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How long is a good Passage?

Do you make some with several paragraphs? Do you find that you have to break a long descriptive scene into 'pages', or feel like short scenes between choices are too short to be a single Passage?

How many letters/words/sentences/paragraphs do you usually make your Passages? What metric do you use to say that a Passage is 'too short' or 'too long'?

Comments

  • This is very subjective question because it can depend greatly on two thing:

    1. The Size of the Font(s) being used to display the text.

    Although the default font size(s) of the relevant text is set by the Developer, both the End-User and the web-browser/operating system they are using can override that size.

    2. The Dimensions of the area in which the text is being displayed.

    Unless the dimensions of the area are hard-wired to a fixed size then again the dimension can be effected by things outside the Developer's control, like the current dimensions of the web-browser view-port or the physical dimensions of the screen it is being viewed on.
  • Well, let's remove all those concrete stuff and concentrate on the abstract ones.

    Simply, how much text would you read before you can say that "this Passage is too long/short"? Would it really depend on the font size and text area dimensions?
  • edited August 2016
    I played a game called 'Stowaway', which had far too much text in the passages it just got boring to play. But in my games, when I make a fighting scene I use the (link:) macro to keep extending the fight but keeping it on one passage. I think that's pretty cool. I mean, check out this:

    {
    (print: "<script>$('html').removeClass(\)</script>")
    (if: (passage:)'s tags's length > 0)[
    (print: "<script>$('html').addClass('" + (passage:)'s tags.join(' ') + "'\)</script>")
    ]
    }<big>''Gregori Base''</big>
    Character Bios Unlocked!(color: "grey")[
    View ->Character Bios]

    You break into the base wearing the JS-TC34. It is the middle of the night, so most of the criminals working for Harry are asleep. There are a few on night shifts though, and one goes to attack you. He punches the armour, and breaks his hand hitting the strong metal.
    (color: "red")[
    (link: "Punch Him Back")[''SMASH!''
    You punch him in his solar plexus, and he goes flying back, before breaking his spine on a wall. Someone else runs at you, shooting you with an AK-47, but the bullets do no damage to the armour.

    (link: "Counter Attack")[You upercut him, making him jump in the air for a second and drop the gun. You grab his weapon, and when he lands on the hard floor, shoot about twenty bullets into him, staining the ground with blood. Just then, someone jumps onto your back, and starts strangling you.

    (link: "Get Him Off")[(text-style: "blur")[You can't breath! He's chocking you. With the small amount of energy you have, you run back and smash into a wall behind you hard. You hear crunching noises, as about thirty bones are broken.] Then, as you catch your breath, a grenade is thrown at your feet.

    (link: "Throw It Back")[You pick it up and throw it back.
    |explode>[]
    (live: 3s)[(replace: ?explode)[(color: "red")
    You can hear as the explosive you managed to throw into someone's mouth detonates, and you can see guts fly everywhere.

    (link: "Continue")[''BLAM!''
    A pistol is fired, and a bullet shoots right into a weak spot of the JS-TC34 that you were hoping no one would see. You look around, and see the person who pulled the trigger - Harry Gregori. You try to walk towards him, but with the injury it's quite hard.
    ''BLAM''
    Harry fires another bullet into the same spot, and you can feel yourself bleeding. You start limping towards your enemy.
    ''BLAM''
    Again, the pistol is fired. You crawl along the floor, until you reach Harry. He helps you up, before firing three more bullets into you. Behind your back, you get the powerful explosive that Mathew equiped you with to destroy Gregori Base.
    'My turn.' you say agressivly.(color: "red")[<big><big>''
    BOOM!!!''</big></big>]
    (color: "grey")[
    Continue ->Open Titles]]](stop:)]]]]]]

    It all works. And in case you were wondering, the first bit is some code to change the background. Once I've finished making this game, I'll put it on my website and make a link on this forum so you can check it out and all the fighting! I guess this is some kinda sneak-peek?
  • Yes, I've also considered using link-reveals for very long Passages. So I guess the question becomes how many words/sentences/etc for each link-reveal?

    Drilling down, I guess it becomes "how big is your readers' span of attention"?

    Do you write long Passages for those who can hold it, or short ones for those who can't?
  • Web interface studies done pre small-screen devices indicated that users did not like scrolling horizontally at all (because it is hard to do with a mouse), and disliked scrolling vertically more than a couple of screen heights.

    This may of changed now that a large number of people are using small-screen devices to access web based interfaces, although I personally don't know of any recent studies on this topic.
  • I try to keep things to a few paragraphs. Any shorter and it is annoying - not much of a "reward" for a click. Any longer and it takes too long to read.
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