“I hope I answered your questions and complaints, as I didn’t really read too much of the review.”
ArcticLizard7A response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12544278/ Hi there, I appreciate all your comments and I will go back and make some necessary changes.
I’m not familiar with the term “massive sue”, could you please elaborate?
This is my first written piece outside of schoolwork, I will try to improve where possible but it may not happen overnight.
There is a plot, I’m a bit shakey on the details at the moment, but I’ll hopefully have it clear in my own head soon.
Thanks again
A “Mary Sue” is a character who trivializes the story. Most commonly, they are portrayed as perfect in every way, such that they are always right and always solve every problem effortlessly, thus making the story boring and without tension. It may also refer to a character who is simply overpowered or is handed an unreasonable number of advantages, such as your character.Thank you for your reply.I see what you mean. I like my choices so far and with what I have in mind, she’ll have her struggles. It just won’t be your conventional ones.
Azakayen AmenazaHey! Appreciate the review! Eh, I was gaming the system mostly because I was already approved. I posted it for humor purposes. Uh, I only have a phone so I suppose it ate my lines. I appreciate the review though, and I hope that when I actually put up a serious story yoy enjoy it! Have a good day.
jakebrushA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12544863/ Thanks for the critical review. I will look to implement the suggestions you gave me
Xeno1101A response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12544482/ Thanks for a long and detailed review for a series I just started. I’m not going to complain about your review but I am going to say three things. First, I’m not going to change the way I write based on one review. This is my story, I’m writing it for me the way I want, and if you don’t like it, as you said, there are thousands of other stories on this site. Secondly, I want you to know the purpose of this first chapter. I wrote it this way to set up the rules and explain how everything would work in a futuristic version of our world. Like the title says, it is a prologue and is solely meant to give a backstory and explain how everything happened. Lastly, the main plot of the story won’t be revealed until later on in the book, as I want a good portion of the story to be just the adventure of Jason and his friends and their journey through a world with both Pokemon and animals. I think of this story as my interpretation of the show mixed with the games, where there is an ending goal, but there is also a bigger world than just the single plot. I plan on writing it this way because I don’t know just how long the story will go for. Yes, it will go on for a while, but I want to focus on one chapter at a time. I hope I answered your questions and complaints, as I didn’t really read too much of the review.
[I hope I answered your questions and complaints, as I didn’t really read too much of the review.]
Then why should I read this? If you’re going to have a conversation with someone, do them the basic courtesy of reading what they said first.
How can I have a conversation if you keep critizing everything I saysecs agoWhy did you respond at all if that’s your attitude? If you’re going to talk to people, you need to actually listen to them. If you’re not going to listen to me at all, don’t waste my time.
And the answer is: By addressing the criticisms. If you’re right, you should have no trouble defending yourself, shouldn’t you?
GreedyMattymoA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12544107/ honestly never realised that i did that with the title. don’t know how to separate the author notes.
after talking to my friend about it, i may stick to the 4 moves limit.
and thank you for recommending a beta reader for me, i hope you’ve have a good day
SilverXxWindA response to your review at https://www.fanfiction.net/r/12545578/ Hey! Thanks for your review to Memory Box – I genuinely appreciate the feedback. It makes sense and I will definitely take it into consideration for the next drabble. Thank you for explaining the bit about using the word said. I’d heard your advice before, but it had never been explained to me, so I understand it now. Though I will say that I’ll continue to use legendary names in place of God as I please, because (a) I like it, and (b) I see it frequently in other stories I read, so it’s the norm for me. Just a difference of opinion between us. Nonetheless, your feedback is greatly appreciated! Take care.
36m ago
Thanks again! I know it takes time to read through and write reviews for people, so even though (I’m guessing from your profile) that some people have issues with your criticism, I am sincerely glad you cared enough to help me improve. People need to learn how to take constructive criticism in a non-personal way.
Nicole
secs ago[Other than that, do you have any other feedback for me?]
Uh, no, sorry. The reason I knew you hadn’t put it in the anime world is because I filter it out. I’m not familiar with the anime, so I have no opinion on anime fic.
One thing I forgot to mention though — the term “drabble” refers specifically to works of exactly 100 words. It’d be more accurate to call these oneshots or shorts.
BunnyhoppyThanks, it’s helpful to know the mistakes I made. I made the world ‘any’ rather than ‘anime’ because it contains characters such as Red and Blue. The font I used while writing this made it difficult to see the problems with the speech, so I won’t be using it from now on. Thanks for the help!
Going to have to call you on your comment on reading what someone says before having a conversation about it. I distinctly remember you once saying that you posted a review for a story you didn’t care for before reading it through as you didn’t want to subject yourself to any more of it.
If you’re going to leave a review without fully reading, you certainly are in no position to be lecturing someone on commenting on your review without reading it in its entirety.
I await your self-righteous rationalization on how this is a different situation.
Unlike criticizing (part of, for bonus points!) criticism, which is such a wholly unselfrighteous thing
Meh, as has been pointed out countless times before, the format of the review deserves criticism. I’m just pointing out the hypocrisy of the comment.
So, are you arguing it was wrong to not read the whole fic, or that it’s right to argue about imagined criticism, or that both are wholly acceptable but you needed to comment so here we are?
I think you’ve missed the point I was trying to make. One one hand we have a person saying “I’m not going to pay attention to what you wrote, but I’ll still review you.” On the other hand, the same person says “Please do me the basic courtesy of going through what I wrote before responding.”
