#nonlinear storytelling

[iloveabunchofgames]

#JakeReviewsItch

A Normal Lost Phone

by Dear Villagers

Genre: Adventure, Interactive Fiction, Puzzle

Pitch: Look through text messages, photos, and more on a lost phone to learn about its owner.

My expectations: I've heard of this! I don't expect to have my mind blown, but this series is fairly well regarded, right? Is "normal" meant to be ironic, like I'm about to stumble upon some horrific mystery, or is this going to be a contemplative look at the hints at the life of an ordinary individual captured on a piece of consumer electronics? I hope it's the latter.

Review:

Content warnings are important. They are an encouraging sign of social progress, and I hope we never move backwards. It is awesome that we live in an era where it is common to respect each other’s sensitivities. I hate content warnings.

I hate when a well-crafted, slowly unfolding story—a story where all the mysteries would fall into place if you just knew that one crucial piece of missing information—gives away the whole game before it’s even begun. A Normal Lost Phone presents an absorbing slice of life, written with a masterful grasp of nonlinear storytelling and keenly observed characters, but I was on the lookout for the thing before I’d clicked past the title screen.

A content warning was the right call. No one who might be hurt by said content deserves to be caught off guard. I wish I had a better solution, but I don’t. I mean, I’m being as vague as I can, but I’ve already told you there’s a thing.

A single, admirable, necessary sentence tainted my experience, but it did not ruin it. The call to empathy and understanding still resonates. This story’s strength is not in its ending but its telling. Highly recommended.

+ Invites you into the life of a stranger. Spins an absorbing, painful, small-scale yarn within the confines of a phone, where all the disconnected, seemingly disconnected puzzle pieces click into place as the context is revealed. + Dreary indie pop from a surprising number of artists. It's not enough music to cover the game's total playtime, and I never found an option to make the playlist automatically repeat, but I found my fingers tapping along to the tunes often enough that I didn't mind having to manually reset it.

– Content warning gives away major themes too soon. The seemingly incongruous details that should be intriguing fall flat if you've already predicted where the story's going. (A content warning was still the right call.) – While I like the idea of the handful of password-cracking puzzles, and even felt satisfied with some of them in execution, it's a drag when you know you've seen the answer somewhere and have to dig through dozens of messages to get what you need. – SPOILER! SPOILER! SPOILER! Are you playing a character? Are you playing as yourself? This question is left to your imagination, but whoever you are, there's no reason to believe you have any connection whatsoever to the phone's owner or any of the characters in the story. In order to progress, you must read personal message, send sensitive messages and even photographs—not as yourself, a stranger who picked up a stranger's phone, but as Sam, the phone's owner. It's incredibly invasive, and it serves no purpose except to satisfy your own curiosity. Now, if I could do the thing that I would realistically do in this situation (look for contact information and return the phone to its owner without invading anyone's privacy), we wouldn't have a game. I don't feel bad about playing a game in the way it was intended, but I do feel weird about it. It's a game about feeling empathy for a person who keeps secrets; a person who is right to keep those secrets; a person whose secrets should be respected. And the goal is simply to satisfy my own curiosity, no matter what violations that entails? Weird, weird choice.

🧡🧡🧡🧡🤍

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[elliart7]

As things got worse and worse, Bobby always wondered what happened to his oldest and dearest friend.

(Story explanation under cut)

After losing his wife and daughter to divorce after an extremely turbulent marriage, Bobby is left trying to be his own person again while finally finishing the nursing degree he had to give up years ago.

While trying to find some quiet on the roof of the college’s life sciences building, he ends up in Nowhere Land. There he meets Isaac, a grad student and TA at the same school just months away from either finally earning his doctorate, or burning out worse than he ever has before under the pressure.

Memories surround them that they’d rather never remember, let alone live through, as they evade the twisted god of this realm to make it out alive together.

#art #digital art #comic #horror comic #horror art #original story #ocs #lgbt #queer #nonlinear storytelling #illustration #emotional abuse #fiction #elliartpost #original characters

[polyshipweek]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Stranger Things (TV 2016) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Eleven | Jane Hopper/Maxine "Max" Mayfield/Lucas Sinclair Additional Tags: Drabble Sequence, nonlinear storytelling, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - No Upside Down (Stranger Things) Summary:

Ten glimpses into the relationship of El, Max, and Lucas.

