateral thinking than level grinding, and it's full of surprises.

>>14829288

When I saw that Ascii art the first thing I thought of was Dwarf Fortress, which is also full of surprises. Seems to be a trend.

>>14829254

>warhammer books for children

>intentionally trying to turn your child into a turbosperg

this should be illegal

>>14829182

>>14829223

>>14829234

>>14829313

Look at all the great authors of Fantasy during the 80's, they're all Physicists, Chemists, Biologists or Mathmaticians. Look at the writers of Modern times, it's all failed Gender Studies students.

Gee, I wonder why writing as an art has degenerated.

>>14829410

Do you really feel qualified to judge the entirety of "writing as an art"?

>>14829313

If they even tried to imitate them it would be better than what we have right now. Those fucks listened to some communist asshat teaching bullshit like "creative writing" instead of actually thinking about what made the old fantasy material good. That is when they didn't actually study bullshit like gender studies or african history.

>>14829410

Scientists were particularly involved in writing sci-fi when not actually working on their research papers. Fantasy had more varied backgrounds. Still, drones shat out of communist brainwashing camps they were not.

>its the /tg/ autist again

>>>/tg/

Recommend me some top tier fantasy literature. I am in the mood. I already read most kg the classics Robert Howard, Tolkien, Robert Jordan. Give me something so schlocky it trandscends its inherent shittiness and becomes great. Give me the real business. That weird tales shit

>>14829429

Doesn't take a Master chef to know the difference between fine dining and fast food.

In terms of the art of writing, one was written by people with great knowledge of the world and whose job often involved a lot of writing. They had many sources of inspiration and had great experience with how words work.

The other probably took up prostitution to pay for their tuition. They shunned criticism and relied on isolating themselves from reality to prevent their feelings from being hurt.

Out of the two, which do you think would be a better writer?

>>14829453

>greatest fantasy author of all time was a language and literature professor

So not a film studies major who failed their way out of hollywood and was desperate for work?

Thanks for making my own point for me, which was that the greatest authors were learned people rather than sheltered children.

>>14829457

I think the better rhetorician relies less on sweeping generalizations and provides examples of his claims.

>>14829456

How about you read something that won't turn your mind derivative? Read the inspirations, not the inspired. Don't read Tolkien, read the Sagas, the Bible and Beowulf.

>>14829466

You listed STEM and STEM alone, making me assume you were one of those people.

>the greatest authors were learned people rather than sheltered children

But learned people are and were sheltered. The people who weren't sheltered in those days could write only a little more than their name.

>>14829494

I already did mate. I want to read something more contemporary.

>>14829456

Read the Thomas Covenant books

>>14829499

Give me a thin rundown. What can I expect?

>>14829269

It truly makes me sad that the company that made The Riddle of Steel rpg died. It was one of the most innovative rpgs I've seen with mechanics that could improve both tabletop rpgs and vidya rpgs as a whole.

>>14829503

shitty generic anglo-writing

>>14829493

You want examples? Let's take H.G. Wells, who was on Scholarship to study biology. How about Arthur Conan Doyle, who was a Physician?

Let's compare this to the latest Award winning fantasy writer; Catherine webb. Winner of the World Fantasy Award. Who studied at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.

This echoes what another anon mentioned before. That previous authors were inspired by the world around them while current authors were inspired by other books. One would lead to new ideas, the other would lead to an incestuous genre that encourages corruption. Remember the Hugo awards disaster?

>>14829548

Speaking of the Hugo award, the current winner is N. K. Jemisin. She is a psychologist and career counsellor who's work had "a wide variety of themes, including cultural conflict and oppression".

>>14829560

A fragment of the Synopsis of her award winning book.

>"Nassun and Schaffa reach the ruins of a city in the Antarctic region, from which Schaffa believes transportation is available to Corepoint. They descend into the ruins, where it is revealed that the Earth itself is a living consciousness, furious with humanity's attempts to control it and the loss of Earth's moon, which Earth blames humanity for. The core is rich with the magical energy that forms the Earth's consciousness, and Nassun realizes this directly fuels the Guardians' abilities and longevity through an iron shard embedded in their brains.".

>>14829586

Sounds like the plot of an SMT game.

>>14829548

>H.G. Wells

>Arthur Conan Doyle

Their story and characters are shit. Them along with all those Jules Verne type of authors only know how to write spectacles after spectacles or plot points, not characters with actual emotions and motivations. They're no match to artistically acclaimed authors such as Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Hermann Hesse, or even GK Chesterton.

>latest Award winning fantasy writer

Who gives a shit about latest award winners of anything, they're all shit, not only limited to writing.

>>14829743

I also like Goncharov, Gogol, and Thomas Mann tbh.

>>14829743

>He doesn't enjoy Tarkovsky

How uncultured.

>>14829753

Tolstoy isn't Tarkovsky

>>14829456

The Blade Itself and sequels are modern, but they aren't really derivative in my opinion, and certainly not comparable to the trash marxists shit out. I don't know if Joe Abercrombie is a marxist, but from his writing and his appearance it's doubtful.

>>14829762

You're right, Tarkovsky is far more superior. He's the Todd Howard of the Film industry.

>>14829743

>>14829753

>>14829762

>>14829787

shut up shut up

>>14829804

>loses an argument

>u hav no reading compursion!

>>14829805

Not to mention the Black Company series, which was completely original and enthralling.

>>14829804

Sounds like our Tarkovsky autist who hasn't appeared in a while.

>>14829238

>ancient

Living under a rock.

>>14829182

> The "no bullying" policies allowed them to start early.

But anon these "nerds" are bullies themselves now.

>Now being a hipster faggot furry tranny nerd is cool.

>>14829805

Jack Vance is not 80s ffs, he is 60s. In the the 1960 he was 44 years old and he was product of completely different era.