I’m not making any judgments (here, at least) abount the rightness or wrongness of it.
So your point is that when he read part of a story and commented on that part only, he was actually commenting on the parts he did not read, therefore it is hypocritical of him to tell someone not to do the same.
Or put more shortly, your point is you don’t see very well.
I find it humorous that you comment on my vision. Things seem to be quite blurry from the pedestal you’ve placed yourself on.
Yes, truly ad hominem is the best way to indicate you alone have the moral highground.
Yes, truly ad hominem is the best way to indicate you alone have the moral highground.
Just pointing out that you would be a poor judge of vision in general, since you still don’t seem to be seeing the point I’ve made. Or choosing not to see it, doesn’t matter to me.
Also, “only reviewing the part he read” is bullshit. I’m going to declare it loud and clear. I’ve said in another comment that it wouldn’t matter if he’s read nine-tenths of a story/chapter before reviewing it, if he hasn’t read the whole thing, he has no right to comment, based on his own statement. Well, I suppose he still has the right, but any comments he makes should be dismissed as quickly as he originally dismissed the author’s response above.
The funny thing is, he’s doing the same thing the author in question did, when you think about it. I think I, personally, have told him twice that he actually did read the entire story in question, but he seems to be ignoring the parts of my posts where I said that. So either he’s deliberately ignoring it because it doesn’t fit his narrative, or he’s just skimming my responses and hoping he addressed the whole thing.
I guess that makes all his criticism of Mini-Farla invalid because he didn’t read the whole thing.
Ok, let’s go back to Mini-Farla’s comment from the other post:
Oh, I didn’t even notice that, I was skimming by that point. Fake fanfic does not deserve that much brainpower.
Now let’s ask the Almighty Google to defing ‘skimming’ for us:
Skimming is useful when you want to survey a text to get a general idea of what it is about. In skimming you ignore the details and look for the main ideas. Main ideas are usually found in the first sentences of each paragraph and in the first and last paragraphs.
Now when you’re doing the kind of reviews Mini-Farla does, correcting typos, grammar, etc., I would think the details are pretty damn important. You would certainly want to read more that the first sentence of every paragraph, I would think.
Of course, if Mini-Farla’s definition of skimming means ‘completely reading the story/chapter/text in question, then you have something to talk about.
Well, he definitely missed that one small detail while acurately identifying the main problems with the story, so…
Yeah, still waiting. Points for actually providing a quote to support what I imagine you must think was an irrefutable argument, though. I sure look like a fool for making that other post before reading this one now. Whoops! Yes, from your mistaken perspective of what he did in the first place, that definitely would look like objective evidence, I’ll give you that. That still doesn’t make my mixture of rum and coke a shitty mimosa, though (… you might want to read that post before this one for that to make sense).
Mini-Farla, are reviews on FFN editable? This could all be solved if you just added your “Your characters deserve real names” copypaste. Your failure to do more than skim meant that you didn’t notice all reasons that story was bad, so all the other reasons why it was bad are invalid.
They are not.
Now when you’re doing the kind of reviews Mini-Farla does, correcting typos, grammar, etc., I would think the details are pretty damn important.
Can you explain why you think this? Given he’s not correcting line by line and so has no need to find every example of a problem, and he never claims his review covers every problem, why do his reviews only work if he goes over the fics with a fine-toothed comb?
Ok, I’m going to blow the whistle on this now. I’ve indulged it for a bit, but now you’re all focusing on something I never intended to discuss in the first place. I’m through talking about if you need to read an entire chapter before reviewing. My point is that I think it’s hypocritical to say “read my review before talking to me” when you didn’t read the whole story before reviewing.
My all means, review something you haven’t read in full, but then turning around and telling someone to read what you wrote before responding is going to raise my eyebrow.
I see the points that you and the Farla-fans are making. That responding to a review is different than leaving one, and that you don’t need to read the whole thing to leave a review. I disagree with the former and the latter falls outside of the scope of the issue. I have no idea if the collective vision around here can see the point I’m trying to make, or if heads are so buried in the sand that they can’t.
It’s almost like it’s a terrible idea to pretend you’re just super concerned about one thing when really it’s something over on the next table you’re objecting to.
Relatedly, christ, you really didn’t need to explain the shocking revelation that actually you disagreed with what he was doing. It’s not like you were doing a great job of hiding that.
I have no idea if the collective vision around here can see the point I’m trying to make, or if heads are so buried in the sand that they can’t.
Hey, remember that song and dance about acknowledging your own hypocrisy? You know, I’ll never say that I’ve never said/done anything hypocrtical in my life, but I’ll certainly admit to it when called on it, and that willingness to admit seems to something lacking around me. Now, remember all the stuff about other people’s arrogance, and being too blind to see because of it? How would you describe someone saying, “The only possible reason for other people to think I’m wrong is if they’re literally blind to my perfect arguments?”
It’s not like you were doing a great job of hiding that.
I surely wasn’t. People kept wanting to bring me to it and I obliged for a while. I’m no longer willing as it’s now clouding the original point.
How would you describe someone saying, “The only possible reason for other people to think I’m wrong is if they’re literally blind to my perfect arguments?
If I’m guilty, so is everyone else in here. The attitude here is ‘we’re right and completely unaccepting of considering we’re wrong.’ I don’t think I’ve seen a comment here that implies anyone would even remotely consider a change of view. The Farlas seem too arrogant in their literary abilities to unbend, others seem unrelenting in their desire to defend them.
