Fanfiction Lounge

[Breezy]

Yeah, some of her reviews go in her livejournal without the author's knowledge or consent. That's when she's really wicked. o.0

I'm sorry, I keep talking about Farla heh. ^^; I'll shut up now.

 

[Frostweaver]

@ Destiny of Understanding (ch. 1)

-it's no doubt that ch. 1 is the introduction and the start of the story >>; story titles should reflect something about the content of that chapter, not about where it is in the story timeline

There was a great calmness in the air though it was not the calm before a storm but the calm that was only felt just before dawn.

Much of it is redundancy... Though I understand how you're actually saying the reverse, right now it's not saying anything... If you want to say the reverse, then all of the following scenes gotta have a similiar syntax in order to convey the idea to the reader that something is unusual. Have to try to be concise and clear, with the proper usage of diction as well.

There was a little light coming from the horizon but it was still too early for there to be enough to illuminate the few clouds that were in the sky, only visible because of some of the few remaining stars were being blocked by them.

-err... this one I'm just totally stumped...

The calmness promised that the coming day would be filled with beautiful sunshine, and that the sunrise would turn the clouds around the horizon a wonderful shade of pink for a few minutes, though it?s promise that was not needed as almost all mornings were like this?

-same problem with the whole beginning... it's a terribly confusing way to convey your idea right now...

-another consistent problem with your sentence structures... just because a sentence is technically grammatically correct, that doesn't mean a huge sentence with like 50 words in it is a good sentence. In fact, most of the time if the sentence has more than 3 clauses, it's a sure note that you should use 2 sentences instead.

-what is "too light" o.o; i think you want to use "bright" there instead...

If the creature that was going to make the day different wanted any of them it would have already of gotten one and left, no it was after something a bit bigger, something that wasn?t covered in fur quite unlike itself.

-Again I get what you mean, but this is *terribly* confusing... partly because what should have been in multiple sentences are forced into one huge one... partly because it got such a strange syntax of wrongness to it...

-watch out for its and it's

-... I'll just ignore all the future strange syntax that's making this fanfic very difficult to read from this review now... but definitely, you must rework these unclear sentences!

-so many continous usage of "but in fact..." "however..." "in reality..." "though..." "then again..." "but..." x_x; It makes your sentence very boring actually if all of them have the same structure... that is why we should vary the length of our sentences, and play around with voices and clauses in order to make our sentences interesting.

-Ninetales say such an unusually lot with possibly important things about the plot... it can get a bit boring? There is no rush to spill out all the plot immediately... afterall, we must conserve part of it in order to keep the readers interested with the mysteries... as well, revealing somethings that are only relevant in the distant future too early will result in readers possibly even forgetting some of the stuff...

-and i didn't even realize that the "All-Weathers" are humans until there O.o; even though they're introduced to the story a long while ago... hmm >>;

-Lilac is also a bit OOC... or should I say, out-of-logic? Even though she's some unnoticed girl that seeks attention yet cannot find it, it's still unreasonable to be so calm and firm at the same time in front of Kitsune at the end of ch.1...

-as a last bit of advice, watch out for a highly redoned plot... what ch. 1 tells me is that the overall plot is very alike to *many* other plots out there. This will mean that if you want your story to stand out from the rest, then your plot details will have to be *very* detailed and spectacular...

Focuses to Improve On
-syntax to help clarity
-clarity in plot
-sentence structure to help clarity

Grammar Basics: 7/10
Characterization: 10/20
Coherence/Readability: 7/10
Tone/Structure: 6/20
Diction: 10/20
Effort/Originality: 15/20
Lit. Device bonus: +0

Total: 55

Now I'll look so much like a bad guy after 2 consecutives of marks in this general region... not that I care about being the antagonist of today, but I do want to remind everyone that I give a mark as I see fit in comparison to a truly enjoyable fanfic, regardless of age or anything.

 

[Aiya Quackform]

My fic is next... *is nervous* Hey, what are the odds of three bad scores in a row, right? *nervous laugh* ... *crosses fingers for a 70+*

 

[Flatulus]

Frost you know you have just made the mods look bad, my fic was last weeks fic of the week and you just put it down as only deserving a low score... The fact I might get in trouble for it is still a possibility, but it's more likely you'll suffer instead.

