The FFR Scary Story Event

[Dark_Chrysalis]

Ooo, ooo, MY turn to critique things!

MOST FRIGHTENING: Riotpolice
MOST COMICAL: Callipygian
BEST IMAGERY: Destroy2777
BEST OVERALL: Destroy2777

Goldstinger: First submission, much daring, many confidence. Kudos for having the story be completely about FFR. Unfortunately in some places I got lost and had to reread the lines over again to get the meaning. I sort of wished you hadn't held yourself back either. 2000 words of gore, swearing etc. would obviously have been too graphic for the front page, but I felt like the reigns got pulled a little hard (you're damn right this is a pony pun) and it ended up being a shadow of what you could've produced. The image at the end seems disjointed as well; if that image doesn't have some hidden message to be found with editing software etc. I'm not entirely sure what it's there for other than to confuse the reader. If something IS hidden, that just seems esoteric since this is only about stories. Would definitely GTFO if something like this happened though

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Riotpoilce: Dat title tho. Definitely discriptive in your writing but kind of falls flat sometimes ("a killer that had killed someone" bro rly), and the narration tends to get ahead of the story with the wallet being a glaring *super hint nudge nudge* example. Kind of wish it was more subtle and sudden that he had misplaced it. Several times the narrator just says what the character does 1 line later and its a little tacky I'm afraid. Quite a few spelling/grammar errors as well. Aside from those, the onomatopoeic style you used is unique among everyone, deciding to sound out actions and internal monologue instead of merely describing things, which was nice to see. It helped to really evoke a spooky setting, even if a litte cliche at times. Utilizing the forum medium and having the images and long space for tension was cool as well.


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Callipygian: This story is so full of can't even I just can't even. My first thought was "holy SHIT someone who knows what an arrow to the knee really means" and as I kept reading I couldn't help but smile. Clearly the only intention of this story was to get a good laugh, and on many levels for many people it should do just that. I just really wish some kind of spooky/scary factor was put into the story to fit with the contest's theme. Despite its silly nature, it's actually well written with no egregious errors that I could find. Of course, I wasn't paying that much attention since I was too busy internally giggling and anxiously awaiting the next comedic stab. You basically guaranteed yourself 20k and a token

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jjontehasajkcnauncawinawhhizzu: Eh. The FFR connection is incredibly fleeting and vague in this. It might as well not have been mentioned at all. There are obviously attempts in the story to be funny but none of it really did the job. This could've maybe won funniest if Callipygian hadn't submitted. REALLY needs sentence breaks to not look like such a clump of text, and spelling/grammar errors abound.

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YoshL: Ha. Tournament. I get it. The repetitive nature of the writing kind of irks me but I completely understand it was what you were going for and it's not inherently bad. It's really unfortunate how close of a call this was for me... I thought for sure you would get my vote for best imagery until I read Destroy's story. Not necessarily as spooky or creepy as it is an FFR poem, but you still manage to get a lot done for being the smallest submission. It really was close.

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Dossar: Name puns ahoy! The FFR tie-in is definitely there, and follows a nice central theme of a house-of-horrors. Kind of annoying how Nero is basically the greatest detective since Sherlock and Batman had a gay love child, since he always knows precisely what to do next. Lot of random things popping up doing... random things. Fun little origin story.

(As an aside: your comment about my story kind of ruins the whole fun of guessing who everyone is... big meanie)

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Destroy2777: You sure you didn't just have a thesaurus sitting by your side while writing this? Imagery, vocabulary, grammar, it's all here and it's all unique and interesting. Reminds me a lot about my story */shameless plug* with how the scenes are described, though you go to even greater lengths in many instances. It's really more written as an epic tale than something meant to be scary/spooky, but I definitely feel it's the best overall story and deserved my vote as such.

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Dark_Chrysalis: 11/10 would bang for sure. But that's probably vote buying or some shit so I guess I disqualify myself from myself damn

[Riotpolice]

Originally Posted by Callipygian

Cheers to all for submitting their stories!

You can't trick me -SYNTHLIGHT!!

[Destroy2777]

It's always so beautiful seeing what stories people can come up with. Thanks for the reads, everyone.

So now, the voting:

Best overall: Dark_Chrysalis
Most frightening: Riotpolice
Most comical: Callipygian (who else would it be?)
Best imagery: gold stinger

gold stinger - Option-Out

I utterly loved the atmosphere that you granted with this story. The first-person journey guides us all through the phenomena you experience. I love the distorted image of the song right at the end, as well.