As I’ve been told by others here, good luck in deciding that you’ve won.
So again, you said:
I’ll never say that I’ve never said/done anything hypocrtical in my life, but I’ll certainly admit to it when called on it, and that willingness to admit seems to something lacking around me.
And your best response is to say IF you did so, we definitely did first and harder. On the basis of you being better than us. Then you follow by saying we’re declaring this means we win, I guess on the basis that you kept trying to declare it and we must commit all your sins.
You know, usually someone can at least choke out “Maybe I’m at fault for failing to explain well enough for your tiny brains to process…” or something, but even that would be too much for you, wouldn’t it?
And your best response is to say IF you did so, we definitely did first and harder.
I don’t recall saying that. I know I’m the one who came crashing in on your party. I’m saying I was met with people who were so resistant to any consideration of my comment, it was amusing.
Now I’ve listed what people have brought up as counterpoints to my thoughts previously. This may seem condescending to some here, and I really don’t care if people feel that way at this point, is there anyone here that, without judgement or argument, can write in three sentences or less what my original point was? I don’t think it would be hard to do, but the question is, is anyone willing to do it?
You know, usually someone can at least choke out “Maybe I’m at fault for failing to explain well enough for your tiny brains to process…” or something
Not without being accused of ad hominem, or is that what you’d like me to do so you can dismiss my arguments in an easier fashion?
Okay but, here’s the thing, and I’ve told you it at least three times now: He did finish the entire story, and unlike the author he’s responding to, didn’t say “I didn’t read this whole thing, but I hope this review covers all the problems in the whole thing”, he only pointed out the flaws he noticed in the part he read. Both this one that he’s reviewing, and this entirely unrelated one where he missed that single detail (because the story was poorly worded) that you’re using as evidence that he’s a hypocrite.
So it’s hypocritical to… what, skim through something because it’s impossible for him to care about, read a completely different thing entirely, review that second thing, and then get annoyed when someone responds to that review by admitting he didn’t read the whole thing but hoping he addressed the whole thing regardless? Because once he skimmed through something else to point out errors in dialogue formatting because the story was too inane to comment on?
Maybe you might have a point if he was telling the person whose story he only skimmed to do him the basic courtesy of reading his entire post, I suppose?
As for needing to finish something before reviewing it… Yeah, no. As someone who has finished at least a half dozen anime series off the top of his head on pure spite, including both seasons of Sword Art Online, it’s actually pretty ridiculously easy to tell something is bad without completing it. Oh, sure, you might underestimate the scope of how bad it was (as Mini-Farla did in your example), but you can’t exactly say “you didn’t give this thing you called bad a fair review; if you had stuck around you would’ve actually learned it was far worse than that!”
I’ve seen someone who refused to watch an anime because he knew it’d be bad based solely on its description in the seasonal anime chart. People asked him to review it anyway. So he finished it out of pure spite. Do you want to know what conclusion he came to at the end of a 52,000 word long review of the series in-depth?
Whoa now, dude. I’ve never once claimed that I’m not too arrogant to see someone else’s opinion, or resorted to calling you an arrogant person as an insult. Just because I think you’re making your points solely to stroke your ego doesn’t mean I won’t explain precisely why those points are incorrect. The only reason I brought it up in the first place is because you claim that’s why Mini-Farla writes his reviews, which would make it hypocritical for you to do it in yours.
I am the most stubborn son of a bitch you’ll ever see. I can’t tell you how many arguments I’ve won just because the other people lost the willpower to continue. But that doesn’t mean I won by just ignoring their arguments until they got too tired of repeating them to continue. I do see your point, and I disagree with it. Now it is your turn to explain why my disagreement is, in turn, incorrect. I have stated why I disagree with you, multiple times. Repeating your point over and over will not change that fact. I will continue to repeat my disagreement with that point until you actually respond to that with something other than repeating your original point.
So, as someone who was not called out on it yet still admitted to it anyway, will you admit to it now that you’ve been called out on it by Farla? Because you were the first one to admit that you would be unswayed by literally anything we told you, and then accused us of sticking our heads in the sand and ignoring your truths. I don’t think anyone, and correct me if I’m wrong, said that you had decided you were correct until after you said “as far as I’m concerned I’ve already won the argument”.
So, before we can actually continue the argument, we first have to convince you that you have not, in fact, won the argument. Do you see how this could be a problem? Hell, the very fact that there are people willing to continue arguing is proof that you’ve not won.
CrazyEd, you’ve made a couple posts so I copied some parts of them below to respond to individual points.
I am the most stubborn son of a bitch you’ll ever see. I can’t tell you how many arguments I’ve won just because the other people lost the willpower to continue.
If you call that winning an argument, it makes things a lot clearer.
Just because I think you’re making your points solely to stroke your ego doesn’t mean I won’t explain precisely why those points are incorrect. The only reason I brought it up in the first place is because you claim that’s why Mini-Farla writes his reviews, which would make it hypocritical for you to do it in yours.
And I won’t be able to convince you I’m not doing it for ego any more than Mini-Farla can convince me he’s not doing it for ego. Is it acceptable for Mini-Farla to disagree with me, but not me with you? I’m assuming you feel Mini-Farla isn’t reviewing for ego, is it too far to stretch to believe I’m not either?
