4 - In which Dawn Skystar gets a Riolu because of course she does
Abruptly teleporting herself, her friends, and the new pony she'd be calling a relative for the forseeable future seemed like a good idea to Twilight Sparkle, a good way to get out of that hospital and into her Fluttershy the Pokemon Breeder's cottage. The place was full of Pokemon, the place smelled like Pokemon, and the sounds of Pokemon could occasionally be heard around the area, but Twilight didn't bring them here to sightsee, she brought them here with a plan. Now that they were here, Fluttershy would give Dawn Skystar her new Pokemon quickly, Twilight was sure, and nopony would question the wings on Dawn's back before she brought the Alicorn back to her home.
Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy started singing to the new mare about Pokemon and what a big deal getting her first Pokemon would be. Rainbow Dash joined in, and they all began un-subtly hinting at which ones they wanted Dawn Skystar to choose.
After just over a minute of singing, every starter Pokemon, plus some extra ones, were out of their Pokeballs and standing in front of Dawn Skystar, waiting for her to make her choice.
What would she choose? That's what Twilight wanted to know. What Pokemon would catch her eye, what would her choice be able to do, and what type would it be? Would the new girl choose something suited only for combat, like an aggressive Fire-type? Something better suited for a less violent lifestyle, like a Grass or Water type?
Twilight peered closer at the exaggerated expression of thought on Dawn's face. What would she choose?
Bulbasaur? Charmander? Squirtle? Pikachu? Eevee?
Chikorita? Cyndaquil? Totodile?
Treecko? Torchic? Mudkip? Skitty? Trapinch? A Zigzagoon Twilight quickly pulled away from the group with her magic?
Turtwig? Chimchar? Piplup? Riolu?
Snivy? Tepig? Oshawott? Purrloin? That same Zigzagoon, which Twilight's magic pulled away once again?
Chespin? Fennekin? Froakie?
Rowlett? Litten? Poppolio? Rockruff?
Each of these Pokemon had their own strengths and weaknesses over each other, each had their own-
“I choose Riolu.” Dawn said, petting the little blue lady, whose bright red eyes were outlined with a black domino mask. Fluttershy used her wing to give the Riolu's Pokeball to the new lavender Alicorn, who took the ball into her own wing.
Of course she would, Twilight thought as her hoof swiftly met her face. A Riolu, just like the one Celestia had given to her long ago, on the day she joined Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns. Why did she even bother to wonder about these things? The special important pony got a special important Pokemon everypony wanted, even though this meant more of them were bred, so they hadn't really been rare for decades.
She supposed she COULD chalk this up as a win for her “This mare is a living weapon interested only in things that would be useful for fighting, and she'll turn on you as soon as she gets her memories back unless you and your friends can teach her the magic of friendship and convince her to rebel against her purpose” theory, but everypony wanted a Riolu. After all, they evolved into Lucarios. What filly or colt didn't want a Lucario? Grass-Type Starters were currently the best thing you could have, because they beat the Water-Type starters ponies chose to beat the Fire-type Starters ponies chose to beat the excessive abundance of Lucarios! Grass-type Starters were even better if they knew Earthquake, another move that could beat Lucarios. Also, Grass-type starters could beat the Water-type Pokemon trainers with Lucario caught to patch their team's Fire weaknesses, typically Azumarill or Gyrados if they were smart.
“I really must make a nice belt for you,” Rarity decided. “Perhaps something that'd stand out against your coat... Or, something that would match it?”
"Make it white," Dawn decided. "And not green or animated."
"Animated?" Rarity wondered, thinking of magically-animated belts.
An idea popped into Twilight's head. Perhaps there was a way she could bypass the whole 'everypony wants a Riolu' thing and REALLY get into this new mare's head, so she could see what Dawn deemed as most important. “Now that you have a Starter Pokemon, what type would you like her to be?” Twilight asked innocently.
