strangetomato | Thought for the day: Sim stories are like serial comics

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Thought for the day: Sim stories are like serial comics

Remember how I said I thought sim stories were more like graphic fiction than novels or movies? No? Well, I did. I think they're often sometimes like television shows too, in their serial nature, but the format speaks more to the comic medium (if we're talking about text and image sim stories, and I am).

The latest issue of Bitch magazine came in the mail today, and I was reading the review of Alison Bechdel's The Essential Dykes to Watch Out For (a GREAT read, in my opinion - you should check it out). At the end of the review, they quote her as saying, "A comic strip, like life, is a novel that never seems to get anywhere." It really reminded me of sim stories, especially mine. They just soldier on, perhaps with an end in mind, perhaps not, and that's just what I like about it. That's why I enjoyed DTWOF too. I came to really feel for the characters, and I was content to see them going through their day to day dramas, or even just cooking dinner (laced with politics, which makes it even more interesting). With sim storytelling, I'm writing (and playing) instead of reading, but I enjoy the feeling of following a set of characters as they gradually grow. Is it the same for you when you play and create? Or read, for that matter?

Of course, if I'm going to compare my story to a specific comic, I'd probably lean more towards Strangers in Paradise, which does have a plot, but it's really not nearly as important as the ongoing development of relationships between the characters. I love that series, but it's introspective to a fault, just like S,HWC is. It's obviously something I enjoy. In fact, when reading SiP, I often find myself going "yeah, yeah... crime stuff, plot... where's the next scene where the talk about that awkward kiss they shared?" Yeah, I may have a problem (I'll look into getting the help I need). SiP even ocassionally features pages and pages of lyrics, which is something a lot of us sim storytellers indulge ourselves in (it's super indulgent in the most teenagery kind of way - I know this, but still I just can't resist at times).

Anyway, I just wanted to share my musings. Feel free to add your own two cents or three.

(Is this what they call a meta? A baby meta, maybe?)

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I definitely agree. I was thinking about that when I was writing up my notes- how some stories progress and watch the characters grow and become more than they originally were, while others tell a specific story and that's it. Your story is definitely one of those, we're content (well, I know I am) to just watch the characters live their lives, and watch them change and evolve.

I was going to say that my story does have a definite end (it's actually VERY short- it's looking at 6 chapters, with the epilogue) so it won't continue. As much as I love the characters I'm writing about, I couldn't do it for as long as you (and others) have.

That's all. I feel like I should say more (but as you know, I'm not an in depth commenter. It's all surface for me.)

Oh, and meta are usually much more self referential, I think. All the ones that I see are usually talking about their stories and WHY they do certain things and HOW the characters behave, mostly. It's like musing... about yourself.

I actually watch

metafandom and the posts are usually discussing some topic that relates to fandom, which may or may not refer to their own work. But it does usually use a certain fandom as an example (maybe just because they are in it, though).

I like that comm because they often have very interesting posts about writing, character building, and sometimes sexuality/gender stuff too (among other things).

That comm is AWESOME. I've never been, but I can already tell it rocks.

I guess we're just using different definitions, then. xD

Yeah, I guess I should be clear that I'm talking about ongoing serial stories, but so many sim stories fall into this category, I didn't bother to be specific. It seems to me that sim stories either go on and on, or are dropped without being finished. A short series or one-off seems pretty rare in these parts, though they're out there, for sure.

I'm thinking it's the way the game is set up that plays a role in this. It's a game about playing the day to day lives of simulated people, with no specific purpose or ending. It only makes sense that many stories would follow that trend too, right?

It's nice to have a clear layout when writing a story, like you are. It feels good to know you'll finish something too. With my story, though, I'm pretty happy with the aimlessness. One day I'll just call it off, and that'll be that (hopefully at some point that gives some small amount of closure, at least).

Yeah, I saw you use the word, and also some other people, but I've never fully understood the meaning. I know what meta means, but I've always assumed it could refer to any reflection of the fandom or medium you're using (based on that site, which has so many different topics). Self-referential would make sense, but maybe any analysis of simming and sim-related things could also be called that?

I have no idea. I need someone to define it for me.

Yeah. Legacies MIGHT fall into that category, since they're so rarely featured, but I personally don't put them there. The ones that are stories seem to go somewhere, so they don't count.

