Afterword
Hello, PocketFullaShells here, and thank you for reading all the way to the end, unless, of course, you just skipped to the last chapter. Well, jokes on you, since this isn't really a chapter, but just talking about some of the thought processes and decisions I put into The Unknown Continuum and Scenes From A Memory, as well as my plans for the future regarding writing in The Unknown Continuum world. If you enjoyed The Unknown Continuum but did not read Scenes From A Memory, then I'd really recommend you read SFAM. I think it's just as good if not better as a whole, and this afterword will cover both of them, so spoilers for SFAM will be all over the place here.
Origins:
The initial spark behind The Unknown Continuum started after I was about four hours into playing Explorers of Sky. After the partner and 'I' got badgered into doing life-threatening exploration work, I thought 'So, the main character got ripped from his own planet AND his own body and put in an unfamiliar world and body. On top of that, he also lost almost all his memories, yet conveniently remembered how to speak English. Oh, and said world is a maelstrom of violence. What an absolutely horrible fate! That would be absolutely terrifying!' I noticed the Pokemon Mystery Dungeon fanbase in general seemed to treat this as being almost benign or even flat out desirable as a whole, so I began to wonder how the story would go down from someone who really didn't want any part of the whole being a pokemon business.
When I started writing it back in July 2010, it was a lot more comedy focused. It was more about the misadventures of Floyd and how he reacted like a bit of a lunatic for comedic purposes, but about half a year into writing it, I realised that a lot of the humour was coming across a bit awkwardly. I'd imagine the characters doing things in my mind and thought 'hey, that'd be funny, I'll put that in!' The problem is that a lot of my comedic ideas simply didn't translate well into written format so I ended up relegating the comedy to mostly being dry observations from Floyd and took more of a drama and story focused approach.
Floyd:
When designing Floyd, I knew right from day one that he would be divisive. I can really see a lot of people hating him, but I can say with full confidence that he wasn't boring. With all of these protagonists just taking the whole being ripped through time and space as if it was a minor inconvenience, Floyd being wildly horrified by it with his fiery personality would at least make him very different and unique among PMD fiction/comic protagonists. He gives something new to the table. While Floyd would ditch his dreams of returning home decisively in chapter 14, his turbulent character still goes on, but mostly manifested itself in different ways.
I always saw Floyd more as a 'slay the dragon' character rather than a 'save the princess' one (in spite of having a thou shall not kill policy), so as a result, he was someone who'd always want to go after the criminal instead of helping people in danger. This intertwines with his religious beliefs, which I used to both develop his character and build the world at the same time. I thought this aspect was conveyed pretty well throughout both stories, since I wanted Floyd's actions to sometimes be questionable, yet understandable and consistent with his character.
I always figured that someone forced into a different body would really suck at using it initially, hence why I decided to make him feel like borderline deadweight in fights, forcing Serge to do the heavy lifting. An interesting thing I noticed about him is that while he was kind of dragged through the story kicking and screaming, he's actually pretty adaptable. I admit that this wasn't really intentional, but it ended up being a happy accident, as Bob Ross would put it.
A key aspect of his character was his devotion to the rules. Interestingly, I noticed that fiery and emotional characters tend to be rebels and often ignore laws and rules on a whim, so I thought it was interesting to see a character who had this sort of personality be very loyal to the rules. Mostly, this came in the form of what he regarded as the most authoritative set of rules and maxims, Dialgism.
From the dead future chapters onto the end, I liked seeing him really wrestle with what he thought was right or wrong in regards to his faith. Serge quite rightly calls him out when he put several people's lives at risk at the hand of the cannibal with a small army of hounds. His gut feeling was that it was wrong, yet he put his judgement in the hands of his faith, and the faith told him to tell the truth. I liked seeing that slowly dissolve over time until he went 'fuck it' and just killed everyone in his path. This also ties into Floyd dealing with the pressure of having the entire universe rest on his shoulders. The sheer pressure is probably like nothing anyone had ever experienced in real life, which contributed nicely to his sanity starting to erode towards the final chapters in both stories.
I was actually thinking Floyd would be a treeko initially, but a few days before I started writing TUC, the gen 5 starters were revealed, and I then saw that snivy would be a better fit. Also avoids having two prominent characters share the same evolution line.
If I had any complaints about Floyd, is that I think I might have made him too much of an asshole at certain points. In fact, when I was reading through and making a few edits, I actually toned down some of his nastier moments in the first third of the story. He was fine in SFAM, though that was more because he was under far less stress, and I thought that was a nice way to show how he acts differently under different circumstances.
All in all, I think Floyd himself is the best part of TUC and SFAM. Good thing too, since it was a very Floyd-centric story as a whole.
Fun facts: I also wrote him as being politically quite conservative, though I never made a point of it in the stories, since I didn't want to bring up politics or real life religions in my stories. Not touching those topics with a 30 foot barge pole. Also, his friends on more than one occasion have thrown pink paint at him. I'll let you figure out the pun they were going for. Something that was very out of character for him is that he didn't once complain about being naked throughout all of TUC. While it would have funny and in character, it'd cover the entire story with a layer of awkwardness that I didn't want, so I left it out.
Serge:
I don't have as much to say about Serge because, regrettably, he's kind of vanilla. For the first ten chapters, he was really just someone for Floyd to bounce off, he still suffered from being pretty bland up until the dead future arc. In the earlier chapters, I didn't know what I was doing too much, so he just ended up being a less wimpy version of the Explorers partner. I think not giving him a more distinct character and personality was one of the biggest shortcomings. I don't really mind generic good guys too much, but if you asked me, the guy who wrote his character, to describe what he was like for the first ten chapters, I'd be pausing for quite a while. The whole relic fragment arc was weak, and in hindsight, I'd have probably cut it out entirely and done something that would help shape his character more.
That being said, from chapter 21 onwards, he did get better. While not much of a rebel, he does decide that anything goes when it comes to survival, showing the pragmatic side of his character, the peak of this aspect being shown in their encounter with Palkia. He takes no pleasure in doing such things though.
I think where Serge shines is how he and Floyd work off each other. The calmer pragmatist bounces off really well off the fiery rules-worshipper, and helped create some interesting conversations between the two. Both were guilty of exploiting each other during the earlier chapters, which lead to scenarios that would cause friction and scenarios that would bring them closer together.
The idea of him being a reincarnation of Jake was actually conceived well before Super Mystery Dungeon came out in Japan. They nicked my idea! They owe me! On a more serious note, it really kind of felt like a 'why not?' than anything else. Guess it served a purpose in getting Palkia to hear Serge out I guess.
I designed Serge to be the more likeable of the two leads, and I think he serves well as an anchor to Floyd. When Floyd steps out of line and risk casting audience empathy to the wayside, Serge is there to either reign him in or call him out. I guess in that respect, Serge is safe, but still functions well in the story.
I was torn between charmander and cyndaquil for Serge's species, but seeing how charmander can't turn off his fiery tail, it makes hiding in the dark moments impossible, so I made Serge a cyndaquil.
Serge fit the role and the story well, but I really should have given him a more distinct character.
Fun fact: His name was inspired by a monkey that was part of a French learning programme for young kids.
Wigglytuff Guild:
Wasn't too sure what to do with these guys to be honest. In the games, they took up so much time in spite of doing almost nothing, and it seems that flaw leaked into The Unknown Continuum. If I were writing them now, I'm still not really sure what I'd do with them. I guess it gave them a variety of personalities for Floyd and Serge to bounce off, but aside from Wigglytuff and Chatot, they were just kind of there for the most part.
I did find it interesting how Corphish and Chimeco got a bit of the spotlight in chapters 7 and 8, allowing for a bit more variety in the fight scenes, and the scenario that set up the three of them being together was down to Chatot. I toned up his 'dickishness' from the games, and while I don't think it was a bad choice per se, I can't really remember why I did it either. I found the idea of him sharing an interest in the humans quite interesting though, as it reminded me of someone back in my school days. We hated each other's guts, yet we both shared a lot of interests, so during the rare times we were amiable, we could actually talk about stuff just fine.
In general, I toned down their verbal tics to make them seem more like people as opposed to walking catchphrases, while still trying to keep their personalities in check, though I did alter some of them here and there. Wigglytuff took a darker turn towards the end, clearly not taking the death of three of his members well at all. Did Wigglytuff and Chatot have a thing for each other? I'll let you decide.
They were harmless I guess, as they didn't feel overly intrusive, and they give something for Floyd and Serge to interact with aside from each other.
Fun fact: Wigglytuff's birth name is Edmund.
Grovyle:
Personality wise, definitely the most altered character. My reasons for making him more emotional and cheerful are honestly very petty; I just hate stoic characters in general. It becomes very hard for me to get invested in what a character is doing if they're not showing much emotional investment themselves. To go on a tangent, while I said the Wigglytuff Guild didn't really do much, they at least showed enthusiasm in what they did. During the reunion scene with Grovyle after escaping the future, he just sits there with a neutral face for the entire scene. Now there are the occasional exception to the rule, such as Data from Star Trek TNG, but Grovyle in the games was not one of them. Stoicism doesn't equal badass for me by any stretch.