Okay but, here’s the thing, and I’ve told you it at least three times now: He did finish the entire story
And by his own admission in the other post, he skimmed it. Skimming, by definition, means he did not read it all. If Mini-Farla comes in right now and says something to the effect of “That was wrong, I didn’t skim it, I actually read it” then we have no argument and I walk away happy.
So it’s hypocritical to… what, skim through something because it’s impossible for him to care about, read a completely different thing entirely, review that second thing, and then get annoyed when someone responds to that review by admitting he didn’t read the whole thing but hoping he addressed the whole thing regardless? Because once he skimmed through something else to point out errors in dialogue formatting because the story was too inane to comment on?
I think it comes down to a disagreement on the premises. I believe that a story and a review are both works by their respective authors. You don’t. Mini-Farla left a review after skimming a story because he could guess how it was going to go. The author left a response after skimming the review as they could probably guess how it was going to go. Especially if they have seen any other of Mini-Farla’s reviews due to the amount of copypasta. We’ll be able to keep spouting point and counterpoint at each other till one of us, probably me, loses interest, at which you’ll declare yourself the winner based on your own rules of argument.
I’ve seen someone who refused to watch an anime because he knew it’d be bad based solely on its description in the seasonal anime chart. People asked him to review it anyway. So he finished it out of pure spite. Do you want to know what conclusion he came to at the end of a 52,000 word long review of the series in-depth?
Because one case describes every possible scenario?
Nope.
I just woke up so the short version is: When I expressed my own criticisms of why Mini-Farla reviews things the way he does (concerning the very clinical way he describes grammatical errors), he actually explained his logic amazingly well and I totally see why he does not do it the way I suggested and why it would be bad for anyone to do so.
I do not think Mini-Farla has it out for anyone he reviews, and the main reason he posts such negative reviews is the low quality of what he’s reviewing. When I wrote something short and halfway competent, his response to it was encouragement to write more and a few narrative questions (which themselves were valid questions and based largely on a disagreement in opinion on how pokemon should be portrayed in fiction).
When I expressed my criticisms of the way you do things (concerning the very personal way you attack the reviewer), you just said “well, I calls ’em how I see’s ’em”, connected a few tangentially related things as proof, and announced that as far as you’re concerned you’ve won. You pop up every time Mini-Farla makes a post to call him a bad person and I get the feeling that you think that I disagree with you because I either don’t understand your point well enough or because I like Mini-Farla more than you.
It’s not possible (from my perspective) because, while Mini-Farla addressed my disagreement with the way he did things to the point I now agree with him, you’ve done nothing but reinforce why I disagree with you.
Wow, that was just the main point of my argument, and it was way longer than I expected. As for how Mini-Farla doesn’t need to interally carve every word of a fic onto his soul to realize it’s bad, I’ll let the guy who wrote 52,000 words about why an anime he knew was bad just by reading the summary turned out to be bad explain the tools he used to determine this fact. I’m sorry it’s a bit long, but he explains it a lot better than I could (or honestly could care to right now).
I totally see why he does not do it the way I suggested and why it would be bad for anyone to do so.
You do and I don’t for reasons I’ve previously discussed, so I won’t go into it again.
I do not think Mini-Farla has it out for anyone he reviews
Neither do I, and once again, I’ve discussed my thoughts before on why I feel he does what he does and won’t bother again.
you just said “well, I calls ’em how I see’s ’em”
Yep.
connected a few tangentially related things as proof
Definitely connected based on my premise as previously discussed.
and announced that as far as you’re concerned you’ve won.
Based on my premise as previously mentioned. Yes, you’re correct.
You pop up every time Mini-Farla makes a post to call him a bad person
Fact checking…please hold. Just went looked at the last 10 Mini-Farla posts and found my comments in two of them Have I been sleep-posting under another name again?
I get the feeling that you think that I disagree with you because I either don’t understand your point well enough or because I like Mini-Farla more than you.
Leaning towards disagreement with you on the former, toward agreement on the latter.
you’ve done nothing but reinforce why I disagree with you.
Fair enough. I didn’t expect to change any minds here. I came to point something out.
As for how Mini-Farla doesn’t need to interally carve every word of a fic onto his soul to realize it’s bad, I’ll let the guy who wrote 52,000 words about why an anime he knew was bad just by reading the summary turned out to be bad explain the tools he used to determine this fact. I’m sorry it’s a bit long, but he explains it a lot better than I could (or honestly could care to right now).
I’ll counter your single case with a single case of my own. There was once a fanfiction I read (wish I could remember the name) that would certainly be considered poorly written by the measuring stick used around here. Some grammar and spelling mistakes. Generic romance fic. No real unique ideas present. Red flags all over the place. I read one chapter. I decided to read another chapter. And another. I finished the fic and I believe ended up at eightyish chapters and I enjoyed it. I therefore state that you CANNOT tell something will be bad without reading it all because I have a single case where it happened.
Of course, I don’t actually mean the above, but it seems to be the strand of logic you’re following.
that would certainly be considered poorly written by the measuring stick used around here. Some grammar and spelling mistakes. Generic romance fic. No real unique ideas present. Red flags all over the place. I read one chapter. I decided to read another chapter. And another. I finished the fic and I believe ended up at eightyish chapters and I enjoyed it.
“Bad” and “enjoyable” are not mutually exclusive, and that you seem to think everything is that black and white is really indicative of your whole attitude here.