>>14829453

>they're all Physicists, Chemists, Biologists or Mathmaticians

Not necessary, what they need is greater knowledge and experience than readers otherwise they have nothing to tell. Coming from the natural science helps but is not mandatory. Any sort of experience and real achievements helps.

oh wait, this

>>14829457

>They had many sources of inspiration and had great experience with how words work.

>The other probably took up prostitution to pay for their tuition.

If only. Prostitution may supply multifaceted experience though high intellect people have difficulties to write it down as they probably would kill themselves. Problem that tuition crusade of "others" starts and ends with boring words "i took the loan".

>>14829453

>was a language and literature professor

Back in the days been language and literature professor meant things. Discovering things others don't know discovering world without leaving your library. But know it becomes more and more just rank badge of propaganda corp.

Any time any kind of social organism attracts more and more people, it gets worse.

>>14829548

>Remember the Hugo awards disaster?

Isn't that an ongoing clusterfuck? Last I remember the leftists in charge vowed to change the rules to not allow anyone else to use the nepotistic system they put in place against them.

>>14830924

At least when GRRM writes filth it's that honest kind of shit that actually could happen to people, and he always tries to fist it in with as much levity as humanly possible. It's filth but it's honest and sincere. The man knows how to make you feel as uncomfortable as humanly possible but his reputation as a filth writer is undeserved. He's not Piers Anthony.

>>14830942

>The man knows how to make you feel as uncomfortable as humanly possible

And why would I want to feel like that reading a book about fantasy medieval politics and a magical ice genocide? I want to have fun, to read about clever plots and exciting events, not banquets, his rape fetish and feces. Prince of Thorns does it far better because at least Jorge knows he's stuck in a shit word and gives it the middle finger at every opportunity.

Also, let's not forget GRRM got butthurt someone crashed the leftist Hugo party and said they broke "an agreement between gentlemen". He's a hack with a well deserved reputation as a hack.

>>14830953

>not banquets

What is your problems with banquets? You know that in medical world feast was main social and entertainment event, they didn't have TV. Here is the point of ASoIaF succces. It written from completely different point of view than fantasy before it did. Its written from POV of kings and princes, from teh inside castle. Fantasy before was mainly written from the POV of wanderers, AD&D party (aka dirty hobos) who are usually are not allowed into castles and they stay outside in cold dark night and envy feasts going inside. When they get inside they do it by the force of the sword or trickery, they don't belong to this world, they are bandits and thieves.

ASoIaF POV makes it stand out and have little competition. Of course there are people conditioned by previous fantasy to associate themselves with hobos who are not allowed to the feast in the castle.

>>14831046

This so much. The main problem fantasy has is that every other new fantasy world written by either a nobody or a known writer is that they do not innovate. They just pick up that kick ass D&D campaign they played some years ago, twist it a bit, make characters sligthly more consistent than your average PC, and call it a day.

Notice how they are all vaguely medieval Europe, but with wizards and dragons? You may argue this is not true for your favourite fantasy world, because they tend to disguise it with small twists, or even big, batshit insane twists, but these tend to be ignored and just casually exposed once to know that yes, the writer is capable of original thought, but they prefer to go the easy way and write about a guy with a sword and a guy with robes and a silly hat who are on a quest to save the world/kill a dragon/acquire the macguffin. Case in point, TES: it's full of batshit insane lore, but what do you get to play in the games? Oh, an ancient evil awakens. Again. Go kill it with european styled medieval weapons or fireballs. Morrowind and Shivering Isles (specially the latter) were better, but they did not break away from this trend.

What about, I don't know, basing your game on Native American (either north American or south American, both would be interesting)? They have some pretty extensive and interesting lore and aeathetics that has not been exploited to death yet, unlike north European or Greek mythology. What about using Hindi lore? Now THAT's batshit insane. Asura's Wrath was based on Hindi lore and we all know how cool that anime was. What about alien fantasy, as in something so weird it would be hard to pinpoint it to a specific culture? But no, you have to ape Tolkien. Again. Fuck your elves.

I assume these are the people who go on StackExchange Writers and ask how to make a story based on the Hero's Journey. Why even write if you have nothing special to explain?

>>14831277

>What about, I don't know, basing your game on Native American (either north American or south American, both would be interesting)? They have some pretty extensive and interesting lore and aeathetics that has not been exploited to death yet

But what sort of people would be studying that lore and what is their trade?

>>14829106

>Is it because games just copy D&D?

Yes

/thread

>>14831277

It's funny that you criticize Morrowind for being generic while ignoring all the batshit crazy things that happen in even the main quest itself.

For a bit of quick context, the writer was a religious studies graduate and had knowledge of Catholicism.

He made Morrowind based on Jesus and the 12 Disciples. The Dumner were a desert tribe with a demon worshipping religion who was conquered by a Roman-esqe empire and now most of them want a chosen religious figure to free them. There are many fake chosen ones, but our protagonist clears the trials. He journeys into the desert to face the Devil who tempts him. Ultimately the hero refuses the offer.

This isn't even getting into how you clear the trials of the Chosen one by assassinations, slavery and sexual favours. Or how you spend most of the game not fighting and mostly tracking down books to learn who you are and who your enemy is.

For all of Morrowind's faults, being generic is not one of them.

>>14830771

>cherrypick anons' posts without actually responding to their points

I replied to them all and argued against all their points tho.

>namedumping famous authors to impress shitters

Only named the relevant ones.

>red herrings

It was you who just didn't understand the important issues I was addressing.

>>14830953

>He only likes comfortable and safe fiction that makes him feel good.

>He wants to pretend people don't get laid or get raped during war.

Go read Harry Potter you fag.

>>14831356

Don't get me wrong, I wasn't talking about storylines , but about settings. GoT also has plenty batshit insane events in its plot, but it is still generic fantashit, only somewhat saved by the fact that it is low fantasy, which is rarer than high fantasy.