TUC Grovyle wasn't really good either though, since he makes Serge look like he's bursting with personality. He's driven, determined and...happy to see Floyd...yeah, I kind of failed with him here. I guess the trouble I had with him is that he was the opposite of the Wigglytuff Guild – big role, little time with him. Still, he was part of the fight scene in chapter 19, possibly my favourite one, so he wasn't all weak.
SFAM Grovyle was better though. I liked the scenario of how they came together, and having him shyly get more involved with human life was an interesting arc for him, as well as helping Floyd soothe his fear of pokemon. At times, he had a bigger brother protective nature over Floyd, much to Floyd's annoyance, but I still think I got their friendship down pretty well. I also think he functioned fine as the glue that held the group together during the dead future chapters in SFAM.
Much like Serge, he was a bit bland for my liking, except I think he suffered from it a bit more since he wasn't as good a foil to Floyd as Serge was. The whole foil thing was more done by Omar in SFAM anyway. The weakest prominent character in my eyes.
Fun fact: Grovyle loves electronic music, but Floyd hates it, so he refuses to allow him to play it in his presence. However, he doesn't play metal when Grovyle's around either.
Dusknoir:
Probably the character I altered the least from the games. Only real difference is that I played up his cowardly nature a bit more. Sucking up to Dialga was also translated, and also added to Floyd and Kirk. Curiously enough, it was Floyd that came to like him more, unlike in the games. This was mostly due to sharing religious beliefs, making Floyd feel less alone, and it lead to some pretty good conversations between the two of them. Serge noticeably wasn't all that impressed, and I'd say it was due to Floyd and Serge discovering Fogbound Lake, so as a result, a lot of these big accomplishments feel less big to them now.
I think Dusknoir sucking up to Dialga for sheer survival purposes puts the two villains in a comparable, but different light. One is doing it out of an animalistic survival thing, the other is being very lucid about what he's doing. It helps give Dusknoir a reason for his heinous and selfish acts while not giving him any real amount of sympathy.
The biggest flaw with him is that, well, he's a dusknoir. I called him being a villain on the very first scene in the game due to his species alone. I mean, just look at him! He's also called Dusknoir! Might as well give him a sign that says 'I'm evil!' and call him Mr Badguy. In hind sight, I'd have probably changed his species entirely if I were writing this now in order to make it less obvious.
SFAM Dusknoir was also quite interesting. Initially had motived similar to Grovyle, albeit a bit different. In the same way that tribes came up with their own faiths to explain the workings of the world, Dusknoir too was searching for higher meanings as he became more self aware, leading to his friendship with Kirk and becoming a Dialgan. I wanted to make his friendship ending with Kirk slow and painful, and I think I did that fine.
A solid character, not really any major faults with him aside from his species.
Fun fact: When no one's looking, he often enjoys watching reality TV. He went to great lengths to ensure Kirk would never find out this personal shame of his.
Dialga:
Probably the only character aside from Floyd who gets mentioned in every chapter in both stories, yet was barely ever around. Things like this was used to help build up a god-like image of him. In fact, I'd say TUC and SFAM is most enjoyable if you know what all of the pokemon look like except for Dialga. I figured that a faith revolving around him would be very rigid with its morals, fitting in with the solid/liquid/gas theme for Dialga/Palkia/Giratina.
I found playing with the idea of fictional deities a lot of fun, and the idea of a being like that losing its mind to be quite terrifying, especially for Floyd who worshipped him for most of his life, possibly contributing to him being mentally shattered ever since he escaped the dead future. I really wanted to exploit it for fear purposes, and I think I did a fine job of it.
Also enjoyed playing around with the idea of fallible deities, which was the biggest factor with Serge becoming quite paranoid ever since the incident at Temporal Tower. There was something a bit uncomfortable about how he wants humans to live by strict rules since it was because he thought humans were fallible and were prone making lapses in judgement. As opposed to Dialga, cough, cough.
Dialga was more of an idea and force to others to respond to, but he fit well as that.
Fun fact: Dialga is the eldest of the three brothers. Palkia and Giratina were created by Arceus afterwards in that order.
Darkrai:
The whole story is incomplete without Darkrai, so I wanted to weave him in before the end. I always saw him as being more of a manipulator behind the scenes than a fighter, hence why he was so hesitant to try and directly engage Floyd. Upon trying to think what could motivate him, I was struggling for a while, but I think changing Darkrai to being only able to exist in people's minds was an interesting one, and it feeds in well to him being a cowardly manipulator as opposed to a man of action.
All things considered, I think he should have came across as a bit creepier than what he ended up being, though having Darkrai keep watch of Floyd ever since escaping from the future was a little tense, and the fight between the two of them was strange and off in all the good ways. Much like Dusknoir, I wanted him to have a reason to do things, but for the audience to still hate him, and I think it worked well enough.
Solid as a main villain, albeit nothing great.
Fun fact: Darkrai can pass between the dimensions, but it takes him an entire year to cross safely.
Kirk:
One of the SFAM characters. It was kind of odd having him being mentioned quite a few times in spite of not being seen until towards the end of chapter 2. Writing him was a little tricky at times, since it was the only prominent character that had a familial relationship with Floyd, so I took care to write him as a father and not as a friend who was over thirty years older than Floyd. I think I pulled it off well, since Floyd showed a lot of respect towards him, and Floyd was never the rebellious type anyway.
I wanted to convey someone who showed enthusiasm but, through age and maturity, learned to temper it and use it sparingly and appropriately, which was shown in the church scene and in the dead future chapters. Also like how he was struggling to keep the group together and trying to push them all in the right direction as a leader, given how he was used to leading by being a priest and a school teacher. Regardless, it only carried him so far in the dead future.
A decent character, but, like Serge and Grovyle, his personality was a little bland. Fit his role nicely though
Fun facts: Kirk is actually really good at playing the drums. He won a talent competition in school by playing La Villa Strangiato by Rush from start to finish. His favourite album is Counterparts, by the same band. Also, his name is old Scots for 'church.'
Omar:
The breakout character in SFAM and TUC as a whole for me. Probably the second best character in both stories. He served as an excellent foil to Floyd in the dead future chapters, and seemed to be the one most affected by the never-ending night.
Omar before the endless night was always a source of cheeriness that felt welcoming and friendly (aside from when Jake died), and acted like a real friend. There was something quite infectious about the way he acted.
Omar after that was a little creepy, mostly down to the speed of how he went from happy-go-lucky to hardened survivalist. It was at this point where he was a real foil to Floyd – always agreeing on what to do but never on how to do it. It really shined at the end of SFAM 8, which is possibly my favourite moment in either series.
Fun fact: Omar's surname is Haddad. Realised that I never once stated it in SFAM or TUC, so better now than never.
Ezekiel:
Ezekiel was never even supposed to be a character initially. When I was writing the last two chapters of SFAM, he was just supposed to be an apparition created by Darkrai to spook and confuse Floyd, but two things changed him into being his own character: The reader's reactions to him, and Super Mystery Dungeon.
I don't have many people who comment after each chapter at all on either Deviantart of , but all of them were asking who that strange snivy was. I never had any idea what he was supposed to be, and after thinking about it, an apparition seems a bit anti-climactic. Then I played Super Mystery Dungeon which toyed around with reincarnation (albeit very half-assed), which inspired him being a previous incarnation of Floyd. As for how this affected Floyd, I could say that some of Ezekiel's personality traits were passed onto Floyd, but as for the details, you'll eventually find out in a sequel. Hopefully. My plans for the future are below the chapter notes.
Reading back at the chapters where he was in, he kind of overshadowed Darkrai in terms of being creepy. He's probably the scariest thing in TUC and SFAM, in spite of having a mad god and a hellish future to content with.
I don't really have an opinion since he's pretty much sequel fodder. Guess he's good sequel fodder if he got everyone's curiosity about him though.
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Fight scenes:
To show that Floyd sucked at fighting to begin with, I made the fight scenes clunky on purpose initially, with Floyd intentionally seeming like deadweight. Towards the end, I wanted Floyd and Serge to feel like they were on point with each other, and to have the feeling of them being like miniature ninjas, to show how well they were learning over time. Sure, maybe the timespan of a mere few months felt a bit quick for them to learn, but I figured it was better doing that than artificially drawing the story out over the course of a few years.
After a while, I wanted to focus on the emotions of the fight scene quite heavily, to really dig into why it came to violence and what Floyd stood to gain or lose. Really came to a head in the fight scene against Grovyle, where his sanity started fraying ever so slightly. I covered a lot of different scenarios and odds for the characters, and while a few of them near the beginning felt like filler to just make the place seem a bit more hostile, I thought I done a decent job with them.
