Writers' Resources

Reading fantasy again, I've started thinking about how odd it is how in books like that, the non-human races invariably scoff at human frailty and vulnerability, even those that they'll call friends. Like that's mean?? Why would you be a dick to your friend who you know is not capable of as much as you are, and it's not their fault they were born like that. That's mean.

Like consider the opposite: Characters of non-human races treating their human companions like frail little old dogs. Worrying about small wounds being fatal - humans die of small injuries all the time - or being surprised that humans can actually eat salt, even if they can't stomach other spicy rocks. Being amazed that a human friend they haven't seen in 10 years still looks so young, they've hardly aged at all! And when the human tries to explain that they weren't going to just unexpectedly shrivel into a raisin in 10 years, the longer-lifespan friend dismisses this like no, he's seen it happen, you don't see a human for 10 or 20 years and they've shriveled in a blink.

Elves arguing with each other like "you can't take her out there, she will die!" and when the human gets there to ask what they're talking about, they explain to her that the journey will take them through a passage where it's going to be sunny out there. Humans burn in the sun. And she will have to clarify that no, actually, she'll be fine. They fight her about it, until she manages to convince them that it's not like vampires - humans only burn a little bit in the sun, not all the way through. She'll be fine if she just wears a hat.

Meanwhile dwarves are reluctant to allow humans in their mines and cities, not just out of being secretive, but because they know that you cannot bring humans underground, they will go insane if they go too long without seeing the sun. Nobody is entirely sure how long that is, but the general consensus is three days. One time a human tries to explain their dwarf companion that this is not true, there are humans that endure much longer darkness than that. As a matter of fact, in the furthest habited corners of the lands of the Northmen, the winter sun barely rises at all. Humans can survive three weeks of darkness, and not just once, but every single year.

"Then how do they sane?" Asks the dwarf, and just as he does, the conversation gets interrupted by the northland human, who had been eavesdropping, and turns to look at them with an unnerving glint in her colourless grey eyes, grinning while saying

"That's the neat part, we don't."

How To Get Started Making Visual Novels

Wanna make a visual novel? Or maybe you've seen games like Our Life, Blooming Panic, Doki Doki Literature Club, etc. and wanna make something like that? Good news, here's a very basic beginners guide on how to get started in renpy and what you need to know going in! Before you start, I highly recommend looking at my last post about writing a script for renpy just to make it easier on you!

LONG POST AHEAD

Obviously, our first step is downloading it from their website

thankfully, its right on the home page of their site. Follow basica program installation steps and run the program. I highly recommend pinning it to your task bar to make it easier to access.

From there, you're met with the renpy app, it's a little daunting at first but let's talk about what all these buttons are for.

Projects

This part is simple, it just lists the current projects in the chosen directory. You probably won't have any in there of your own. You should still see Tutorial and The Question!

Both of those default projects are super helpful in their own ways, i highly recommend testing out the tutorial and playing around with it just to get comfortable with some of the basics.

Create New Project

The first step to actually making your game into a game!

You'll be met with a prompt letting you know that the project is being made in English and that you can change it. You can click Continue.

From here, you'll be asked to input a project name! Put in your games title, or even a placeholder title since this Information can be changed later! (this is also the title the folder will be in your file browser, be sure to name it something you won't overlook)

Now we get to choose our resolution!

If you have no idea what to choose, go for 1920x1080! This is the standard size for most computer monitors and laptops, but it will still display with moderately decent quality on 4k monitors too!

You can choose 3840x2160 as well. This is 2x the measurements of the default, with the same ration. These dimensions are considered 4k. Keep in mind, your image files will be bigger and can cause the game to have a larger size to download.

Now we get to choose our color scheme!

Renpy has some simple default options with the 'light mode' colors being the bottom two rows, and the 'dark mode' colors being the toop two rows.

You can pick anything here, but I like to choose something that matches my projects vibes/colors better. Mostly because depending on how in depth you go with the ui, it minimizes the amount of changes I need to make later.

Click continue and give it a minute. Note: If it says "not responding" wait a moment without clicking anything. It can sometimes freeze briefly during the process.