That's an EXCELLENT point about the game though, it's SO TRUE. People are just... more "biased", I guess, to like those sort of stories, because we're all Sim players-- we're used to seeing them in the everyday grind?

Yeah. I have a definite ending in mind, so I don't worry too much about it.

NO DON'T EVER DO THAT. :( :( :(

(I'd be happy with closure. That was me being dramatic.)

I've been comparing sims stories to comics for a long time. Comics are one of the places where there has been consistent serialized storytelling, which is what most sims stories are.

I don't know that I agree with the description that a comic never gets anywhere. There are plenty like that, but there are also plenty that have set durations and end after they're done. It's all a matter of what the author/artist is looking to pull off.

Yeah, me neither, actually. I just went off what I saw other people using it as. I have ideas for those sort of things all the time, but I never type them up.

Yeah, I've always seen the connection too. That's why sim storytelling appeals to me so much.

Maybe not so much that it doesn't get anywhere (most comics eventually do), but they're often less goal-oriented. They follow story arcs and things evolve, but there's a very different sort of contract with the reader. You don't pick up the first issue and come out of it with a clear idea of how it will all end. You do that with both novels and movies.

Some also start out one way and completely transform before the end of the comic series. The Sandman was little more than a superhero comic when it started, and it quickly grew into something far richer and more rewarding (not to say that superhero stuff is never rich or rewarding). I love that ability for things to change as they go. I did have some goals in mind for my story, but many have completely transformed.

I get most of that urge to self-analyze my stuff out while I respond to comments. After replying to a lot of them, I'm usually all meta-ed out.

Hmmm, legacies are much the same, really. Commentary legacies are a lot like comic strips in their focus on humour and the regular format and sequential episodes. It could work. And story legacies are very much serial stories.

The game is about domestic life, so maybe that does appeal to many sim storytellers. It's also a shell for customization, so this obviously doesn't apply to everyone. Some people use it as a tool to create very different things.

I can and will end the story at any given moment. ;) Haven't you heard the sage advice to "leave a party while you're still having fun?"

I'm not sure what a meta is. :P I've heard the term several times but I've never been able to quite figure out the meaning.

I totally agree with you on the long-running comic = long-running sims story. Sometimes they have little sub plots, etc. but it keeps on keeping on... and as long as the author is still enjoying it I think that's wonderful! :D

Do you follow webcomics at all? Websnark was/is a blog that had some interesting insights into them. The author even worked out his own vocabulary to designate a strip that successfully changed from gag a day to plot/drama driven or attempted it and failed.

Most of my reading with sims stories is focused on legacies. They mix the visual storytelling with some of the best things I enjoy out of the game. There are plenty of them that have gone through the same metamorphasis - from random commentary on what's happening to a legitimate story with ongoing plot lines. It's an interesting change to see take place.

Sandman is one of my favorite comics, even if I came to it really late. :)

The only webcomic I follow much is Liliane, Bi-Dyke by Leanne Franson (yeah, I have an obvious pattern of reading lesbian comics).

pixel_and_bean turned me on to Anders Loves Maria too, but I don't read many other than that (well, my SO's stuff too). I should. I'm sure there are good ones out there to discover, if I wade through all the graffiti-inspired art to find it.

Websnark sounds interesting. I'll have to check it out.

I have mixed feelings about legacies. I do enjoy seeing the sim genetics play out, but the pace can feel a bit rushed to me. I think I'd rather follow just one character through their life than a whole multi-generational family saga. I do really like seeing those legacies that grow into stories naturally over time that way. It's very interesting to see a change like that take place, in any project.

I came to Sandman late too. It was a little before my time. I read it when it was compiled into books.

Edited 2009-03-09 22:49 (UTC)

I'd always imagined meta to be any sort of like... analysis? Trying to get to a deeper understanding of things by talking about it? IDK. I agree with Strange that at least the LJ definition of it doesn't have to be self-referential.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=meta

I'd go with second definition maybe?

:\

Good God, I love SiP.

Also, I agree with everything you said. The Sims itself is a game of the day-to-day with a large focus on relationships between characters so it's not surprising that the stories coming from the game are largely episodic and relationship-based.

I love character driven stories. I love getting emotionally invested in fictional people and their plights. On the other hand I myself am a huge plot driven writer. I love writing things with points and clear beginnings/endings. They can be huge, epic sorts of stories, but if I don't nail down all the details ASAP I go crazy.

