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Volunteer projects are hard to keep up

2008-11-19 - 12:18 a.m.

One of the long-standing segments of my 20-somethings has been volunteering as lead writer for a game project. I became a part of it moons x moons ago. Through a series of regime changes I ended up being the person in charge of the main plot, the core story, and helping the writing staff work with the world and its general backdrop.

It's been nearly six years.

Six. It seems vaguely like yesterday that I started on New Magincia, or Skara Brae. I've literally written hundreds of characters. The reams of files stretch like weird bended fingers into the horizon, scaling up mountains like fleshy trees planted into sleeping green meadows.

I've written beyond the equivalent of three novels for this enterprise. Nearly 200,000 words. The amazing part is that, after a good long while, I have neared the end of my journey. I could easily wrap things up, scale back the myriad of impressive but nuanced player-controlled decisions that subsequently influence the plot, and still count myself reasonably accomplished.

(The fact that the now absent leader of the project expected a sequel is an overlooked factoid I don't pay much attention to. If I did anything, it'd be shockingly short. 20 hours of gameplay tops, compared to the 120+ this behemoth will be).

What's bugging the fuck out of me is that a few long-standing members are giving up the ghost. Our main interior worldbuilder just stated that he doesn't have the drive he used to. Granted, he's a teenager, so it was bound to come sooner or later. In effect, unless we get some new recruits, this means I'll probably need to learn the construction set interface and help after I'm done with writing. It isn't how I'd planned spending my golden months/year on the project.

But I have put so much into it that I have to see it to fruition. I sneak out of my girlfriend's bed every night and rush home just to work on it. I take tiny steps with it any time she announces she's going to read. Abandoning the thing is so far beyond the question that it's answered before asked.

I wish it could be easier.

* * *

Quick bits:

*Whatever it was what made my reality and/or dreams all scary like, what with nasty levitation and door smacking, has gone and buggered off. This makes me happy. I slept with the lights on last night, because who wouldn't? I slept decent. I woke up at 7am but then slept more.

*Next week I'm going to Detroit for Thanksgiving with Emily's family. I'll hopefully get to see Nicholas. He wants to do some more collaborative work on ACT, besides using my ye golds old 1 megapixel shot of a Zug Island fireball entitled 'Zug Tits'. This will involve stalking his apartment building. I stalk buildings well.

*I've gotten through the first paragraph of my 4th science manuscript. The 2nd and 3rd haven't been sent in yet, but my prof. will get to it eventually. Hopefully. Maybe.

*I had four drinks tonight. Emily and Jason tried very hard to convince me to do my apparently regionally famous rendition of 'Baby Got Back'. I wasn't in the mood. I still feel bad about it. I'd tried thinking of a warm-up song like Right Said Fred's 'I'm Too Sexy', but that too seemed bollocks. On the one hand, I paid only for one drink. On the other hand, Jo-Ann and Veronica, who knew Jackie who knows Emily and who knows why anyone reading this might care, were also vaguely keen on me crooning into a microphone. That much was buggered.

*Maybe I should have just stuck to writing linearly composed fiction like most desperate writers and tried that way. I really do still want the game to succeed, though.

*This whole entry has an eau d' emo essence that was only vaguely intended instead of meaning to be Italian. I.E. obvious.

I.E. I'm going to bed, I'm exhausted from myself.

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