On all the sites I put the fic this was the first bad review, I don't see how the plot is unorigional but I haven't read many fics to compair it with so I can't say for sure that your wrong.
Yes, my spelling and grammer is shocking, it comes from failing english two years in a row but that's not really important.
I understand that you probably don't like my fic, it's understandable that you can't like every kind of fic, and this fic is not for younger pokemon fans.

On a lighter note: How close did I get to the worst fic you've reviewed?

 

[Yamato-san]

Flatulus, the mods may find it good personally, but Frostweaver reviews in a rather thorough and, I can assume, unbiased and fair manner. That aside, there also have been tons of occasions where the "Fanfic of the Week" was just the best they could come up with to showcase for that particular week (in other words, it's not crap, but it's certainly not gold nor any kind of precious metal/stone/pearl/jet/amber/other organic materials for that matter. And when the only other things available for that week is crap, you know what they'd pick).

 

[Frostweaver]

What Lily thinks is one thing. What I think is another. We maybe pairups and are good friends, that doesn't mean I cannot disagree with her or even prove her to be wrong. In the same manner, she can also refute me. I've stated this very clearly before in one of our PMs. Don't tell me what to do or what not to do in the name of someone else here, be it using Lily's name, or the higher staff's name...

or even, the old Kairi herself.

I've always made the mod look bad and poking fun of them anyway. I wasn't a likable fellow staff when I was a mod (and thank goodness that I got out of Mod Lounge so soon)

No. Neither of us will get in trouble, nor will anyone for that matter. Does a teacher get a deployment letter from giving a student a "low" mark? If that is what is happening, then there is no need for teachers in the world

I've explained about the chapter thing already. I read as far as I go, and come to a stop when I see that I've made enough suggestions for you to work on. If I find that there's a lot to do in one chapter, then I only review one chapter. However, if your story is flawless, then I'll be forced to read all those 10 chapters of it.

There are *tons* of stories with ninetales playing "mysterious" roles (in fact, Vulpix/Ninetale itself is a very overused Pokemon character, next to Eevee and the Eeveelutions, tie with the legendaries)... and there are plenty others with manipulative Pokemon trying to take on the human world. Fanfiction.net has tons, and even a few months back PC got one itself of mysterious Ninetales running around with all those mysterious tone (but didn't manipulate any human being)

Also, I'll side with Farla on another point about the plot- whenever Pokemon and Humans are able to understand each other, it's almost bound to have chaos that appear, unless the situation is that the fanfic takes place in an alternate universe. It's almost always that authors allow the Pokemon and the protagonist to be able to chat with each other without ever giving a reasonable explanation! In here, we have "well this Ninetales is SPECIAL." (but at least it's better than those "how did that happen? Oh well *shrug*") Well, like, ok... what about it?

True that in stories, the author can almost bend anything to his or her will if s/he chooses so. But this is only true if the author makes it conceivable, convincing and realistic.

How is grammar "not very important?" Grammar is a set of rules set for words and other writing components to form sentences, therefore making it possible for everyone else to understand what is being said/written. If you failed english 2 times, that is "fine." If you're writing a fanfic with english not being your first language, that is also "fine" (meh english isn't my first language either.) But to just shrug it off and ignore the problem... that is not "fine." If you have problems with grammar, ask for assistance and let others help you with it. Reading more fanfics or published books can always help with grammar.

Only one man in this world can escape from the restriction of grammar, and I doubt that your name is William Shakespeare who's probably kind of a bit too old to write by now.

As a small sidenote, spelling errors should not exist at all, because a spellchecker is too wonderful nowadays to let spelling errors slip like that.

"Younger pokemon fans?" Well that's probably true as I maybe younger than you by a few months... that I don't know. Perhaps I am just an ignorant little boy who haven't seen what are the true "evils" out there... guess Pokemon MASTER are just fairy tales. Perhaps our definition of "younger pokemon fan" is completely different, and we aren't sharing any common ground here...

One night ago, this forum has already proven itself that a fanfic's success in another website/forum do not gurantee anything whatsoever... do not use the same argument again for it's refuted already.

