Breaks: An Important Phase

Hello World!

Yes, I once again believe I have pulled out of my insidious addiction to Kingdoms of Camelot on Facebook and may consider myself a writer. I do hope I am correct this time. The promising part is that I am writing again, with the help of a new reader. (Thank you Terra, dear!) I crave the creative urge again, and occasionally my muse floats in and flies with me.

I am excited that Terra and I have worked through the first third of The Game together. I re-read and revise chapters I wrote back before addiction set in. She reads about two chapters a week answering questions on plot, characters, and her expectations of what is coming. Very satisfying feedback. (As Chris in my book would exclaim, "S-weet.")

And the bizarre thing? I cannot feel sorry about the "lost" writing time. I have learned an enormous amount about online gaming, made deep friendships, developed new skills (diplomacy, for example), and grown more than I ever expected. KoC was "just a game," but the people have been worth it all. And the time away has allowed me to see with fresh eyes, catching flaws I might have missed had the writing ontinued unbroken these months.

The upshot? I fully expect to finish The Game by year's end. I have more people interested in my novel than previously. The research into gaming and its community was a fabulous success. And I confronted long held but unexamined cultural assumptions and flushed them down the sewer -- a repeated theme in The Game. 

Once again, I experienced the process and the relationships as more important than the plan. Had I actually let that slip my mind? Nah. It is a foundational truth of my life.

Kingdoms of Camelot (KoC) Part III: Parallels with The Game

Hello World!

Kingdoms of Camelot (KoC) has been seductive and addictive, has spiked my adrenaline and linked me into a community of new friends. So here’s the hard part. How do I duplicate all this in my novel, The Game? Is it possible to reproduce the allure of virtual gaming in the  real-life theme park of my story?

I think I’ll examine my four summaries on how KoC works in reverse order.

The fourth piece is easiest – community. My characters are all looking for connections. That the Game exists means that friendships will form. Plus, I encourage interactions between the local. and The Game staff through a system of rewards. The book’s in pretty good shape here.

You can’t have too many adrenaline spikes, but I have not neglected them. And with those that occur outside The Game, this is fine tuning rather than substantive change. Hopefully, awareness is all that is needed.

The first two aspects of KoC gaming – seduction and addiction – are those I must recreate in The Game. Of the two, addiction is more difficult. Yet for The Game to work, must draw people in and leave them aching to return over and over again.

I’ve been working, with my writer friend Lee Hallison, on developing the pamphlet that players in the story will receive as they enter The Game. It describes points, categories and levels of experience, and offers some hints.  Having my characters reference it for direction should help non-gamers understand what is happening..

The Leaderboard could dominate more, I suppose, though comments from my writing group tend to ask, “Why explore?” “Why continue?” Who cares about earning a score?” Why indeed? The seduction needs to precede the addiction – and I’m not sure yet how to strengthen it.

In kiosks, players can check what they’ve found and their points earned. If my characters make more use of these at first, they’ll be reinforced more often. Perhaps I need some additional way for players to discover their progress?

Though I sense layers of involvement on the horizon in KoC, they seem less adaptable to The Game. The vital elements must occur early on – make The Game more winsome, and draw the players into exploration. Their rewards will constantly encourage them onward.

Next stop – back to the book!

Kingdoms of Camelot (KoC) Part II: Adrenaline and Community

Hello World!

In yesterday’s blog I began an analysis of factors that made the fb game Kingdoms of Camelot effective.  If I’m to  include them in my book, The Game, I need to figure out how to adapt them and weave them into the experiences of the characters.  I covered numbers one and two, so shall move on from there.

1              KoC is seductive.

2              KoC is addictive.

3              KoC spikes adrenaline.  Not long into the game, I was attacked! Already seduced into believing I was talented, and addictively spending hours online, I played in a zoney glaze. Suddenly, WHAM! My carpenter friend had me defend my castle and I wiped out my attacker’s entire army. Bound to my city, I wanted nothing more than revenge!  I counterattacked, waited for my troops to arrive, then cheered and shared the victory (see #4.) One U.K. player described his city as “his baby,” and I understood his possessive devotion. Build it. Protect it.