Riotpolice - Super Scary Halloween Urban Legend Story

The classic horror story formula: you're alone in an isolated location, with nowhere to flee... then the killer strikes. Imagery was excellent here, both through description and literal images (that killer's face out of nowhere... [shivers a bit]). My favorite aspect about this story is the psychological effect that one's mistake could end up costing him or her something so dear to him or her. Combine this with the atmosphere you give in your story, and the level of horror is simply amazing.



Callipygian - Untitled

This story was overblown and ridiculous in every sense... which is exactly why we all LOVE reading it. There's even the infusion of player's cultures and modern internet gaming as satire points, just to keep driving the fun. Kudos.



jjontehhizzu - Untitled

I honestly feel a lack of impact from this story. While it does teach morals of trust and caution, and poke a bit of fun at the traditional nerd/jock stereotypes, I never feel any sort of atmosphere as I read through, and feel little as a result.



YoshL - Giving Thanks

This story truly does give an accurate analysis of the tournament playes' psyches and feelings as they endeavor in the official, done exquisitely through your use of repetition. However, the story doesn't hold much beyond this point, and is a tad short; although, the final line of repetition does show how the story might progress onward, reiterating, so it has some reinforcement there.



DossarLX ODI - The Beginning: Terror From Beyond

While many of the scenarios and events within this story are original and quite entertaining, there are two things that offset me as I read: the various references, and the length of each event. I feel like I'm struggling to understand what you mean every time I come across a proper noun, and that makes me feel as though I'm missing part of the story's meaning. On my other point, each event is relatively short, and these seem like cursory glances that make the story run along too quickly. I will say, however, that if you're going to expand this story, alongside further description of each event, I'd definitely be interested to see how it develops.



Dark_Chrysalis - Difficulties

I cite my words from my review on Riotpolice's story, on the point of the penalty of failure, here as well. I adore the concept of the story, and eloquently flows in terms of plot and revelation of characters. I honestly laughed a bit when I saw all this was from just testing a song's difficulty, but then thought back to the torture of the player, and hated myself a bit for that. You also preserve outstanding imagery through your third-person omniscience: I feel very involved alongside the story thanks to the ability to understand each person's feelings and expressions, as well as listen to the conversations that occur. This distortion of the FFR system had me enraptured, and left me smiling and satisfied after the story. These factors are why I consider Difficulties to be the best of the group.

[Epicman9001]

There will also not be any imposed length limits, so feel free to make your story as long or short as you feel.

Notice how only long stories have been submitted in the first post in this thread

[Epicman9001]

Originally Posted by Skullbac

My scary FFR story

One day someone missed a note on Free space

this is my favorite ffr story now.

[Dark_Chrysalis]

Originally Posted by Epicman9001

Notice how only long stories have been submitted in the first post in this thread

While "as short as you want" wasn't necessarily followed exactly, did you really expect everyone's smartass comments to be accepted as "stories?" The objective of this event wasn't to karma farm on reddit, it was to create an engaging experience. I could have just as easily made my story "FFR pumpkins dickbutts 3spoopy5me" and gotten 30 friends to vote my story up but what would that prove? Some discretion had to be made

[TC_Halogen]

Best Overall: Dark_Chrysalis
- Absolutely fantastic, on so many levels. The detail was superb, and there were some interesting dialogue insertions that really added a nice touch to those who have been around in the community for a while. I had a few laughs reading your story, and the creative writing mention of "show, don't tell" has certainly been executed with flying colors here. (A question that I have: was the number #1782 intentional, or just a random number? If intentional: fucking hell, kudos to you for really thinking outside of the box, hahaha.)

Most Frightening: Dark_Chrysalis
- I couldn't bear to deal with something like what your main characters has to deal with in this story, because I do know what the process of difficulty ratings can be like. We often rack our brains with uncertainty, and the last thing I would ever want to think about is a reinforcement of pain with unsatisfactory performance on files. The concept of being in a cell where there is truly nothing else to do but the assigned "task" really adds a whole other level of intricacy to me, especially when it's either do the task that is given to you, or die with a lack of cooperation. One really wonders if the torture ever ends...