“She's Steel and Fighting, and I have no idea why I'm already familiar with Pokemon, their types, and every move worth using each one knows.” Dawn said in confusion. When she noted the confused stares of some ponies, she quickly put on a nervous smile and added, “I mean, it's not like I spend THAT long studying Pokemon every day!”
“Your Lucario is Steel and Fighting-typed, but she doesn't have to be,” Twilight explained with a tempting smile. “I can use my magic to change the types of any Pokemon you want. Your Pokemon will gain access to all the moves of every new type, and copies of the old moves, retyped to fit her new typing!”
"You WHAT?" Dawn gasped. "But that completely ruins the point of Pokemon having types! What's the point in using a Dark-type Umbreon if it could be Ghost and Fairy or something?"
"What do you mean?" Twilight asked, because type-switches were normal in her world. "You can tell what type a type-changed Pokemon is just by looking at one. In some cases, it can be even easier to tell what type a type-changed Pokemon is."
“Well, if everypony's using type-changed Pokemon, I'd be an idiot to not use them... Can you make my Pokemon have two items at once?” Dawn asked, vaguely remembering something in her memories about that.
“No, but I can let your Pokemon use two abilities of your choice at once.” Twilight said.
“Really?” Dawn gasped gleefully, just like a young Twilight Sparkle hearing that her favourite author would be in town, or something. Her jolly little Riolu seemed excited by the prospect, too. For Twilight Sparkle, it was... bizarre. It was like looking into a mirror, watching a perfect reflection of herself move and act, a reflection that seemed so much like the real thing, until it imitated the Twilight Sparkle from a few years ago, rather than the one of today. She really, really hoped that either this mare would pick up some unique mannerisms soon, or that she'd get eventually used to interacting with what felt like some long-lost cousin she couldn't remember, and kinda wanted to.
“Yes, but I won't give any Pokemon any broken combinations of abilities and types, like Wonder Guard on a Dark and Ghost-type Pokemon, or Wonder Guard and Levitate on an Electric-type Pokemon." Twilight decided firmly. "And I won't give Wonder Guard to any Pokemon, unless that Pokemon has at least two weaknesses!”
“Ghost and Dark Pokemon have weaknesses now,” Pinkie Pie pointed out happily. “Fairy is super-duper-times-four effective on those!”
“But that's still just only one weakness.” Twilight reminded her. “Every type combination I make must have at least two weaknesses, or no Wonder Guard allowed!”
“In that case... I'd like my Riolu to be Electric, and Flying!” Dawn decided.
“Huh?” Twilight asked, not expecting that. Electric wasn't exactly a type useful for non-combat things, unless you knew a spell that'd let you convert electrical power into magical power, but Flying... It could be good for saving falling ponies, and it could be good for chopping wood with blades of air, but it could also be good for scouting ahead and getting air support in combat. Flying and Electric... Well, that combination certainly wasn't Grass and Psychic.
“Electric and Flying are the coolest types!” Dawn enthusiastically gushed. “I want this Pokemon to be able to fly through the air with me, and zap all the flying Pokemon she'll fight!”
“But you don't know how to fly yet,” Twilight pointed out.
“Why were you at the hospital?" Rainbow Dash asked suddenly.
"Some Pegasus dropped a piano on my head," Dawn explained.
"A piano?!" Pinkie gasped.
"I got better." Dawn shrugged.
"Alright. Why are you an Alicorn?” Rainbow Dash asked.
"Oh my g... goodness, Rainbow, you c-can't just ask somepony why they're an Alicorn!" Dawn stammered, hairs on her mane beginning to stick up out of place.
"Why not?" Rainbow asked. "How did you become an Alicorn? Why weren't we invited to your Alicorn coronation party?"
"Uh..." Dawn stammered, her mane growing more ruffled with each second. "Y-You know, the... One thing I should... Aurora Borealis."
"Aurora Borealis?" Rainbow Dash wondered. "Who in the hoof is that?"
"Oh, no, that isn't a pony's name. I meant to say Auroric Older Chalice! That's what I call old gold chalices."
