That Victorious Feeling · 10:56pm Dec 2nd, 2018
No, this isn’t some big announcement or whatever. I didn’t finish any major story today or... really much of anything. About the only true victory I had was getting back in the writing groove after four days of feeling fairly miserable (and I’m still not quite out of it, though I see the light at the end of the tunnel). So why am I using Epic Badass Twilight imagery and naming the blog in such a manner? Well, there’s a story behind that.
Last month I decided to play a Visual Novel called Adventure of a Lifetime. I chose to do this because last year at around the same time I decided to try its predecessor, If My Heart Had Wings. This I did purely for nostalgia purposes; I remembered when I was a teen and used to go through visual novels. Admittedly, the ones I played as a teenager were crappy, but I enjoyed them enough to wonder if maybe the genre had improved any over the years. For the record, it took me 107 hours to complete all of IMHHW routes - which is a lot for a mere visual novel. But I played through the whole thing, because the stories for most of the available characters were startlingly good.
Today, while trying not to cough up a lung and taking a break after hitting my writing goals, I went and finished my first route in AoaL. The game is nowhere near as good as its predecessor. Superior translation, good music, but the story is still highly repetitive (apparently a common aspect in Japanese storytelling), only two routes are available, and of the three main characters only one is actually interesting (although two of the side characters are a hoot). Even so, when the ending of the first/main character’s route came up, I was... satisfied. Immensely satisfied. I felt like I’d witnessed the end of a good story.
That’s something IMHHW also pulled off spectacularly for two of its routes. When I finished those, I felt like I’d seen something awesome, something worth getting invested in. It was the rare sense of pride and victory that so very few stories can achieve, regardless of genre or medium.
That’s where I’m going with this. That epic feeling that something amazing has been achieved through the story. Getting that feeling at the end of AoaL got me to wondering just what it is that brings that feeling about. I’ve felt that way with my own writing, and that’s what really makes this interesting to me: what did I do to make myself feel that way? Trixie vs. Equestria, Lightning’s Bolt, Twilight’s Inferno, The Gentle Nights: Audience of One. Yes, Bulletproof Heart. There comes that moment in the climax where everything has come together, the battle is being waged, and it just feels epic.
But notice the stories I listed. TvE and AoO’s climactic moments were vastly different from that of Lightning’s Bolt, and it was vastly different from the climax of Twilight’s Inferno. Indeed, there’s nothing really ‘epic’ about Lightning’s Bolt, which is all by design. And yet it still felt epic in its conclusion. What brings that out? What makes it feel so good?
For me, I think it is a combination of things. A connection with the characters, throwing a great personal challenge in their way, watching them face that challenge head on, and seeing them grow to become better than they ever were. And perhaps, like in the case of Twilight’s Inferno, the sense of victory is as much for myself as for the characters involved.
Character is, I think, the major key of those visual novels. Frankly, the character I chose to follow in Adventure of a Lifetime annoyed the hell out of me. That’s why I picked her first; to get her over with so I could end the game with the cool, interesting one. But by the end of the story I wasn’t just rooting for dumb blonde, I realized I was proud of her. Somehow the game’s writers found a way to ensure this highly annoying girl prone to stupid decisions and dragging everyone down with her had gained my appreciation and respect. That’s impressive. It makes me want to take a closer look at her character arc to try to understand just how they pulled that off.
It’s the same way I think of Angel Bunny in Of Angels or Lightning Dust in Lightning’s Bolt. The story is all about their characters. I don’t know how many people have told me that Of Angels made them appreciate that rascally rabbit for the first time ever. Oops, there’s that sense of victory, again.
I don’t suppose I have a point in all this. I just got that feeling while finishing a visual novel and felt the urge to write out my thoughts on the matter. But I think that, in a way, that feeling is one of the reasons I enjoy writing. I love that sensation. I love seeing characters grow, learn, and become better people. I love the sense of victory and achievement that comes with completing that big story and knowing that in some alternate universe in my head, I helped someone win. Some of you will say they’re just characters in a story.
I say if that’s how you think of them, then you aren’t a storyteller.
I’m sure others out there have felt this way, either about something they’ve written or something they’ve read. Or more; no medium is free of this. How about you? Has anything given you that sense of epicness recently?