Now we should be back at our home screen, with our new project showing. Let's talk about allll that stuff on the right now.

Open Directory

This just opens that particular folder in your local file explorer!

game - is all the game files, so your folders for images, audio, saves, and your game files like your script, screens, and more.

base - this is the folder that the game folder is inside of. You can also find the errors and log txt files in here.

images - takes you to your main images folder. This is where you wanna put all of your NON gui images, like your sprites, backgrounds, and CGs. You can create folders inside of this and still call them in the script later. EX: a folder for backgrounds , a folder for sprites for character a, a seperate folder for spirtes for character b, etc.

audio - Takes you to the default audio folder. This is empty, but you can put all your music and sound effects here!

gui - brings up the folder containing all of the default renpy gui. It's a good place to start/ reference for sizes if you want to hand draw your UI pieces like your text box!

Edit File

Simple enough, this is just where you can open your code files in whatever text/code editor you have installed.

Script.rpy - where all of your story and characters live. This is the file you'll spend most of your time in at first

Options.rpy - Contains mostly simple information, like project name and version. There aren't a ton of things in here you need to look at. There is also some lines of code that help 'archive' certain files by file type so that they can't be seen by players digging in code however. Fun if you want to hide some images in there for later or if you just dont want someone seeing how messy your files are. We've all been there

Gui.rpy - where all of the easy customization happens. Here you can change font colors, hover colors, fonts, font sizes, and then the alignment and placement of all of your text! Like your dialogue and names, the height of text buttons, etc. It more or less sets the defaults for a lot of these unless you choose to change them later.

Screens.rpy - undeniably my favorite, this is where all of the UI is laid out for the different screens in your game, like the main menu, game menu, quick menu, choice menu, etc. You can add custom screens too if you want, but I always make my own seperate file for these.

Open Project - this just opens all of those files at once in the code editor. Super handy if you make extra files like I do for certain things.

Actions

last but not least, our actions.

Navigate Script - This feature is underrated in my honest opinion, it's super handy for help debugging! In renpy you can comment with # before a line. However, if you do #TODO and type something after it, it saves it as a note! You can view these TODO's here as well as easily navigate to when certain screens are called, where different labels are (super great if your game is long, and more. It saves some scrolling.

Check Script (Lint) - also super duper handy for debugging some basic things. It also tells you your word count! But its handy for letting you know about some errors that might throw up. I like using it to look for sprites I may or may not have mispelled, because they show up in there too.

Change/Update GUI - Nifty, though once you start customizing GUI on your own, it isn't as useful. You can reset the project at any point and regenerate the image files here. This updates all those defaults we talked about earlier.

Delete Persistent - this just helps you delete any persistent data between play throughs on your end. I like to use it when making a lot of changes while testing the game, so that I can reboot the game fresh.

Force Recompile - Full disclosure, as many games as I've made and as long as I've been using Renpy, i have never used this feature. I searched to see what it does and this is the general consesus: Normally renpy tries to be smart about compiling code (creating .rpyc files) and only compiles .rpy files with changes. This is to speed up the process since compiling takes time. Sometimes you can make changes that renpy don't pick up on and therefore won't recompile. In these cases you can run force recompile to force it. Another solution (if you know what file is affected) is to delete that specific. rpyc file.

The rest of your options on this right hand side are how you make executable builds for your game that people can download to extract and play later!

Sorry gang! that was a whole lot of text obviously the last button "Launch Project" launches an uncompiled version of the project for you to play and test as you go! Hang in tight because my next post is about how to utilize github for renpy, so you can collaborate easier!

I'm so excited to announce Loish's Digital Art School! I've been working on this for a long time and I'm so glad I can finally share it with you all. This is for those of you who are looking for brushes, tutorials, and other super helpful learning content!

Loish's Digital Art School is a collection of resources for digital artists that includes video tutorials, brushes, palettes, challenges, and more. Most importantly, it’s free! I know how important it is to have access to helpful information, especially if you’re self-taught. To get access, just head on over to Loish.School ❤️

Selective Mutism (SM) is a situational anxiety disorder. Those with SM speak fluently in some situations but remain consistently unable to speak in others. Outside of speech, all forms of communication may be inhibited, such as writing, body language, gestures, and facial expressions in some people.