Twilight's right eye twitched. "You mean aurulent. Auroric isn't a word."
"What are you, a dictionary?" Dawn chuckled. Something popped up into her mind, a phrase she instinctively held a strange loathing for, but said anyway. "And I'm not a real Alicorn, so I didn't get a real coronation."
"Wait, so you call old gold chalices 'Auroric Older Chalices'?" Rainbow asked.
"Yyyes! It's a... regional dialect!" Dawn decided.
"From what region?" Rainbow Dash asked suspiciously.
"Uh, upstate... Hermany?"
"Germaney," Twilight corrected.
"Germaney!" Dawn declared. "That's where I was, for... a while!"
"Was that where you got that 'old gold chalice'?" Rainbow questioned.
"I... can't say." Dawn said, frantically glancing at Twilight with big and pleading "HELP ME!" eyes.
"How did the Chalice make you an Alicorn?" Rainbow queried.
Dawn paused. “Uh... magic!” She answered with a big, nervous grin. And then, she snorted reflectively, twice, for some reason.
"Can you speak Germane?" Rainbow questioned.
Fragments of memories came to the surface of Dawn's mind, and all she could do was screw her eyes shut and start to scream whatever she thought was right. If she gave up now, she'd never forgive herself! "Wo ist die Lammquelle?!" She bellowed. "Was machst du?! Wo ist die Lammquelle?! Warum kündigst du dort?! Probier's einfach ein bisschen härter! NEIN, NEIN, NEIN, NEIN, NEIN, NEIN, NEIN! Gib nicht auf! Beuge dich vor, Großmutter! Beuge dich vor, Glurak! Unübersetzbar japonisch sprichwort! Annulliere meinen esel! Denk an all die Menschen um dich herum und die Leute, die dich anfeuern! Du bist fast da! Schau mich an, es ist verneinungzehn grad und ich ernte GEDÄMPFTSCHINKEN! Du musst es nur versuchen! Sie werden Ihr Ziel sicher erreichen! Deshalb sollten sie... NIE VERLIEREN SIE IHREN WEG!"
Rainbow Dash blinked. "Uh..."
"That was definitely Germane, but I can't say I caught any of that," Rarity admitted.
Twilight let out a long-suffering sigh. "Alright, Dawn, you can stop messing with them now."
"...Ok," Dawn said uncertainly, not sure what Twilight was doing.
“She doesn't like to talk about how she became an Alicorn.” Twilight explained in a non-explanation, and all of her friends decided to never bring it up again, while imagining up their own horrible super-tragic backstories behind this, except for Pinkie, who assumed the new mare just accidentally drank fifty gallons of flight potion while mistaking it for hot sauce, and Rainbow Dash, whose mind first leapt into the awesome realm of comic book origin stories, and then trudged back to the more mundane and likely "She cast a spell that went wrong so she has wings now forever, the end" story, where Applejack's mind had already gone.
To take the conversation away from Dawn's Alicornhood, Twilight's horn suddenly lit up, and her magic targeted the Riolu, lifting her into the air. Her blue fur turned yellow, her black fur turned electric blue, she gained Noctowl-like electric-blue wings for her back, and surprisingly, her face gained jagged sideburns, like two upside-down thunderbolts. Her tail grew out to resemble a big, light, and puffy grey storm cloud, and the head-ball-things on her head grew long curly fur, causing them to resemble golden versions of Pinkie's tails.
She dropped the yellow Riolu, who landed on her feet with a confident smile and gave the lavender Alicorn an excited hug as a silent 'thank you' before jogging over to her Trainer's side.
“I'm gonna name you Farto!” Dawn felt the urge to say, for some reason. She ignored it. “I'm gonna name you Raiden!” She declared happily, hugging her new Pokemon.
“Riding?” Applejack asked in confusion.
“Raiden's the name of a fictional storm wizard some primitive Pre-Equestrian Yaks used to worship, before we told them Pegasi were the ones controlling the weather,” Twilight explained.
“Neeerrrds!” Rainbow called good-naturedly.