Most Comical: Callipygian
- I laughed quite a bit reading this story with some of the imagery, and the concept of boosting FFR's attention is brought about in such a bizarre manner that it is absolutely hilarious. In addition to this, some insertions of settings and situations made me chuckle - Stian being exposed to the Norwegian fjords, getting Luis all of the Fuddruckers' burgers he could ever want, me panicking because no matter how many stupid things I throw in front of both of them, Vertex BETA's final wall of doom arriving at a poorly timed sunrise to cause a myriad of unfathomable events... would read again for great laughs!

Best Imagery: Dark_Chrysalis
- It was quite difficult for me to not imagine what being in this situation would be like as an avid FFR player (as well as someone actively contesting difficulties), and I have to say... not something I would ever want to experience in my life. From the torture of the person playing the queue of files to the uneasy and tense explanation from the boss to #37, this story is engaging all around and simply easy to enter.

[FFR Events]

The results are in!

Best overall story:
1st place: Dark_Chrysalis
2nd place: Destroy2777

Most frightening:
1st place: Dark_Chrysalis
2nd place: Riotpolice

Most Comical:
1st place: Callipygian
2nd place: Dark_Chrysalis

Best Imagery:
1st place: Dark_Chrysalis
2nd place: Goldstinger
3rd place: Destroy2777

As user votes were narrowly focused this time around, a few of these categories don't actually have 3rd place winners (Dark_Chrysalis too strong). As such, I think I will instead take some of those unclaimed winnings and give them to non placed submissions as a participation prize.

Users who won a choice of an event or support token unlock (Dark_Chrysalis with two, Destroy2777 with one, and Callypygian with one), can post in this thread for what one(s) that want. Please note though this doesn't include the tournament fundraiser tokens.

A big thanks to all those who put in the time to create a story for all of us to enjoy! I highly recommend reading the submissions if you haven't already.

I will be distributing prizes soon, and will update this post as things happen.

EDIT: Credits have been distributed! I decided to give non placing users a 5k participation prize due to the lack of 3rd place users.

[Dark_Chrysalis]

My story so based everyone got credits because of it.

YOU'RE WELCOME EVERYONE ELSE

But seriously this was actually a lot of fun to do, and I definitely didn't expect to run away with the competition like that. A few things for OP:

1) Is it possible to edit the story since I didn't get all the coloring done in time? Or even possibly add the little bits I had left out for the rushed part of my story?
2) For the tokens I'd like The Wisest Were Wrong and FREEDOM DiVE please.

[Callipygian]

Thanks for the great stories and your kind appreciation of my submission. As a token, I'd like to have The Bridgeport Run, please.

[Riotpolice]

Thank you for hosting this event, I enjoyed writing the story!

[Dark_Chrysalis]

Originally Posted by Callipygian

Thanks for the great stories and your kind appreciation of my submission. As a token, I'd like to have The Bridgeport Run, please.

Aaaaaaaaah I forgot about those 3 tokens. Can I have Touhou Judgement In The Sixtieth Year instead of FREEDOM DiVE? It's cool and all but waaaaaay outside of my ability to play haha

[rushyrulz]

Congrats to all winners

[foxfire667]

I'll reiterate for clarity:

Originally Posted by FFR Events

Please note though this doesn't include the tournament fundraiser tokens.

As in no Touhou Judgement in the Sixtieth Year, The Bridgeport Run, and Bedtime Story.

Your original choice was unlocked Dark_Chrysalis. As for Callipygian, please choose another token for unlock.

[Destroy2777]

My thanks once again go out to everyone who shared their stories, allowing the reader's mind to explore the haunting worlds that laid within your beautiful words; the same thanks also go to the event staff and everyone who voted; FFR would never have gotten to experience this without you all.

As to the token, I'd really like to enjoy FREEDOM DiVE's song and chart, even if I'm probably going to collapse playing it, lol.

[foxfire667]

You now have FREEDOM DiVE!

I'll just send a PM to Callipygian so they can choose their unlock.
EDIT: All tokens and credits distributed!

[Dark_Chrysalis]

Asked one but haven't heard a response yet... Is it OK for you to use a fixed version? Either way I updated my original post with it. I would greatly appreciate it!

[foxfire667]

Whoops, I apologize for the lack of response!

I don't see any issue with that, so when it gets posted it'll be the revised version.

[Wayward Vagabond]

read through d_c's story today and hella cool for the shout out 9)