As for the lighter note, the worst fanfic that I've ever seen is on ffnet where Ash and Misty just pretty much smack together and kissed for no reason in Charicific Valley, while Brock and Liza went to a date somehow for again, no reason... that 100 word fanfic is truly a waste of pixels on my monitor screen.



If you (or any other writers here) doubt my inability to remain focused and unbiased when rating a story, that would be fine by me. True that I can say nothing to defend myself on this one, except to ask those who want a review to have trust and faith in me...

There is an efficient method to truly put your fanfic to the test if you think that this review from me is highly inaccurate and misleading. The method is to somehow find a way for Farla to read over it. Perhaps if you're in luck, she will drop a comment or two about it. Surely though, it won't be as nice as mine...

 

[Iveechan]

The worst Pokemon fic I ever read was about James abusing Jessie, who was his wife and then she kills him in the end. There were no Pokemon and they were totally out of character. It was a Lifetime movie, not a Pokemon fic.

Oh wait, scratch that, the WORST fic I ever read was at... some other... forum recently. All the author did was brag about how wonderful her character was, how she was talented at everything and was friends with Lizzie MaGuire and other stupid crap. Omg, I should make a fic where I'm friends with Danny Elfman and I own 400 Pokemon.

 

[Aiya Quackform]

Worst fan fic I've ever read? Well, I generally don't read fics that start with a misspelled word, so I can avoid most... Although it would have to be a fic where Ash and ALL of the gang (I mean everyone ever mentioned in the series) got invited to this island crammed with legendaries and shinies and everyone caught ten shiny legendaries. Yuck.

I must, now, mention my absolute favorite fic of all time. It was called "Belzakath the Shadow Blaze: Legend of the Black Mew". That sounds like a long n00b fic, I know, but the girl who wrote it had a true gift. It started out as a well-written trainer fic, but she infused more & more into it. She and her Houndoom could communicate telepathically, and she found that she wasn't the only one who could communicate with a single Pokemon. She could communicate with this guy in her dreams, and she and her Houndour shared their dreams... Now that I type all this out it sounds like total n00b fic, but it really wasn't. Even the best of the one-shots I've read here simply don't compare to that series. Unfortunately, she wanted to re-write the beginning, had her fic deleted with the intention of re-posting it later, and got banned for bad conduct shortly afterwards...

Oh, Frost, I was wondering where I can find this "Pokemon MASTER" fic.

 

[Dragonfree]

The score of worst Pok?mon fic I've ever read is tied between two. One is about the daughter of Ash and Professor Ivy (who is the author's favorite character) and how perfect she is in every aspect (except grammar). The first chapter contains a HUGE list of all the Pok?mon she will catch in the fic - admittedly she then gets starter Pok?mon, and after that she battles somebody and turns out to already have two of the Pok?mon from the list. The list also includes Groudon, who is her "big teddybear", and Treecko, Torchic and Mudkip that Max gave her as a birthday present because he fell in love with her. (And, um, if she's Ash's daughter, how old is Max?) Biggest Sue EVER.

The other worst fic is called "Ash Becoming a Love Machine", which won an award at The Pok?mon Tower. Thankfully I've been told that the author cheated on the awards, but that doesn't make the fic any better. It's badly written, the grammar is bad, the characters are OOC (no, scratch that, they had no personality at all except "OMG CONDOMS!!!11LOLOL!"), it has the most ridiculous sex scenes I've ever seen, it jumps back and forth in time, it changes to IM-style script format randomly in the middle, Ash and Misty get married TWICE during the story (I'm not joking, part two ends with him proposing and her marrying him, and part three, which is supposed to happen before that, also ends with him proposing and her saying yes), the only thing that really happens in parts one and two is that Ash buys "crates" of condoms, the only real plot in it (which is in part three) is an extremely typical Misty-falls-in-love-with-this-guy-and-Ash-becomes-jealous-and-they-battle-and-Misty-realizes-how-much-better-Ash-is-and-cheers-for-him-and-he-wins, and the chapters have absolutely nothing to do with each other. When I'm feeling cruel, I like to go and snicker at it.