“So, does she have Wonder Guard yet?” Dawn asked excitedly.
“That was just an example!" Twilight spluttered, shocked that anypony would actually want something so horrendously fun-ruiningly broken. "I can't just... I mean, think about it! Shedinja is Bug and Ghost, and it can only be hurt by Fire, Flying, Dark, Ghost, or Rock-type attacks. Those are five incredibly common types, and getting hit by just one will knock any Shedinja out. And Stealth Rocks will take it out instantly! Shedinjas are one of the worst Pokemon in the world, without their Wonder Guard ability. Your Flying and Electric Riolu would only be hit by Ice and Rock-type attacks, two types out of eighteen! If your opponent didn't have Rock or Ice-type attack, you'd be unbeatable, and it just wouldn't be fair! A weakness to Stealth Rocks wouldn't be able to offset something so incredibly broken, and Riolus have 190 to 284 health points on average, while Lucarios have 250 to 344 health points on average, a total increase of... of...”
Raiden was looking right at her with big, sad, pleading eyes. Twilight found herself forced to stare into them, her willpower slipping away. She tried to look away, only to find herself looking into the bigger, sadder puppy-dog eyes of Dawn Skystar.
“Alright..." Twilight sighed. "If you can get all eight Gym Badges, and evolve your Riolu into a Lucario, I'll give her Wonder Guard. Until then, you'll have to give her a small, only slightly-useful ability. Something like Inner Focus, or-”
“Contrary! So we can do Contrary Close Combat!” Dawn yelled excitedly, jumping around her. “Plus Poison Heal so she can hold a Toxic Orb and be immune to all status effects while healing an eighth of her health each turn! Or she could hold some leftovers for three sixteenths of free healing a turn, and a teammate could poison her using Toxic instead! Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes-”
“No.” Twilight said flatly.
"Speed Boost and Pure Power?" Dawn suggested.
"That's even worse!" Twilight insisted.
“Fine, how about something gimmicky like Water Absorb and... Simple?” Dawn asked. “There's a move called Simple Beam, right? So Simple can't be anything special.”
“You're half-right, but at least Simple isn't on Wonder Guard's level. It'll make Swords Dance more effective, but you'd still have to spend a turn using swords dance, so there'd still be some strategic thought involved,” Twilight said, her horn shining its magical glow around the Riolu, magically replacing her Steadfast ability with her two new ones, Water Absorb and Simple, something visualized when the Riolu suddenly smiled, her aura getting bigger and bluer for a second. “But why Water Absorb?”
“It'll really, really annoy ponies with Water-Type Pokemon.” Dawn said as if it was a brilliant strategy, a delightfully devilish grin forming on her face. “Scald can't get me now! Where's the first gym?”
“Wait, shouldn't you spend some time getting to know your Pokemon and training with them first?” Twilight asked, and quietly added, “And learning how to fly?”
“Sure, I can make time for that stuff too.” Dawn said dismissively, fully absorbed in the prospect of going on a real Pokemon adventure. “Who's the nearest Gym Leader for me to own?”
“Ah am,” Applejack said, because the author just remembered that she existed. “Yer lookin' at Ponyville's Pokemon Rancher and Fighting-type Gym leader!”
“Fighting?” Dawn wondered.
“You need strength to run an apple farm, and keep a Pokemon ranch running smoothly.” Applejack explained. “Ah have Grass and Ground Pokemon help out on the farm, but my Fighting Pokemon are the best.”
“I'm going there tomorrow,” Dawn decided. “But today, I'll train! Twilight, where's the best place to train in town?”
“I would say the Everfree Forest, but-”
“Great!” Dawn said, and teleported away.
“But I didn't even tell you where that is!” Twilight said in confused shock.
And as soon as she was gone, ponies started to talk.
"So," Rainbow Dash said suspiciously. "When were you planning on telling us you had a cousin?"