Morrowind may have a good plotline, but it is still a story about elves, the chosen one, gods, fireballs and questionable guilds without an actual craft. It may be several notches above most other fantasy settings and stories, but it's hardly mind blowingly original, and being fantasy, a genre in which worldbuilding is even more important than sci-fi (also rotten to the core with "politics on space" nowadays), it should be.

>>14830924

>This was from a Star Wars book

When I saw this posted before I thought it was from some weird leftist fetish book.

>>14829200

>>14829223

>>14829265

>>14829272

>>14829313

>>14829410

>>14829453

>>14829457

>>14830933

>>14831046

Reading those has given me hope, that not all is lost.

(((Futurians))), (((ACE Books))), (((Hugo Awards))) and all those failed women with or without communication, art and design degrees fucked most of it up.

>>14831414

Check out Amid Evil. I never played it but you might like it.

>>14831401

The funny thing is that all the big publishers are recording losses across the board as readers of science fiction and fantasy leave in droves and authors decide to go the self-publishing route.

Novels are another thing women have ruined for everyone, since 99% of all editorial positions in big publishing companies are filled with women, and they gatekeep anything that isn't kosher like the traitorous harlots they are. If you ever wondered why no book that gets published in the West is wroth the paper it's printed on, that's your answer.

>>14831396

And then this clown has the gall to ridicule Tolkien because he didn't bore us with Aragon's tax policies. I find it funny that the guy that actually lived through Hell on Earth during WW1, that marched through mud, guts, shit and piss, and watched his friends die miserable and meaningless deaths, that had to sit at home while two of his sons went to fight in WW2 decided to write a book like Lord of the Rings, that didn't actively try to shock the audience, but tell a compelling story about likeable characters, while some fat pig that likely hasn't seen his penis in three decades thinks he's the better author because he spends pages describing the cast's bowel movements in excruciating detail.

>>14829410

>during the 80s

Before the 80s.

The present day managed to kill what communist pseudointellectuals couldn't kill.

It's actually pretty impressive.

>>14831397

>elves, the chosen one, gods, fireballs and questionable guilds

To be fair, other than magic each element has a twist to it.

Elves are degenerates divine beings who want to genocide the world to take back their rightful place.

The whole point of the "the Chosen one" story in Morrowind was that there was no chosen one and that the Daedra Azura was randomly throwing people at the problem until it got fixed.

The Gods are all dead and this is an important part of the story.

Other than the imperial thieves guild, all the guilds make sense in some way.

>>14831497

>Aragon's tax policies

It would make for an interesting story if done right, especially considering how taxes were done back in the day.

The Roman empire for example tried to give the task to the whoever could do it best. What ended up happening was that the people who were hired acted like Robber Barons and terrorized their assigned lands for money and kept most of it for themselves.

>>14831497

LotR is ultimately an uplifting, optimistic work. Its about raising your spirits. That's why he doesn't bog down the story with tax plans or other mundane issues. The classic tales and myths didn't so neither did LotR.

>>14831381

Don't worry, I'm quite certain you don't understand them either.

>>14831537

You can have both, nigger. The problem with GRRM isn't his writing, it's the fact that he's canonically dead as an author. There is no fucking way he is finishing A Dream of Spring before he croaks.

>>14829106

You don't get into writing for videogames if you're good at writing, and everything retards produce is shit.

western rpgs are shit OP

JRPGs are better

>>14831046

liberals don't actually care about diversity

when they're white, they just want to virtue signal

when they aren't white, they just want more of their race in their and for their generally superior competition(white people)to be beaten down as much as possible

when given a choice between killing, subverting, dragging down, or otherwise stopping their competition WITHOUT becoming better than them, or becoming better than their competition, liberals will NEVER become better than their competition

liberals are inherently opposed to meritocracy; you can ask /pol/ for more about this

>>14831729

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crab_mentality

>The metaphor refers to a bucket of live crabs, some of which could easily escape,[2] but other crabs pull them back down to prevent any from getting out, ensuring the group's collective demise.

>>14831729

>>14831750

I remember when TVtropes had a massive shitfit over this and they deleted like half the trope page. If you found it now it would probably be nothing but villainous examples in Doctor Who or some shit and how they're badong.

Because the golden age of western fantasy is long past, and video games missed it. Contemporary western fantasy fiction is dogshit too, but there's a large backlog of stuff that's actually good you can read instead, so it's not as noticeable.

>>14831750

I've never understood the mentality, but I know it prevents people from working together even when everyone stands to benefit. As far as I can tell, those people have difficulty thinking outside of the social circles they find themselves in. It is amazing that companies would hire people with such a combative mentality to be community managers. Somehow they believe the person attacking everyone around them isn't going to do the same to their employees and customers.

>>14833015

While I don't scientific proof I have a pretty simple explanation. It's a holdover of a primitive behavior usually found in solitary animals from before civilization. The reasoning for this goes like this: they are hogging a resource I want so to get the resource I will chase away or kill the animal hogging the resource.

Of course such behavior doesn't actually work in a civilized setting but they will try it anyway over and over like an animal that can't rise above their instincts. The mistake you making with these "people" is assuming they are people and not animals that walk on two legs.

>>14833050

Armchair is a meaningful insult when it's about a meaningful college title

>>14831750

>le crab mentats

>wikipedia as a source

get your nigger memes out of here and go woke someplace else

>>14829106

The rainbow hairs and beardmen destroyed it.

>>14829106

Too much high fantasy instead of dark fantasy. High fantasy is too utopian and derivative.

>>14833251

This shit is neither high fantasy nor dark fantasy. It's contemporary sociopolitical soapboxing wearing cheap elf ears and practically the genre equivalent of Halloween.

>>14833087

It is odd that it applies to situations that have no resources associated with them, like grades. Though, I guess in that case higher grades may provide access to more resources later on. Also, people get mad at the top performers when grading on a curve since it impacts their score. Damn, I remember all the times I got booted from servers for doing too well. I'd get accused of botting. It was nothing more than a strategy to eliminate competition and get above a 1:1 kill/death ratio. If I had a 22:4 ratio, then that sent many people under 1:1.