Based on your premise which I find to be inherently flawed and you’ve done nothing to change that finding, yes.
But yeah, as someone who considers his favourite series of light novels to be so bad that he was actually amazed that someone else on this site actually enjoyed it… what Act said. And I only had to read half of volume 1 to know how I felt about the series (which currently has over 10 volumes, I think).
You seem to be missing the point of the video. It’s not that he was able to guess that he wouldn’t like this one particular series. It’s that, using his sizable experience with the medium through consuming as much of it as is humanly possible, he is able to recognize trends in the medium to more or less accurately predict whether or not he would like something based on only a sample of it. Having read all eighty chapters of that fic, would you say that someone who dropped it after the first one because of all those red flags you were able to ignore was completely incorrect about the writing quality of the series? How quickly did those red flags disappear? Did they ever?
What would you say to a friend of mine who keeps telling another friend of mine to give the LN series Overlord another try based on the fact that it gets a lot better around volume 10?
What would you say to a friend of mine who keeps telling another friend of mine to give the LN series Overlord another try based on the fact that it gets a lot better around volume 10?
There is literally no type of person I understand less than this. Unless I gues they’re immortal and/or obscenely rich and don’t have to work.
What hurts me is that I do have a few series like that to recommend to people, and it always feels like swallowing broken glass to restrain myself. I’m not here to show off my collection of beloved garbage, but it still hurts.
*coughFSNcough*
Though, granted, it gets good sooner than after 10 novels.
But yes, generally speaking, “it gets good later” is a poor argument as there is plenty of stuff that starts good and stays good.
I think there’s a case to be made for, like, Book 1/Volume 1 or the equivalent span for other media being slow. Not bad per se, but slow. Especially in Japan, authors often use that first volume just to introduce the characters and setting. It tends to be low on action and high on exposition. I remember Act pointing out that KnK managed to avoid this, and I think that kind of underlines the trend.
TBH I don’t think FSN falls into this. I remember really enjoying the prologue, and then the game backpedals a bit to do setup, which is totally fine construction-wise — in fact, it’s pretty typical. If, say, HF were a standalone, that would be a big problem, but… it’s not. In the context of everything else, it didn’t feel that bad.
Book 1/Volume 1 or the equivalent span for other media being slow. Not bad per se, but slow.
Yeah, agreed. I think there’s a (palpable) difference between slow to setup and not good. SNAFU is what immediately comes to mind — the LNs are very slow, but they’re certainly not bad, and I’m entirely willing to tolerate something with interesting charcaters and clever writing being kind of boring for a while, especially if it comes from a rec. It’s not like, at the tippy top of my list, but I don’t think I would have dismissed it out of hand even if I’d gone to it on my own. It’s slowness in conjuntion with other red flags that’s the real issue.
What hurts me is that I do have a few series like that to recommend to people
Heh, I think everyone does.
My favorite opening for Nasu’s work has to be Tsukihime, all told. It does a good job of starting slow but tense – Shiki watches his family die as a child, then wakes up in the hospital, still a child, after a terrible car crash, and starts seeing death. Then the game timeskips to the archetypal ordinary school life, plus death glasses, with the next big change in Shiki’s life being his move to his original home, which he hasn’t seen in years.
The way Nasu suddenly went WHAM SHIKI CHOPS A GIRL TO PIECES was just brilliantly done after slowly getting the reader to sympathize with him.
I miss Tsukihime.
“Bad” and “enjoyable” are not mutually exclusive, and that you seem to think everything is that black and white is really indicative of your whole attitude here.
Strange that I’m saying something is NOT black and white here, then. I’m being told “A subject matter expert can tell if a story/series/chapter is good from a small sample. Period” I’m saying things are not so simple as sometimes experts can be wrong.
I think I prefer DDD opening:
“He awoke to the faint sound of grating bone.
In the dead of the night, when he opened his eyes, he lost his sense of feeling in his arms and legs.
He was mimicking a transparent chrysalis. He became a dwarf, no bigger than the palm of a hand, locked inside the brain. However much he moved his limbs, his sleeping corpse would not budge.
Only his left arm was connected to his trapped mind. The blood beating in those veins was transformed into information. He felt the illusion of a mere part replacing his whole. Being only able to move his left arm meant that the existence of
Ishizue Arika was concentrated in his left arm.
“——ah”
His body, is in pain.
He hears the sound of grinding.
He feels the chill of his body being scraped away,
The pleasure of his entirety being chewed.
The realization that he was being eaten.
He The arm faded away and he finally regained himself his freedom . In the darkness, he heard slurping. He removed the blanket.
On top of the bed was the sight of complete red. The girl, stained in pure red from the nose down, smiled at him with her shattered jaw.
“Onii-chan, it hurts doesn’t it?”
The girl was taken a hold of by something wrong.
On his left arm which had been gobbled up quickly, there was no pain, there were no bite marks. The girl licked the severed surface with her shattered jaw. As if to fill in the large hole of one who has lost someone.
It was a silent night of grating bone.
The sound of budding, beautiful life.”
Always appreciated stories opening on an upbeat note.
Yeah, I don’t share Nasu’s vore fetish. Also I haven’t read DDD.
There is literally no type of person I understand less than this. Unless I gues they’re immortal and/or obscenely rich and don’t have to work.
Or young, which is sort of the same thing! When your access to media is limited, you lose little by trying out each thing, and when your life experience is limited, you have no idea what you’ll like or won’t, and you have tons of free time and no real concept of time and no grasp of just how much there is out there.