Twilight began visibly agonizing over a tough decision. Did she tell her friends who Dawn Skystar really was? Did she choose not to do that, and risk things blowing up in her face when some contrived nonsense caused everypony to learn Dawn's true identity, which would likely turn out to be something awful, like a living weapon born to destroy? What if that made Dawn mad enough to fulfill her original purpose? Did she forget how trustworthy Pinkie could be, and assume she'd be a blabbermouth, somepony she could never trust with Dawn's real identity? Did she- Wait, why was she tempted to wilfully forget such an important detail about her fourth-closest friend?
And now that she decided to not do that, why did she find herself so incredibly tempted to do it anyway, to act differently from how she normally would, just to "Mix things up"?
"She isn't my cousin." Twilight suddenly said, and took a deep breath. Best just to rip the bandage off, she supposed. "I can trust all of you with a secret, right?"
"I knew it!" Rarity gasped. "Twilight, darling, such things might have been considered something to hide before Equestria's founding, but-"
"Lyra found her in Ponyville today, and brought her to me." Twilight interrupted.
"Oh, my!" Rarity gasped, pretending to faint onto her fainting couch.
"And lost her memory!" Twilight insisted, and Rarity got back up, disappointed. "Some new Alicorn who looked just like me just showed up out of nowhere today, and said what Lyra thought her name was, then Derpy dropped a piano on both their heads. Lyra forgot everything that happened that day, and the new pony, Dawn, forgot everything. But when she woke up, she woke up screaming, and then she suddenly got paranoid about whether somepony might try and attack the hospital... Whoever she was in a past life, I don't think she lived a very happy one. I used magic to let her change her mane's colour, and I said she could stay with me for a while, but... Her body is a perfect copy of mine, right down to the genetic level, but her cells are less than a day old."
"Which means?" Rainbow Dash asked, not wanting to admit she knew what cells were.
"She's less than a day old." Twilight explained.
"She didn't look a day old to me," Pinkie pointed out, thinking of Pound and Pumpkin Cake.
"Well, I'll be darned..." Applejack murmured to herself. "Just when ah thought ah'd seen everything..."
"Was she made by the Mirror Pool?" Pinkie asked.
"No, that was one of the first things I checked. Her genes, the ones her body's using, copy mine exactly. But the genes her body isn't using were removed, and in their place... There's information there, coded into new genes, but it's shoved in so densely my magic can't read it! She could have anything in there. Genetic memory, ancient spells, hours of incantations for forgotten world-changing spells, or the lifeblood of some unknown species she'll be able to replicate and recreate perfectly using her own unused genes."
"Genes are those things that decide what your body looks like and what foals you'll have, right?" Rainbow checked, vaguely remembering something she'd read or overheard while flying.
"Yes, and memes decide what your mind and your contribution to the culture around you looks like," Twilight explained.
"What if she's some kind of super-powerful living weapon made with your genes, plus all the genes of the smartest Unicorns and strongest Earth Ponies and fastest Pegasi of all time?" Rainbow asked excitedly, remembering something like that happening in a Daring Do book: Griffon scientists created the Ultimate Life Form for the sole purpose of defeating Daring Do. The Pegasus barely escaped with her life before the Ultimate Life Form turned on her creators and brought the fancy old tomb's life-creating room down around her.
"If she is, then we want her to have good memories of us before she gets her memories back for some contrived reason." Twilight declared. "I'm going to need time to research a spell strong enough to scan the information in her extra genes, which means all of you need to spend time with her and show her why Equestria is a wonderful place. Rainbow, teach her how to fly. Fluttershy, teach her how to heal sick Pokemon. Applejack, you'll be the first Gym Leader she'll fight, so make sure she battles with care for her Pokemon. If she uses them like tools, pretend not to notice, and tell me as soon as possible. Rarity, teach her about art and beauty while making her a belt for her Pokeballs. And Pinkie Pie, give her a party tonight she'll never forget!"
Pinkie began to gleefully vibrate.
"What if she isn't a living weapon?" Fluttershy asked in a manner that was quiet, but, for her, also pointed. "What if she's just scared and confused?"