>>14831046

It would be more interesting to seek out myths which are markedly different at their base, because otherwise you'd just end up applying a different coat of paint to the same base. Like the Indo-European dragon slaying myth. The Nips have a myth which not only concerns itself with slaying a dragon, but follows the same formula as the IE one. It contains all the necessary ingredients - slayer is the god of lightning, dragon is a multi-headed serpent connected to the water (often being the representation of an actual body of water), the dragon's death releases pent-up waters, the dragon holds a symbol of fertility as hostage, the killing weapon which is the representation of lightning, even if bladed, causes wounds which would be done by a blunt weapon, along with marks of scorching, you even have the line "and [he] slew the serpent" repeated over and over again. This is often the case throughout the old continent, you've got a lot of those myths which follow the same formula.

>>14833050

>Armchair Literature

Where else do you think literary criticism is done? While mountain climbing? Fucking retard.

>>14830924

Ask me how I know the author of that book was jewish.

Does Poland count as "The West"? Because The Witcher has an awesome setting.

>>14833324

how do you know the author of that book was jewish?

>>14829106

The modern fantasy and Science Fiction genres are pozzed, and have been for decades, it'll pnly get worse. It's only natural it'd affect games too.

>>14833301

>It is odd that it applies to situations that have no resources associated with them, like grades

It certainly is weird but then again we were never function under such systems and as matter as most of what is wrong with modern society is that we were never meant to function under such systems.

>Damn, I remember all the times I got booted from servers for doing too well. I'd get accused of botting. It was nothing more than a strategy to eliminate competition and get above a 1:1 kill/death ratio. If I had a 22:4 ratio, then that sent many people under 1:1.

They might very well believe you are cheating as a rationalization of their desire to eliminate the competition. Everyone here should be aware of and possibly have witnessed the mind's ability to perform mental gymnastics.

>>14833341

>Video decrying "ideological conquest"

>Open it up, it's a furry.

Like pottery.

>>14833308

>>14833381

Honest question here: when and where did you graduate from mandatory schooling and was it public? When I was in High School we had teachers practically browbeating us to pass up scholarships "so the less fortunate could get in" and would constantly try to to instigate classmates against each other over the stupidest shit. This was nearly 10 years ago and in a nearly rural area so I can't even imagine how bad it is now.

>>14833427

Thank God I live in slavland where teachers are either drunk and mean or drunk and happy. You can't imagine how living under communism for a few decades can inoculate the populace against Marxism.

>>14833423

There is an argument to be made that he's /our/ furry. It's actually the best summary I know of in regards to what happened with sci-fi and fantasy publishing, despite the furry meme. Even the normalfags are catching on the fact the leftist zeitgeist has infiltrated everything.

also, that same video's been posted here for years

>>14833427

I must have been lucky then, because the teachers at my school always insisted everyone get every scholarship and extra credit thing they could.

>>14833427

East coast about 7 years ago. I hindsight I should have skipped out on high school and gone for a technical school but I was too young and had poor parenting to realize or know such a potential option.

>>14833455

>>14833423

>>14833341

Furry or not, the faggot has some points and in the end results are all that matters. If the furfag succeeds then we benefit and if he fails he'll be burnt like a faggot in Rome.

I see nothing wrong with using him.

>>14830924

You shit on GRRM but at least he actually knows HOW to write, even if the WHAT is dubious. A lot of the trash published nowadays reads like it was written by a fucking high schooler

>>14833634

Oh, sure, he can string a bunch of words together, I'll give you that, but 80% of what he wrote for ASoIaF is useless filler. He himself admits he has no actual plan and just keeps writing and rewriting the plot for years on end.

>>14833341

I've mostly read the older stories. I enjoy a focus on smaller groups of adventurers in a world that is primarily savage. Challenges adventurers are faced with rather than kingdoms or worlds. I dislike epic stories. An epic journey is fine, but epic like nearly every RPG? No. Look at Dwarf Fortress. You have a fort. Nethack, you are in a single dungeon and your goal is to get an amulet to offer to your deity. You aren't saving the world. Being forced to save worthless NPCs has made me fatigued with RPGs. It has gotten to the point where those lazy fucks hand out their daily tasks and give you errands to make their lives easier. Western RPGs have become literal chores.

>>14829453

>Consanguinity

That's an excellent word. Thank you for that.

>>14829499

>Thomas Covenant

Here here!

>>14829503

It's Tolkien, but not Tolkien. Not far from >>14829517 but they're decent reads all the same.

>>14829456

T.H. White is also good, I don't think I've seen him mentioned here.

>>14829269

I've been playing DCC (Dungeon Crawl Classics) lately and it's not bad for being simple, it's just a different genre, like casual vidya, basically. The old DnD is still there for people to play and you aren't losing any hardcore players to casual shit like DCC any more than the MPAA is losing sales to piracy.

>>14829787

>Only an educated man could shitpost this hard.

Are we the lost writers the genre is looking for?

>>14829805

>Dying Earth

I really need to re-read Hyperion and then get to those books too.

>>14833634

Knowing how to write grammatically correct English should be a base expectation for any writer in any genre, not something worth praising an author for. And there is nothing particularly praiseworthy about GRRM's prose; it doesn't distract the reader by being bad, but it doesn't impress anyone either. It's a background element. Given a book format like ASOIAF, with multiple viewpoint characters, the bare minimum for a more skilled author like myself would be to vary the prose style between characters to enhance characterization.

>Why aint games as gud as books doo hoo

jewish subversion

>>14833962

I don't mean grammatialy correct, I mean knowing shit live show vs tell

>>14834010

Which should also be standard for anyone considered an author. Unfortunately the gatekeepers of the modern day don't care at all about literature and will publish the most disgusting shit cocktail of a "book" if it pushes the right agenda.

>>14834039

I hate the nigger on the right so god damn much.