I have literally been fleeing from the sense of epic awesomeness. Since I set out to write a Slice of Life story. It's hard to avoid, given the pressures of narrative.
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Honestly? I didn’t appreciate Disney shoving microaggressions down our collective throats. But ignoring that, I thought it was a great movie overall. But of course it was; Disney tends to do a wonderful job on its major animated motion pictures.
There's a couple of things like that.
Code Geass is one of the best anime series I've ever seen. Half the characters are super genius masterminds who are trying to out-smart the other in the backdrop of an alt. universe global war. It's pretty slow at first but the third act is mind-blowingly worth it.
The Brothers Karamazov is a novel I'd strongly recommend you read, partly because it's one of those Greatest Books Ever types where you're supposed to gush over how great it is. It's a masterpiece in character development. The characters here are more real and human than any other I've read about. I guarantee you will be moved.
I think I've told you this before, but Witcher 3 has an amazing story with dozens of interesting characters, and it all comes together in a very Game of Thrones-esque way.
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I think you misunderstood. The feeling of epicness I’m describing is not about big events like armies and magic battles and saving the world. It’s far more personal than that. This is why I mentioned Lightning’s Bolt (which I totally understand if you haven’t read).
LB was a slice of life story. It’s climactic moment wasn’t a big battle or anything like that, it was just two ponies talking. But I still get that sense of epicness and victory out of it because what they’re telling one another is the culmination of 100,000 words of mistakes, misunderstandings, and character growth. You don’t need an epic event to achieve an epic sensation.
Austraeoh has a moment in the sixth or seventh book where a character’s sudden action recontextualizes the previous several hundred thousand words and it’s pretty epic.
I have experienced this phenomenon too, when wrapping up the end of Essenza di Amore. I was and continue to be immensely proud of both Cadance and myself for the turmoil we endured and overcame.
Over to video games, the games that most left me feeling whoa are Dark Souls, Spec Ops: The Line, and most recently, Far Cry 5.
Did you prefer the childhood friend or the new girl?
I get that feeling when I write something that I’ve been itching to do for a long time, which is often some critical scene in the middle of a story versus the final one. I sit back and think “wow, I finally did it! Awesome!”
Japanese media tends to be really good at this, that climax where the protagonist finally overcomes their internal conflicts, and thus manages to completely obliterate an external challenge which seemed insurmountable. My favorite example of that is the final race of the 2008 Speed Racer movie — and honestly a huge chunk of why I love that movie so much. More recently, other than Bulletproof Heart, I could probably cite:
- The ending of Shirobako, an anime about anime production, where (to avoid spoilers) a group of characters finally manage to make their highschool dreams come true.
- The grand finals of the Dota 2018 International, an e-sport competition, where a team of rejects systematically demolished all their opposition in a series of highly contested matches where they always seemed to be playing from behind.
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I've not seen any of those, but I'll admit you have me curious.
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Alas, it shall take me a while to get that far. But at least now I know I have more to look forward to than over-the-top ridiculous action sequences!
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I can see how you'd feel that way about EdA. I'm also annoyed to hear about all these games that are supposedly awesome but which I don't have time to get involved in. Well, that's not entirely true; I am playing some games, as this blog shows. There's just so many and I can't keep up anymore. Stupid real world with its stupid problems.
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Why in Luna's name would I pick some stereotypical, untalented, overemotional, unrealistically big-boobed, blonde-haired and blue-eyed schoolgirl when I could go for the pragmatic, cool athlete with something resembling fashion sense who won't nearly get everyone around her killed by leaping into terrible decisions head-first? Plus she's a tomboy, and I've got a thing for tomboys.
And in case you're asking that based on anime/manga stereotypes rather than having seen the visual novel, that means I went for the childhood friend.
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I know that one! There's always those two or three scenes that you thought of when the concept first crashed into your skull, but then it takes so much work to finally get there. Another instance where the work leads to great rewards.
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Finally, someone else who gets what I do in that movie! I loved the ending so much. Nobody else I know seems to have any appreciation for it.
Also, while I've never played DOTA before, now I kinda wish I'd seen that competition just to see something like that in action. It sounds like it was exciting to watch.
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Yep I picked her too. I needed a diving buddy.
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I haven't actually picked her yet. As I said, I chose the annoying one first to get her out of the way. I still want them achievements, yo.
