Heya all, TiGonn here, formally known as SmashFan2005. I changed my name cus well, on nearly everywhere else on the internet I'm known as TiGonn. But alas if some of you still wanna call me Smash, that's perfectly fine.
Also, today is the 11th anniversary of a little game called Skyrim. Damn. I am old. We are old. Life is-
Anyway hello and good day or night to you sir or ma'am. What is this you may be asking yourselves?
Simply put this is where I'll post my random thoughts and insights into the previous chapter's conception. These posts will contain spoilers for the chapters that precede them but they'll not contain spoilers for the ones that come after. This will also be completely off-the-cuff and unedited, mistakes be damned.
With that outta the way I have a LOT to talk about so lets get started shall we?
First of all I wanna apologize for the long ass wait. I said back in 2018, DAAMMMN, that I'd be able to write consistently again and uhh it just didn't happen. However, things are different now. Covid is over and I now have no more excuses to not write. I want to be as open and as upfront with my readers as possible, that's the main purpose of this post.
Basically I discovered a tool called NovelAI, I'm sure some of you have heard of it or maybe even use it. I was apprehensive at first because I thought it'd be like "messing with the integrity" of my work by having some robot write my story instead of me. But having worked with it now I can see that is not the case. It's more like a robotic arm to aid my writing, not an entire sentient AI being taking over the world if that makes sense.
Because of this tool my creativity has skyrocketed and I've written like hella mad over the past 4 days. I thought I'd written about 80% of the chapter last week.
So as it turns out that was about 30% of it instead. Yes, this chapter is a long ass mothertrucker lol, probably the longest one I've written to date. You may call it rambly or too long and that's fine, that is your opinion to have. Be sure to tell me if you prefer longer or shorter chapters in reviews if you feel so inclined.
Regardless of reviews however, some chapters will just be way longer than others. It'll be an organic process. I can't say for certain that it won't happen again but I'm not planning on another longish one for about... 4 or 5 chapters from now. That may change however.
Phew, that was abit of a mouthful. If you're still here, thanks for reading.
Anyway onto the specific insights of chapter 2 we go. Ahem.. ahem. Spoilers ahead for chapter 2, you've been warned. Although why're you reading this when you've not read it? Who knows. Either way this is your one and only spoiler warning.
- SPOILERS BEGIN
This was the most difficult shit I've ever written. Nothing else, so far, even comes remotely close. When I set out to rewrite Part 2... I knew that would be the case. Diego's mother being murdered right in front of him was... difficult to get right. I didn't want to be massively over-the-top, since this scene isn't meant to be enjoyed, nor did I want to censor myself from the reality of this scene. It was a fine line I was on but I did my research and finally wrote this scene up... in 2021. I am quite proud of how it turned out.
Diego is a rather complex character, despite being newly introduced to this story, relatively. We see him briefly in part 1, yes I will rewrite Part 1, more on that at the end, but I felt like the audience as well as myself needed a rather in depth look at his backstory.
You may call it "filler" but I call it world building. The other difficulty of this chapter was the timeline, oh god the freaking timeline. It's safe to say that my version of Venom isn't 100% lore accurate. The atmosphere is breathable afterall, as are all Lylatian planets. That to me, besides having every planet on the system be habitable, is the least realistic part of doing my Star Fox story, but I've come to accept that.
Regardless I was as careful as possible to stick as true to lore as I could. The only "major" lore that I broke kinda was Andross' origin story, but that'll be changed when I eventually write my prequel story to fit in with all the lore I've changed abit. Timeframe for that is to write it after Part 4 but we'll see, that won't happen for quite a while. But the timeline is as accurate as it can be. It wasn't easy getting everything to line up but it does quite nicely.
From now on, I myself as the author will have the timeline with dates and years written out lol. Don't worry, you as the readers won't have to keep track of that it's just for me.
But anyways, last thing I wanted to talk about in relation to this chapter was the idea of Diego writing a letter to Peppy in order to get some measure of closure, or at least an attempt at it. This was not the original idea but I think it fits with the lore and his character. That letter is messy in places for a reason, since it's literally supposed to be Diego writing out that part of the story and not me as the author. Yeah yeah two hospital bed scenes in back-to-back chapters. That probably won't happen again, just a coincidence lol.
I thought the letter was a rather great idea but lemme know if you agree or disagree.
- SPOILERS END
But yeah all in all I'm very happy with this chapter. My current goal is to release one chapter a month. Although I think, don't quote me on this, that I can do some within three weeks I'm not gonna assume I always can. With that in mind my current goal for releasing chapter 3 is before Christmas, should easily be doable, since the first few pages are already written.
Lastly, I mentioned earlier that I'd be rewriting part 1. It's old and filled to the brim with oddities and it's not up to my current standards. However, people loved it, I love it, it's not going to be rewritten for awhile.
I'm going to finish Part 2, 3 and 4 before going back to rewrite Part 1. (I finally figured out the main villain's motivations for Part 7 yesterday so that was random and nice.)
For those not in the know yes, this will be a long ass series that I've planned for most of my life. However I hope to take as many people as I can on that journey with me.
For those who've been fans of this series for years, thanks for putting up with me. I hope the putting up is at an end. Surely feels like it right now. And for my new readers, welcome, welcome. I hope you all enjoy what I intend to make as the best story saga I've ever written.
~ With All the Love, Ti "Smash" Gonn.