I remember feeling like that. I remember reading garbage books that just strung you along until the final page reveal, even after I learned to identify those ones as just stringing me along. Because I might miss something!
Or young, which is sort of the same thing!
Yes, this is a fair point that I left out because I’m apparently an old lady and assume everyone else is, too! I think that’s a standard part of the development of personal taste, whether it be books or music or hobbies etc etc. I remember most clearly the progression of my taste in manga from really bland fluffy stuff (I had a Tokyo Mew Mew period) and slowly finding things more complex.
I remember reading garbage books that just strung you along until the final page reveal, even after I learned to identify those ones as just stringing me along. Because I might miss something!
I still find myself finishing things out of indignance because I spent good money on them and god dammit I am going to force this game to admit it has nothing else to offer. It never really is a good decision, but I apparently am incapable of being conditioned against it.
“it gets good later” is a poor argument
Especially since volume 10 did nothing to address the narrative problems the friend had with the series as a whole. In fact, according to the second friend, they get even more pronounced.
(The friend doesn’t like how edgelordy Overlord is.)
Volume 1 or the equivalent span
Well, in my case, the first volume was basically two shorter stories connected in the middle. The first half reads as a completely standalone narrative that establishes the two main characters and the dynamic between them. But yeah, overall, you’re probably not wrong.
KnK was probably able to avoid it because a mystery novel, by definition, doesn’t need to put all its cards on the table in Chapter 1.
My favourite opening for Nasu’s work
Hm… I think I prefer FSN’s because Rin’s typical high school life is just so much more engaging than Shiki’s. Can anyone even remember the name of his redhaired classroom guy? Can anyone even care about him? Nasu really gave me no reason to think of Shiki as a character any more distict in personality than a harem protagonist with an interesting backstory.
Until he kills a girl so graphically the narration is downright fucking sexual.
On that note, Tsukihime does get a lot of points for making a point of telling the author just how problematic Arc and Shiki’s relationship is from both sides of the equation, though.
Or young, which is sort of the asme thing!
Add in “nostalgia for older viewers” and you’ve just described why high school is so prevalent in anime!
KnK avoids it by being consistently good and going with an in media res opening for the first story. Which may be confusing at first, but the emotional stakes are made pretty clear from the start even if the setting isn’t, so you still get invested pretty quickly. You only learn backstories of the main characters after you already care about them, which is generally a good practice.
As been pointed out countless times before… by you. I don’t think I’ve seen anyone else raise a criticism which, when answered by Mini-Farla, hasn’t had an acceptable answer to whoever was raising the criticism… except for you.
But here’s some criticism for the format of your own reviews: It’s pretty hypocritical of you to call out Mini-Farla for stroking his ego for seemingly no reason other than stroking your ego.
How is it hypocritical to say “look man if you’re going to want to respond to what I have to say, you’re going to have to read what I have to say”? Because once he was incapable of caring about the inane plot of a single fic enough to realize that there was even more to critisize about the story than just its grammar?
You can see my last comment to Farla above for a general response.
How is it hypocritical to say “look man if you’re going to want to respond to what I have to say, you’re going to have to read what I have to say”? Because once he was incapable of caring about the inane plot of a single fic enough to realize that there was even more to critisize about the story than just its grammar?
Once again, just calling it as I see it. I don’t believe hypocrisy has a “one time exception clause.” I’ll never say that I’ve never said/done anything hypocrtical in my life, but I’ll certainly admit to it when called on it, and that willingness to admit seems to something lacking around me.
It’s pretty hypocritical of you to call out Mini-Farla for stroking his ego for seemingly no reason other than stroking your ego.
You can say what you like, but I’m here for the entertainment. It’s like watching one of those funny video shows, seeing someone get hit in the crotch, and chuckling, even though you know you shouldn’t. If Mini-Farla is willing to hit himself in the crotch for me over and over, (through his copy-pasted reviews) why should I turn down the show? Heck, it’s even interactive.
one time exception clause
Okay but here’s the thing: It isn’t hypocritical to want someone to read what they’re responding to just because, one time, you did not read something as closely as was possible before responding to it. Farla’s response to your comment above just about sums it up, actually.
You can say what you like, but I’m here for the entertainment.
I’ll never say that I’ve never said/done anything hypocritical in my life, but I’ll certainly admit to it when called on it.
I’m waiting.
Sorry to disappoint you, still here for entertainment, not ego.
Look man, we can argue until the sun burns out whether or not Mini-Farla is a hypocrite if you want, but I definitely am a catty bitch, so if that’s the game you want to play, I’m down for it. But you’ll definitely lose.
As far as I’m concerned I’ve already won the argument, and I don’t need your permission or validation to say so. Here’s a copy-pasted definition of ‘hypocrtie’ for you from google:
“a person who pretends to have virtues, moral or religious beliefs, principles, etc., that he or she does not actually possess, especially a person whose actions belie stated beliefs”
Now let the “principle” in question be copied right from Mini-Farla’s comments:
“If you’re going to have a conversation with someone, do them the basic courtesy of reading what they said first.”
If Mini-Farla reviews a story while only reading half, three-quarters, nine-tenths, whatever fraction of the story, he’s a hypocrite. It’s as objective as his dialogue copypasta.
Sorry to disappoint you, still here for entertainment, not ego.
So your comments are what entertain you, not the reviews themselves?
