OC Slamjam Compendium Comments the Third · 6:11pm May 30th, 2015
This brings me up to about the halfway point on my comments about theOC Slamjam contestants!
Part one is here.
Part two is here.
Mild Manners
A pony of royal blood is an interesting idea, because Prince Blueblood and his completely unspecified brand of nobility is a thing to be explored, maybe, I guess. He’s cohesive enough, and the profile is well written, so we’ll have to see if people do well with utilizing the various aspects of a pony who’s much more… well… mild, compared to the other contestants.
Dawn Gleam
Again with a goddamn H-A-T list. That’s a trap that leads to non-characters. That’s not the main problem with this one, though—the main problem with this one is that Trixie being a candidate for Celestia’s apprentice is a shitty fanon idea and you should feel bad. This is another Idea Bin Escapee, but one that is actually interesting and—crucially—open-ended. But ditch the daggers and the “shoo-in for HONESTY.” She’s already more of a super awesome canon related protagonist than most people will be happy with. Seriously, this is the second time we’ve seen daggers, and I know from experience that this is because these characters were used for RP scenarios full of edgy mary sues and some kind of fighting ability was expected if not required. Stop it. If you’re writing fanfiction instead of RPing then you need to be better than that.
Mizuko
Mizuko has easily lost the title of “worst by far” to Minx and the one with the spinal defect and the forgettable name, but she is still stand-out terrible. The thing that made me initially flag her as the absolute worst pony in the contest is that when I skimmed over all the characters, my eye was drawn to the nauseating Tumblr shit at the end of her first paragraph in the Personality section. “any number of inherently negative traits […] include, but aren’t limited to: bigotry, prejudice, snark (or any form of mean-spirited sarcasm), sexism, misandry/misogyny, etc.” Being a weeaboo self-insert was bad enough, but this elevated it to HOLY CRAP WHAT?
Aurora, you were right—she’s not even that bad; it’s just that she keeps raising Mary Sue red flags. For starters, she has among the worst cutie marks in the contest. And yes, her name is “Water-tan,” good job that’s very clever and would be a perfectly good pony name if this were a shounen anime. The sad thing is that we have the beginnings of an idea with “cares about competitive swimming more than having a social life,” but by that time we have already read “SHE IS AN AMA DESU, WHICH IS HOW THEY SAY ‘DIVER DESU’ IN GLORIOUS NEIGHPON!” and cringed.
Wind Whistler
Wow this one has a boring backstory. Most of it could be cut and replaced with “high-ranking, well-liked guardspony,” but I will credit him for being cohesive (if formulaic) with his backstory and personality. There’s nothing inherently wrong with it, but I think this is another sign of a roleplaying character—a detailed and mostly irrelevant backstory.
Silver Lining
My eye was caught by “misogyny/misandry,” but how did I overlook “autistic older brother?” I kind of don’t want to tear into this one the same way, because its mechanics are exceptionally bad, and writing a takedown would just be beating up on low-hanging fruit.
Falcata
I… I just… Holy crap, I don’t even want to read this fucking thing! Just look at this entry like what the hell happened here!? This isn’t how outlines work! “Time-displaced pegasus legionary from ancient equestria” is all I need or want to know about this character.
Summer Heat
I would expect this kind of thing from an F-list profile. Or Furcadia. Or some equally filthy corner of the internet that I’m ashamed to know about. That said, it’s a good F-list profile (though that’s not saying much) that is neither embarrassingly snowflakey nor depressingly empty and direct. Whatever. When we find out whose character this is, I’m gonna have a good laugh at their expense. Looking forward to what kind of stories come out of this one.
Calluna
I mentioned in one comment that the two typical personality types are “friendly, outgoing, please love me” and “quiet and withdrawn, just like all those Buzzfeed articles about us introverts.” This is the second one and there’s almost nothing more to see than that.