I also rarely, if ever, referred to pokemon fighting techniques as moves. Floyd had no interest in pokemon training, be it participating, learning or watching, so he'd never learn the names of the attacks, hence why I never said something like 'I dodged backwards and retaliated with a vicious razor leaf.' If Omar was the main character, it would have been named attacks. I also pretty much ignored any and all gameplay rules. Instead of thinking 'Floyd is using leaf blade against a charizard, that only does a quarter damage. Floyd is using lead blade against a golem, that does quadruple damage,' I took it more on a case-by-case basis. Golem's rocky 'skin' is surely much tougher than a charizard's scales, so Floyd attacking by slicing wouldn't hurt it as much as it would a charizard. Also, mentioning game physics or logic in pokemon fictions is a massive pet peeve of mine.
World-building:
TUC was more about peppering the already made world with different details and explanations. I only realised about a quarter of the way in how small the planet would be (probably smaller than the moon), so gravity would surely be very weak. Palkia made gravity stronger there, that's the reason I guess. Geographically, having grassy areas, mountains and deserts all be within about a day's walk or two felt a bit off, but I don't think it broke the environment.
SFAM and the human world was another kettle of fish entirely. Obviously, I took the real world and garnished it with pokemon stuff in a way I thought it would fit. I decided to set it in the early 2030s to give technology a bit of a chance to make pokeballs, and while it'll obviously take many more decades to be able to shrink living creatures like that, it saved me from writing a world that would be too futuristic. It felt like a nice balance.
The opening ramble was inspired by a funny discussion about how much tax money running pokemon centres would cost. Floyd, as a non trainer, would obviously be up in arms about it. Other little complexities involved the idea of needing a licence for bigger and more dangerous pokemon, and how some of them wouldn't be allowed to walk in public spaces. Just try to walk with a rhyperior along a busy city street.
As for the religions, I kind of botched it a bit. For as much as the characters went on and on about it, there was only three distinct things about the Dialgan faith. No lying, no killing, and no punishment should be worse than the crime. Granted, it was more focused on trying to seem dogmatic and rigid than anything else, so I guess it served its function well enough. As for the other religions, it would appear on the surface that Arceism is corrupt and horrible, but just bear in mind that you're hearing all this from Floyd's perspective. He's hardly a balanced source.
Pacing:
I really shouldn't have took Pokemon Mystery Dungeon as inspiration for pacing, since their stories were always pretty poorly paced, Super especially. All of them having their first thirds dragging their feet (except for Gates to an extent, that opening third had at least a degree of substance.) Sadly, this bled over into both The Unknown Continuum and Scenes From A Memory. If I were to write them now, I'd have condensed the first six chapters into four, and the expedition into two chapters, making the first ten chapters into six, and condensing chapters 2-5 into two chapters, making the entire story only ten chapters long. Aside from that, the pacing felt a little slow, but never gratingly so, and it's always better to pace a story too slowly than too quickly. The ending segments of Super PMD taught me that well.
Music:
While music can't be synchronised in novel form, it did influence both stories quite a bit. I'd often listen to music that had a similar feel to what was happening in the story, example, a lot of really dark sounding metal in the dead future chapters to really get that nasty feel reinforced. I also put in a bunch of obscure references, a lot of chapters named after songs. Another influence came specifically from the band Opeth. They balance out some brutal, heavy, dark sounding passages, complete with death growl vocals with lighter, beautiful parts to help them contrast and make each other stand out. I took this as a lesson for the stories, as having things be dark or light all the time will just sound flat after a while. Balancing things and switching between the two every once in a while helped make it more balanced and impactful.
Ending:
I always wanted to make the ending both logically satisfying and emotionally satisfying, but this proved to be a bit easier said than done. I ran through an assload of ideas before I came to the one that I wanted. Here are the rejected ideas I had:
Dialga resurrects Floyd after finishing repairing the tower, just like in the games. Not only did I want to make things a bit different from the games, it felt a bit convenient. A variation would be Serge going back to Dialga's world to ask him in person.
Floyd just remains dead. Logical enough, but probably not all that satisfying to just end it like that.
Floyd is resurrected as a celebi. One of the stranger ideas I had if I just wanted to make the ending kind of weird. I think it probably could have worked ok in its own quirky way, but I prefer the ending I actually have it.
A pokemon meets Serge on the beach and says that he's looking for his son. Vaguely implied to be Kirk. This obviously couldn't work since I had Kirk appear as a pokemon in chapter 30.
It wasn't until about chapter 28 when I thought of the ending that I would be happy with. Thinking back to SFAM4 and TUC14, there were two Floyds from different times in roughly the same area. Of course, they way Floyd gets wiped from time and space is that he changes history to the extent that the past Floyd would have no reason to go back in time. However, said past Floyd would live on, so in a way he dies, but in a way he lives. Then it came to me that a logical and emotionally satisfying ending would be for Serge to meet the other Floyd, even though the other Floyd would have never met or knew anything of Serge. Even though the chapter itself wasn't actually all that great, I'm happy with how it ended. Or maybe you would have preferred Celebi-Floyd, I dunno.
Chapter Notes
These are a bit rambly and go on for ages. I'll keep them here so you can pick up my thoughts on each chapter, but if you want to skip towards my plans for the future regarding stories, then ctrl-F 'Plans For The Future' to find it quickly. Or just scroll down, or whatever.
SFAM1:
Floyd needs to shut up about religions that didn't come into play much later on. Made for an awkward opening scene, I don't like it very much.
Scenes with him and Grovyle are quite good.
Aside from the sloppy and long-winded first scene, I think it's a solid opening chapter.
SFAM2:
Floyd REALLY needs to shut up about religions that didn't come into play much later on.
Again, scenes with Floyd and Grovyle were fun.
Probably the most light-hearted chapter out of both stories, but it was pretty weightless. I like this chapter less in hindsight, and while I was planning to have this chapter to be more a world-builder.
SFAM3:
Less rambling, more happening, while still being able to learn about the characters.
Mostly light hearted, but has a but more weight to it.
Main cast interactions were improved.
Better humour. Might have ran the pokemon giving Floyd unwanted hugs gag a bit too much, but I just find the idea of someone as stuck-up as Floyd getting undesired affection from friendly pokemon to be really funny.
In hindsight, I like it more than I remembered, first chapter in SFAM that I say was good, or at least better than the first two chapters.
When I wrote this, I started debating whether I wanted to make Serge a reincarnated Jake for an entire year before deciding 'eh, why not?' Probably didn't really affect the story too much and might have seemed like an awkward coincidence, but I think it helped build the world up a bit, and TUC36 did end up making it matter to a small degree.
SFAM4:
Opening scenes show off Floyd's pragmatic side, and it really goes to show that he obeys the letter of Dialgism, but not always the spirit of the rules, especially given he's the sort of person to make excuses as to why he's still technically following the rules.
Also shows Grovyle's protective nature over Floyd, which can be a bit smothering to him. All things considered, it was only natural he ended up becoming the voice of reason in the later SFAM chapters.
Loved the scene that linked SFAM4 with TUC14 where Omar sees the future version of Floyd. Both amusing and creepy at the same time, and really digs into the mystery.
Good to build the dimensional scream in a big, albeit not world-changing manner.
Liked how the feeling of the emotional punch moment was that of helplessness for Floyd, though I think I could have conveyed it better.
I like how it's slowly sliding into darker material ever so slowly.
SFAM5:
The reactions to the end of the world was a pretty good scene, giving people a rough idea of how they'll act when it comes.
Fixed over a massive flaw that I didn't even think was there. I wrote the later parts of TUC as if there were a time-skip of a few weeks in SFAM5, but when I looked over it, I forgot to actually write it in. It's there now though, so as a result, the later TUC chapters take place during said time-skip. Everything that the past version of Floyd that appeared at the end of TUC experienced was up until that time-skip.
First proper action scene in SFAM, and as expected, it's more about Floyd just trying to survive. Fights in SFAM and early TUC chapters are purposefully a bit clunky since Floyd really just has a crowbar and good wits, and is hardly the miniature snake ninja he is in the later TUC chapters.
Gives a rough idea of the 'power-level' between humans and pokemon, but it's a bit skewered since in the second half of SFAM, pretty much every opponent and assailant is highly malnourished compared to Floyd who remains fairly healthy, hence why Floyd is able to stand up to them better later on.
Floyd feeling righteous about assaulting a teenage girl. Goes to show how serious his Dialgan mentality can be, but whether you think it was justified or makes Floyd nasty is down to you.
The doctor is my favourite one-scene character in the whole story. Uses a lot of mannerisms that were popular a couple of years ago, since in context, SFAM takes place in the early 2030's.
Love the paragraph where Omar rips into Grovyle. Scenes like that made Omar the breakout character in SFAM for me.
SFAM6:
Something strange happened between this chapter and chapter 7. I think Kirk, Omar and Dusknoir kind of pushed aside Floyd and Grovyle's main character roles and took it for themselves. Grovyle's just kind of there for those two chapters, but I think it's because that Kirk, Omar and Dusknoir form a trio similar to the Star Trek trio of Kirk (same names are a coincidence), Spock and McCoy. Both Kirks ended up being the balancing leader between two people who are often opposed to each other, or take very different points of view, and it's just a set-up that works really well in general.