Alan Wake's original ending had a sense of awe to me, even the last line, "It's not a lake, it's an ocean," was rad as hell, and lately Thunderbolt Fantasy has really scratched that itch. I never thought my favorite show of a year would feature puppets, but there we go.
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Oh they're not that bad, come on now. Especially for a weeb series
I agree with everything else though.
And muscular tomgirl is best archtype in VN's aside from maybe the ara ara milf type, so good taste there. God tier would be a muscular ara ara milf tomgirl, but sadly developers don't cater to my taste.
Edit: I'd also highly highly recommend Saya No Uta as a VN to play if you haven't yet. It's incredibly good, but depressing enough for me that I was only able to full-clear it once and never again.
Tv tropes used to have a page called “Crowning Monent of Awesome” which, sadly, I believe they deleted, but used to be a list of those epic moments (though probably leaning to the flashier). It was fun to read because every entry was a chance to bask again in that almost numenous moment of awe. One entry that I particularly remember was for the Codex Alera (book series): “pretty much the whole last book.” It sounds silly, but it was kind of true. You pretty much spent your time picking up your jaw and moving on to the next chapter.
I think there is a somewhat subtle difference between moments that are amazing, and moments that are amazing because they are the culmination of a lot of storytelling. Trying to remember examples off the cuff, a lot of my ideas tend to fall in the first and not the second (which is what you were looking for.) That made me think about this a little more carefully, and I’m still not sure all my examples are good.
I second (third?) that Speed Racer is awesome and has just such a climax. Wreck-It Ralph completes his journey in epic fashion. While I like Zootopia, I feel the amazing epic moment is a moment of failure, not victory. I love MLP:EG Friendship Games because Sunset Shimmer gets to complete her epic three movie heel-face turn.
As far as other stories, “Highball: the railway ponies” has an amazing ending. It’s not an unalloyed victory, but I think it counts.
I’ll keep thinking on this.
I went through my top bookshelves and was surprised at how few actually have an epic moment driven by character development.
Injuring Eternity definitely fits. The last chapter capstones the whole thing with a tender moment of awesome that can only be because of the character development earlier.
I think Nyx’s final “stand” submitting to the Princesses’ judgement as an adult in Past Sins might qualify.
“Exchange”, essentially a ascended crack-fic, always felt epic to me, but I can’t decide if it fits. The completion of the stone quest, the defeat of Twilight, and Twilight’s final redemption always felt epic. The first has character development but happens in the middle of the story, the second I think is just a crazy battle, but the third seems like epic character development and a grand culmination, yet a lot took place offstage.
Finally, Spellbound Fireflies seems like the completion of Scootaloo’s journey should count, but I can’t remember a specific scene. (I must need to reread it!)
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With the exception of Highball (which indeed had an ending that qualifies), I've not read any of these stories. I think some are on my RiL. I may have to give them a closer look. Also, totally seconding that Wreck-It-Ralph mention.
EDIT: Okay, who wrote Exchange? I see several stories with that name.
I think Spicy's final courtroom rant in Tastes Like Heresy qualifies, though her victory there is pyrrhic as all-get-out. Her calling out all the big shots and detractors, deciding that if the Princess wants a spectacle she'll sparking-well get one...
There was just something wonderful about her looking at the fate laid out for her, and deciding to take charge of what was left by burning it all down. And as a result of her actions, she got banished with a (slim) chance of return rather than merely being forced to eke out a life in obscurity. Unicorns will be talking about that for a long time (though usually in hushed voices when they don't think others are listening).
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This is the one I am thinking of:
https://www.fimfiction.net/story/169217/exchange
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Ewww, HiE. Well, I've read one or two of those that were worthwhile, so I'll give it a go.
...
Eventually.
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They recently released a 1-hour documentary about the Dota 2 finals I mentioned, which do a pretty good job at showing the excitement, and the human angle of it all, even if you don't have context on the game. Take a look here if you are curious: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bv4CqIxqTMA
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I know only the barest of basics for DOTA. Skimmed the video. Yeah, even I got excited about it. Very good directing.
But Sweet Luna, that’s a crap ton of money to win by playing a video game. What an age we live in. It really is like a major sport now, isn’t it? Makes me want to take a look at the StarCraft ones (because I know those are/used to be big).