4              KoC builds community.  The best protection for your investment is an alliance (up to 100 people.) Our alliance has a particularly enticing chat. A new member from a different alliance recently told us, “I like experiencing the people all around me.” In chat, I help others, speeding up their building and research by tiny increments.  If they are fb friends, I can help again on their fb post. We send virtual gifts on fb, and receive several chances per day at winning magic spells. Webs of connection spread.  We forge connections as we pass the time in chat. Online communities are quite compelling. I love meeting people without visual prejudices kicking in. So I support this alliance – and the idea of losing these friends one day is totally unacceptable.

Which brings me to the end of part II of this blog. The hardest part is ahead. How can I use this knowledge within my very different novel to make my real-life game work? I guess I’ll just have to wait until I can read what I write in part III!

To be continued . . .

Kingdoms of Camelot Part 1: Seduction and Addiction

Hello world!

Yesterday marked two months of involvement with Kings of Camelot. A good time to distill what I’ve learned and gained (and lost) so that I can somehow infuse it into my novel, The Game. The what-have-I-learned part is easier than the distilling, so, for the sake of my own sanity, I’ll start there.

1. KoC is seductive. Early on, I had to discover what was expected. A list of “quests” set my goals, and a “might” score increased as I messed around. As the might score increased, I began to earn higher ranks. By following quests and points and ranks, I trained myself to be a better and better player. And always, the little rewards and awards kept coming, making me feel smart and competent (whether or not that was true).
2. KoC is addictive. I’m reminded of training my late cat, Caspia. She occasionally stood on her hind legs in anticipation of a treat, so I encouraged the behavior, until she always stood for food. Then, I enticed her to stand for longer, and finally had her do a string of “tricks” to receive her goodie – chase me round and round the divider between the living room and kitchen, run to her indoor cat condo and climb to the highest level -- squishing her chubby belly through a tight passage (making us laugh), until she stood on hind legs at the tip top, five feet above the ground, in anticipation of her reward.

Similarly, KoC’s reinforcement schedule trained me to give over bigger and bigger chunks of time. There is a city to construct -- structures to build. They take a few seconds at first, and it’s a small inconvenience waiting for them to finish. But each one needs eight more upgrades to achieve full usefulness. Each level means a longer wait, and they begin to require resources that you need to gather. So you learn to wait longer. And longer. Soon, you are spending all day online. Trained exactly to the game’s demands as surely as Caspia atop her cat condo. 

With that lovely image, I think I’ll stop for today. But do check back for the next thrill-packed episode . . .

A New Year's Resolution about Gaming

Hell world!

     Where have I been? Good question. November just sped along until travel and holidays took over.  And December? Well, that is today's story.

     The Game, my novel, is about people and cultures. But the setting is a theme park with real-life gaming (instead of virtual). Many writers treat setting as a character. My wonderful reader’s group felt that the setting wasn’t as well developed as my other characters. 

     Consequently, just before Thanksgiving I started playing a virtual game as research.  I hoped to make the novel more attractive to gamers – and everyone else.I joined a game through Facebook called “Kingdoms of Camelot.” Within a week, I was totally addicted. Hooked. Mesmerized.  And the fascination has not worn off. (ç Understatement.)

     I became accustomed to building cities and alliances and attacking enemies, and was drawn into the community chat. I met wonderful people there.

     A gentle chiropractor in ND.

     A one-time-bad-boy carpenter, struggling to find work in the damaged economy of southern CA.

     A boy with stunning leadership skills.

     A cancer researcher in Sweden.  

     A lonely lover in East Java.

     Two Lebanese college students.

     An Australian contingent, including a Kiwi.

     Canadians, folks from the UK. People from all over the world. Relationships forming and growing.

All of which is wonderful. Superb, in fact. And similar in many ways to the community that forms in my book.. It all came together!