The ending scenes were pretty tense with the fake cops, then Primal Dialga in the distance. In hind sight, they're actually more exciting than most of the action scenes.
SFAM7:
I think I did a decent job of making the eternal night feel very inhospitable and hostile. Even if there was no immediate danger, it still felt discomforting, which all worked well in my eyes. Always made sure to have softer moments to avoid keeping things too dreary though.
Tried to slowly draw lines in the sand between the characters, most notable between Omar and Dusknoir who pretty much hated each other since they first met.
I was debating whether to have Dusknoir back-stab the group at a critical moment instead of a 'safe' one, but I figured that A: He'd be too much of a coward to do so and B: Would not feel suddenly hostile towards Floyd let alone Kirk.
Kirk would have been almost as hostile towards Omar's will to kill as Dusknoir, but I think the realisation that nothing in this timeline would exist if they successfully carried out their mission made him a bit more accepting of the killing.
SFAM8:
The softer first third is one of my favourite parts. Just the characters just telling how each other how they feel about the entire thing, from Grovyle almost giving up completely to Omar's fear of what he could be becoming by leaving a trail of destruction and death where he went in order to protect the group. Digging through what motivates the characters just felt right, and even applying bits of comedy here and there helped relieve the tension a bit since it was mostly two chapters of straight dreariness.
Most of the chapters towards the second half of either story were named after songs, but this chapter took a couple of nods to the song Illumination Theory by Dream Theater. First, the plan to undo the timeless wasteland was named after the song directly, and Omar invokes the song's lyrics when speaking to Floyd about how far he'd be willing to go. 'Something, something, What are you willing to live for? Something, something, What are you willing to die for? Something, something, What are you willing to kill for?' An obscure nod, but the scenes still worked well regardless.
I liked where I was going with the scene with the luxray and the bit before it, but I think I could have pulled of the fear of isolation better if I sat down and re-done it, or study how horror writers do it more.
The scene also shows the strengths and weaknesses of Floyd when it comes to dealing with threats. Pretty good at outsmarting hostile pokemon, and strong enough to take down a lot of different species once outsmarted, but he'd likely get eviscerated if it was a straight up fight, even if the luxray was starving and weak. Seems like the ideal power level for a human protagonist in a pokemon world. Obviously, Floyd indirectly killed it since it'll be unable to hunt effectively with all of its knees broken, but given the story is from Floyd's perspective, he just chooses not to think about it.
Omar's rant towards Floyd and Kirk might be one of the best moments of SFAM. I personally thought it was quite powerful stuff, really ripping into the whole no-killing policy. In a way, Omar was right, since by not using the handguns, it left Dragonite more vulnerable, ultimately leading to her demise.
One of my favourite chapters in SFAM for sure, though I remember SFAM11 being better.
SFAM9:
Kind of the reverse of the scene last chapter. I liked the part where Grovyle perks Floyd up a bit, and it seems this chapter as a whole is about the conflict on following Dialgan doctrine vs doing what Floyd feels is right, as shown in spades towards the end.
A bit concerned that Grovyle had too small a role in the last few chapters, but it wasn't as bad as I remembered it to be.
The last third or thereabouts is probably the nastiest part of either story. Might have went a bit far, but it still served its purpose in hammering in what had to be done from Floyd's and Kirk's perspective.
Figured a more fitting death from Omar would involve being tricked rather than out-fought. The whole 'I'll cover you so you can escape thing' would have been corny in my eyes, since they'd all know that they'd be much weaker if the group's number's diminish.
Zoroark was also a fairly creepy one-shot, since it shows that there are other dangerous agents that were after them. For a one shot, he has a surprising amount of plot impact, removing a major character from the plot and killing off a minor one.
The last couple of lines are kind of cheesy, but I still think they work.
SFAM10:
Starting to think I'm abusing dream sequences, but the one with Omar is one of my favourite ones.
Yes, there is a road called 'Fannyside road. It's real.
I renamed Post Town to Syrinx when looking things over. There may be a funny nod to it at some point, that'll involve temples and priests in a sequel. If you can figure out the reference already, you've got great taste. Just a little nod to Gates and showing that things are starting to get a bit crazier with the worlds collapsing in on one another.
The fight between Floyd and the lucario was to demonstrate that Floyd was catching all his opponents off guard previously, and in a straight up fight, like he had with the lucario, would likely lose to them all, and all of them were starving and weak for their usual standards. Also showed that through all Kirk went through, finally found his killer instinct to save Floyd from being slowly beaten to death.
Noticed that Kirk vary subtly hinted that the three of them would be wiped from time and space if they carry out the mission before revealing it to them at the end.
It was quite frustrating once they got to the Highlands. It's a beautiful part of Scotland, but I couldn't describe the vast scenery since it was always night and they couldn't see too far ahead of them. Turned it into a softer moment for the characters, which I liked.
Admittedly, Floyd grabbing a sableye to beat the other sableye with was just amazing. Probably the highlight of Floyd as a human fighting.
That sableye that was stabbed definitely died. Just don't tell Floyd that.
It was during this chapter and SFAM12 that I noticed a problem – Floyd gets the absolute shit beat out of him in both of them, yet he still keeps on going. All things considered, he really should have been incapacitated by the end of SFAM10, but maybe with the combination of Floyd's determination, being physically healthier than almost everyone by that point in time and sheer luck, maybe it's not so bad.
Liked having a kinder send-off to one of the characters for a change, since Omar and Dragonite were killed in sudden and violent ways.
One of the better SFAM chapters.
SFAM11:
The best SFAM chapter in my eyes, genuinely happy with this one. The funny thing is that I didn't even plan for this chapter to exist until I wrote the opening scene where I thought 'Well, I don't want Darkrai coming right out of the blue at the end, so he has to make some kind of appearance before the confrontation' which ended up expanding into a very long dream sequence that ended up being the introduction of a character who wasn't even planned to be a character initially (Ezekiel.)
I liked the conversation between Grovyle and Floyd where they were discussing their inevitable deaths, and it was an example of Floyd subtly using his ego to boost up other people rather than just himself.
The long dream sequence is the most atmospheric SFAM ever got, and it's my favourite passage in the entire story. Starts off quite pleasant (even if Darkrai was trying to probe Floyd for information), before slowly becoming stranger and creepier with the first sighting of Ezekiel and Darkrai's behaviour becoming more and more erratic. A lot of the visuals were quite restrained before slipping into creeping wrongness, which I also liked.
Ezekiel at this point had no name, and wasn't even a character by this point. In my mind when I was writing this, he was nothing more than an apparition created by Darkrai to make Floyd feel as off-kilter as possible. It wasn't until some readers were asking about him and Super came along that I got the idea to make it a previous incarnation of Floyd that was stirring due to Darkrai's presence.
The ending also marks the first time Floyd make a lucid and thought out decision to kill.
SFAM12:
Confirmed that the bus crash that killed Jake was due to an untimely dimensional scream from the bus driver. Thought it'd help tie things together and to show why a fully lucid Dialga might not want to bless his followers with such a power.
The language that Floyd used to describe things changed a bit in this chapter, referring to any enemy pokemon as being either distractions or obstacles, dehumanizing...well, depokemonizing them in the process. I also liked how he was worried that his humanity was being taken away by the conditions and the sole drive to redeem the world (well, it literally got taken away at the very end of SFAM/the start of TUC). Possibly the beginning of madness for him, but it never amounted to too much for him in SFAM.
Kind of surprised that Floyd's soul wasn't a blissey – he can sure take a huge beating and still keep going! Hopefully it didn't break suspension of disbelief too much.
'"The scratching and clawing never stopped, like insects were scrimshawing the inside of my skull.'" One of my favourite descriptive lines I wrote. Makes my skin crawl.
Starting to see why people were so curious about Ezekiel. He kind of overshadows Darkrai in this chapter, and there's just something really unsettling about him.
This chapter was a bit better than I remembered, and I think it's a worthy ending to SFAM.
TUC1:
Intro gives a nice feeling of impending events down the line, giving the impression that the story will build up to something.
Slow pacing at the start, but I didn't want to rush into it too much to let the atmosphere settle in.
Floyd discovering he was a snivy was rather amusing.
I figured Floyd should have a completely passive role in combat initially, given he'd likely still be struggling to walk properly, hence he was just moral support for Serge.
Decided to make the reactions to Floyd quite mixed initially, but the whole foreign aspect was more a by-product of the fact that the gen 5 starters were just newly announced when I wrote the first chapter.
Solid opening, now that I've edited the sloppy grammar that plagues the earlier chapters.
TUC2:
The fight scene was deliberately awkward and stilted to show their inexperience. I think it functioned fine as a tone-setter for the fights ahead.
