Hap Recommends Moar Scribblefest #6 · 4:10pm Mar 12th, 2016
Hello again. This time around I've been trying to look for stories that got less exposure than some of the others I looked for in the hopes of finding some really good ones that might have simply fallen by the wayside. Unfortunately, that plan seems to have backfired since a few of them didn't really do much for me. However, this is why I haven't read other, heavily viewed stories with very large ratings. In fact, some of these stories had so few votes that they simply didn't show up.
I've also been trying to sneakily avoid reading ones that TheHatMan has also looked at, since he's been reviewing a few too.
So, if you're interested, take a look below for some more EFNW Scribblefest 2016 entries that you might find it in yourself to read and enjoy. Avanti!
Rainy Daze and the Darkness Within, by DUB
I wasn't a fan of this one at all, I'm afraid. I can tell it was trying to liken itself to classic fairytales (or at least, I think it was) like Rapunzel and a few others. The story relies almost entirely on telling, making it diffifult for me to be invested in, and the characters feel incredibly bland. We know very little about Rainy Daze and Buddy Brewster aside from their surface characteristics. Rainy is a unicorn with a curse that only activates upon true love's kiss, and Buddy is an alicorn who brews root beer. Now, I expected myself to become an instant fan of any character involved in brewing and beer, but Buddy is irritatingly boring and even inconsistent.
Across the story Buddy alternates between a character who's just there to serve as a bland and boring romantic interest and a character who's a bit untrustworthy. The untrustworthy bit stems from an obvious need for some drama that ultimately went nowhere.
The romance between the two is downright lazy. They meet, the story skips over their devellopment, and all of a sudden, the pair are madly in love, and spout the usual 'you are my only love' drivel without bothering to actually show me what one can do for the other. I don't even really know much about their personality aside from Rainy whining about her curse ever few paragraphs, which made me dislike her intensely. I couldn't be bothered to care for their romance since neither character is shown to have any quality or virtue I admire.
The dialogue in this story is particularly irritating, as the story doesn't follow the usual, modern, and effective method of splitting each line of dialogue from a different character into a different paragraph, meaning I ended up looking at a big mish-mash of dialogue that was a pain to read.
The conflict at the end is just as disappointing as the rest of the story, and was essentially just shouted down. Buddy and Rainy live out their happy, personality-less days without having had to deal with the curse. The curse just gets referred to a bit and any drama the characters have is lumped onto that instead of an actual character conflict. 'Oh, it's not a legitimate problem' they say, 'it's just your curse acting up'.
Recommended to: Anyone who desperately, desperately wants to read a fairy-tale-like story. You'd likely have to be very young to enjoy this, but I wouldn't really recommend it to adults to read to kids, either, since it doesn't teach any kind of virtue or moral, except perhaps 'fall in love with the first guy you see and act like a whiny curse-obsessed brat and hope he shouts it down after you accuse him of cheating'. Far more likely this story should be recommended to anyone who wants an example of heavy telling in stories and get an idea why, when taken to extremes, it's a bad idea.
Aerial Dreams, by BNuts
I was initially interested in this one due to similarities I perceived with my own entry, Weatherpony. The story was, after all, about a female protagonist badass, there was a picture of Cloudsdale on the front, and the description hinted about this great disaster (probably a storm, I expected).
It quickly became apparent the story had a lot less in common with Weatherpony than I expected. Aerial is a pegasus, for one, not an earth pony, and instead of trying to save Cloudsdale spends most of her time on training exercises to join the Wonderbolts. She establishes relationships with other characters, both Canon and OC, and goes around just generally being good at what she does.
I didn't find much to like in Aerial, but that's less because she irritated me and more because there simply wasn't anything there. She was a blank slate and her only interesting characteristic was that she liked to fly, which did not a fun character make. The side characters were equally bland and whilst I couldn't bring myself to be irritated by them as much as Buddy and Rainy (for being stupid, contrived, and whiny as well as bland) I don't think I ever really enjoyed reading about their adventures.
Their story pretty much just involves them doing training exercises with one exciting bit near the end. The story jumps time period a lot and it's really hard to understand how things are evolving. There's even a tacked on romance subplot near the end but it didn't feel built up to or meaningful, since there was simply nothing I knew about either character's personality. It would be like if I told you Steven and Mary decided to have a relationship. You wouldn't really care, because you don't know anything about Steven and Mary. I guess you might say 'good for them' but I doubt you'd dwell on it for long.
The ending is abrupt and felt really hollow. The writing often got a bit stilted and felt a bit unfocused, like I could never quite tell what was going on without slowing down and concentrating and there's no persistent conflict to get invested in.
Recommended to: If you're a huge Wonderbolt fan you might get a kick out of seeing some of your favourite characters in this, but really I don't think this is the best story for that. I should also mention that this is a prequel, so if you're already a fan of BNuts stuff, you might get some enjoyment out of this that others might not.
Lady Trixie and the Black Knight by SpaceCase101
This one is likely my favourite out of the three despite having the most glaring grammar and spelling issues of the three. It frequently gets mechanical things wrong, and in a way even little old me can notice. However, it also has two legitimately colourful OCs that I did have a little fun with, the knight in particular. He's nuts, and sees everything as an epic quest even when it really isn't. As with a lot of characters, being a bit nuts helps.
His sidekick is all right, although she's a bit of a wet blanket. She contrasts rather sharply with her master. Between the two of them, I think they make a pretty decent duo, and it's really a pity that this story has so many mechanical and storytelling issues because I rather like them.
The story itself lacks any persistent conflict, and could be summed up by 'knight in rusty armour goes ballistic'. The end is abrupt and hollow, and nothing feels accomplished. It's just something that happened, and it's really hard to get invested in a story where very little actually happens. The characters are dictated only by their whims, so they don't have a long term objective to strive for. If they did, this would have been a really fun story.
Recommended to: If you're very forgiving of spelling and grammar, and looking for a truly bonkers and colourful OC, I think you could do a lot worse than this story. The story ultimately goes nowhere, but it's main character is really what makes the story. If you like him, you'll likely feel you didn't waste your time. If you don't, then you're probably in trouble. So, ask yourself: would you like a nutty, hyper-role-playing knight in rusty armour and his wimpy squire Aurora?
That's all from me today. I'm afraid there was only one I think I came away with some positive feelings for, but I suppose that's what happens when you gamble on lesser rated stories.
From here on out, though, I'll only be reviewing Scribblefest entries either if they get requested or recommended to me, since next week will be a bit busy and I've managed to get through a rather impressive 18 stories (which is almost half the entries) in rather quick succession. So, once again: if you've read one and thought it was good, do post below and I'll try and get around to taking a look at it if I have time.
Cheerio!
Thank you for the review and yes I do need to work on the structuring of my stories.