honeylemonbutte

[honeylemonbutte]

note that I am talking about highways/interstates where a toll is charged in ALL LANES at ALL TIMES. I'm not asking about an extra lane that costs money to access (eg commuter lane). the fee may differ by day/time and/or type of vehicle, but a fee is charged to every vehicle that accesses the road. the road can charge tolls as you get on and off, or may charge tolls at points along the road, or both.

take "my state" however you like - you can answer based on the convention in the place/one of the places you grew up. you can answer based on the convention in the place you live now.

elaborate in the tags or comments if you like!!!

I know this is america-specific, but I made this is because I am interested in why my friend in pennsylvania uses "turnpike" and I from illinois use "tollway." where is the boundary between word usage? also, I only get so many poll options. if someone else makes a similar poll for other parts of the world, tag me/send it to me and I'll be excited to share it too!!!

[honeylemonbutte]

| quarts & jasper _1_|_2_|_3_ by rockhuntermark

| contains: clacky rock sounds, water splashing

[honeylemonbutte]

Copper Replacement Agate

[honeylemonbutte]

MAGE REBORN PUBLIC UPDATE APR 5, 2025 https://forum.choiceofgames.com/t/a-mage-reborn-book-two-wip-updated-april-5th-2025-book-one-released/95149/6330?u=nm6k

[honeylemonbutte]

moment of unspeakable beauty today when one of my coworkers called another coworker "judas" for not splitting a can of white monster with her, and i got to watch the guy who sits next to me open a new google tab, type in "jeudis," and say quietly to himself "french thursday...?"

[honeylemonbutte]

necromancer princess who keeps the same knight around hundreds of years

[honeylemonbutte]

I’m watching Splash (1984) which is a romcom about a guy who falls in love with a mermaid, and when she chooses a human name she chooses Madison and guy says “that’s not a real name, but alright” which seems to imply that Madison was not a name until at least the 80’s and all girls named Madison are actually named after the mermaid. thought you should know

[honeylemonbutte]

if tumblr shuts down you'll find me like this

[honeylemonbutte]

have you guys done that “what kind of reader are you” quiz and if so what did you get

[honeylemonbutte]

Shared Storytelling Choices

The standard kind of choice in interactive fiction presents the scenario to the player, and the player navigates the maze of possibilities of the world as the writer has crafted it.

There is another type of choice, though, that a writer might want to sprinkle in, to mix up the feeling of the choice structure and the tone of the narrative.

This is a collaborative choice--one in which the player gets to choose a reality of the world for them to deal with.

Some people hate this. I'm talking about choices like this:

So, here, you and Fitzie have to sneak into a hotel, so you need a uniform. There's only one uniform. Who does it fit?

This kind of choice lets the player make a decision about what's going on--until the player chooses here, the nature of the uniform is an unknown.

Note that this choice includes an option that is clearly worse--you need two uniforms that fit, but you only have one. That's bad. But if you want, you can also have none! Giving the player the option to make things worse for themself works if the player knows that the game is going to *reward* them (with more narrative) for making choices that create interesting dilemmas.

Same here:

Depending on the choice made here, there is either a person at the back of the train to help you, or not, and which person it is changes. The reality of the world morphs to match the choice; here, the reader creates the story along with the writer.

I don't think every choice should be like there, but I do there's there's a lot more room in interactive narrative to create a playful, collaborative relationship between the player and the author.

As a side effect of using this kind of structure, I suspect that the player will be more willing to try things, to not play it safe, or just play towards stat-maximizing, because they feel like they have more agency. It feels more like you're telling a story together. Because you *are*.

Read more tidbits and musings about interactive game design at: https://www.patreon.com/TheNobleGasesClub

[honeylemonbutte]

i love this tweet bc it’s the exact same genre of culturally tapped in unnecessary haterism i also peddle in

[honeylemonbutte]

“Don’t let me lose you. Let me come back to you. Come back to me.”

— Dylan Thomas, from a letter to Caitlin Thomas wr. c. February 1948

[honeylemonbutte]

hey people who know astrology shit. ive been having a lot of feeligs lately. any planets i can blame that on.

[honeylemonbutte]

Reading Just Once

A really long interactive story with tons of branching narrative, lots of choices, multiple alternate chapters, and extreme responsiveness to player choice is made for people who replay, and replay, and replay, looking for new routes, experimenting with different types of main characters, new romantic interests, and exploring all the paths on offer. I want people to explore the three million words and get lost in the paths.

But I also want to serve the player who wants to read it just once, or who has a one true path! And by making all of the alternate paths real and leading to interesting paths that the player is explicitly Not Choosing, that makes the path they *do* choose that much more meaningful, and have weight. I think there's incredible value in seeing those four options you aren't selecting, considering them, pausing, and then saying, no, I'm going this other way instead, and never looking back. That's really interesting to me also.

[honeylemonbutte]

Black-and-yellow Broadbill (Eurylaimus ochromalus), family Eurylaimidae, order Passeriformes, Malaysia

photograph by Wai Loon Wong