A new step. A new direction. · 9:21pm Feb 28th, 2017
Wow, it's been a long time, hasn't it? Almost a year since the last time I posted a story chapter. I feel awful about that. Life has been kicking my ass between work and raising my daughter. I'm sure some of you still want to see the next chapters of stories like Life Fiber Harmonize and Equestria's Strife Online, right? Maybe some of you are even hoping for me to pick Dragoon Wars back up? Well, I have an important status update for all of you regarding that. I'm headed in a new direction.
I announced a long while ago that I had made my own Patreon account, and everything I said in that blog post holds true. I can do better, and you all as my readers deserve better from me in terms of consistancy.
This is why I am pleased to announced that I have recently received a kick in the pants. After having dropped off of the site and stopped writing in general for quite a while, I suddenly got my first patron in the form of atronosthelast. Rather shitty of me to only get my motivation back after something like that, but it worked!
As my first patron he has chosen which of my stories I will be writing a new chapter for, and he has chosen Life Fiber Harmonize to be the one I work on. The next chapter is in progress now, and I am excited to be back on track.
But that's not all, folks.
While working on LFH I decided to do something big. Just writing fanfictions wasn't going to get me places, and I know I have so much more to offer. I have to branch out of this comfort zone if I want to be a better writer.
The first step in my newest direction as a writer is a project called Future Gear. In this near-future, sci-fi story, our world is swept up in the latest and great invention in human history, Solid Light Emission. This device has lead to a techological revolution, culminating in the titular Future Gear, clothing that serves as a personal SLE device. These mass production clothes have led to a cultural boom of safe, spectacle combat, among countless other changes. It is a tale of fun and games underlined with a treacherous underground looking to use the safely restricted technology for far more lethal and self-serving ends.
Credit for the concept of this world goes to a friend of mine who goes by Shazbot(not on Fimfic). I intend to bring his world to life, and I am proud to present to all of you:
Since this has nothing to do with ponies, I cannot put this story up on this site (unless Knighty finally expands the site like he keeps hinting at) so the best way you can show your support on here is by commenting on this blog and spreading the word to anyone you think would like this story.
Lastly, if any of you want to go a step further and support me even more, with the added benefit of voting power on any story I work on in the future, feel free to contribute on my Patreon Page.
I would love to hear the thoughts and questions of anyone that reads this first installment of Future Gear. Hope you all enjoy it!
One last thing! If anyone knows of a group that I can advertise this story on, I would be very grateful! All the ones I know of require it be pony related.
I read it and I like it. In fact, I'm already coming up with an OC to fit in that verse.
My imagination is a volatile thing. If I see so much as a cool concept, I'm already figuring out something for it.
What if there exists a modding/design community for the future gear?
4441746 Oh there is. Future Gear is fashion, technology, and combat rolled into one. Granted, outside of military spec and criminal hacking, combat is purely non-lethal and strictly protected. It's an embrace of human nature to fight, and making it a safe way to do so. It reduces crime, can help solve heated conflicts safely, you name it.
Gear comes in just about any type of clothing type you can imagine, with various fashion philosophies. No dangling jewelery or loose/billowy clothing though. That can be both a safety hazard or just mess with the projections. Anything that fits those descriptions is usually normal clothing.
As for modding, household names in business provide their own lines of products within the Gear firmware. Whether it's copyrighted designs for Gear or their projections, or for combat techniques, tools, and other such things, their are customized options all around. Most prolific of all is gaming companies and their creation of products and techniques based around the franchises they hold.
4442013 I'm talking more like a community of people who can tinker with the gear almost like one would build something with Lego bricks. Original designs, designs based on things like Super Sentai mechs and other fictional robots, and more.
As for what they would do, they would mostly just share their designs, show off, and engage in the safe combat it allows. It's an art form, really.
4442668 Ah, well that should go without saying. If companies can make their own designs, obviously there's a community that can produce their own designs as well. By mentioning that many companies could do it, I figured it was obvious that normal people could too, although with fewer resources overall.
Hell, one of the characters that will be a primary focus is a man that designs combat technique programs for himself and is looking to gain the attention of Future Corp, the ones that made Future Gear.
4442677 Would you mind if I made a character to go with the designer you mentioned? They could be a program runner, which would allow your character to see how their programs work outside the computers.
4442952 Hmmm, your character would have to bring something else to the table. Giovanni (the programmer character's name) already tests his own programs extensively.
Gio's the mind of character that grew up infatuated with Future Gear, and devoted everything to it, so it stands to reason that he's obsessed with Gear's biggest faccet, fighting. He's good at exactly two things: Gear and combat. If something can't help him with one or both of those two things, it doesn't interest him and he tends to lack in those areas. Social skills being one of them, for sure. However, that does mean he has obsessively studdied the intracacies of Gear software. That's how he came to be an amateur combat program developer.
However, while he is knowledgeable in the hardware of Gear, that particular line of development doesn't interest him as much since he can write programs for any hardware he can buy. Perhaps your character could be a hardware designer? Gio is designed to wear a pair of glasses that scan enemies to reveal their specs, so perhaps your character invented them to help him?
4442952 Also, keep in mind that all Gear has four "classes" depending on how they engage in combat. There are Brawlers like Alyssa, Gunners like the mercenary, Bladers like some of the goons that surrounded her, and lastly Casters, which operate a bit more specially than the others, but are basically a mid-range specialist with flashy "spell" techniques.
4442986 So he's more of a software specialist then. I could come up with a hardware specialist to work with him.
If you have a Discord server, could you PM me a link to it?