>>14833664

>Hyperion

Try reading Flashback by the same author. It takes place in a world where Commiefornia is about to be taken over by La Raza (with a leftist professor wondering where it all went so wrong) and Israel has been nuked out of existence. It made leftists very butthurt.

>>14834039

I'd pay to watch a nigger sow try and play Kerbal Space Program.

>>14834023

Yeah, I agree.

>>14833962

>Knowing how to write grammatically correct English should be a base expectation for any writer in any genre, not something worth praising an author for.

I am fucking sold

This.

>>14834053

>Flashback

>>14834124

Holy FUCK I am a retard.

"I am fucking sold" should have been beneath

>Flashback

>>14829106

It's because setting does not make a story interesting. Structure makes a story interesting and therefore only someone skilled in structuring a story can produce interesting writing. In order to be remotely successful as an author or screenwriter, you need to know story structure and understand how to develop characters. Even though television and movie producers constantly hire plenty of untalented writers, they all went to school (or at least practiced often) and developed adequate skill in basic story structure.

Video game writers have no such skill. Even back in the days when RPGs were actually good, video game writers had no experience or skill in story structure. At most, they had DM experience.

Are the books by Pat Rothfuss worth reading? I've heard tons of praise for them but he seems to be dangerously apathetic about actually finishing up and watching one panel where he's speaking was alright until he gets preachy and then I check another video of a panel he did and he just plays the same cards like a comedian recycling the same jokes.

>>14833515

Thats one great article. Thanks.

>"Towering above all, though, was (and still is) my unabashed obsession with the two titanic literary talents chiefly responsible for birthing the entire shebang: J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973) and Robert E. Howard (1906-1936). I consider each the complete equal of the other, two flat-out geniuses destined to be remembered and reread hundreds of years after the Pulitzer-winning authors praised by most mainstream critics are forgotten."

>"But it was only recently, after decades of ever-increasing reading disappointment, that I grudgingly began to admit the truth: I don’t particularly care for fantasy per se. What I actually cherish is something far more rare: the elevated prose poetry, mythopoeic subcreation, and thematic richness that only the best fantasy achieves, and that echoes in important particulars the myths and fables of old."

>"Soiling the building blocks and well-known tropes of our treasured modern myths is no different than other artists taking a crucifix and dipping it in urine, covering it in ants, or smearing it with feces. In the end, it’s just another small, pathetic chapter in the decades-long slide of Western civilization into suicidal self-loathing. It’s a well-worn road: bored middle-class creatives (almost all of them college-educated liberals) living lives devoid of any greater purpose inevitably reach out for anything deemed sacred by the conservatives populating any artistic field. They co-opt the language, the plots, the characters, the cliches, the marketing, and proceed to deconstruct it all like a mad doctor performing an autopsy. Then, using cynicism, profanity, scatology, dark humor, and nihilism, they put it back together into a Frankenstein’s monster designed to shock, outrage, offend, and dishearten."

>>14829106

> Is it because games just copy D&D?

Japs copy DnD all the time, specifically the early editions because of an early cutoff of imports while DnD was still fresh in the mainstream.

>>14835082

>SJWs hate jews, that's why they began by being deployed to bust up Occupy Wall Street for jews

>/pol/ is just like SJWs because all I know is the false left-right dichotomy and I have no idea what third position means

Good post otherwise but holy shit if you don't lurk /pol/ enough to know which posts are and aren't from alphabet agencies, don't talk about /pol/.

>>14835082

hi sargon

>>14835333

>>14835121

No, SJW's absolutely do hate jews. Remember that the central tenant to SJW's bullshit is that they think that there's these interconnected webs of social systems made by the echelons of society meant to keep minorities and women down (note the similarity with /pol/'s delusions here). and white males up top. Jews are overwhelmingly wealthy, upper class people in charge of huge corporations and organizations that wield immense social power. They are also white. They are LITERALLY the exact sort of thing that SJW's point to to prove their point.

Obviously they won't just come out and say it, or view jews as bad the same way that /pol/tards think jews are ethnically tainted, but on the privilege totem pole jews are viewed as oppressors, not as the oppressed. Likewise, they view Israel's actions towards Palestinians as oppression and tyrannical. You can look up articles about pro-Zionist feminists being harassed and cannibalized by other SJW's, even.

>Most guys who promote SJW ideals are Jews

That's not mutually exclusive with SJW's hating jews, though: Plenty of SJW's are white and men, despite SJW's hating those group, remember? People in the "oppressor" social groups are allowed into social justice circles as long as they check their privilege or whatever and be "woke" about how privileged they are. Read your own image: literally the first set of posts in it has the guy noting how as jews they are more privileged and need to use it to stand up for minorities.

>/pol/ is just like SJWs because all I know is the false left-right dichotomy and I have no idea what third position means

>f you don't lurk /pol/ enough to know which posts are and aren't from alphabet agencies

I used to lurk /pol/, m8, I know what i'm talking about. Way back in 2013 you might be arguably riight but ever since social justice bullshit has gotten more and more out of hand /pol/ has gone from, as you imply, a sort of third "grey" position rather then right/red left/blue, (I would actually argue that a LOT of people online, even normiie as fuck places like certain parts plebbit, lean "gray" rather then right/left, with old /pol/ / most imageeboards/MRA's/GG being '"far gray"); to just outright far right out of reactionism. You see this on /v/ as well, with generalizing all people on the left/liberals as SJW's.

Back when the NSA leaks first happened, /pol/ still had enough standards to see it as a bad thing. I even started some threads to try to start some IRL protests, and it actually got traction to where there was a geneeral and a fourm set up for organization with around 100 people participating. The whole "Resist PRISM" logo that gets posted everywhere online was from that. But even just a few years later you litterally saw /pol/ defend mass surveillance and other bullshit just because the dems/SJW's were against it. You see the same shit now with Net Neutrality. And even back years ago, /pol/ still had a lot of delusional race shit too.