A bit of an introduction chapter, but I'm kind of struggling to justify this chapter's existence.
A funny aspect is Floyd getting angry at how little pay he actually gets to keep, where it was much worse (10% as opposed to 35%) in the games.
TUC3:
Mostly just there to introduce the dimensional scream and to show Floyd as being someone who likes to, in his eyes, dispense justice. Again, not the best of chapters.
This chapter and a lot of the earlier ones felt like symptoms of following the game too closely. I'd likely have done things quite differently if I were writing TUC now.
Chapter's two and three could have and should have been cut down and amalgamated into one.
'Feraligator' as opposed to 'Feraligatr.' I just figured they wanted to scrunch it into a 10 word limit, but I myself have no such limitations.
TUC4:
I've noticed that characters say 'I reckon' quite a bit. Nuzleaf is possessing every single one of them, it's canon because I am the writer and I say so! On a serious note, Nuzleaf's verbal tic made me a bit more conscious about using the word 'reckon.'
That trip to the waterfall was completely and utterly pointless, it could have been written out entirely.
Figured that chatots might know about western musical writing, since their head is in the shape a of a quaver. A real chicken-or-egg situation in-universe though, so I decided to have some fun wit it.
This entire chapter was almost completely pointless. It could have been removed entirely and almost nothing would have changed. I think it might be my least liked chapter of the entire story.
TUC5:
Team Skull could have been written out entirely. They don't really add anything, and just take up time. They weren't funny or interesting, and are just a waste of space.
Chatot's backstory is the only thing going for this chapter. I'd say this is as weak as chapter four, but I'm wondering if that's just as much a criticism of the source material as well as TUC itself.
Chatot's behaviour seems a bit swingy. Oddly enough, it was inspired by some assholes back in the school days, where one day they could be dicks, then the next I could actually enjoy a conversation with them, leading me to believe that they were very swingy depending on their mood at the time.
TUC6:
The best chapter sine the first TUC chapter, it has a degree of substance to it.
Nice to see Floyd become more driven compared to his usual self. Serge on the other hand has been really vanilla so far. I regret not carving out a more distinct personality for him, and I regard that as one of TUC's biggest weaknesses alongside TUC2-5 in general.
I liked how I hinted that the three who had to stay behind were coincidentally said bad things about Chatot, giving a hint that he forced them to stay just because he hated them.
An encouraging ending to see the characters not take it lying down, and to have a different cast dynamic for the next couple of chapters.
In the real world, I just walked a real life craggy coast a couple of days before typing this. Thirty miles over two days.
TUC7:
Floyd, Corphish and Chimeco form a good trio.
Corphish, or any other native pokemon, shouldn't know what a hippie is, but I just thought it was funny, so I left it in.
Fight scene was fine, but it was a bit long winded.
Chapter is ok, but I think 8 and 7 should have been shortened and merged into one.
TUC8:
Said movie Floyd was talking about was The Lion King.
Entertaining action scene, might be the best so far in TUC.
The reunion with Serge was nice, but would have been much better if he wasn't as bland as a sack of potatoes by this point in the story.
Him questioning his odd enjoyment of violence could really be down to many different things: Maybe he was always quite violent by nature, but was too disgusted by the idea of violence to ever indulge in it. Maybe it's the pokemon instincts peeking through, which would make sense considering that the pokemon in the human world seem to enjoy being trained for battle. Perhaps it could be Ezekiel starting to leak his influence through, though that certainly wasn't planned since I wouldn't conceive of him until about five entire years later.
The last few paragraphs were easily the strongest moments of TUC so far. A mysterious vibe that really sets in Floyd's loneliness and a desire for what he has lost.
Might be the best TUC chapter so far, it's between this and 1.
TUC9:
Is Wigglytuff exceedingly reckless or does he trust that the group can look after itself? I don't know, go ask him yourself.
Possibly the only scene with any kind of reference towards sexuality in both stories. Not only did I find the scene quite funny, it was also to establish Floyd as having zero sexual attractions, even as a human. It wasn't exactly for special snowflake issues, but it was useful to completely kill any chance or potential feelings of romance that I could have accidentally given in later chapters completely stone dead. I'm aware that player-partner shipping is quite popular among the PMD fanbase, so I thought this was a good opportunity to completely snuff out any shipping fuel in case any reader suspected that Floyd and Serge would hook up.
Harvey, Benoit and Acalan serve two purposes – dimensional scream fodder so Floyd can figure out what to do (starting to think the plot convenience super-power might have been better ditched, since it does lead to quite a few 'if only he got a vision here, he'd have seen that coming' situations) and as a bit of an origin story for the continent's civilization. I also edited the strange language to be ancient Greek to tie in with the final chapter. In other words, it was the ancient pokemon civilization that built it.
That double dumbass Star Trek IV was so forced, but it's endearingly corny, so I'll leave it in.
I decided to make Floyd's little speech at the end a little more elaborate and hammy. Makes it a bit grander, and subtlety wasn't really a thing with Floyd.
Solid chapter overall, I liked the deepening mysteries and all that jazz.
TUC10:
The Groudon fight had a fun climactic end. The real Groudon would have been about thirty times as large at least though, since I'd imagine it'd be kaiju sized at the very smallest.
I decided to tone down Floyd's dickishness in this chapter, since I didn't think it'd be in his character to go that ham on Serge. Also helps keeps any empathy the reader might have for Floyd.
The part with Armaldo wasn't really needed per se, but just a fun shout out to the special episode and gives a bit of backstory to Wigglytuff.
I thought it was an interesting idea for Floyd, and Serge for that matter, to look unusually old for their ages since they were overdue, by age, for an evolution. In snivy years, Floyd's probably approaching his fifties, even though he's only twenty-one (even though he thinks he's only twenty by this stage)
This chapter was a bit long-winded in my eyes.
TUC11:
Saying that there was a lot of riolus, pikachus, eevees and vulpixes was actually a very subtle stab at people constantly using those species for PMD art and fics. Nowadays, you could add fennekin to the list.
Liked how I showed how vulnerable Floyd was when he was alone
Not an eventful chapter, but it did close up a loophole of wishing for solutions I guess. Can't say I like it too much aside from Floyd's journey to Star Cave.
TUC12:
This is the chapter where things really get going. Only took almost the entire first third to get to this point, and that's almost as long as all of SFAM!
Given this is the chapter with the cliche yet mandatory fall-out between the two leads, I was fairly happy with the set-up for it. Floyd is becoming increasingly irritable with being trapped in the pokemon world for so long, and stress has been setting in over time.
The scene with Floyd and Serge discussing whether they should help Marill was pretty good, since it showed the more tangible rift growing between them, and helping reinforce Floyd as more the 'slay the dragon' person compared to the 'save the princess' type that Serge was.
Floyd projecting his fears and frustrations onto Serge was obviously wrong of him, and Floyd expecting the worst from Serge, such as thinking he got him into trouble and was going to ditch him was a good build up to the temporary end of Team Conviction.
Was Floyd screaming 'DO IT YOU CUNT!' too in your face and edgy? Eh, I'll let you be the judge of that. Was Floyd's actions in line with good morals and/or Dialgan morals? I'll let you decide that for yourself too. Regardless, it's a good insight into the strange way Floyd thinks, which would be much harder to do if the story wasn't from his perspective.
Serge's being a little insensitive towards Floyd and his plight might have ended up pushing him over the edge, as well as Serge getting on better with Dusknoir more than he ever did with Serge.
Love the conversation between Dusknoir and Floyd, especially when he was, unknown to Floyd, talking about his father. The whole drapion thing was a lie, and since there'd be no way Dusknoir could figure out what soul Kirk had, he just said any random pokemon. Turned out Kirk had a haxorus one.
Pretty much everything in this chapter worked well, making it the first one in TUC that I really liked. Also works well if you don't like Floyd as a person, since Serge, metaphorically speaking, slaps him around.
TUC13:
This and TUC21 seem to be the most atmosphere-focused chapters. The whole section at the shop was kind of filler though.
Not much happened here, since it was more focused on the feel of the environments than anything else. I think I did a decent job with the atmosphere when Floyd starts getting close to Giratina, with all that loopy nonsense towards the end.
I liked the description of Giratina. I went out of my way to do so in flowery detail to really emphasise the deity-like nature of these 'pokemon' in TUC, since to Floyd, a pikachu is just a pikachu in the same way a rat is just a rat to us. Every day, ordinary, nothing special, hence why I was light on descriptions for more mundane stuff while heavy on otherworldly stuff.
Easily the chapter with the least dialogue.
TUC14:
I remembered this chapter being one of my favourites for the atmosphere, world building and bringing a satisfying and logical conclusion to the 'Floyd wants to go home' arc.
Yes, you heard Giratina correctly – humans were originally going to be fish-men, kind of like the deep ones or the creature from the black lagoon before Arceus.
The backstory to the world is a bit of an exposition dump, but I still think it's all intriguing.