 

[Chibi Pika]

I must admit, I'm starting to not want to ask Frosty to review my fic. Not because I'd get a low score, but that he'd probably point out some major error in plot that I couldn't explain x.x; The score I wouldn't care about, I know I suck =P

Holy crap, I remember reading the first one Dragonfree mentioned. The worst I ever read was the infamous "new girl in town." Pretty much everyone in the SPPf fic forum saw it; counting all three threads, it got about six full pages of reviews, but it was about a girl who got all the legendaries from her grandma, then got all starters and eeveelutions from Prof. Oak...ect...

~Chibi~

 

[Iveechan]

I think that both Dragonfree and Chibi Pika are talking about the same author I was speaking of. Wow. The poor dear is famous for all the wrong reasons.

Funny thing is, once I was getting constructive criticsm (this is before Frosty's reviews), my drive to write went down. No, not because I was throwing tizzy fits, but because I was so worried about making each chapter flawless. Right now I'm extremely stumped on Guilty and I'm worried that some future events I have planned will seem, er, stupid.

 

[Aiya Quackform]

Funny thing is, once I was getting constructive criticsm (this is before Frosty's reviews), my drive to write went down. No, not because I was throwing tizzy fits, but because I was so worried about making each chapter flawless. Right now I'm extremely stumped on Guilty and I'm worried that some future events I have planned will seem, er, stupid.

Yeah, I know what you're talking about. I used to always be worried that my writing wasn't perfect. But, not too long ago, I came to the conclusion that of course it's not perfect. I'll get reviews that tell me my flaws, it's part of the learning process. It's important to remember why you write. I write because I love it, it's an extension of myself. I have to keep that in mind at all times or I get completely self-conscious of my writing.

 

[Breezy]

The score of worst Pok?mon fic I've ever read is tied between two. One is about the daughter of Ash and Professor Ivy (who is the author's favorite character) and how perfect she is in every aspect (except grammar). The first chapter contains a HUGE list of all the Pok?mon she will catch in the fic - admittedly she then gets starter Pok?mon, and after that she battles somebody and turns out to already have two of the Pok?mon from the list. The list also includes Groudon, who is her "big teddybear", and Treecko, Torchic and Mudkip that Max gave her as a birthday present because he fell in love with her. (And, um, if she's Ash's daughter, how old is Max?) Biggest Sue EVER.

Oh, I know that fic. --; Poor girl wouldn't really listen to the advice we gave her either.

Another fanfic I read that was horrendous (besides mine of course) would be that one fic with the OT catching all the legendaries in less than three chapters and having May fall in love with him. Another would be that one that went to the unknown dungeon yesterday. ;) Rockets blowing up? No way!

Aren't we all worried about constructive criticism? We only want to hear what is good about our fics despite how much we argue that we only want to improve. ;)

 

[Flatulus]

Frost, I was just joking, I knew I'd get a bad review from the start (Well I knew I deserved it, most reviewers aren't as honest as you) but I was never writing the story to build up a fan base, I just felt like it would be a good way to use my spare time... of course the fans I do have make it more than worth my while continuing it, though it would be nice if everyone who read it commented on it.

I do intend to improve on the things you pointed out in the future chapters if possible but many mistakes were once off, many others are plot related and it is too late to fix those. Yes, my spelling and grammar is bad, and that improves slightly with the later chapter though it is still far for perfect and it will continue to improve as more chapters are done... Yes, I thought about fixing the mistakes I knew of before you reviewed it but for some reason that felt a little dishonest and I ended up skipping doing that.

To be honest I didn't realise how overuse Ninetales was, and you do have a good point about how that little detail lowers the quality of the whole fic, though on fanfiction.net someone has pointed out how I successfully develop my character's personalities, keeping them quite realistic as well as commenting on how the whole plot seems interesting and different... of course that was just one person and is hardly enough evidence to accuse you of being a bad reviewer, but is was fun to try.

One point you seem to of missed, though that?s understandable since you?ve only read the first chapter, the human is not the protagonist, it is the Ninetales that is? I agree that it wasn?t explained well enough as to how the human began to understand the Ninetales but I intended it to be nothing more than simply adding pokemon language into the poor girl?s head, it is not the ability to do that which makes the Ninetales special (That?s just a minor extension certain capabilities a Ninetales had in the aname series), it is the nerve to actually mess around with someone?s mind without thinking of the consequences for doing so and the fact the Ninetales has a few problems breathing fire.