Minx
Again, I jumped the gun by saying that Mizuko is the absolute worst. I called Mizuko “terrible,” but this abomination here is “disgraceful.” It reminds me of six or seven years ago when I was roleplaying with a Megaman Battle Network OC. It reminds me of some of the charactrers I saw eight or nine years ago when I was roleplaying on Gaia Online. It reminds me of so many teenage roleplaying experiences that I’m willing to share embarrassing information about my roleplaying past just to express the caliber of bad that this is. Mizuko was a self-insert sprinkled with mary sue clichés; this guy is a OHSEE DUNOT THTAEL who doesn’t even have the decency to be modest like Mizuko or well-written like Dala. I don't think I would have outdone this one if I wrote an intentional, ironic Mary Sue.
Glyph Dance
Second one who carries daggers in his tool belt OH BOY OH BOY. I am trying my very, very hardest to not let my judgement be tainted by the fact that he came right after Angelynx/Minx/Devilinx. I would expect to see Glyph, Dala, and the underground pegasus all in the same RP thread. So many DONUT STEELs here that maybe I should stop judging them so harshly. My main problem with this guy is that he’s supposed to be some kind of too-cool-for-school badass, which isn’t the most horrible thing but it sure does make my eyes want to roll.
Iron Curtain
This guy might be my absolute favorite character in the whole damn list. No bullshit, described with a completely straight face, he’s a proud Communist from glorious Stalliongrad who lost an eye fighting the capitalist pig-dogs in the war. He wears a fucking ushanka. I laughed my ass off while reading this character, and the stories with him in it did not disappoint at all.
Spring Blaze
This blatant self-insert is joining Mizuko and the spinal defect one on the “worst in show” short list. I will not spend more time on this comment than the author did on the character. Well, okay, just one thing: Game design out of fucking nowhere? Really? You might as well make a horse pun for Gamergate.
Price Back
This guy is actually pretty good. His personality is a bit like the “buzzfeed article” generic, but it is also nuanced in well-conceived ways and can drive interaction. The quirk of being “susceptible to injury” seems random along the lines of what’s her face’s spinal defect (I refsue to go through the trouble of looking up her name). We’ll see how well people use Price Back.
Wait—on second glance, his name sucks. It has nothing to do with anything.
Minnie Milk
I can’t be the only one who can’t stop thinking of Milky Way when I read this name. And with her missing teeth I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that she’s a friend of Summer Heat. Anyway, this one’s weird. Along with her really strange quirks that don’t seem to fit into a holistic picture, there’s also the fact that her personality section is all about her getting mad when she’s bullied. I… don’t know what to make of her. Guess I’ll have to read her story.
Overall Minx seems to be by and far away considered the worst OC in the contest.
And for good reason.
Mizuko is still the top of the list of fics I'm of the honest opinion shouldn't have passed just because of their opponent. It's too bad Oddball didn't finish his fic, because unedited and thrown in, with just a bit more effort to finishing it, it would have demolished what passes for Mizuko's story. It's like the author has no clue what makes a good story.
At least Minx is getting kicked out first round. The other we have to suffer for another.
You're really hard to please, I see.
3110531 Oddluck, you mean. And yeah, Mizuko's author isn't going to last another round unless their writing quality levels up considerably from now until then.
3110697
Doubtful, but stranger things have happened. If they up their skills that dramatically in that period of time, they'll still have to write a better story than their opponent... but, you know, if they manage that, much respect.
I hope you do my OC next. I'm curious to see what kind of hate mail I have.
3110697
3110704
Now I really wish I had entered a joke OC named Donut Steel.
I maintain that Falcata is an interesting character and doesn't deserve the hate you throw her way, if only because I have a soft spot for pony stuff that skirts the line of being pony.
...
No comment on the rest.
Even though you know I could.
You're welcome.
3112217
I think intentional joke characters were against the rules anyway, so you wouldn't have been able to. That said, some authors were clearly able to sneak one past, so I guess it doesn't matter.
3115608
Booster Bones and Iron Curtain are full on joke characters. But it would have been kind of heartless to block them out of the contest, so...
It appears I've struck a nerve of sorts in this one.
twentypercentcooler.net/data/5d/25/5d2593adb12e52ff8b63f09699e6c753.png
3110704 Oddluck was a mare, and should be referred to as 'her' instead of 'him'.