I came for the reviews. I stayed for the comments.
Someone who pretends to care about the people Mini-Farla’s reviewing just to point out perceived hypocricy to stroke their own ego is also someone with false moral beliefs. And someone feels he’s already won doesn’t feel the need to continue the argument for any reason other than stroking his ego about how right he is. Why even respond to me if you don’t need my validation? If you’re right, you should be able to just leave it at that and be satisfied.
So, I’m still waiting. Until then, you might want to try HoodedAuthor. He (she?) still seems willing to explain to you the difference between responding to a short story with a review and responding to a review with a conversational response. I’m not. I’d just say the same thing they are anyway.
And why would I be? You’ve already decided you’re correct. And after all, you do have history on your side. How can I argue with previous incidents where all these same exact things have been pointed out? Who’s to argue with that? Hell, this argument is just one more time you’ve pointed out the same exact thing so, now that I think about, next time you point out this same exact thing, you’ll be even more correct. Damn, I’ve never seen someone win an argument before it’s even been made. I should just give up now. You’re pretty good winning arguments. Maybe I should try your strategy next time I get in a disagreement. Deciding you’ve won seems to be working out pretty well for you.
Anyway, good luck with deciding you’ve won your debate with HoodedAuthor.
I didn’t come in here expecting to change anyone’s mind more than I would walking into an NRA convention trying to sell stricter gun control. I’ve presented objective evidence, given definitions and examples, and received exactly what I expected. I’ve had responses akin to upset authors arguing with Mini-Farla about capitalization and grammar rules. I know that the only thing I do at this point to satisfy you, and most people here, would be to completely and totally capitulate and grovel for mercy.
Okay, that last bit may have been a little over the top, but you get my point. You can also probably guess that it’s not going to happen.
So, I’m still waiting. Until then, you might want to try HoodedAuthor. He (she?) still seems willing to explain to you the difference between responding to a short story with a review and responding to a review with a conversational response. I’m not. I’d just say the same thing they are anyway.
Already working on it.
If that’s really, sincerely, what you believe you’ve done, then I know now for a fact that I am right to not even bother, and I would really suggest HoodedAuthor to not bother either. I now await you to either admit to hypocricy like you said you would if called on it, and a quote from this post’s comments section where you provided either actual objective proof or examples (as opposed to just alluding to the fact you have them). I won’t argue that you defined hypocricy (though I’d suggest you look up a definition of “objective”), but the other two are a bit harder to locate.
Until then, I continue to wish you luck in deciding you’ve won.
Psst, sorry about the off-topic reply but friendly reminder that you can use ‘they’ as a gender-neutral pronoun if you don’t know or are unsure of someone’s gender :)
Going to have to call you out on not reading what someone says before having a conversation about it. That’s not actually what Mini-Farla said. What he told the author was that, if you’re going to respond to someone and start a conversation, you should actually read what you’re responding to.
If what you’re talking about is the case I’m thinking of, he actually did read it, he just couldn’t care enough to follow it very well because it just used the skin of Pokemon to dress up a totally unrelated fic as being about Pokemon and he didn’t want to subject himself to it (which is a problem with the fic in its own right) once he realized that.
Ignoring the fact that he wasn’t having a conversation at all, he still actually read the whole thing, just not closely enough to realize the two cardboard cutouts in the cliche scene shared a name because they were the same species of pokemon (which I, who was the one who noticed that fact, had to read his quoted except several times to make sure I was reading it right). But even if he had outright stopped reading halfway through, there would be absolutely nothing in the second half that changed the fact the first half was riddled with the grammatical problems he pointed out, or that it wasn’t actually a Pokemon fic.
I await your rationalization on how only commenting on flaws in the fic noticed by a single reading is the same thing as trying to address all of someone’s concerns without actually reading all of them.
Sorry, didn’t bother reading much of your comment above, so I’ll just direct you again to the comment to Farla above. It probably answers whatever point you were trying to make, if you were even trying to make one.
Feels great, doesn’t it?
You do realize that’s what the person Mini-Farla said lacked basic courtesy was doing, not what he was doing (or even what you think he was doing, in a completely unrelated conversation in a completely different context with a completely different person), right?
But to respond to this comment: It is kind of annoying that we have two or three comment threads where we’re saying the same thing, so it probably would be better to condense them into one. That’s the first thing you’ve said I totally agree with. Mini-Farla does that all the time with his capitalization thread linking. No skin of my back there. It’s super annoying to have to repeat the same exact argument fifty thousand times.
That implication doesn’t actually remotely bother me. What should bother me (well, what was solely intended to bother me, at least) about that comment is the smug tone and condescending attitude. The “if you were even trying to make one” part was a nice touch. I bet you think this was some kind of master stroke argument that none could come back from, don’t you? It’s not.
I’m still waiting for you to admit that you’re commenting here not to call out Mini-Farla for being hypocritical but to stroke your own ego. You did say you’d admit to hypocricy if called on it, right? If you do, please respond to the comment where I say “I’m waiting”. No need to have three comment chains that all say the same thing.
Look man, we can argue until the sun burns out whether or not Mini-Farla is a hypocrite if you want, but I definitely am a catty bitch, so if that’s the game you want to play, I’m down for it. But you’ll definitely lose. So let’s try to keep it civil and not go down that road, shall we?