... Still you should try to get a feel of the whole plot before calling it unoriginal, the Ninetales (Named Kitsune) is trying to take over the world but the difference is how she's doing it a very different way that'll take DECADES (Thus there is no chance of her achieving it in the 50 odd chapters planned) to finish, which is also a way that's more likely to work and she is not doing it for personal gain as she merely thinks humans are doing too much damage and must be stopped.

The story is more about the journey itself than the reason for the journey, focusing on how challenging it is for the Ninetales to stay in control (Being dominant) when the whole world is rigged against that, it is about how the girl fears what could happen if she isn?t careful?

Please note: I am not giving you a link to the site where Lily keeps her none pokemon fics after such a bad review, though I wouldn?t be surprised if you have already either found it for yourself or Lily has just handed it over to you.

 

[Frostweaver]

lol... so much for all those PMs that was promising me a beautiful and near-flawless fanfic =p It's dramatic irony looking at those PM and compare them with the message in the fanfic lounge...

It's not dishonest or being unfair about editing your own work! Afterall, that's what reviews are all about in the first place... to encourage editing, and to point out what needs to be edited and improved on.

Err... whoever said that the characters are realistic certainly missed that dialogue belonging to Miss All-Weather that I pointed out earlier XD; It is quite a terribly flawed line... didn't fit the situation overly well. A girl who just realized that a nightmare came true... is certainly not going to say something like that, especially with the calmness in her voice.

The protagonist thing is debatable... I've learned 2 different things about what a protagonist is from 2 different teachers. One says that there can only be one protagonist in a story (ex: Only Tai near the end of Digimon season 1 is the protagonist), while the other teacher says that it can be a group depending on the situation (ex: Tai, Matt, TK and Kari are all protagonists, not just Tai). I personally believe that it can be a group, which to the point of the end of ch.1 points that both Kitsune and Miss All-Weather *will* be protagonists... however, I understand if your english teacher is like my current one, where there can only be ONE protagonist. But notice how you're in a way contradicting yourself by claiming that Kitsune is the protagonist, yet in your 2nd last paragraph you cast Lilac to be the one in the spotlight? ;p

Giving Miss All-Weather the ability to understand Pokemon speech is hardly an act of mind torment... it's not on a severe level enough to be considered a harsh risk of great consequences.

Too bad that his account is defeated and his story will be forever extinct (there goes my true *favorite* Pokemon author ;o; ), but an older writer by the name of Brian on fanfiction.net wrote a brilliant mind torment story of Ash and May... I was reading it at 2 AM and that was terribly unpleasant O_o; scared me half death... I don't remember the name of that particular story now, but it is a terror fanfic that actually consist of no Pokemon, no names mention (you are never told directly the fact that it is Ash and May in the story), and minimum movements (almost scriptfic...) The content and style used to convey the idea of true mind torments... a masterpiece *sniff sniff*

The absense of danger from understanding Pokemon speech (at most it's going to be fright, not so much danger) doesn't support it as an act of mind torment/control.

The idea of a world dominating scheme that last through a year and the idea of a world dominating scheme that last through decades in a fanfic do not differ from each other at all besides the spelling of "year" compare to "decade." Time is infinite and can fly at any pace we want in a fanfic anyway. What difference does that make?

Actually, you just spoke of the common plot... Pokemon fanfics that feature Pokemon as the protagonist ALMOST ALWAYS include Pokemon trying to rebel against human beings in order to save the planet.

-Dragonfree in PC wrote one featuring Absol running away from humans who have betrayed nature.

-Trials of Reluctance featured Archie's *partial* plan with the identical goal. He tried to wipe out the world of humanity along with their "dirty machines" (and you'll notice that a motif featured only by Team Aqua is machines... a very good job done there as it's clear to notice this motif whenever Team Aqua is in play) by plunging it into the sea.

-Pokemon Special manga featured the Elite 4 trying to recreate the world so it is an utopia for Pokemon, by wiping out all the other humans in the world.

-The Pokemon League in Pokemon MASTER also had a similar scheme to destroy humanity to stop their corruption of the land.

-Iveechan's story did not focus on this as the main idea, but partially suggested a similiar theme by portraiting the man whose name should have been Anthony as a pretty much, a drunken brute.