"In that case, she'll need friends to help her get on her hooves until she gets her memories back, or becomes able to live on her own. Alright, girls, you know what to do!" Twilight announced, and teleported back to her castle.
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Sunny approves. Ten ducks out of ten.
... What the hell just happen? ... And, seriously, type change? That ruins the whole point of pokemon types. ...Why am I bothered by this? ... Still, its good but I wish this made a bit more sense... The characters feel stiff like they aren't actual characters.
8840487
No it doesn’t. Reads fine for me.
For two days in a row, I've consistently had around six more likes than dislikes. Interesting. Well, if it's this controversial even now, I've done something right.
Edit: Seven! Clearly, my latest chapter made my fic even better.
when did dave learn how to teleport?
8840265
Oh, neat, that reminds me of Verbose Mode, who was a long-time writer who actually had experience under his belt and could tell others how to improve. His goal was to prove that Displaced aren't inherently terrible either, but he had one drastical difference in mindset:
He focussed on execution. Instead of thinking, "How can I make this stand out and seem creative?" he thought, "How can I make this story good?" While that usually involved breaking from the norm, it's not breaking from the norm just to do it - It's purposeful breaking from the norm.
8840252
I don't really think making it about what you see as flaws on part of the reader is the right decision, but hey, I'd only consider myself slightly above average.
A funny thing is that you immediately equate the cliche-Displaced to being an all-powerful God Mode Sue - They're actually not. They're incredibly powerful characters that only encounter challenges a bit beneath their level except for when they come to clashes with other Displaced. They're nowhere near all-powerful or God Mode, even if a lot of the time it doesn't show that well.
Which part, not having their main-character be immune to mind-control? I'd take a look at Lord of the Rings then, the main-character there isn't immune to mind-changes. Or did you mean Displaced-story? In that case, everytime a Displaced just acts like the character they were displaced as for no reason would count as a mind-change. I'm just presuming that you don't mean that the main-character doesn't shrug off something harmful to them, because there are a lot of examples for that.
I would recommend you look at Verbose's story for hints on how to properly capture your audience's attentions and show the audience, instead of telling them through exposition. Because the way you're trying to write your not-parody is how you would write a parody - The average person can't be described as "average in all regards", or "not really interested in any specific part". Just the mere fact that you overexaggerate his mediocrity causes you to try to make him special - If you really wanted to hit the average-cliché without parodying it, you would have tried to write him like you would imagine a normal background-character to spend their day, not tried to write him as "the most average guy in the world", because being the most average would set him apart and as such cause him to actually not be average. Atleast when I asked him, Verbose had been very helpful and told you truthfully how I could become better - But that's the catch. He does it truthfully, he's not going to tell you "Your characterisation is great" if your character's personality changes from Edgelord to Pony-princess to Serial Killer to Neighbourhood Kid too whatever for no reason, so he's unlikely to agree with anybody who says they're good enough - He himself still tries to improve, even though he's better than most. But aslong as you are willing to put in effort to improve, he is (or atleast was) a good person to ask for help.
8846343
He saw Twilight do it, and he's Twilight. But until he learns magic properly, he'll ONLY be able to do spells he's seen Twilight use.
8847210
wow r00d
You're right about the exposition, though. How can I do that better?
8847262
Nice, I summoned someone willing to give me proper critique! Sorry about my douchebag act, humanity decided the act of criticizing a critic's critique is the ultimate cardinal sin a while back.
>Verbose Mode
No idea who that is
>He focussed on execution. Instead of thinking, "How can I make this stand out and seem creative?" he thought, "How can I make this story good?" While that usually involved breaking from the norm, it's not breaking from the norm just to do it - It's purposeful breaking from the norm.
I don't understand what you said here, could this be reworded?
>hclegend
That guy harassed me on reddit and deviantart, and stalked me into a subreddit for old people, ignore him and what how I told him to sod off seems to say about me.