T. being jewish myself, i've seen plenty of SJW bullshit that's basically a mirror image of /pol/'s about jews; and the reason the protest effort fell apart on /pol/ was because despite the fact I was legitimately wanting to do what I could to make a difference in stopping NSA spying. Also, in case you aree wondering, I don't feel informed enough to have an opinion on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but I lean anti Israeli based on what I do know

That being said when I had to go find the image just now it seems like the guy who made the symbol ended up making his own campaign io, which is where the image spread from there, so i'm glad that SOMETHING good came out of it.

>>14835435

>>14835432

Motherfuckeer I also forgot to sage since this if off topic

god damn it

>>14833327

Fixation on flatulence for several pages.

>>14835443

that's were the god games should've stepped in

>>14829456

Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath by HP Lovecraft. I would read some of his other short stories before it especially Celephais and Kadath. Pickman as well.

But its a great story, with nigger kidnapping aliens, and moon ships.

>>14835082

>SJW's actually hate jews, m8.

But you can't deny they are jews. I can't help but assume americans are mostly jewblooded no matter what religion they have.

>>14835856

Only a jew could turn into an ubber soy boy and suicide culturally.

You have to face it, America. Most of you have the jew gene that will explode any time and turn you into a crazy leftist.

>>14835877

Says the kike.

>>14835432

>paragraphs and paragraphs of pilpul

>btw I'm Jewish

Jesus Christ.

>>14835948

Considering I had to look up what the fuck pilpul even means, you are apparently a better one then I am.

Anyways, nice dismissal of everything I said.

>>14835948

Considering how the LoL referral bot keeps getting deleted on time yet his whiny diatribe stays up I'd be willing to bet it's cakeboy himself.

>>14835962

Your entire rhetorical basis is "i-it's not race goy" despite kikes being thrown out of everywhere 350 times for acting like kikes, using "gray" instead of "National Socialism" and, again, being unable to differentiate between FBI agents trying to keep the "pro-whites are skinheads who hate niggers" thing going, on a board where 20 stories a day are posted about kikes just openly being anti-white at this point. Unreal. Too lazy to find and post Igraduallybegantohatethem.jpg so just pretend I did.

To be clear for anyone else bothering to read this, it doesn't matter who SJWs think they dislike because they are merely being used to undermine anything they're inserted in like the useful idiots they are, while being managed by jews the entire fucking time, because they don't hate jews or jewishness, they hate rich jews (and rich anyone else) for completely baseless, selfish reasons while being completely ignorant of how they assist them. They are broken and easy to manipulate due to drugs or owing the IRS or being a pedophile or any of the other things we found on them during GG, and yet they're employed by jews writing garbage article after garbage article.

>>14835432

>the Aztec shilling spic that spergs out in every thread and floods it with pictures of spic "civilization" is Marxist kike

No one saw this one coming.

What's the name of that fantasy series where women are basically sex slaves and humans are held captive by like aliens who keep them at the technological level of the bronze age or something like that? I remember all the covers looking great and the entire series basically being memory holed completely by modern critics and gatekeepers for being so ridiculously un pc for the current year. They came out in like the 60s or 70s I think.

>>14829234

So the next mass shooting will be commited by /tg/…

>>14829712

> not characters with actual emotions and motivation

All motivations are real, though not always good. This simplification and name calling between real and not real shows us that you know nothing about critique.

>>14836309

Bonus trivia is that the author wrote them as response to feminists screeching during the 60s and 70s.

>>14836310

>>14836376

We have IDs.

>>14829223

>Hell if I was one of those greats I'd drink myself to death just looking at the garbage that is produced by this generation.

No, you'd print your own work and make a killing. You think these people were dumb?

>>14836426

They had standards.

>>14836431

And they still wanted to make money. Talented writers have no problem selling their product in this day and age, especially when they can self-publish and keep all the money for themselves. This is very common for nonfiction work.

>>14836453

>they're not doing it for propaganda!

You're a special brand of retard. Either that or you've just slithered here from cuckchan.

>>14836472

Occam's Razor says incompetence is more likely than malice. It's easier to be retarded than it is to formulate a conspiracy.

As it pertains to fiction book publishers, there is the general assumption that the only way they are able to grow their customer base is to make books for children, teens and young adults who are all in school and thus forced into bookstores for summer reading/textbooks in the first place. This is why there's so much teen and YA literature: because that's the point where most people stop reading. Affecting this is the aforementioned textbooks, which is where the remaining booksellers make most of their money. Fiction books are largely seen as recreational items that skim what "core" sales weren't able to pick up. And once they do get the next big thing the goal is to upsell people not on sequels but on comic and film adaptations which bring in more money.

The only conspiracy here are textbooks, because students can be forced into buying brand new ones every year assuming they aren't forced to get them through a (((subscription))) based service made plausible by the NCLB and Common Core. Which is where publishers are refocusing their efforts: to sell textbooks (or just subscriptions to e-textbooks) directly to students without a middleman. In this way they chive maximum profit. Fiction books are rapidly becoming this leftover thing from another era that nobody really wants anymore. Those that do, self-publish like nonfiction writers often have to.

>>14836523

>Occam's Razor says incompetence is more likely than malice. It's easier to be retarded than it is to formulate a conspiracy.

They're Jews, anon. Hollywood and the gaming industry are proof enough they're perfectly willing to burn billions to push propaganda. If you want a closer analogue to books just look at what they've done to comics. Entities that want to make a shekel do not behave as Marvel and DC do. Book publishers, especially those publishing fantasy and science fiction, do not publish the garbage they do if they want to make money off the white, heterosexual, male audience. And it's obvious there is market for these books considering how flooded Amazon is with all manner of self-published crap that sells like hotcakes.

Like a naive fool you base your conclusions on how a human would think and do, not a Jew, and that's why you reached the wrong answer.

>>14836569

Yeah, because Hollywood and Kikeflix haven't been churning out garbage like Harry Potter, 50 Shades of Gray, the Expanse, Altered Carbon, American Gods et al at an accelerated pace.

