2019-03-31 09:45:39 (edited by Mayana 2019-03-31 12:00:13)

A new storygame has just been posted on chooseyourstory.com, so I figured it'd be nice to let you guys know, too. It's a pretty large story, with 10 chapters and over 100000 words, so it should keep you entertained for quite some time. And that is just the first part!

Those of you who visit COG might be aware that this storygame was previously meant to be hosted there. Unfortunately that could not happen because of the petty and unprofessional behavior of the admins. I will not go into detail here though; if you're curious, there are a few links you can check out in this news post. I'd appreciate if you could post any opinions about the awfulness of COG on there, we'll welcome you with open arms. Let's keep this thread peaceful.

Description:

You are ten years old when you first feel the weight of shackles around your wrists. In a matter of hours, your whole world is turned upside down as you and your brother are dragged away from your home in Greece to work as slaves in the Roman Empire. Now you must struggle for survival. Every decision you make will affect your future. Your life, the life of your brother and the lives of your friends are in your hands.

Begin your journey as a child, and make heartbreaking choices that will shape the adult you will become. But be careful. An act of kindness might come back to haunt you, and a thoughtless word could earn you some powerful enemies. A split second decision will determine who lives and who dies. Will you sell your soul to win your freedom, or sacrifice everything for the people you love? Will you even live long enough to see the sun rise?

Does that sound like it could be interesting? Awesome! Remember, while the storygame is completely free to play, if you enjoy it a lot it would be nice if you could give the author a few bucks on her Patreon.

And finally, here's the link!

Yes, I definitely left the forum. Mhm. Why would you have any doubt?
Code 7 tips: https://forum.audiogames.net/topic/4010 … or-code-7/
Don't forget to be awesome!

2019-03-31 11:11:41

This probably belongs in new releases.

2019-03-31 11:17:19 (edited by Mayana 2019-03-31 11:18:39)

@Defender you're right, it does. I realized that soon after I posted it, but figured it's best I don't create a second topic, since that'd be unnecesary spam. So it's best we just let the mods move it. I am terribly sorry for not thinking before posting.
But in the meantime there's nothing stopping us from talking about the story anyway. Do you find the description interesting? If so, I recommend you check it out; it's free and very well written. smile

Yes, I definitely left the forum. Mhm. Why would you have any doubt?
Code 7 tips: https://forum.audiogames.net/topic/4010 … or-code-7/
Don't forget to be awesome!

2019-03-31 11:39:26

Moderation:
I have just moved the topic to the new releases room.
End of moderation. smile
Sounds like an awesome game. thanks for sharing.

Best regards SLJ.
Feel free to contact me privately if you have something in mind. If you do so, then please send me a mail instead of using the private message on the forum, since I don't check those very often.
Facebook: https://facebook.com/sorenjensen1988
Twitter: https://twitter.com/soerenjensen

2019-03-31 11:43:06

I love time crest. Hopefully this game will give time crest competition for my favorite

2019-03-31 11:59:03

@SLJ, thank you a lot for moving the topic.
@Zarvox Price of Freedom doesn't seem to be similar to Time Crest. It is played in a web browser, unlike Time Crest which is only available as an app on iPhone. Whereas Time Crest seems to be about a time travelling mage or something like that, Price of Freedom talks about the life of gladiators in Rome and tries to be at least mostly true to history. It is also just a story, not played in realtime. The only similarity I can find is that they both have choices, so if you're searching for something similar to Time Crest, this isn't it. But still, please give it a try, and I hope you enjoy it! smile

Yes, I definitely left the forum. Mhm. Why would you have any doubt?
Code 7 tips: https://forum.audiogames.net/topic/4010 … or-code-7/
Don't forget to be awesome!

2019-03-31 13:40:54

Youch checking some of those links it sounds like there's been quite  the flame fest about cog titles, in particular about censorship in fiction which I confess does bother me given the prevalence of highly extreme attitudes these days.

I'm glad though that choosyourstory is now a viable platform for serious work. When I checked it out originally you had to do a lot of weeding to actually find the good stuff, and though there were some good things on there, like dungeon stompage and dead man walking, there  was also a huge amount of adolescent, poorly written dross. Admitedly that was I believe in 2013 so matters likely have changed considerably sense then, indeed I do remember someone mentioning the site had gone through a cleanup program.

I'll see about checking this one out, since I can respect any author who tries approaching such a difficult subject as slavery in a really meaningful way.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-03-31 14:24:58

Censorship is indeed one of the things CYStians dislike quite a lot about COG. But this time, the issue was more in the COG admins supporting plagiarism and just generally being very petty and condescending towards Avery, who despite that has been shockingly calm and nice. But anyway, let's not bring the drama here.
CYS is free too use, so most authors are just casual writers who write stories as a hobby. So yes, the quality does vary. But if the last time you used it was in 2013, you'll find that there's a major difference; the standards are now much stricter, and Warrior Cats fiction was banned, because of the extremely low quality of it. Of course, there are still a few stories that are not that good, but just good enough to stay afloat. But generally you can figure out which ones those are by the ratings.
We have also had a lot of contests in the past few years, and got plenty of good stories that way, such as Bestist Frend Jane (the first story I've seen where the spelling mistakes in the title were completely intentional). EndMaster, one of the best authors on the site, also published a sequel to Innkeeper, named Rogues.