>Which part, not having their main-character be immune to mind-control? I'd take a look at Lord of the Rings then, the main-character there isn't immune to mind-changes. Or did you mean Displaced-story? In that case, everytime a Displaced just acts like the character they were displaced as for no reason would count as a mind-change. I'm just presuming that you don't mean that the main-character doesn't shrug off something harmful to them, because there are a lot of examples for that.
Immune to mind control? Huh? David got a piano dropped on his head, causing him to lose all memories of being David the Human. Pianos don't have mind control powers. Or am I reading that paragraph wrong?
>read the story it'll make you better at this
Will do, thanks.
>you did the average protag stuff wrong
Sorry. I was going for "He's a loser and a crappy streamer of bad games, he describes himself as average to feel better, but he's a total loser", did that work? If not, how can I make what I was going for there clearer, and make it funnier?
Does anyone else think the image I'm using for this story is shit? Because I do, and I'm thinking of replacing it. Or at least removing that impact-font text. It reminds me of those "Haha hey guys look at me I'm doing this bad thing ironically" fics, which isn't what I want this fic to be.
8847262
That story was brilliant, thanks for telling me about it.
I thought that was the point of this fic, I thought it was intentionally bad.
8847786
Really? Shit, I only wanted that to apply to the first chapter. Below-average loser who thinks he's just average dresses up as everything, then goes to Equestria as just Twilight, and loses his memories to a falling piano.
I'm looking at this fic's "Score" all wrong.
Sure, I'm pissing off a lot of people by writing this. And I apparently pissed someone off a lot when I said "I'm going to write the best story ever!". But there are thirty five people on this site that liked this fic. I brightened up their day, and that makes all the hate and "I fucking hate Displacedfic you should write something else" and "Are you making fun of displacedfic you son of a bitch?" worth it.
8847297 One shouldn't act like a douchebag, period. However, I do admit that people on fanfiction-websites tend to overreact to critiques being called in question, especially considering nobody here is a professional critic and they can get it wrong just as easily as everybody else.
--
Verbose Mode was one of the leading admins or moderators of Rage Reviews, who had heard of Displaced's awful reputation and wanted to prove it wasn't the fault of the idea. That is pretty much all you need to know about him, I mostly mentioned him because he has a similar goal to you.
--
Okay, I'll try to reword it and explain a bit more about what I mean. Writing a story consists of multiple things working together - The idea for and behind the story and its setting, the decisions in regards to story-telling and the actual writing.
The idea for the story is what you start with, your inspiration. You hammer out what kind of story you want to write, what kind of world and what you really, really want to incorporate, and then you're done with the idea-bit. The important thing to know is that, aslong as you know how to tell that kind of story and have good writing-abilities, any idea can be done well. Proving that no idea is inherently bad is what both you and Verbose want to do.
The story-telling bit is more difficult, since it contains such things as "How am I going to tell or show my reader this and that?", "What kind of narrator do I use?" and "What do I emphasize in my story?" Another important aspect is the flow of the story, and ensuring that there are no or few plotholes. Basically, you take the idea behind the story you want to write and then turn it into an actual story. It is also sometimes referred to as execution of the idea, which is what I meant.
Actual writing is really just the act of putting the words on paper / computer while ensuring that all words are written correctly and that the sentences are grammatically coherent.
If either the story-telling or the actual writing is awful, then the story is bad. In one case because it doesn't do what you're trying to achieve (for example making most readers laugh), in the other because it is extremely difficult to read. If both are awful, then the story is illegible.
However, in your case you focus on the idea and making it different - This is good, because it can make more people open to giving your story a chance, but in doing so you forgot to think as much about how to tell the story best, and which parts of the ideas wouldn't work well in the story-telling bit. Verbose however has good grammar and spelling, while also pulling the execution / story-telling of rather well, changing ideas or leaving them out if they aren't beneficial to the story. All the times he thought outside the box, he determined whether it would be better for the story than the solutions in the box, knowing that a story needs to be different to be recognised. But he didn't decide, "This would be different so I'm going to do it," he decided, "This is the story as I have (planned) it right now, this would be a different solution than the obvious. I'm going to compare it to the obvious solutions and see which one works better with the story."