Good Links: DSM, NHS, iSpeak, SMIRA

SM is not very well known, therefore there are many misconceptions about it.

1 - Selective Mutism is NOT a choice.

People with SM are unable to speak in certain situations, or with certain people. They do not refuse to speak. 

2 - People of ANY AGE can have selective mutism. 

SM usually begins during early childhood, most commonly before the age of 5. Many people believe that it only affects children and that they will ‘grow out’ of it. This is not always true. It can still persist into adulthood, especially without treatment. 

3 - Selective Mutism is NOT always due to trauma.

There is no evidence that people with SM are more or less likely to have experienced trauma or mistreatment than people without SM. As stated, SM is an anxiety disorder, not a trauma disorder. Although some people with SM may attribute it to trauma, this is not the case for the vast majority of people with SM.

4 - Selective Mutism is NOT a symptom of, or the same as, autism.

Selective Mutism is classed as an anxiety disorder and can be ‘recovered from’. Whilst autism is classed as a neurodevelopmental disorder, or neurodivergence, which someone will always have.

The two conditions are commonly comorbid. However an important distinction is that SM is mutism that is specifically caused by anxiety, not by autism (or by delayed speech or language impairment). In each case the mutism will have fundamentally different causes, and require different ways to treat and respond to each person. This is an important distinction, as misdiagnosing one as the other can be potentially harmful.

5 - People with Selective Mutism always have ‘lesser’ language abilities.

There is no correlation between SM and an individuals language development.

questions to make each character unique**

** y'all you don't need to be able to answer all of these for every single character. just things to think of :]

have they / would they dye their hair?

do they maintain eye contact when talking?

what is their tell for lying?

do they have an accent?

what languages do they speak?

what kind of music do they listen to?

describe them in one word. what could happen to make them the opposite?

do they have any ghosts?

what is their worst fear?

what is a secret they do not tell anyone?

what motto do they live by?

if they were a famous figure, who would they be?

what great moment shaped them to be who they are? have they lived through the moment yet?

what is their fatal flaw?

how do they feel about jewelry? painted nails?

what kind of art are they?

do they play a sport?

do they have a speech impairment? how would that translate across paper?

what could you do to betray their trust?

what makes them smile?

if you had to choose something to make them go all john wick, who would it be?

do they swear? in what language?

how comfortable do they feel around strangers?

are they extraverted or introverted?

do they stand straight? what is their posture like?

what is their sleep schedule like

would they consciously invade someone else's body space? even a stranger's?

how do they feel about contact with other people? do they flinch?

are they the first to hug?

what would make them kill / stop them from killing?

how do they smile? do they have dimples?

what about their teeth -- braces? sharp teeth? dentures? yellow teeth? what about spots?

how do they get others' attention? clear their throat? punch them?

do they talk with their hands?

what is their final goal?

how would they describe happiness?

what is their biggest conflict? it doesn't need to be big for everyone else, only for them.

how do they react to death?

do they cry? how do they cry -- silent tears, sobbing, a swallow?

how do they react when someone else is crying? can they comfort a stranger?

how are they around pets? are they allergic to any?

following up, do they have allergies?

do they take off their shoes going into a stranger's house? would they offer to do the dishes?

do they call strangers by their first name or title?

how do they show fear? trying to hide it? shaking? etc.

what is their impact on other characters?

how could any of these change by the end of the story?

Hey, random writing tip: Instead of having something be a ridiculously unlikely coincidence, you can make the thing happen due to who this particular character is as a person. Instead of getting stuck on "there's no logical reason to why that would happen", try to bend it into a case of "something like this would never happen to anybody but this specific fucker." Something that makes your reader chuckle and roll their eyes, going "well of course you would."

Why would the timid shy nerd be at a huge sketchy downtown black market bazaar? Well, she's got this beetle colony she's raising that needs a very specific kind of leaf for nest material, and there only place to get it is this one guy at the bazaar that sells that stuff. Why would the most femininely flamboyant guy ever known just happen to have downright encyclopedic knowledge about professional boxing? Well, there was this one time when he was down bad for this guy who was an aspiring professional boxer...