Yes, I definitely left the forum. Mhm. Why would you have any doubt?
Code 7 tips: https://forum.audiogames.net/topic/4010 … or-code-7/
Don't forget to be awesome!

2019-04-01 04:40:35

@3
Don't feel so bad, it's a simple mistake that anyone could make, easy to fix and gives the mods something to do. Now that we have multiple mods, it's not a real annoyance for them anyway.

2019-04-01 15:03:45 (edited by Dark 2019-04-01 15:08:20)

Gave this a try.
I like the story, and it definitely tells me there's more on the site than just the adolescent rubbish I was seeing previously.

I do wish there was a bit more of roman life than just  the gladiator  arena.

Last year I read the first man in Rome by Colleen McCullough and I was quite fascinated by a lot of details of roman life, for example the fact that well educated Greek slaves could actually become pretty powerful since they were responsible for a lot of the clerking and records duties.

Still since I died in chapter seven due to a lack of agility, I'll see if it goes places later.

Thanks for a really nice find.

Btw, I've dug out my old chooseyourstory account, I'm darkempathy on there.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-04-01 15:49:10 (edited by Lucas1 2019-04-01 15:51:12)

CYS has decent filtering, the easiest of which is the top games and featured games. Featured authors also have other stories that often aren't featured, so then you can find more good stories. If you can handle the forums then you can look there as well. I'd say the major problem with CYS story creation that I like about COG is the scripting. While COG actually seems to discourage complicated game mechanics, in some cases it has a better language for implementing them. Anyways, I'm getting off track.
The problem with COG is that, while I might not be a fan of the actual company, I have found myself enjoying the games there many times. I purchase them so that writers like Kevin Gold, Jim Dattilo and in some cases Zachary Sergi get money that I think they deserve for quality writing. POF would've been in that list as well if it had been published over there.

2019-04-01 17:06:20

The filtering got better after I went through and just started deleting/unpublishing every story there with 2.5 or less rating. Took awhile though.

Found Dark's original post:

http://chooseyourstory.com/forums/newbi … ssage/8661

Writing: It's more fun than a barrel of Ebola ridden monkeys!

2019-04-01 18:59:13

Thanks endmaster, forgot I made that post, I'll have to have another look at the site.
I'm a bit confused however.

Beware! spoilers ahoy for chapter 10 of price of freedom innocence lost.

I finished the arena fight and had the conversation with Titus where he reveals he used to be the gladiator known as the bull. The last link I followed was labeled "seems that master has big plans for us"
Then however the game just stopped, no more links, no way to progress no end screen.

Are there really only ten chapters to this one? If so the ending is quite abrupt, since even if this is the first part of a planned series, I would've expected to be a little "the end" message.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-04-01 19:14:03

Damn, that's definitely not supposed to happen. Yes, there are just 10 chapters, but there definitely should be a note at the end of the game and then a end game link, or at least there was when I played it. Could you maybe post your stat page? I'm not sure how one would go about duplicating that bug. What exactly do you mean by the game stopping? Did the link not work at all, or did it take you to an empty page?
I'll notify the author about the bug, and you can also post about it yourself on CYS. She made an account on here as Avery Moore, but it hasn't been approved yet. Thanks for reporting this.

Yes, I definitely left the forum. Mhm. Why would you have any doubt?
Code 7 tips: https://forum.audiogames.net/topic/4010 … or-code-7/
Don't forget to be awesome!

2019-04-01 19:27:27

I don't have the save file I'm afraid, since I just played through the hole thing without checking,  sadly there wasn't an end note.

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-04-01 20:00:19

mine asked me to save the game and wait for the brothers in arms that'll be released soon, and that our choices would matter on that so i did save it you need to register an account there to save your game.

2019-04-01 20:22:38

Hmmm, I thought I was logged on to the site, but since I ran C cleaner today its possible the logon cookie got deleted, still I would've expected an end message (I did see one when I died).

With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)

2019-04-04 23:39:04

It should tell you that a sequel is comming, and that you should be logged on in order to save your stats for the next chapters..., and really cool! I just loved the entire story

After years, i finally changed my signature! But i don't know what to say :D

2019-04-06 23:50:10

Just refresh the page and you’ll be all good, also that ending was pretty good

warning: this post is about to end, press h, or don't, I don't mind.

2019-04-08 19:10:26

Hi guys! Author here. Very belated thanks to Mayana for posting this thread over here. Also, thank you guys for letting me know about the bug at the end of chapter 10. That was a coding error and I've fixed it now. ^_^

2019-04-08 22:49:23

When I save my game and close fire fox, I have to play again, I have to start this story again.

2019-04-09 11:18:29

meiffert wrote:

When I save my game and close fire fox, I have to play again, I have to start this story again.

Ah, sorry about that. I think that was because I briefly unpublished the game to fix some bugs. (Apparently unpublishing the game means that all the save files get deleted... Sorry!) sad