dragavan

I must rate this honestly.

The story is very linear, as every "wrong" answer is an instant end, so it looks more like a single twig that has been stripped rather than a branching story. The story itself is parody, but doesn't really have much of the feel of any of the characters (which good parody should). If the "crappy" style wasn't obviously on purpose (as should be able to be seen from the quality of his other stories) I would even have to rate it lower. Being that it makes fun of said "crappy" stories by emulating them so well I allow a slightly higher grade.

Overall, however, the story really isn't that good so I can't give it the high rating others seem to think it deserves.

The only reason I even looked at this story is because of a posting on the forums about how bad this crap was. Then I saw the ratings these stories were getting and had to see if they were really that bad, especially given there are like five of them now. Well, the verdict is in. THEY ARE.

These may be a collection of in-jokes for fans of Facepunch Studios, but they are not coherent stories by any stretch of the imagination. Given that this is a Story writing site, I have to use that criteria when rating it. Even if I got the jokes, the writing would still be atrocious and sparse. Ever think of putting more than ten words or one sentence on a page?

And in reply to the angry statements by another reviewer (who may work for Facepunch for all I know), you don't have to know the subject matter of a story before hand to be able to tell if it's well written or not. I could easily read Harry Potter or Buffy fan-fic without ever seeing a thing about them and still tell if it was written well. I wouldn't get all the in-jokes or references, but I would be able to follow the story and tell how well it was written. This tripe, is not.

Now, I rarely give tens or ones to stories because they are for things that have that extra something special that pushes them outside the bounds of normal ratings. This story (and I a sure the others of its ilk I am not even going to try to read) actually deserves this honor. It's like the author actually tried hard to make sure there was nothing of value here and connect it in ways that made no rhyme or reason... So 1.

Just as I stated about the original version of this story: Great work and feel, but just not over that bump to get a ten out of me (and it's not because of my dislike of the subject matter). You can tell the author (who we now know is correctly credited) really knows his subject and how to get the desired feel in the words.

I do have a few small gripes. The story is rather short, I feel some of the choices lead to events that don't exactly match the choice you made (often running on through a lot more story that your choice had no real affect on), and too many of the no choice (Continue...) rooms to keep the feel of it being a CYOA going. All of these gripes are stylistic choices on how people organize and create stories (and some people seem to prefer them this way), but otherwise this is a near perfect piece of work in my book. Very worthy of the Nine I give it.

This is not a rating related comment, so I left it out of there... But why is this marked as MA? I can't imagine that even if most of the rooms were detailed it would be MA. The content seems to be like it would be at the level of R at worst. Rating something MA will not get you more readers, since MA is ignored by default on searches. It will only get you the readers who bother to choose to look for MA stories either as a full search or just to find porn... Which this isn't.

Okay, this story could have been slightly interesting if you actually had choice in it (rather than just getting to try to guess what the author thinks the cool answer would be), The rooms actually had some descriptions to them (rather than short news blurbs about the events of the choice), and actually made some level of sense.

I hate stories that just railroad you to make one choice. Why bother even giving me other options if they are all just going to give me one line (that usually just says you suck) and then end? Try to expand a couple of these options all the way to an ending, or at east make them a few choices deep before they end and tell you that you suck.

The only good thing I can say about this one is seems to be complete and has an actual "successful" ending. Not that the ending makes much sense. Also, it's not the worst story on the site by a long shot, so I'll give it a 3... barely.

Not a whole lot I can say about this other than it's mostly just more of that no writing, short room, boring crap that shows up on here in droves and then is summarily voted down into the gutter of the site by the voting public. Try putting in some descriptions, and actual story, and characterizations, and more than one line per room... Hell, you might even try to get a paragraph or two in per page... I mean, don't strain yourself or anything, but it would sure be nice.

Also, I would have been nice and given this story a rating of 2 if it wasn't for the cardinal sin of the author giving their own obviously inferior story a rating of 10. Tisk tisk. For that you have earned yourself a whopping 1... and I really don't give 1s or 10's easily, so you should feel honored.

I have to agree with the other two ratings already given (not counting the author) on just about everything they said. This story really needs to have actual story to it. Putting one line of text (or amazingly two on some pages) does not really constitute telling a story.

Also, the numerous sudden deaths are more of an annoyance along the way of a linear story than a true choose your own adventure story. I would suggest you allow a couple of the side paths continue on to tell alternate stories for a while, even getting to different ending places than the main story perhaps.

The main thing I have to say is just tell a story. Beef up your rooms, flesh out the characters, add more threads to your story, and then reset your ratings so we can all vote again on the new and improved version of the story.

Although right now I have to give you a 3 (would be a 2 except I found what little was there to be quite creative).