I know it sounds stupidly obvious when written out like this, but when you're up close to your writing, it's hard to see the forest for the trees. Some time ago I finished reading a book, where the whole plot hinges on character A, who is 100% certain that character B is dead, personally getting up and coming down from the top rooms of a castle, to the gates, at 3 am, to come look at some drunk who claims to be this guy who died 17 years ago. Why would A do that, if he's sure that B is dead?

Because he's a Warrior Guy from a culture of Loyalty And Honour, and hearing that someone's got the audacity to go about claiming to be his long-lost brother in battle, there is no other option than to immediately personally go down there to beat the ever-loving shit out of this guy. Who then turns out to actually be character B, after all.

Writing tips # 6 - The Body

Hey, hi everyone! I'm back again with yet another segment of Writing tips. Today I'm going to chat about something many struggle to describe. The body. Below will be several categories containing words synonymous with descriptors used when explaining someone's body. Hopefully, now y'all won't end up struggling for an hour like I have trying to figure out a socially correct way to explain that this particular character is obese :D

Thin

Angular, bony, emaciated, dainty, ethereal, frail, gangly, lanky, lean, malnourished, narrow, petite, puny, rawboned, scrawny, skeletal, skin-and-bone, skinny, slender, slight, slim, stick, twiggy, underweight.

Heavy

Beefy, big-boned, bloated, brawny, broad, bulging, bulky, burly, chubby, chunky, dense, elephantine, full-bodied, gargantuan, heavy-set, husky, lumpy, massive, obese, oversized, paunchy, plump, plumpish, portly, potbellied, pudgy, robust, rotund, round, shapeless, solid, stocky, stout, thick, wide.

Short

Compact, dwarfed, dwarfish, little, low, miniature, pint-sized, runty, squat, stunted, stubby, stumpy, tiny, undersized, wee.

Tall

Alpine, beanstalk, gangly, giant, lanky, lofty, skyscraping, stick, stretched, towering.

Weak

Decrepit, delicate, effeminate, emaciated, feeble, flaccid, fragile, frail, puny, sickly.

Strong

Beefy, brawny, burly, firm, herculean, huge, hulky, husky, muscular, powerful, ripped, robust, rugged, shredded, solid, stalwart, stout, strapping, tough, well-built.

Fit

Athletic, hardy, healthy, hearty, shapely, robust, toned, trim.

As always I hope this helps. Have a wonderful day and let your days be blessed as the best! <3

some people think writers are so eloquent and good with words, but the reality is that we can sit there with our fingers on the keyboard going, “what’s the word for non-sunlight lighting? Like, fake lighting?” and for ten minutes, all our brain will supply is “unofficial”, and we know that’s not the right word, but it’s the only word we can come up with…until finally it’s like our face got smashed into a brick wall and we remember the word we want is “artificial”.

The Neurodivergent Writer’s Guide to Fun and Productivity

(Even when life beats you down)

Look, I’m a mom, I have ADHD, I’m a spoonie. To say that I don’t have heaps of energy to spare and I struggle with consistency is an understatement. For years, I tried to write consistently, but I couldn’t manage to keep up with habits I built and deadlines I set.

So fuck neurodivergent guides on building habits, fuck “eat the frog first”, fuck “it’s all in the grind”, and fuck “you just need time management”—here is how I manage to write often and a lot.

Focus on having fun, not on the outcome

This was the groundwork I had to lay before I could even start my streak. At an online writing conference, someone said: “If you push yourself and meet your goals, and you publish your book, but you haven’t enjoyed the process… What’s the point?” and hoo boy, that question hit me like a truck.

I was so caught up in the narrative of “You’ve got to show up for what’s important” and “Push through if you really want to get it done”. For a few years, I used to read all these productivity books about grinding your way to success, and along the way I started using the same language as they did. And I notice a lot of you do so, too.

But your brain doesn’t like to grind. No-one’s brain does, and especially no neurodivergent brain. If having to write gives you stress or if you put pressure on yourself for not writing (enough), your brain’s going to say: “Huh. Writing gives us stress, we’re going to try to avoid it in the future.”

