oh my god so a while ago i submitted the amadeus demo to a certain not-to-be-named indie event, not really expecting it would be accepted but figuring it's worth a shot and either way i get feedback. right.
now i have had... mixed... experiences with the particular group putting on this event. i think they do some genuinely awesome work and provide an invaluable service, but the overall community still feels wholly unprepared for anything even remotely artsy or weird. like even though it's an indie scene it feels very normie core. i don't even consider amadeus that artsy or weird, but i am occasionally reminded that i may have a skewed frame of reference compared to a lot of folks.
(a few months ago i attended a narrative feedback thing with them that was such a dumpster fire it pissed me off so bad i went and wrote 43790248932 paragraphs about it on here. like just genuinely some "have you, like, ever read a book?" tiers of utterly baffling "criticism." one of them pointed out to me that i may not have considered this, but Amadeus comes off as slightly rude. ....NO FUCKING SHIT.)
anyway. i submitted the demo because i figured the feedback would be useful, i can use any positive quotes in future trailers, etc. i have as of today learned that the game didn't get in and also received the promised feedback.
first of all i think it says a lot that from seeing in the email "we regret to inform you," my response was oh thank fuck. I don't really want to deal with tabling at an event cuz I have other shit going on and would rather focus on finishing the game since I've just made a lot of decisions I'm excited about; they also didn't get these responses back far enough in advance to actually prepare tabling materials if I HAD been accepted so it would have been more stress than anything else. I've also been salty at things like the above narrative feedback debacle so I was absolutely just like "this is completely fine with me."
But I made the mistake of reading the feedback provided and now I am going insane again.
TO BE FAIR! SOME OF THE FEEDBACK IS GENUINELY THOUGHTFUL, I may take or leave a lot of it, some of it raises good points I've already addressed, some of it clearly understands what I'm going for etc. I appreciate all of that.
But man some of this is pissing me offfffffffffff.
Some quotes that are making me particularly want to kill someone:
"When first meeting the witch the dialog is just incredibly long and boring and I ended up skipping through most of it. Given how linear this story seems to be, I think it would be better suited as a webcomic or a motion comic, not a visual novel."
DO YOU KNOW WHAT THE WORD NOVEL MEANS. JESUS CHRIST.
I am extrapolating a hint of potentially meaningful feedback from this which I'm already addressing (the personality of the Witch in that conversation should come through more than it does) - but this person gave that "feedback" in the douchiest most insufferable way possible. Luckily for them, I've since made that conversation even longer. Fuck off.
"Some of the music is very harsh and dissonant while being very repetitive, which made me less enthusiastic about listening to it."
This was the same person which just tells me they have no taste. Like hmm I wonder if there was an intentional reason I am using dissonance in the soundtrack about someone going through something insanely fucked up. The repetition is an understandable critique even if I'll be ignoring it, but "some of the music is harsh and dissonant" is not a valid critique. Soundtracks aren't supposed to just sound like nice flowery music all the time, or at least not good ones. I'll be making the full soundtrack more dissonant just for you.
"Is there a reason for the Amadeus's bracers to be colored in but not the rest?"
[different person] THIS . THIS. F. ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS
NO. THERE'S NO REASON. I TRIPPED AND FELL AND ACCIDENTALLY ONLY SOMEHOW ENDED UP COLORING HIS ARMS IN EVERY SINGLE ASSET THAT DEPICTS HIM BY ACCIDENT SOMEHOW! THANK YOU FOR CATCHING THIS OVERSIGHT! SILLY ME!!!! IM TEARING MY HAIR OUT
"Not all of the music is equally fitting. There's at least one track that gets a bit techno."
yeah and im adding another track inspired by Bad Taste Aquarium from Sonic Adventure and another one that's basically GoldenSlaughterer 2. girl help I'm being "critiqued" by lame people with absolutely no taste
im so glad i read this after i finished moving my to-do lists to a new project management platform and getting really excited/motivated about where i'm at with the game because if i had seen this 2 days ago it would have just fucking killed my motivation. man. it's literally so hard being the only person with #vision
14 notes
·
View notes
girl, u started posting things for Christmas and then just went missing 😭😭😭 what happened to you??? is everything okay?
Hello I'm okay I promise!
Yeah that one was on me for thinking a December writing challenge would be a fun little thing I could do in the evenings whilst on an ICU hospital rotation 🙃 long story short it was super busy in the department and I stayed late pretty much every night and then had to do the keeping the human alive things and study for quiz time at rounds with the specialist each morning so I literally did nothing but study, eat and sleep for the whole month and I just didn't get a second to relax or write 😭
It has been CRAZY since the start of December!! I had a week off for Christmas and then I was travelling again for more placement, I've been applying to jobs and my finals are in 4 months time (which sounds like a while but I have 5 years of content to review and full time rotations in the day). Have also been lowkey seeing a new guy so that's been taking up a lil bit of headspace too 😶
I've also decided 2023 has got to be the year I decide to grow up and get my shit together before I enter the real world and honestly who knew meal plans and food shopping and working out took so much time!? Not me.
As the guys who've been here for a while know, I'm never gone forever!! I'm gonna need a couple more weeks to get through a round of job interviews, finalise my revision plan, survive an equine hospital rotation and get settled in a healthier routine, then I'm planning on making a partial return once I've got a bit more control over things and I can afford a bit of a break from all of this, but I won't be back online and posting regular-regular until the end of May after my exams
The good news is I'm taking two months properly off in the summer so you can bet your assess that's going to be a project finishing marathon!!
The Christmas fics are going on pause and will be re-released next year (I know, I suck, I'm so sorry for letting you all down) and I'm going to finish Flat Spin and Obvious by September and hopefully work through my request pile as we go from now onwards to keep me in the writing mindset
Anyway, I love and miss you guys like mad! I'm shocked by how much attention this blog is getting even when I'm not posting and I promise once I've got my real life together I will be back. In the meantime keep rereading and sending stuff in, I love hearing from you all!! <3
16 notes
·
View notes