Is that you Aztec kike? Did you switch your IP to continue trying to calm the goyim? You do realize no one buys your stupid fucking garbage since it's a widely known fact that leftists actively gatekeep and thought police novels to ensure only kosher stories are fed to the gentiles.

>>14836575

>Yeah, because Hollywood and Kikeflix haven't been churning out garbage like Harry Potter, 50 Shades of Gray, the Expanse, Altered Carbon, American Gods et al at an accelerated pace.

What does that have to do with anything? All those things just go to prove that jews wanting to do nonfiction investments should put their money into comics, movies or TV not books. The remaining jews in the print publishing industry then focus on education/textbooks because that's where the real money is. Fiction print books then become an afterthought, at best used to kickstart larger multimedia empires that make money from things other than print books.

>Is that you Aztec kike?

No and you're being retarded for accusing me of it just because you're too stupid to realize why kikes made the NCLB Act and the Common Core. Seriously, just how fucking stupid are you?

>>14836634

The author is a butthurt leftist.

>>14836639

>Michael Moorcock

>more cock

Gee, I wonder why…

>>14829456

There was this one fantasy novel from the 80s where the party sends their female members into an enemy camp so the enemy can tire themselves out by raping them all night, allowing the men to kill them all while they rested. I can't remember what it was called though.

>>14837293

That sounds like a plan the captain from Sealab 2021 would come up with.

>>14837293

Guardians of the Flame by (((Joel Rosenberg)))

>>14837428

Yeah, that was it. Figures it would be written by one of (((them))).

>>14835989

10/10 post

>>14836309

>Science fiction/fantasy author Michael Moorcock has suggested that the Gor novels should be placed on the top shelves of bookstores, saying, "I’m not for censorship but I am for strategies which marginalize stuff that works to objectify women and suggests women enjoy being beaten."

Yep that's the one, thanks man.

>>14835432

Oy vey.

>>14836309

>>14839201

You know, a funny thing about slavery is that it can be used to portray an incredibly opressive world in a very cool way. We have this idea that all slaves actually want to be free and only remain enslaved due to death threats and similar.

What's not so often portrayed is the idea that maybe the world is so fucked up that you would never make it on your own out there. Maybe the economy is so terrible and the land so barren that you can't find a decent craft to earn a living or plant food to live.

If a world had a very small amount of usable land that was split between really powerfull warlords, submitting to slavery would be the most natural option to survive, but as a plot point, this works wonders to portray incredibly desperate situations and hopelessness far better than death threats.

>>14836639

Good thing he said to read Elric and not the author's biography or political manifesto then.

>>14850451

Modern people will never seem to understand that acceptance of your inferiority is freedom from the chains of resentment. Humility and obedience to them are innately oppressive, and so like a dog with no clear pack structure, they tear shit up and shit on the floor.

Reminder that this started early. There is the Fantasy series of Gor, a world where men are hyper masculine barbarian warriors and women are merely property for them to fuck and fight over. It got a cult following and spawned its own little BDSM fetish circle, complete with books on how women can best role play being the submissive sex slave for their wild fantasy barbarian partner. The publisher was making money hand over fist with the series, but a bunch of pissy liberal feminists types took over the publishing house. They sat on the series for 14 years. 14 Fucking years until the rights eventually expired and were finally handed back to the author. The author had to wait all those years, not able to self publish his own work and couldn't make a dime on his labor. All because the publisher decided it was wrong and offensive material and hated how triggering it was more than they love money.

>>14850705

Just in case you ever needed more proof that money is merely a means to an end.

>>14829106

The vast majority of fantasy - lit, games, movies, whatever - is fucking garbage and has been for a long time. Fantasy is basically incestuous at this point; newer works of fantasy are based on older works of fantasy instead of being based on ideas that someone thinks are interesting in their own right and as a result the foundation of the works are fucking garbage.

You can even see this reflected in individual properties - let's look at some of the more iconic D&D settings introduced and/or updated from edition to edition.

-AD&D-

>Greyhawk

Alternate earth (originally based on a medieval Chicago) with a fuckload of content, an ongoing history and six races of humans; whipped up by one legendary sperg in his basement

>Hollow World

A god who is a magic dinosaur used magic to hollow out the inside of the planet and used magic to turn it into a Doyle-esque living museum of the world's cultures, animals and life forms and keep it safe from the burrowing horrors gnawing at the core of the world

>Birthright

A world where people descended from dead gods acquire the power of their ancestors through connection to their ancestral lands; additional mechanics are provided for resource management and large-scale engagements

>Planescape

A setting based around factions warring for control of the various planes of existence, centered around a toroidal planar metropolis at the center of the entire cosmos which is ruled by a being so powerful that even gods don't dare to trespass.

>Ravenloft

A gothic horror setting based in the private kingdom of a vampire lord - the rules for good and evil in typical D&D are thrown out the window and everyone is at the mercy of eldritch forces that will probably grab you and drag you to hell if you get their attention

>Spelljammer

MOTHERFUCKING MAGIC SPACESHIPS. Go whaling for giant space squid, hunt down space dragons, use reality-disrupting warheads in naval battles and keep a space dinosaur as a pet. This is the coolest fucking shit ever.

>Dark Sun

A grimdark mash-up of Burroughs' Barsoom Cycle, Dune and a medieval Mad Max. The only cities are totalian city-states ruled by draconic sorcerer-kings, most of the monster races were exterminated by other races in the struggle for resources and everyone dresses like a Frank Frazetta painting.

-3.X-

>Eberron

Magipunk setting with sapient constructs, elemental constructions and slight variations on the usual suspects - halflings riding dinosaurs, jungle drow, etc. Generally bland.

>Ghostwalk

Set in the world of the dead, essentially a giant space underneath the world where the spirits of the dead can choose to stay instead of going to the afterlife. Interesting but more-or-less completely ignored by WotC.