Okay, heres the thing. When writing a story, its the authors job to make sure they engage the reader. Failure to do that, resulting in the reader getting bored and closing the story, is likely a fault on the authors part and therefore it is worthwile to address that in a review.
When reviewing, it is the critics job to point out faults and give praise when due. It is not there job to write the review in such a way that ensures the author will read it. Whether they take the criticism on board is entirely up to them.
Thats the difference. Reading a story halfway through, getting so bored that you stop, and leaving a review saying the stories boring is fair. Getting a review, not reading it, and then trying to argue with the reviewer is not. Understand?
If the story is only half read before a review is left, and the review is only half read before a response is made, wouldn’t that make the review as half-assed as the response?
No, because often you don’t have to read a whole story to know it’s bad, but you do need to read a whole review to understand all the criticisms.
Put it this way. If you found a story, and within the first line, everything was mis-spelled, unpunctuated, uncapatlised and, hell, let’s just say what was written was horrendously offensive and bigoted too. You would be at every right to stop reading, post a review saying “this line was so awful in all these ways that I don’t want to read any further”.
Now let’s say that author responded to your review. But let’s say they didn’t actually bother to read it. They just read the first word, assumed they knew what you were getting at, and responded to a bunch of criticisms you didn’t even make. Now do you see the difference?
Stories and reviews are two different things. You can’t respond to them in the same way.
Put it this way. If you found a story, and within the first line, everything was mis-spelled, unpunctuated, uncapatlised and, hell, let’s just say what was written was horrendously offensive and bigoted too. You would be at every right to stop reading, post a review saying “this line was so awful in all these ways that I don’t want to read any further”.
Now let’s say that author responded to your review. But let’s say they didn’t actually bother to read it. They just read the first word, assumed they knew what you were getting at, and responded to a bunch of criticisms you didn’t even make. Now do you see the difference?
I would say that, based on Mini-Farla’s dismissal of the author’s response, the review should not have even been made in the first. Simply reporting the story to FFN would suffice.
You forget that my intent was not to talk about if it’s right or wrong, it’s about consistency of action, which I’m not seeing.
Obviously, I have my own opinion of the matter of reading a story before reviewing, and reading a review before responding, and I imagine most people can tell what it is by now, but it’s not what I originally came to discuss.
I’m curious: What would you report it for? Low quality isn’t against the rules. If something is low quality, the official method of response FFN provides its readers is… the review feature.
What you’re doing is like… If I tell you that you’ve made a shitty mimosa because you mixed three parts orange juice with one part champagne, would you call me a hypocrite for making an even shittier mimosa when I mix rum and coke?
I’m curious: What would you report it for? Low quality isn’t against the rules.
I was referring to the “horrendously offensive and bigoted” part. I pictured a bunch of random slurs and hate speech. I don’t think anybody would say that reporting it is out of line. If you took something else of of the comment, then I apologize, we’re talking about two different things.
Actually, we were. From the “based on Mini-Farla’s dismissal” clause, I thought you were talking about reporting the fic he reviewed, not the hypothetical one HoodedAuthor proposed.
Well then what are you even doing? Just pointing out hypocrisy wherever you think you see it? If you weren’t even arguing whether he was right or wrong, then what’s the point? Just to prove that you’re smart enough to notice when someone’s being hypocritical?
Because as we all know, FFN’s administration is so reliable.
But yes, precisely. Original fiction should not be in a fanfiction archive in the first place. If I show that I’m not going to waste my time critiquing the plot of a story that shouldn’t be there to begin with, maybe I’ll get that across.
Because as we all know, FFN’s administration is so reliable.
Maybe, but it’s the tool FFN gives you to deal with it. Leaving a review to make sure the author knows that you know they were wrong? Isn’t that similar to what I’ve been accused of? Pointing out hypocrisy to show I’m able to point out hypocrisy?
In the absence of authority, our only recourse is to take matters into our own hands. It is entirely possible the authors were making a mistake out of ignorance, and would correct their own behavior when I made them aware of another option. Or perhaps they, like authors repeatedly tell me, are simply too lazy to change their behavior because they believe no one cares; then by expressing my displeasure, I am showing their behavior is unpopular and giving them motivation to change it.
(It can also be a kindness. The administrators take stories down without warning or explanation. By informing authors of rule violations, I am giving them the opportunity to protect their story, or at least to know why it was taken down.)
In the absence of authority, our only recourse is to take matters into our own hands.
I’m sorry, when I read this I got an image of you laying beatdowns to authors through reviews the way Batman beats down bad guys with his fists. You just need to come up with a better superhero name.
Just because authority doesn’t work the way you want it to means you have to take it into your hands? Also, you’ve stated a lot on how the FFN takedown practice works behind the scenes. Were you on staff with them, or just basing this on your experience on how you think it works?
Leaving a review so that the author knows that they’re wrong (which they might not know because FFN moderation is functionally nonexistent and arbitrary), actually. But, really, even if they were not against the rules, “I would not like to see this kind of story” is itself a criticism of that kind of story.
What Mini-Farla is doing is basically community policing in the absence of actual police presence. What you’re doing (arguing with someone who you believe incapable of proving you wrong solely to prove how right you are) is more like Batman. Batman’s not in it to clean up Gotham. There are far more effective ways of doing that, but that doesn’t quite stroke the ego as well, now does it?
Except that’s not what they did. Had they responded only to the part they’d read, they wouldn’t be getting mocked for the absurdity of trying to respond to criticisms they imagined might be there.