#polyshipweek23 #stranger things #nonlinear storytelling #drabble

[puppyeared]

Been LOVING your lil magician folks recently please continue they're beautiful and very cute and cool and also very well-designed!! 🥺❤️

thank you for the kind words !!! im not much of a writer, but i do have some sort of story in mind for them.. theyre bitter rivals who end up as roommates bc of their scatterbrained elderly landlord lol

#idk how much of it im gonna keep or change but thats basically the gist of it ^_^ #i dont know if i could ever write a solid linear story bc im very indecisive and tend to change things a lot so most of what i make ends up #very abstract or nonlinear.. just short drabbles or stuff that can be slotted into a general setting or premise #although i do want to challenge myself to try and write some sort of enemies/rivals to friends because i have a huge weak spot for that #dynamic!! i tend to be a little soft on my characters which i think has to do with me being a conflict avoidant person. so maybe exploring #this kind of dynamic will help me experiment with my sense of storytelling. although i cant promise it will be written well lol #im also thinking of making their story part of a bigger world so kinda like an omnibus?? i have another story in mind i think i can fit int #the same canon and itd be funny if theres like a bunch of wacky going ons between different apartment tenants nichijou style #but we'll see!!! thank you for your interest in these little shits!!!! #my art #myart #my oc #oc #presto #shuffle #house of cards #oc talk #ask #doodles #yapping

[muppet-on-a-spit]

just so it's so so so clear why i am Pained that book 5 doesn't exist: wouldn't it be crazy if book 5 took place not only right before Amelia got on the train up until she took it over from One, but also when she was with Hazel. imagine this movie going back and forth between the process of learning how the train works so she can take it from One (as she tries to hide her rising number from him) and learning about Hazel, and eventually how to protect her from being ejected like the rest of her failed experiments (all while her number goes back down, almost without her notice). in the 80s, when she thought she could crack the code of the train with logic and her knowledge of engineering, and in modern day, when she's learning that the train is created by the emotional experiences of passengers. she was never in control her cars, because they were always going to be shaped by her unresolved trauma and denial and guilt. watching her start to shape her belief that maybe one day she'll get Alrick back if she does whatever it takes, and then watching her break it down at the same time,, watching her learn to both take care of herself and stop being so deeply selfish in the future, while she digs herself into a self-destructive hole in the past. watching her learn how to create someone like Hazel, and then learn that she is responsible for what happens to her... AGH it would RUIN me. it would ruin me.

#infinity train is perfectly set up for some Fantastic nonlinear storytelling for amelia #nonlinear storytelling <3 #and remember. always remember that hazel is amelia's unresolved trauma. her hope. her inner child. etc etc #and learning how to take care of her & see her as a person is literally learning how to take care of herself #amelia hughes #infinity train #hazel infinity train #hazel hughes <3 🐢 #gray speaks

[mongeese]

I do feel an intense desire to parse what exactly all the different songs on jenny from thebes mean and how the narrative all fits together but I think that's sort of counterproductive. It doesn't matter what happened. What matters is that it was inevitable. What matter is that she's gone, always has been, always will be. Did she buy the Kawasaki during the album or did she always have it? Either way, it's somewhere in a wreckyard now. Every end point fixed forever on the day its arc began. Fate has this album in a death grip.

All that being said John please I would like detailed story notes and names and dates. Illustrations would be a plus but not necessary. Please

#jenny from thebes #tmg #listen. i support nonlinear and intentionally vague storytelling #and it wouldve felt dishonest to the character to spell things out #but PLEASE i want LORE

[rearranging-deck-chairs]

me trying to iron out my plot so it makes sense: accidentally turns scenes into a bootstrap paradoxes

#i dont mean a scene abt the bootstrap paradox or like a really cool nonlinear storytelling thing #i mean #i fucked up and made a scene into a loop somehow #ive done this multiple times #how does this keep happening #heshteg annoying

[strelitzien-gewaechs]

3!

OH HI there :D

3. What were your top five books of the year?

OH ok so in no actual order cos id sit here for 3 hours debating the order :D

There is a trend here with nonlinear storytelling and also books with footnotes which Im not surprised by

Howls Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones

its. its great its howls moving castle. i dont know what more i could say just that i wish i would've read it sooner lmao. i knew i was gonna adore the book and Sophie and Howl and everything and i was right :D

Our Wives Under The Sea by Julia Armfield

i adore the atmosphere of the book, the like eerie slowbun horror of the ocean. i read it at the beginning of the year and thinking about the book again really makes me want to read more sci fi/magical realism horror

Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett

Epistolary Novel with footnotes and its about Faeries? Absolutely no wonder that i enjoyed it so much. It also made me very nostalgic, and reminded me of listening to the Lore podcast and a bunch of podcasts about fae when i took the bus home after school :D

Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett

ive been making my way thru the Discworld books (very slowly) and honestly, i could fill the top 5 list just with Discworld books, so I limited myself to one. And Reaper Man has got to be the book I still think about the most (both in the "I am staring at the wall at 1 am thinking about the Morris dance" and "Goddamit Terry" when I figured out a new hidden joke)

