Instead of working on Callisto, I spent this morning outlining a new work. It’s not really a game, but it’s not really a story either — there’s no plot to it. It’s just an exploration of a town. Depending on who you talk to, you see different parts of it.
I had to adopt a different way of thinking in order to do this outline, which I wasn’t expecting.
This is how I normally outline.
You come to a decision point. You pick between two options, and/or you make a decision which either succeeds or fails.
When I started outlining this town exploration this way, it didn’t feel like an exploration. It felt like a story struggling to find a plot.
So instead, I made a very rough map of the town.
And then I filled in the little extra bits that show you different portions.
Because I want time of day to be a factor, I had to make a to-do list in a separate document to make sure that, when I write this, I write all the material I need to cover it.
It was a real challenge for me — and will probably be even more challenging once I get around to actually writing the text and coding it in Twine. But it was also a lot of fun, immersing myself not in a plot that must move forward, but in a place. In a way, it’s like reading Charles de Lint’s Newford series, or the Bordertown anthologies, because they all give you new perspectives on the same location, and it usually doesn’t matter what order you read them in.
We’ll see how much I end up pulling out my hair when I go to actually write this, but I think it’s a method of storytelling I’d like to try again.
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