Basically, what I want you to take away from this is that you need to focus more on how your creative ideas interact with eachother to form an interesting narrative, and how that narrative would be best presented - The story-telling bit is your weakness right now, the others are good.
--
I'm going to be honest: While I wanted to read the entire story first, I only managed to get to the end of the first chapter, and even then I merely skimmed a lot of the description. For this part, I guessed based off the comment-section and the first chapter. Neat that it's not actual mind-control, but then I'm pretty sure that most stories don't write about what the protagonist is like just to remove their memories afterwards. Well, except for Raccoon's (another Displaced-writer, basically) Displaced Into Nothing. The reason most don't is because it's usually either not important or it's more suspenseful if the reader finds out that plot-crucial piece of information from their background later.
So, basically, you read it right, and it's just me being dumb-dumb.
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I think the problem is that you focussed on him being "mediocre". A loser is usually seen as actually bad, while a mediocre person is just not very good, but not awful either. I know you also called him a loser in the narrative later on, but when I read the first few paragraphs I really thought you meant that he's pretty normal in all regards, just worse at video-games than most, with luck being all that really let him stand out (since you need to get a fanbase as a streamer first).
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8848387 Well, there you have your problem. You wanted your first or first two chapters to be intentionally bad and parody-like - That causes your story to be seen as one. Your first chapter is going to be the first impression to a lot of people, after the title, story-image and short description. They will read it, and expect the rest of the story to be more of the same - In this case you don't even have enough chapters that the rarest of them might decide to see if you became better over time. Especially the part where the narrator thinks about whether "Surreality" is a real word gives off the impression of a parody.
I would suggest you try to show that he's a loser by showing how he is worse than the normal person at multiple things, and then a bit about his stream. Expositioning it like that either means it is not relevant enough to the story for its inclusion to be important or bettering the story, or that you're a bad author, or that the story is a parody. And, you mentioned that you don't want to take the easy way out - So please don't. Don't make any part of it parody-like in an attempt to parody the concept of parodies to show that yours is not a parody. Do your best to make even the first chapters already as good as you can.
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Now, the third chapter definitely isn't intentionally bad according to that, yet you still wrote the following:
Don't. This has no relevance to the story, this belongs into the author's note instead. Overall, the third chapter doesn't have as much exposition or needless description as the first one, so that's pretty good. You make your narrator appear like an amateur-narrator by having them insert things like that and seeming to accidentally use the wrong words first. (Ex:)
Just put the comments on the phrasing into the author's note, and only have your narrator use the wrong word(s) when they purposefully do it for effect.
EDIT: Sorry, replied to the wrong comment at the second thing first.
8848654
I like you. Thank you for spending time on giving me critique I can use to improve, and a good example to emulate. When I think of a way to make the first few chapters seem less like a bad displaced parody, I'll edit that in.
The "He set his sights for the sun- I mean on the sun" bit was a shitty out-of-place Propane Nightmares by Pendulum reference that didn't really have any place being there at all, now that I think about it. Do you think I should remove that?
Hey, someone from another site brought something to my attention. Does anyone else feel the "Short chapters, uploaded more frequently" schedule system for this fic hurts it, causing the chapters to feel more like scenes in episodes than actual chapters?
8848910 Yes. It breaks immersion to see the narrator 'fail' like that, since it draws attention to the fact that it is a story, and while references can be interesting and / or funny, they should never break immersion. If I had to liken it to something, I would say it's like when a movie just suddenly stops and replays the last ten seconds before continuing - You pause in confusion, before realising that it's not part of the movie and then are annoyed. Simply the fact that the TV interrupted it made your experience worse - It's similar when the narrator throws you out of the story like that. So, yes.
8849455
Alright, removing the Narrator's fail now.
so u have delta pokemon cool
8850798
I wish they had a Delta Pokemon maker in the games, it'd be so cool!