Firestorm footnote
I am posting this to comment on the success of fanfictions as a whole on ffn and other websites, though I will mainly relate this to ffn for specific reasons.
The main arbiter of success a fanfiction is viewed by, by a reader, is the review count. It tells you how many people cared about this story, how many people gave a shit. If you take that into account, this story is a failure by all accounts. Half a year to finish, 45k words, and like 5 reviews. It is my best work though, a story I will always love, one I put my heart and soul into, one I put myself into.
I have finished two fanfictions, and if you are reading this you are probably one of the people who have read either one or both, rainfall and firestorm, my first and second respectfully. The difference in review, and view count, can be understood under a few criteria
Chapter count
Demographic
And snowball effect.
Chapter count: If you want reviews, it doesn't take a genius to figure out you want to upload more chapters in shorter parts. If you have a 10k word chapter, why not break it up into 5 2k word chapters? Well, because you want a narrative like the one I chose for rainfall, a thing happening each chapter, and finishing by the end. Violating that for chapter count is a bad idea creatively, but is a good one for reviews. Firestorm had 7 releases of around 6k words each, and ended up with a fraction of the success rainfall did (35 reviews).
Demographic: Who you appeal to. This is a little more complicated, but if you appeal to people with a less difficult to read story, they are more likely to read it, because they will not struggle and have an easier reading experience.
Snowball effect: Basically "sort by reviews", the stories that have large review counts will attract people who want quality, and percieve reviews as a show of that quality. Having low review count on a longer story can actually hurt it, because people will think that not only is it long, it is shit.
This theory on how to get a popular fanfiction lead to me creating Blossom then, a fanfiction with a gamer ability. It is looking to be more successful than Rainfall, but the second is more insideous.
The Yami and Kami no Shinobi was created when I saw the success of another fanfiction, created 2 weeks ago and with over 100 reviews. I will not detail why I dislike this fic here, there is little point to that, and I don't wish to send hate to them no matter how much I think they cannot write, but it made me think. Why is a fanfiction that is so bad so popular? There are thousands like it, thousands similar, it has only a few chapters and less than 10k words, and slanders and brutalises every character inside I wonder why it was even made.
But then it clicked. Bashing fics are popular, even if they are wrong. Sasuke wasn't that much of an asshole, Sakura isnt really a horrible person, Naruto was feared by most, not hated, but I wondered how much wrong I could get away with. I wanted to make Naruto the mouth piece of a bashing fic, but have him take place in actual Naruto.
To explain, most bashing fics transport us and Naruto to a world where Naruto is a fool, where he says things that in canon aren't true to their face, and then they justify it, sasuke retroactively becoming an asshole, Kakashi apparently neglecting Naruto's training, Sakura turning into a screaming banshee. None of these things happen, so I thought since these fics are meant to take place in canon Naruto, but for want of a nail, what would really happen if I did this? What would happen if I made Naruto wrong? And I just didn't tell the readers.
Some of you figured it out, which I am happy about. Don't worry, I am not a complete fool, I know half the things Naruto thinks aren't true. But that is the point, really. The point is Naruto, for all intents and purposes, does what people want him to, but it doesn't work.
The Yami and Kami no Shinobi has 16 reviews. With 5729 words. That is the best review word count ratio I have ever had, and looking at the comments, only some know Naruto is wrong. To my knowledge, only Araz knows the fic is crack.
So a few spoilers for people who read this far. I am planning on a haram. The haram will be ridiculous. I won't do fem itachi, nor fem sasuke. Basically anyone else is on the table, excepting like sakura and Ino.
I will continue with Blossom, and YKS. Thanks for reading.