These are only the famous ones on top of my head... certainly there are a ton more of them in other forums and other parts of ffnet.

Actually, an original plot that features Pokemon as the main character actually not acting against humanity, by for humanity against the Pokemon who do want to overthrow humanity's reign... I haven't seen anything like that yet, unless you count Pikachu's role in Mewtwo Strikes Back...

Why read about the process if we are lacking the reason... o.o; Explanations really have to be given early on in the story. It is inadequate to ever say "well it's explained in chapter 987 you know, so read on." Actually, this is one of the only flaws the infamous Pokemon MASTER committed... it never explained what is a Pokemon Master until ch. 8 which is way too late... don't ever rely on the thing about "well it's explained later." It really doesn't work... I tried doing that before in my earlier times of writing ^^; The world really doesn't appreciate that...




As for the note:
- I really can't appreciate those fanfics since I don't know anything about the original anyway... I don't know much about anime/cartoon other than Pokemon. Without knowing the original, how can I ever appreciate the fanfics then?

-If Lily truly wants me to read her other fics, then she'll link me to it herself... I did go to bug her about it and all those kind of stuff that day on MSN, but to just being curious about it is different than being desperate to the point of being rude about it...

And now I forsee someone saying how I really can't take jokes and that everything was just "kidding..." Of course, if there's a secret tone of someone being equally serious and upset too in the posts... shouldn't I be serious about it too, especially if my dearest Lily's name is continously hurled at me as if it's used for ransom of some sort...?

Heh... let's drop it while you're ahead and that I haven't raised my voice yet... though now you did tempt me to do so...

 

[Iveechan]

I wrote a fic that was all Pokemon that had nothing to do with rebeling against humans, but it's waaay too inappropriate to post here. And Anthony/Rick is not a drunk. He's just a big jerk.

 

[Dragonfree]

Technically, Last Defense, while being about one Pok?mon who happened to be abused, emphasizes that this is not how a trainer is supposed to be...

 

[Yamato-san]

Why read about the process if we are lacking the reason... o.o; Explanations really have to be given early on in the story. It is inadequate to ever say "well it's explained in chapter 987 you know, so read on." Actually, this is one of the only flaws the infamous Pokemon MASTER committed... it never explained what is a Pokemon Master until ch. 8 which is way too late... don't ever rely on the thing about "well it's explained later." It really doesn't work... I tried doing that before in my earlier times of writing ^^; The world really doesn't appreciate that...

I think there're a couple of flaws in this. For one thing, it's great to keep the readers in suspence, wondering what the reasoning for something is until it's finally explained. For instance, if you have a cool, shadey, mysterious character give us his life story the second he appears, he won't seem so cool and shadey and mysterious, now will he? Also, there're some things that the readers need to find out along with the characters, it can't just be given away in the narration or something because the characters don't know it (ex. Eievui's sudden interest in Hiro).

But if you were just talking about stuff like what the hell this and that is, common things in the fictional world that pretty much need explaining no matter what, then nevermind, I can see your point.

 

[Frostweaver]

Fanfics still have its own way to "explain" something that is "unexplained." You'll detect that the tone trails off, or leave hints along the way about something being strange... However, in this case, there are no such hints nor are there tones that suggest such a thing.

Authors have to "tell" the readers that "it'll be explained later" secretly through the usage of tone, syntax and other devices. Authors can't just remain motionless and expects the reader to find out themselves... Authors have to direct their readers. Readers aren't suppose to do any work when readers are reading. The author do them all.

EDIT:

@ Iveechan: Well didn't I say "pretty much" for Anthony? XD;;;

@ Dragonfree: As for Last Defense, the idea of feeling bitter against humans is still suggested (and clearly too.) It is definite that if Absol is given the chance to strike back at humans, she will *consider* it. However, it'll depend on if Absol's bitterness will overpower her moral... still, idea remains the same that humans were the bad guys there.

 

[Strawberry Delcatty]

Just wondering out of curiousity... I'm redoing HMW in a narrative format, and I'm wondering whether to post it here or wait until I'm finished with my HMW site (the project seems dead at this point, however). I really want to do it here so I can get some reviews, but if you think I should wait, I will.