So before I could even try to write regularly, I needed to teach my brain once again that writing is fun. I switched from countable goals like words or time to non-countable goals like “fun” and “flow”.

Rewire my brain: writing is fun and I’m good at it

I used everything I knew about neuroscience, psychology, and social sciences. These are some of the things I did before and during a writing session. Usually not all at once, and after a while I didn’t need these strategies anymore, although I sometimes go back to them when necessary.

I journalled all the negative thoughts I had around writing and try to reason them away, using arguments I knew in my heart were true. (The last part is the crux.) Imagine being supportive to a writer friend with crippling insecurities, only the friend is you.

Not setting any goals didn’t work for me—I still nurtured unwanted expectations. So I did set goals, but made them non-countable, like “have fun”, “get in the flow”, or “write”. Did I write? Yes. Success! Your brain doesn’t actually care about how high the goal is, it cares about meeting whatever goal you set.

I didn’t even track how many words I wrote. Not relevant.

I set an alarm for a short time (like 10 minutes) and forbade myself to exceed that time. The idea was that if I write until I run out of mojo, my brain learns that writing drains the mojo. If I write for 10 minutes and have fun, my brain learns that writing is fun and wants to do it again.

Reinforce the fact that writing makes you happy by rewarding your brain immediately afterwards. You know what works best for you: a walk, a golden sticker, chocolate, cuddle your dog, whatever makes you happy.

I conditioned myself to associate writing with specific stimuli: that album, that smell, that tea, that place. Any stimulus can work, so pick one you like. I consciously chose several stimuli so I could switch them up, and the conditioning stays active as long as I don’t muddle it with other associations.

Use a ritual to signal to your brain that Writing Time is about to begin to get into the zone easier and faster. I guess this is a kind of conditioning as well? Meditation, music, lighting a candle… Pick your stimulus and stick with it.

Specifically for rewiring my brain, I started a new WIP that had no emotional connotations attached to it, nor any pressure to get finished or, heaven forbid, meet quality norms. I don’t think these techniques above would have worked as well if I had applied them on writing my novel.

It wasn’t until I could confidently say I enjoyed writing again, that I could start building up a consistent habit. No more pushing myself.

I lowered my definition for success

When I say that nowadays I write every day, that’s literally it. I don’t set out to write 1,000 or 500 or 10 words every day (tried it, failed to keep up with it every time)—the only marker for success when it comes to my streak is to write at least one word, even on the days when my brain goes “naaahhh”. On those days, it suffices to send myself a text with a few keywords or a snippet. It’s not “success on a technicality (derogatory)”, because most of those snippets and ideas get used in actual stories later. And if they don’t, they don’t. It’s still writing. No writing is ever wasted.

A side note on high expectations, imposter syndrome, and perfectionism

Obviously, “Setting a ridiculously low goal” isn’t something I invented. I actually got it from those productivity books, only I never got it to work. I used to tell myself: “It’s okay if I don’t write for an hour, because my goal is to write for 20 minutes and if I happen to keep going for, say, an hour, that’s a bonus.” Right? So I set the goal for 20 minutes, wrote for 35 minutes, and instead of feeling like I exceeded my goal, I felt disappointed because apparently I was still hoping for the bonus scenario to happen. I didn’t know how to set a goal so low and believe it.

I think the trick to making it work this time lies more in the groundwork of training my brain to enjoy writing again than in the fact that my daily goal is ridiculously low. I believe I’m a writer, because I prove it to myself every day. Every success I hit reinforces the idea that I’m a writer. It’s an extra ward against imposter syndrome.

Knowing that I can still come up with a few lines of dialogue on the Really Bad Days—days when I struggle to brush my teeth, the day when I had a panic attack in the supermarket, or the day my kid got hit by a car—teaches me that I can write on the mere Bad-ish Days.

The more I do it, the more I do it

The irony is that setting a ridiculously low goal almost immediately led to writing more and more often. The most difficult step is to start a new habit. After just a few weeks, I noticed that I needed less time and energy to get into the zone. I no longer needed all the strategies I listed above.