>Grayhawk

Although ostensibly the default setting, the only love it ever got was a tiny B&W pamphlet and most people still have no idea that Greyhawk even made it into 3e

>Blackmoor

The same as 2e except less interesting

>Forgotten Realms

>Dragonlance

>Ravenloft

Half-assed adaptations of the AD&D content

-4e-

>Dark Sun

The best setting update in the three editions since AD&D 2e

>Nentir Vale

Respectable enough but intentionally slim on content.

>Everything else

More half-assed rehashes that replaced the stranger elements of the setting with more generic shit

-5e-

See 4e

>>14829410

Wasn't this the same for video games designers? If I recall, Bioware founders were both doctors.

>>14839232

>oven roasted shlomo

>not half-cooked schlomo

Put it back! It's not finished!

>>14859002

Consider visiting your local masonic lodge.

Ok. I'm just gonna go ahead and ask: What's a good cutoff year for western fantasy books before they all went to shit? I remember some of those Sad Puppies said that everything after 1984 was when things started going downhill.

>>14829772

>they aren't really derivative in my opinion

They absolutely are, the only difference is that there's a "twist" near the end of the books that's visible a thousand miles away. Joe just got away with it since he rode the first wave of Dark Fantasy stuff that was becoming popular during that time

>>14859032

The furfag in >>14833341 video has a good explanation. Around when the Commies were taking over is when things were going to shit.

>>14833341

There's a quote he uses in that video ~9:30. It's a man talking about the people who turned Science fiction from what it was in the 1930s, to what it is today. It's fucking SJWs.

>>14859187

Worse.

It's the Jews.

>>14859009

This actually isn't that bad of an idea. Fraternal organizations are like churches, but if the people there actually cared about you as a person and not a source of donation money.

>>14859219

But the masons do only care about you in terms of money and favours.

It is the catholic church that no longer cares about your money.

Strange times.

>>14859216

Yeah I got later into the vid. Communist Jews getting gate keeping jobs to push their agenda. Some things never change.

>>14859225

Favours go a long way. They don't lend favours in churches, and they certainly don't know eachother by name. I'm not advocating Freemasonry alone either, but the concept of a fraternal organization, any true and traditional (ie: no women, all members must be faithful to some sort of god/gods, etc. etc.) fraternal organization. I've never understood the fear regarding fraternities, they're generally positive towards fostering a community, and the sense of brotherhood about them appeals greatly to me.

>>14829499

>Thomas Covenant

Pretty good books, not my favorites, but very much worth reading.

>>14829805

>Book of the New Sun

this, 1000x

One of the best books mentioned in this thread. Possibly the very best.

>>14834577

>books by Pat Rothfuss

I don't think he has any idea where he's going with them, and was probably not expecting them to be so popular, or that there'd be so much pressure. I could be wrong about that though.

>>14834053

>Flashback

Thanks, I'll look into that. Was a big fan of Hyperion/Endymion.

>>14859718

Book of the Long Sun is very good as well. Anything by Gene Wolfe is top tier.

>>14834577

No. The main character is a pure Mary Sue whinging about everything while still succeeding at everything. Creates a race possibly more obnoxious than the Aiel. Features a go nowhere anime romance plot, even though the main character can romance any woman after fucking a fuck-god into submission in his first time having sex.

>>14829456

If you want intentional shlock you want david eddings, he literally wrote his books with the intention of making them as cliche and by the numbers as possible to prove a point that original =/= good

>>14829456

It's been forever but Dragons of Autumn Twilight from Weis and Hickman was one I remember as 'so bad it's good'.

The Malazan books from Erikson win the award for the most 'ok' series with the most obnoxious redditor fanbase. The author told them they are special if they read the books, and that the books are really difficult and aren't for everyone. I shit you not, they are transcriptions of his D&D sessions, barely reworked into novels.

>>14860289

I have read most of the main Malazan series and the hardest part about reading them is just how fucking boring they are and how badly they drag on. I hate leaving a book or series unfinished so I tried to slog through to the end but I had to stop about halfway through the last book, it was just such boring rambling pointless garbage.

Parts of the series are decent but most of it reads like a poorly done MMO tie-in novel and the author seems to have gotten worse at his trade as each book went on.

>>14862482

>>14860289

The dialog even boarders on Joss Whedon-tier at some points.

>>14862482

That's pretty much how I felt about them. There are interesting stories and characters scattered throughout a sea of drivel. There are entire books that are completely fucking pointless. As in, follow boring and shitty characters for hundreds of pages, and then at the end everyone dies and the entire county is completely destroyed. And it's not even a tragedy, because you gave zero fucks about any of the characters.

>>14851748

This too. I think Hollywood became dry as bone after 90s early 2000s because of the same reason

>>14850451

>If a world had a very small amount of usable land that was split between really powerfull warlords, submitting to slavery would be the most natural option to survive, but as a plot point, this works wonders to portray incredibly desperate situations and hopelessness far better than death threats.

It resembles more Medieval Feudal Europe than slavery. Majority of slaves were displaced population and at least in their mind their freedom, hope and happiness were in their motherland. Straight enslavement of your citizens were never a big thing. Voluntary submission was usually for lighter oppression one step above full slavery, i.e feudal serf, but it could be very measurable too and often drifted too the slavery direction as feudal really don't have reasons to not oppress his serfs more.

>>14862482

>most of it reads like a poorly done MMO tie-in novel

That's because it's literally the novelization of the author's GURPS campaign

Despite all the hogwash, I still think western has the best and most colorful/consistent fantasy setting i.e. Tolkien's Legendarium, Warhammer Fantasy Battle/40K, Conan the Barbarian's Cimmeria, Innsmouth…

>>14870436

Recently, the Witcher is pretty darn great too.

>>14829110

How?

>>14873477

Stolen from another author too.

>>14835432

good job killing any chance of good discussion about cool mesoamerican shit you dumb fucking kike

pelamela pinche judio puto

>>14829106

Because blandness sells.