The chapter also has a couple of really cool foreshadowing that was done when Floyd briefly goes back to the human world in his old body. What caused him to get so shaggy and messed up like that? Why would Kirk mention something about worrying about dreams to a twenty year old son? Who is that other Floyd? It's continuity porn to say the least!
If you read SFAM4, then you might recognize Floyd as being he doppelgänger. This chapter obviously takes place at the exact same time as SFAM4, and I really loved the idea of the two of them kind of being in the same scene, albeit not really. If they actually did meet, there'd be no world ending paradox or anything, just a lot of confusion.
I figured that it would be good to give the 'Floyd wants want to go home' arc a real conclusion instead of just leaving it there over the entire story, and I thought that visiting the human world only to discover something horrible that makes Floyd want to go back was the best way to do it.
The discovery moment where Floyd breaks down and cries and lies in a lifeless heap was a good emotional core to help give an emotional centre to the chapter, since the first half was a bit 'expositiony'. I also find it interesting that Floyd regards being replaced by a copy of himself to be more horrifying than being trapped a foreign world and body, and a dangerous one at that. Kind of shows the egotistical side of him pretty well without being too obvious about it.
The chapter aged just as well as I remembered it. One of my favourites for sure, but TUC 12 is almost if not just as good.
TUC15:
I edited this chapter a bit more to make Floyd a bit more apologetic and Serge a bit less forgiving to help give a better impression of Floyd really earning Serge's forgiveness. Didn't want it to be too easy, and by the end of the chapter, I want Serge to feel amiable towards Floyd without really being friends, though they'd likely patch things up completely in a couple of chapters.
Wanted to show the similarities and differences between the two of them here, and I think it worked well enough.
I think this, and maybe TUC 12 to an extent, are some of the chapters that Serge wasn't just a bland every-man, which I liked.
Not as good as TUC12 and 14 obviously, but it served a good purpose and was a solid chapter all round.
TUC16:
'Wee Jimmy' was used as a phrase for a random person.
Very unremarkable chapter as a whole, nothing much happening aside from build up. The couple of friendlier moments that Serge and Floyd shared shows that they're pretty much friends again now, and the build up itself was at least ok, with Floyd's attitudes shifting in a very different and new direction for his character, so it's not a bad chapter per se.
TUC17:
Seems like in this world, the traditional anime moment of suddenly evolving at a key moment to turn the tables in a dramatic fashion would be very unlikely here. Even in the human world where evolution isn't limited to springs, dealing with a different body would likely render the pokemon inefficient at battling for a while.
Something I did throughout SFAM and TUC is wipe out all references to the United Kingdom. There was a referendum in Scotland in 2014 on whether to split from the UK or not, and it was a 55-45% on staying, but there is still a lot of talk about wanting to separate. Not getting into my own beliefs on the issue, it's possible that Scotland will split off by 2032, where TUC takes place in. If Scotland hasn't split by them, calling Scotland a country is still technically true whether it goes independent or not.
Feels kind of like TUC16.5 than a new chapter. Given I obviously knows what happens, a lot of it just feels like build up for chapter 19, though for what it's worth, I think 17's a bit better than 16. If anything, it also shows that the guild are taking action, making Floyd and Serge feel a part of something really big. Nice way to scale up the story,
TUC18:
I noticed that I use Tyranitars as stock obstacles to overcome twice or even three times. Hooray for repetitiveness! I guess they function well enough though.
I thought it was good to show why Chatot was the second in command.
I think I should have made more of a fight between the four of them, it seemed a bit quick, not to mention it'd add more hype for the rematch next chapter.
One of the few things that makes Serge is distinctive is that he's not as enamoured with Dusknoir as everyone else is. I seriously regret making him this vanilla, though if I remember correctly, he does get a bit better Chapter 21 onwards.
A bit more plot moving, a bit more action, and Floyd's fury reaching soaring heights. If Chapter 19 is as good as the readers told me it was, then I think a lot of the groundwork was done by the last three chapters.
TUC19:
I decided to make Floyd be so single minded and determined to the point of giving off a vibe of insanity. Gives of a subtle feeling that Floyd might be on the wrong side, in spite of his intentions. I think it's what helped separate this fight scene from the others so far. I also wrote this fight as if it were the big climactic showdown of the entire story, and I think it came off well.
Now I don't watch any anime, but if I were to guess, this felt like the most anime chapter so far. The built up confrontation between Floyd and Grovyle paid off nicely and lived up to the hype that the last three chapters had, and Serge's fighting was well done too. Probably shows both of the lead characters at their best, even if Floyd's sanity seemed to be fraying at points.
Another chapter where just about everything worked. I'm happy with it.
TUC20:
A talking snivy in a dream? Ezekiel wasn't remotely conceived, so I edited a couple of lines to make it a little ambiguous. Was it really Ezekiel there? Why don't you ask him yourself.
"I mean, the idea of the fate of everyone being dictated by a mere few people?"
"Serge...there is nothing remotely 'mere' about us!"
One of my favourite lines in TUC
Seems like Floyd's strange sadistic streak still surfaces even after Grovyle's defeated. While he doesn't show it to anyone except terrible villains (in his mind), it might be a carry-over trait from Ezekiel, as well as a big ego. There's still a part of him that abhors violence, but that could be partially because he's afraid of what he could become.
The back stab, which should be a no brainer if you've played Explorers, was quite good here, even if it was a little obvious from a reader's perspective, since there did seem to be a genuine friendship between Floyd and Dusknoir, both taking comfort in sharing the same religious beliefs. Still, Dusknoir was kind of blatantly feeding into Floyd's ego in the middle of the chapter.
It's hard to say for sure, but Floyd might be dishonest to himself about the whole lying loophole.
Wrote this chapter as if it was the last one in many respects, but still leaving some things open and answered yet. This was a good all-round chapter, I like it.
TUC21:
Probably the most atmospheric chapter in TUC, and probably the most horror-based to, though the other 'dead future' chapters explore different sorts of horror.
I sacrificed a bit of plot and character for this, but I think it worked. Not that it was devoid of it though, with Floyd having arguably his dumbest moment, but Serge is there for good reason. I think it's at about this point where Serge stops becoming so vanilla. Wish I did that much earlier.
Decided to make the sableyes mostly savage to help give a feeling of being hunted down by a pack of vicious animals. Barely enough intelligence to take orders though.
Solid chapter overall.
TUC22:
I really liked the part where Floyd explained his faith in Dialgan principles to Serge. It all has its own logic to it, but Serge would have likely flagged him as a coward for not even being brave enough to trust his own judgement if the current situation wasn't as dicey as it was.
I noticed that the word 'determination' was used quite a bit in the last five chapters or so. Kind of sucks how Undertale made that word into a borderline meme, so it ended up ageing a bit awkwardly.
Bidoof was actually quite creepy for me. Not because of posing a physical threat, but just showing that even a kind soul like him wasn't above descending back into animalistic savagery and madness.
This chapter was a lot better than I remembered, it's one of my favourites. Explores a different sort of horror compared to TUC21, and had some of the best character moments. Also the first great chapter for Serge, as he really stepped out of his vanilla shell here.
TUC23:
Same with Douglas saying 'kill or be killed.' That being said, the scene also helped show how Floyd was starting to become rather single-minded, something that would become a big part of his character from here on out.
It was also at this point where I started using Google maps to plot the way for the characters to take, as I did with a lot of SFAM.
In case you didn't guess, 'Dialga' was actually just Kyurem at the end of this chapter.
It was interesting to see Floyd at his lowest point in the story (Though the end of chapter 25 and the first half of 33 are debatable just as low if not lower for him.) There was something oddly pathetic about the way he tried to justify telling the cannibal where other humans were living, and Serge would have happily ripped into him for it if he wasn't so concerned about keeping moral from sinking further.
Interesting to bring the human world into it, to show how things turned out there, but I felt that in spite of the ruined city of Edinburgh being quite well written, it was weaker than chapter 22, though I think that's more to do with 22 being surprisingly good than anything else.
TUC24:
I can't remember if I ever specified this other Floyd in the dream being Cresselia. Of course, if you've read all of TUC, which I presume you have if you're reading this, then you'll know that the other Floyd is his past self. Regardless, I'll be sure to specify it at point.
I'm not sure if the dream sequence was particularly necessary per se, but I liked it for the atmosphere. I think it also started the ascent for Floyd's character in many ways, since it's where he started picking himself up and trying to make himself into the hero the world needs.
The scene at the abandoned fruit farm showed the other side of the coin. Serge is very much a 'bigger picture' person, but that could have more been induced by circumstances, which makes an interesting clash for Floyd's smaller case-by-case views on life. Might have been slightly jarring for Serge, but it does go to show how he's influenced by circumstances, given he chewed Floyd out for a suspect action in chapter 12. Who's in the right? You can decide that.
I actually wrote spiritomb as not being a pokemon. In TUC, these unholy soul-conglomerations are a sure sign that Palkia's mind is falling to pieces, and seek to assimilate other souls into its being. Basically a ghost-borg. Spooky stuff.