Another perk I noticed, was an increased writing speed. After just a few months of writing every day, my average speed went from 600 words per hour to 1,500 wph, regularly exceeding 2,000 wph without any loss of quality.

Talking about quality: I could see myself becoming a better writer with every passing month. Writing better dialogue, interiority, chemistry, humour, descriptions, whatever: they all improved noticeably, and I wasn’t a bad writer to begin with.

The increased speed means I get more done with the same amount of energy spent. I used to write around 2,000-5,000 words per month, some months none at all. Nowadays I effortlessly write 30,000 words per month. I didn’t set out to write more, it’s just a nice perk.

Look, I’m not saying you should write every day if it doesn’t work for you. My point is: the more often you write, the easier it will be.

No pressure

Yes, I’m still working on my novel, but I’m not racing through it. I produce two or three chapters per month, and the rest of my time goes to short stories my brain keeps projecting on the inside of my eyelids when I’m trying to sleep. I might as well write them down, right?

These short stories started out as self-indulgence, and even now that I take them more seriously, they are still just for me. I don’t intend to ever publish them, no-one will ever read them, they can suck if they suck. The unintended consequence was that my short stories are some of my best writing, because there’s no pressure, it’s pure fun.

Does it make sense to spend, say, 90% of my output on stories no-one else will ever read? Wouldn’t it be better to spend all that creative energy and time on my novel? Well, yes. If you find the magic trick, let me know, because I haven’t found it yet. The short stories don’t cannibalize on the novel, because they require different mindsets. If I stopped writing the short stories, I wouldn’t produce more chapters. (I tried. Maybe in the future? Fingers crossed.)

Don’t wait for inspiration to hit

There’s a quote by Picasso: “Inspiration hits, but it has to find you working.” I strongly agree. Writing is not some mystical, muse-y gift, it’s a skill and inspiration does exist, but usually it’s brought on by doing the work. So just get started and inspiration will come to you.

Accountability and community

Having social factors in your toolbox is invaluable. I have an offline writing friend I take long walks with, I host a monthly writing club on Discord, and I have another group on Discord that holds me accountable every day. They all motivate me in different ways and it’s such a nice thing to share my successes with people who truly understand how hard it can be.

The productivity books taught me that if you want to make a big change in your life or attitude, surrounding yourself with people who already embody your ideal or your goal huuuugely helps. The fact that I have these productive people around me who also prioritize writing, makes it easier for me to stick to my own priorities.

Your toolbox

The idea is to have several techniques at your disposal to help you stay consistent. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket by focussing on just one technique. Keep all of them close, and if one stops working or doesn’t inspire you today, pivot and pick another one.

After a while, most “tools” run in the background once they are established. Things like surrounding myself with my writing friends, keeping up with my daily streak, and listening to the album I conditioned myself with don’t require any energy, and they still remain hugely beneficial.

Do you have any other techniques? I’d love to hear about them!

I hope this was useful. Happy writing!

smartdraw.com - A cool website I found!

I wanted to do a blueprint of a scene and searched for a free online tool. This website has more than just house plans and mind maps, and I think it could really come in handy if you want to make some settings more approachable.

You can choose to start from scratch or use one of the many templates. The latter is probably easier in the beginning, to try out the different ways to arrange and color the objects. After getting used to the interface (it is similar to PowerPoint) you can use the result as a way to plan your scenes or give your readers a visual aid to follow the plot.

The symbols (or rather objects) for the floor plans, timelines, family trees, crime scenes etc. are sorted in many subcategories, e.g. Floor Plans -> Furniture -> Kitchen. No matter which type of diagram you pick, you can also use the objects from the others, so if you want an endoplasmic reticulum in your bathroom blueprint, go for it.

I think that for whump purposes you should especially check out the Crime Scene category for blood, drugs, weapons and so on.

I do have to say that I experienced some bugs and long loading time, but that could just be my ancient computer going wild. Also, the graphics are certainly not the prettiest. As someone who would have had to draw everything themself instead, it's still a great option.

TLDR: It's like Picrew but for locations.