I love the pace of your story though. It's slow, but it FITS. I want it to go slow! I want to just read billions of silly conversations between Ripp and Johnny and coo at all the romantic scenes between the characters. <33333

Shit, I thought the SAME THING when I read that article (love me some Bitch mag--shame I devour it so quickly).

And I'll add, I think the way you (in the collective sense of the word, meaning "sim story writers") come at a sim based story depends a LOT on your background. (forgive me if I oversimplify here) You (the personal you) come from a visual art background so you see your story more as a comic or movie, a very visual medium. I'll use myself as a comparission. I've never thought of my stories as comics even though I'm one of those "gotta have a good mix of pics to words". I've always thought of them more as lazy short stories (lazy meaning I let the pictures "speak a thousand words" so I don't have to type so much--or the pics spare me from having to describe a character's physical appearance). Since the pictures are more a bridge between the words, I don't labor to set up detailed sets (meaning half the time my houses don't even have damn curtains!) and such. And since I lack the compulsion to make really detailed pictures, I end up producing a more convoluted and "plotty" story (and do goofy shit like laboring over making titles that encompass both the A and B storyline in each update and fretting over making sure I have an A and B storyline AND having a good bridge should I have to break a title into multiple parts, etc).

Shit. . .I lost my own train of thought. Eh, must not have been that great then.

Meta(fiction) is when a writer writes about their own writing in the course of their story.

Most noticibly (in sims stuff) it's when a writer inserts their self sim and doesn't try to hide the fact that that sim is THEM. I'm guilty of it in my one neighborhoods. My self sim is "me", the author of Nocheat. Two of my characters even figure it out but the one guy keeps it to himself while the other one is regarded as a senile old man so no one believes him anyway. (I even have one update where JL--my self sim--is confronted by the "senile old man" character who's pissed that he got impregnated with twins).

If you want some great meta style writing you should check out Jasper Fforde's stuff. He's always "breaking the fourth wall" like that. Not in the way of inserting himself but he has his characters refer to writing and they know that they are characters in books. Funny stuff.

God, I love Jasper Fforde <3

I wrote my dissertation (not sure it's the right word?) about reflexivity in film and the terms (reflexivity and metafiction) contains so many things it makes it difficult to talk about. Learned that the hard way...Hah! Anyway, "quoting" (and double translating, how unacademic!) Robert Stam: "Reflexivity exists wherever people "talk about talking" and start thinking about consciousness, language, communication and art."

So everything from explicit fourth wall breakage ("talking to the camera") to more subtle references (Lucy painting Beau as St. Sebastian, using characters from other sim stories in ones own), to the commentary section after each chapter is "meta". Both a story and the reactions to it are (or could be) seen as meta. The interwebs (and the series format) makes it even easier to see (and do) :D And...I'm rambling :P

It's a very good comparison, I think :) The "crime stuff and plot" bits I enjoy the first time around but what makes me watch/read a book/episode/chapter again and again (and sometimes again) is always the characters and their relationship with each other. Getting to KNOW them, their faults and thoughts and feelings and to see them evolve and grow.

Yes, that's the meaning of the word, but it seems to have taken on a more specific internet-only meaning too, in that people call a short written analysis "a meta" rather than saying it's a (meta-)fictional analysis. That's what I was referring to.

I suppose it's a very fine distinction, but it's like the way meme has come to mean something very specific in net speak, when the term has a much broader application.

Oh, yeah, I was just trying to include this (for me new) internet meaning in the broader (already vague) "definition" :) I have a meta hang-up... *blushes*

Yeah, sorry about that. I didn't mean to take away from what you said (I really liked the examples, and it's a great explanation). I was more concerned with explaining that I do know what meta means in a broader sense. Well, I've talked about it before, so one would hope, right? :P

It's interesting when we get to witness new words (or uses of words) forming, don't you think?

Hmmm. I don't know if I agree with you on that. I think you're still working in more of a graphic fiction mode than a text-only mode, whether it's your background or not. What you said about letting the pictures tell the story on many of the details would suggest that.

Also, working from the images first seems more comic-like than later adding picture "illustrations." I know what you mean, though. The text is your focus. It's still a combination of images and text, and I think all sim stories resemble comics in format, if not in the overall approach.

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Thought for the day: Sim stories are like serial comics

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WARNING : rambly

(the way I understand meta)

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