I like this chapter too. Again, not as good as 22, but still solid. Seems like the 'dead future' chapters are of solid quality overall.
TUC25:
The scene with the trainer might have been a bit of a pointless distraction, but it furthers Serge's development as a pragmatist. Wish I added some traits to him earlier on, but I think only making him this pragmatic now is a sign that the circumstances are changing him. In many regards, he's more of an anti-hero than Floyd is by this point, who's still desperately clinging onto his older ideals.
'Black Hill' might sound like the most unimaginative name for a place in the dead future, but it's actually the name of the hill in real life.
This chapter is arguably the most important one in terms of the plot, since a lot of things are changed and revealed in it, but it still has plenty of solid character moments. Pretty much has everything that makes the dead future chapters better than the ones before it, but as the longest chapter, over 15k words in length, it might have been a good idea to make it two separate ones. Still one of the best ones.
TUC26:
I wasn't sure how to nod people to read the SFAM chapters that Floyd remembered, so I just kind of bluntly linked them to it.
Not sure how much I like the reunion between Floyd and Grovyle. It is a very strange circumstance, so I wasn't too sure how to convey it well. Seems to work well though.
Grovyle seems even more vanilla than Serge here. He was a better character in SFAM. Still, some solid character interactions here.
Chapter's pretty solid, but nothing special.
TUC27:
"Stopping the future from turning to a shit shitting a shit onto a pile of shit." Yeah, got an immature giggle from this.
This chapter also shows Floyd starting to lose it very slightly. Trying to protect himself by verbally lashing out here and there and assigning blame almost at random, especially the paragraph where he rants about all other religions being wrong and how he has realised just how fragile the universe could be. One of my favourite paragraphs in the story.
Chapter feels a tad bloated, but it keeps up with the trend of Serge more becoming his own character rather than just playing straight-man to Floyd. Average chapter.
TUC28:
Unsure how the off-screen death was handled. More logically satisfying than emotionally so.
It's at this point where Darkrai really starts trying to get rid of Floyd, but the fact that he's not taking direct action until the very last moment is a hint to his cowardly nature. He also tries to do the same to Serge, but would soon realise that since Floyd's mind is a little unstable by this point, that it was better to focus his efforts on him.
I edited out much of the swearing in the earlier chapters, but I left most of it in for the later ones to help show a perpetually stressed Floyd.
The whole motivational speech joke was due to two things – one, I sat there, not being able to write a good one and two, speeches like that never really fit Floyd too well.
I remembered this chapter being pretty weak overall, but it was a little better than I remembered. Wasn't much in the way of good character moments or plot progression, but it was a good stage setter for the last eight chapters I guess.
TUC29:
Floyd's suspicions of 'Dialga' feel a bit convenient in hindsight. Floyd was never exactly gullible, but I think this scene was pushing it a bit.
Even though I thought Serge was rather bland and not too well defined as a character, I like his subtle development into an ends justify the means sort of hero.
The scene with the vaporeons is probably the last comical scene in TUC.
I liked the little exchange between Carracosta and Floyd about changing the future, showing that it's not one of these 'future cannot be changed' time-travel stories, which is one of my most hated tropes in all of fiction.
Not the biggest fan of this chapter. It's probably the weakest since 16.
TUC30:
I'd have probably used a different species than carracosta in hindsight due to Super Mystery Dungeon. If Super PMD's carracosta exists somewhere in TUC, then it's clearly a different carracosta.
Realised that Carracosta had a slightly 'rapey' vibe in one paragraph. Ended up working well, since he's mostly supposed to be just a disgusting sadist, designed to be hated, and to show what sort of people Darkrai gets on his side, to make Darkrai repulsive by proxy.
The slam-dunk energy ball is just flat out badass. Regardless, the tussle against Kirk and Omar probably has a lot more meaning if you've read SFAM, which it seems like many of you haven't, since it has barely more than a mere 20th of the traffic that TUC has.
Aside from maybe TUC32, this is probably the most violent chapter.
I liked the example of Floyd being glad someone got killed brutally, but would be unwilling to do it himself, a sign that his Dialgan ideals are crumbling.
The whole relic fragment sub-plot was pretty weak in general, but I wasn't sure what I could do with it. I'm wondering if TUC would have been better if I just removed it altogether.
Again, the whole reincarnation stuff came about before Super PMD game out in Europe, so this was a second coincidence in one chapter. I was debating with myself for ages on whether to make Serge a literal reborn Palkian, since while it helps tie stuff together, it doesn't really add anything per se. I just went for it in the end for the terribly lazy reason of 'eh, why not.'
It was at this chapter where I think an interesting dynamic between Serge and Floyd: Floyd is a straight-laced hero in terms of actions (well, he likes to think he is anyway), but more an anti-hero in attitude. Serge is very much the reverse. He's considerably more pragmatic than Floyd, but hardly gets as fiery and angry as Floyd does.
One of the best chapters, but I think it loses a lot of its impact if you haven't read SFAM (Which if you haven't and you enjoyed TUC, then I recommend that you look at SFAM)
TUC31:
The awkwardness of Floyd serge 'thrown under a bus' to Serge was actually really funny.
I like how I made Floyd's way of describing things increasingly aggressive over time.
Grovyle and Floyd speaking to each other as if there's a good chance that they'll live happily together, lying to protect Serge, might be the biggest emotional moment of TUC to me. To go off on a tangent, every PMD fan goes on about the whole Grovyle sacrifice scene, but I thought the bit before it was far more effective, the discovery that the player character, Grovyle and Dusknoir will die. I actually thought the whole sacrifice scene was a bit flimsy since it was never explained why Grovyle didn't just Sparta-kick Dusknoir into the future instead of following him through until the special episode. It was the reason why I put a lot more focus on the 'we've only got a few hours left' as opposed to the 'sacrifice.'
I feel as though this chapter did everything that it needed to, but could have came off a bit stronger. I still like it though.
TUC32:
The start feels a bit exposition heavy, but the way Darkrai says things allows an insight into what sort of person he is at the same time, so it works well.
While it was only a brief paragraph, I think Floyd attacking the idea of 'negative' emotion was a great moment. Floyd was always a pretty fearful and angry person, but throughout SFAM and TUC, he used those emotions to get through all the challenges that life threw at him. Fear to help keep him safe, and hatred, as Floyd announced dramatically, to help fuel his passion to defeat his enemies.
The fight scene felt appropriately trippy, given it all took place within a dream. Also liked the off-feel of constantly entering and exiting dreams throughout the chapter.
I remember feeling conflicted about this chapter for its very ethereal and disorientating feel, but after reading it, it worked pretty well, and it's one of my favourite chapters. Everything worked well here.
TUC33:
Love the very alien descriptions of within Temporal Tower, probably my favourite descriptive passages.
By this point, Floyd has snapped under the pressure of the entire world and from Ezekiel's influence. Yet, the fact he seemed to be getting a kick out of killing the celebi really opened up a dark secret that was always there, lurking in the background. Floyd always had a bit of a sadistic streak, as subtly shown when he was getting a kick out of beating up the criminals earlier on in the story. This could be Floyd's default nature, or at least Ezekiel's, but was thankfully drilled out of him via good parenting. It made for a pretty uncomfortable scene in all the good ways. Serge's uncomfortable reactions were also great. He wanted Floyd to do what needs to be done in his eyes, but it turned out to be a 'be careful what you wish for' scenario.
The descriptions of the 'clock madhouse' were also pretty good. Like how it appears differently, to both Floyd and Serge, since Serge only really knew of sundials as time measurement devices, whereas Floyd knew of a lot more of them. Also, the digital clocks displaying impossible times such as 05:63 was a nice touch.
The second fight scene felt like padding to help show how big the tower was. Floyd's descent and Ezekiel getting close to taking him over was spooky though.
Took me a while to figure out how the confrontation with Dialga should have went down. Given that I spent pretty much the entire damn story emphasising that entities like Dialga were gods, I felt pigeon-holed into having Serge and Floyd channel Palkia's and Dialga's power respectivly. Kind of came a bit out of nowhere, but foreshadowing isn't always a good idea. In Explorers of Sky, it made a pretty obvious twist, Dusknoir being evil, even more obvious. Was a couple of nods to it in SFAM3 and TUC31 though.
Mostly a good chapter.
TUC34:
I designed this particular fight scene to feel extremely alien and off-the-wall. The whole confusing feel was supposed to represent how Floyd was interpreting having Dialga's power within him and how he used it. I think it worked well, but I can see the confusing and alien nature backfiring for some people. I thought it fit very well at least.
I liked Serge's reaction to seeing Dialga. All things considered, the story seemed to be set up for Floyd abandoning his faith, but I decided to not go down that route. A: It's too obvious and B: In spite of being watery with it at sometimes, I wanted him to be a devout Dialgan from start to finish. Also helps fit in the idea of flawed deities. Floyd has his flaws, and so does Dialga, as was explored in the conversation afterwards. I enjoyed that scene.