Great job guys. This is most deserving of being recognized as one of the sites top stories. I looks like everyone involved did the research to get the feel right and wrote nice long rooms full of description and flavor. I would love to see more of it worked on and finished (if that will ever happen) but what is there now is well deserving of praise.

Well... this succeeds at being random, unfortunately that doesn't make it good. In fact I would have completely ignored the story if it didn't get rated with a 10 and showed up on the top list of the site. I can't even really call it a story. It's more of a collection of random scenes that don't connect together to make a whole.

There is also the matter of pretty much every choice except the seemingly random "correct" choice being a dead end that makes this less fun to read. It's more a railroaded story that punishes you for leaving the path set before you, only without marking the path. Perhaps if more than one choice actually went somewhere it might be interesting.

I might have rated it a 5 since it did succeed at what was stated at the start (wanting to be random) and I would have followed the request to not rate it if it was not for your friend giving it that ten. So I saw it, read through it, and have to give it an honest rating.

Dragavan

I hope you guys realize that since you hijacked this story it's no longer a kids story (and not fitting with that old category or the new rating it was given by default). By rating it with tens you now bring it notice as being the only G rated story in the top rated section. This could really cause problems for the site's whole rating system integrity down the road. I hope this gets fixed soon.

First, I have to say I agree with ChubbyT on what this guy is getting away with. I also have to give this story an honest review despite his rating cheating due to multiple accounts... So here it goes.

This story sucks. The writing is poor to adequate at best, with several grammar and spelling errors. Most of the rooms (especially on the John Conner side) are the lame one-line rooms I hate in these kinds of stories. The actual story doesn't really feel true to the characters it's based on and about, nor does it really seem to fit anywhere in the storylines created by the movies or comics it is based on.

All that said, I can't say it's the worst thing I've read, or even the worst story on this site. Also, I am not one to give ratings of 1's or 10's very easily. Stories have to be spectacularly horrible or beyond amazing to get one of these... So far no story I have seen truly deserves either one. That means the lowest I would give a normal bad story on this site would be a 2. Since this is not the worst story on the site I can't give it a 2 and there are some far worse than it so a 3 would even seem to be too harsh.

So my base rating for this story is going to have to be a 4.
Them I am going give it a -1 for being a self-indulgent prick that rated the story he either completely or partially authored with a 10 (dependant on if NelsonMuntz, Jason5550123, j5550123, and jcha2005 are the same person or not).
So now the rating is 3.
Then I am going to have to give it -1 for the self-promoting and illegal use of multiple accounts to give it a 10 (because it looks like NelsonMuntz, Jason5550123, j5550123, and jcha2005 are all aliases of JackJackosn... as well as possibly GreenGoblin2005 and other as yet not identified accounts).
So now the final rating is 2.

Yeah, I think that's fitting.

I have to say (although not a fan of the excessive graphic pulp violence) this is an amazingly well done story. The rooms are long, full of description and detail, and very well written. The choices are few, but consistent, and the characters have more than enough depth revealed through the story to keep them interested.

You seem to have a real grasp of the material and a feel of the genre. Your knowledge of it and the culture really seems to shine through. Some of the wording seems a little off, but it is so rare it's easy to let it slide without a second thought. Overall the story is just down right impressive, especially for a first story posted here.

The only major down side I can see is how short it is. I look forward to seeing more from you in the future. Not quite the greatest story on the site as of this writing (I think Paco still holds that one) but more than deserving of high honors.

Okay, Everyone has been talking about this one, but I just haven't had the time or will (the whole western thing really turned me off) to read it for a long time. I finally decided I had to give in since so many people seem to rave about it. I pushed my dislike of Westerns aside and dove in...

All I have to say up front is Wow. Impressive and well written. The detail, the feel, the language, the choices, etc. It all added up to a great story that is most definitely not for kids. Long rooms with strong writing and none of the "Choose a door" feel about the format at all. Even with the occasional change in authors, they mostly did a great job of keeping with the style and feel of the whole. Definitely deserving of the accolades and is one of the best things I have ever seen on this site.

I would give it a ten if it wasn't for my total dislike of Westerns (although I tried to keep this feeling to a minimum) and all the spelling and grammar errors (which I know I am guilty of as well, but I tend to use the edit button when I find them or are told of them, and actively ask for them to be pointed out if someone comments on them.). I tend to a tough sell when it comes to giving anything a top rating (no matter the subject or format), so this is high praise from me.

Keep up the great work and I hope to see more like this (perhaps not a Western next time) in the future.

This story is mediocre, with several spelling and grammar errors (which I know I am not immune to), but does have a nice framework to it. If it had more detail, better characterization, and less "Do you pick A or B" rooms with almost no lines of text it could actually be a fun and interesting story.

As for the rating, I think this is fair. Although I was tempted to rate it lower since the author had the audacity to give himself a 10. I personally think authors should not be allowed to rate their own stories... But that's just me.