     Only, I need to regain control of my time.  Balance this wonderful new community with my need to work. So that’s what I’ll do.

     My first resolution of 2011.

Write On the Sound (WOTS) Part 3: So Am I Writing?

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On my previous entry I received a question asking if I was writing. Yes! Yes! Yes!

If you've been following this blog for long, you know that one of my earliest rants was about sharing my book with a few relatives and friends only to get zero helpful feedback (and I only exaggerate slightly.) Up until now, the hardest part of writing for me was having to go it alone. I so wanted to hear something -- especially something critical -- from a reader.

I had considered hiring an editor just to get some feedback, but the expense put me off. I'm just not that far along in my rewrite yet. To hire an editor at this point would cost me double, because I'd probably have to do it again later. Obviously my family and friends were too nice to tell me what every writer knows -- rough drafts suck. And those critique groups I knew of had offered me no invitation to join despite my pointed hints.

But an awesome thing happened as a result of the Write On the Sound (WOTS) Friday workshop. I've begun exchanging work with several other writers! Not only does practicing my editing skills on their work sharpen my ability to see glitches in my own, but they critique mine! This has been better than Christmas. Seriously.

With one fellow, I have sent two chapters and critiqued three of his. A doctor, he has been able to help me make a medical scene much more realistic. Then, my new online critique group finished our first round a couple of weeks ago. As I wrote in a summary e-mail, two of the women pointed out the descriptions they really appreciated, while the third, primarily a flash fiction writer, helped me weed thorough the rest and tighten up my chapter. Then, from one I got a three-word description of a main character that blew me away, one reminded me to consider the grittier side of gaming in my book, and one shared her hope for what might come next in the story. (Her idea was so much better than mine that I changed my story!)

I find myself on fire to write again. My muse is grabbing me and taking me on a rollercoaster ride. I love rides. And critiquing with my new on-line writer's group has helped me move forward far faster than I was able to do before -- even counting all the time I put into my critiques of their work. 

As one character likes to say in my book, "Sometime, life can be very good."

Part 2: WOTS Conference Discoveries and Amazon.com Links

Hello World!

In my last blog entry, I started telling you about the Write on the Sound Conference. I'm nowhere near finished. I learned so much.

The keynoter was Natalie Goldberg, author of Writing Down the Bones and other books. With a gentle voice and excellent humor she gave a wonderful talk on how she discovered who she was. As her journey continued, she started writing and discovered she liked it. She became an author.

Writing Down the Bones was 17 years in the writing (and 4 in the publishing), the result of long meditation on the writing process and the way of life. She tells people to practice, practice, practice.  Translated, that means write, write, write -- even if it's sh#t. We all need to keep reminding each other to keep going. Keep our mechanism oiled and ready. If you read the comments on my last blog entry, you'll see that another writer who heard Natalie speak reminded me of that fact recently! (Thank you!)

Natalie had three main bits of wisdom for writers. 

1. Never stop writing. Write daily, even if you have nothing to write. "It’s a deep practice," she said.
2. "Don’t be tossed away," she said. Every time you're put down, after each fall, get up again. And again -- write.
3. "Make positive effort for the good," she told us. As with any good habit like just picking up the toothbrush and brushing your teeth, "just pick up the pen and write."

I first heard about two other books at WOTS that interest me. One is Self Editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Brown and Dave King. Self editing is something I want to learn well.  I've been an editor for others for years, but editing my own work is harder. So it's on my list, and I'll tell you more about it once I've read it. The other one -- as my writer friend reminded me in that comment I mentioned above -- is a current popular YA book called Hunger Games. She (and I) hope it will help inform the game in my own book-to-be, The Game. I have it on reserve at my public library.

If you are interested in the Amazon.com info on these books, I've added a look-up link and a display at the bottom of this page. All the books in the display are my picks -- only the books I've discussed on this blog. I'm a great supporter of the library system, but occasionally I buy books to use over and over again. If you would like to purchase these (or other) books, and do so here, I get a little kickback. Seems like a benefit all around to have the link available. Hope you don't mind.