As for Floyd's death scene, I really wanted to make it great. It was a pity that I didn't have PMD's soundtrack on my side for it, but I thought I wrote it well enough regardless. The last line with Ezekiel made it suddenly creepy at the end. Wasn't sure if it was the best choice, but it did get a reaction out of me when I read it, so I guess it works.
Pretty much everything worked here.
TUC35:
I thought the best way to really drive home that Floyd is dead is to switch the point of view to Serge. Writing this chapter and the last one one pretty strange since I wrote a grand total of 46 chapters from Floyd's perspective, so I kind of had to unlearn writing from his viewpoint. Not only was it a necessity (unless I started writing in third person), but it worked really well.
I liked how I gave a strong sense of being sick of it all from Serge. He got way more than he bargained for when wanting to become an Explorer.
The important thing that Kirk was talking about was potential fodder for a small little add-on to The Unknown Continuum. Kind of a small five chapter thing that vaguely looks at Sky Episode 5. I'll explain it a bit more in the 'Plans For The Future' segment.
About half of the chapter is really just raw fan-service towards the other games in the series. Just wish I didn't go on for that long about it. It really should have been much shorter, but I didn't know how else to do it without making the world seem tiny. Brief time skips I guess? Regardless, if I do write a sequel, this will have ramifications.
I liked this chapter quite a lot aside from the long journey around the world. Did wonders for Serge's character.
TUC36:
The first part is blatant sequel/Super PMD fan-service fodder, I confess. Still, if you're wondering about Ezekiel, as many of you have told me, you might get a brief idea of what he was like now.
I wanted to make an ending that was both logically and emotionally satisfying, and I think this ending worked really well, while also showing what happened to the characters. In spite of that, I'd say it's average at best for a late chapter.
Plans For The Future
Well, if you've read through all that, or at least the part before the chapter notes, then you'll know that I am indeed planning to make a follow up to The Unknown Continuum. It'll be called Pokemon: Incarnation and it'll involve Super Mystery Dungeon this time round, although it'll be a considerably looser with the source material than TUC, and TUC was already kind of fast and loose with the games anyway.
"But PocketFullaShells, a little bird told me that you said that Gates to Infinity was by far the best story of the PMD games, and that you didn't even like Super's story very much! So why are you not basing a follow up on Gates instead?"
The little bird is right. I do think that Gates had the best PMD story by a pretty significant margin (though episodes 2 and 5 from Sky were better,) but the problem with Gates in lifting stuff from it to make a story of my own is that Gates doesn't give me too much to work with. The oddity with Gates's story is that it uses a lot of tropes I typically don't like, yet because they executed them well, it ended up being quite good. A lot of the story dealt with negativity, but I already had Darkrai as a bit of a negativity entity and have Floyd criticise the very idea of 'negative emotions.' (if I were writing TUC now, I'd have put a bigger spotlight on this. Still, Floyd became the hero the world needed in spite of being full of fear and fury, so maybe it was implied. As a result, a lot of the core concepts for a potential Gates-themed story kind of get sunk. Also, I'd struggle to try my hand at writing the whole paradise thing without it getting political. I don't see how I could do it without heading down a road I don't want to go on. Even though Gates's story has its problems, there's not really much I think I could add to it. Its characters were much more well developed in general compared to the other games, so in a way, I'm not writing a Gates-esqe story because I like it.
Super's story is the exact opposite. I really liked a lot of the different directions it was heading down and the concepts used, but I thought they just fucked it all up quite badly in a lot of places. The pacing is so disgustingly terrible that it makes the other PMDs have great pacing by comparison, and it had some of the most lopsided use of its characters, such as making the likeable school kids completely irrelevant, and making the partner pretty much the sole main character was its death sentence. That being said, some of the concepts such as being treated as a child when it was implied that you were older, the partner not achieving his goal almost right away, multiple continents, possession, trust issues, poke-hell and aliens were some really great ideas. This really gives me a lot to work with and can lead to many different roads and possibilities for stories, characters, concepts, comedy and drama. I'm not planning to 'fix' Super's story by any means, since it'll be considerably more different from Super than TUC was to Explorers.
So, what can you expect from Pokemon: Incarnation? What am I aiming for here? First, I want to actually pace it well, given, like PMD stories in general, the pacing was off in TUC and SFAM. Too much arseing around in the beginning. I want to give the earlier chapters more substance and make every scene relevant to the story and helping you get to know the characters and develop them. I want to make the chapters a bit shorter too, aiming for about six to nine thousand words per chapter. Some of the TUC and SFAM chapters got pretty bloated, TUC25 getting over fifteen thousand words long. I'll aim for more distinct characters this time, and I'll probably spend a bit of time drumming the traits in outside the story so I can learn better to write them inside the story, to avoid getting another vanilla main character such as Serge. I'll also have a larger main cast this time, something I'll lift from Gates, to help lift some of the weight from the two main characters, something that really helped Gates out. In short, I want it to be better than The Unknown Continuum.
As for other details you can expect from it, I'll give you a little preview for some of the main cast.
Basil Squire: A twenty-three year old from York in northern England. A failed pokemon trainer who was constantly unable to get much from his team in spite of being a strategic mastermind, he ended up living in his sister's shadow. A fairly relaxed person, he cares about those within his circle, but doesn't really give a shit for anyone outside his friends and family, which often became a source for conflict. Very shrewd, he often plots his life events and plans out in meticulous detail, but often falters when unpredictable elements are thrown in. Still has a desire for adventure, like when he did during his trainer years. Absolutely terrified of goodras.
Melinda Squire: Basil's older sister, aged twenty-seven and professional trainer. Being great with pokemon, she was unfortunately not very good at strategies during battle, so she often gets Basil to do it for her. Extroverted, she often tries to help people with their problems as well as getting to know all sorts, almost to the extent of having a bit of a messiah complex at times, which often clashes with Basil's more insular, introverted nature. Always tries to take the good out of any new experience, whether the experience itself is good or bad. Unfortunately, her hunger for responsibility can often backfire, leading to much senseless stress.
Murphy: A local pokemon. Just graduated from school at the age of seventeen and is dying to see the rest of the world to fulfil his dreams of being an actor. Very energetic and often rather juvenile for his age, he often inadvertently causes a lot of himself and others around him, only tempered further by his distaste of any rule of regulation. In spite of this, he usually tries to do the right thing, albeit often doesn't think of others and the consequences too much. Is very fascinated about the history, legends and myths of humankind. Not sure what species he'll be yet.
Nisbeth: A laid back Toxicroak who lives in a shack at the edge of town in a swamp, aged twenty-nine. A complete slob, doing the bare minimum to get by in life. He's seen as a bit of a weirdo by the locals, but is ultimately pretty harmless providing you don't go out of your way to antagonize him. He's moral enough to not allow his laziness to harm others however, and still seeks out some company from time to time. In spite of all that, he might be keeping his eyes out for an opportunity of some kind.
However, one thing that is very important to the making of Pokemon: Incarnation, and it's not good news regarding the story. Come the end of July, I'll be on holiday for a month, and then it's off to university for me. As you can imagine, this will eat up a lot of time. Might not eat up much more than work, at least for the first two years, but a lot of free time will end up going towards my studies, and after all that, I might feel too mentally worn out to write some of Incarnation. Now, this will depend on many factors. How will I feel when I live on campus? Will it make me feel more or less productive? How much time will university actually take? What will living next to the city do for other aspects of my life? As for now, I can't tell. I predict that I'll never stop writing Incarnation until it's over, but droughts of writing could be likely, so expect slow progress. Then again, my progress was all over the place in TUC anyway. Regardless, as long as I start it, I'll likely never abandon it, since I hate seeing a job half done. In short, I'll be very preoccupied, but I'm fairly certain there'll always at least be some time to write it.
Conclusion
Well, thanks for reading through The Unknown Continuum and Scenes From a Memory (I hope. Seriously, Scenes From a Memory gets almost no traffic. Go give it some love, won't you?) all the way to the end and listening to my ramblings. I certainly enjoyed writing it from start to finish, and it was a great experience for me, as I hope it was for you reading it. If there's anything you thought was particularly strong or weak about these two stories, I'll keep it in mind when writing Incarnation. I love hearing any and all feedback you give me, and it always makes me smile to see a comment or review. Let's hope Incarnation ends up being better than The Unknown Continuum! Expect the first chapter to be up about the end of July.
…
…
"It's a terrible shame. Why couldn't I have been there earlier? Even after all these years, you remembered me and saved my life at the cost of your own. Of everyone I ever encountered in my life you...you were the only one I liked. If only the timing were a bit closer, a mere thirty years...we could have been reunited. It's almost painful to see you die twice, but I won't let your sacrifice be in vain. Regardless, I'll continue to do what I have always done since I came into being, and maybe with time and a good circumstance, I'll see you again. Wouldn't that be wonderful...
...Ezekiel..."