The Day Death Stopped by Rebecca Thorne

I found Rebecca Thornes work this year thanks to her Tomes and Tea series and while I Adore the series and cant wait for the 3rd book, The Day Death Stopped is tailor-made for me specifically. Non-linear storytelling, Footnotes, witches, complicated soulmates-but-not-really/were supposed to hate each other but now that I know you, i don't type relationship. it just feels like that was made specifically for me (also ace main character :D)

#ask memes #tbf all my fav books/5star books tend to be books i go “oh this was made specifically for me!” at some point #and ye nonlinear storytelling/epistolary novels/footnotes are definitely smth i adore in writing

[emblazons]

me, sitting on an 8 page (and growing) outline of an analysis of themes, narrative re-contextualization & design parallels in Denis Villeneuve's Prisoners (2013) and how it plays into the core structure of The Duffer Brother's hit Netflix Series, Stranger Things (2016-present)--

--because it was the movie that quite literally inspired the original 8 episode run of ST and (I am realizing) holds an unbelievable number of structural and context clues for understanding Matt & Ross' show:

cc: @magentamee

#no literally might just have to drop this as a google doc at some point #its starting to be as complex and referenced as the papers i did in grad school #particularly in terms of the El/Brenner/Lab imagery and narrative #like I haven't even elaborated fully on some of the headers #but even with how they recontextualized byler with S4 + how Mike's story has context clues similar to prisoners #that show its nonlinear storytelling? #its like reading the sacred texts at this point LMFAO #which...lmao #i mean it NEEDS this level of elaboration #but whew #but its still got SO MUCH going on #its INSANE #the me tag #movies

[idrawsometimes]

very serious discussion

Textless version:

#when i said storytelling is nonlinear i MEANT nonlinear. the post yesterday was from mid ss and this is from late cr #cr ghirahim #cr fi #chain reaction au #my art #loz #ghirafi #yeah i think at this point i should probably give you a heads up. the swords are in love in this au. #if this is not your cup of tea feel free to: blacklist the ship tag. blacklist the CHARACTER tags. blacklist the whole au if you want! #if this IS your cup of tea feel free to do nothing and wait for me to make content

[seagullcharmer]

every day i make a little more progress

#libra.txt #this is specifically in that i just knocked out another 1k words for the xc1 ywkon rar said i could write #not that there's anything cohesive! yet! #and this may not even make it into the story proper #gonna bring back the nonlinear storytelling of the first one #(maybe) #idk i keep getting scraps of ideas throughout the timeline #i should practise... the fiora&mithos scene i had in mind...... #or fiora and reyn !! #newly awakened fiora going and assisting shulk and dunban in building reyn.... awawawa #hi rar. don't mind me. might dm you tomorrow

[skinzchoerim]

Summer of 85 🤝 Kill Your Darlings

that's it, that's the post

#the feelings they gave me were so similair #and the themes of writing and letting go of a person you loved for all the wrong reasons #AND the nonlinear storytelling #summer of 85 #kill your darlings #ete 85 #été 85

[eluvion]

WIP Wednesday

she is still in a position of the Great Restructuring but!!! nothing’s a gift is slowly being written I swear

#snippets #daredevil #matt murdock #I got so wrapped up in writing that I forgot that criticism needs like. a central thesis #so!! Great Restructuring + outlining #I forgot how much plotting and outlining nonlinear storytelling needs #writing stuff #wip wednesday #nothing’s a gift

[kunosoura]

I think I could turn these books into a really good like moody atmospheric mecha show give me 1billion dollars I have ideas

#the potential for ~nonlinear storytelling~

[decemberhigherpower]

ok ik zero day and duck! but wtf is elephant and is it good

omfg ok so Elephant is like thee umumum (checks letterboxd) liike more well known columbine movie ? its gus van sant and here is my opinion: It Is Not Good but i will rewatch it for alex bc hes so cute

#ok so bascially the acting sucks so hard #and the insensitivty with uhh one of the people they cast rlly grosses me out #(its eric they could have cast anyone else and lose nothing his acting is AWFUL plus his name . no offense though) #it kind of drags tbh shots take wayy too long #kinda cool nonlinear storytelling tho #i think its worth a watch ? all in all its . just fine #alex is so so cute tho #all of my irl friends are creeped out by him lol #which i guess makes sense #ANYWAY im rambling tldr watch elephant only once tho

[ettadunham]

i once again caved during a steam sale and bought a bunch of items from my wishlist, and can i just say... i am incredibly offput by the approach where video game characters are modeled after the well-known actors playing them.

#it's the uncanny valley for me #and no it's not death stranding that wasn't on my wishlist yet it's #mse's playing beyond: two souls #this is also just a weird game that i have so many criticisms about starting with that completely unmotivated nonlinear storytelling #but let's stick to a single theme here #(i also haven't got to the end yet maybe it'll make it better by then somehow)