The Walrein
It is what it is.
- Partners
-
Exquisite Corpse season is almost upon us! I have a suggestion for a new format for one of the corpses this year: A choose-your-own adventure style corpse! The idea is that the first writer would write a section of story as usual, and then at the end they'd list two different choices the reader/protagonist could make. Then, the corpse would be passed onto two different writers: each would receive the last two sentences of the story before the decision point, but they'd also receive one of the choices available as the decision chosen for their branch. For example, if writer #1 wrote:
"I believe the choice is obvious," the rounded red and white duck says. "Two is a larger number than one! My calculations indicate that it is approximately 1.9999999999999 times as large, in fact! Therefore, I am clearly the superior Pokemon! No other considerations are necessary!"
You frown, brow furrowing in intense thought. "I don't know... you do cost 1,500 more coins than the original model. That's kind of a lot. I could get a Double-Team TM for that amount! I've heard that move is so broken that it's even banned in Uber tier - and they let you use Mewtwo in Uber tier! Freakin' Mewtwo!"
A much chunkier duck sitting on the game corner prize counter speaks up in a tinny mechanical voice. "Mewtwo is overrated. Pokemon with 'two' in their name are not necessarily stronger. Mew has 11.1 percent more base defense and special defense than Mewtwo in exchange for only 5.7% less hp, meaning she can last longer in combat. Just like how my battery can last longer than Porygon2's."
The Porygon2 produces a loud electronic buzz. "Congratulations! You have found the single specification where your inferior model has a very minor advantage. I exceed you in all other aspects. I have more base points in every statistic. I record video in 4K resolution with twice the frame rate as you. I have four times as much storage space-"
"Oh, cool, so you can know sixteen moves instead of four?" you ask.
"...no. But I can run the program Marill Kart World! Can the original Porygon run that program? No, it cannot!"
"Very few programs are exclusive to Porygon2. It is as if software developers are skeptical that many consumers will see value in this supposedly superior model."
As the two Pokemon continue to bicker, you slowly massage your forehead. Your headache from staring at Voltorb Flip for four hours straight threatens to mega-evolve into a migraine. Hopefully you won't lose focus and suddenly think something which would drastically re-contextualize your current decision if that was the only thought you could remember for some reason! A loud gurgle resounds from your stomach. That non-stop gaming has left you incredibly famished, and feel like you could eat absolutely anything right now.
"C'mon, hurry up and pick one already!" you hear the person behind you in line grumble.
>You decide to go with the original Porygon, and spend the leftover coins on buying some nice lemonade to go with your dinner tonight.
>Porygon2, I choose you!
Then writer two would be sent the lines "That non-stop gaming has left you incredibly famished, and feel like you could eat absolutely anything right now. "C'mon, hurry up and pick one already!" you hear the person behind you in line grumble.
>You decide to go with the original Porygon, and spend the leftover coins on buying some nice lemonade to go with your dinner tonight."
Writer three would be sent the lines "That non-stop gaming has left you incredibly famished, and feel like you could eat absolutely anything right now. "C'mon, hurry up and pick one already!" you hear the person behind you in line grumble.
>Porygon2, I choose you!"
Then those writers would extend the story and end their segment with another decision. Obviously, the number of threads would expand at an exponential rate so there'd probably at most be only three layers of this, with seven 'decision nodes' and eight 'ending nodes' where the next writer would be told to write an ending to the story. In case there aren't exactly 2^n - 1 writers signing up, the structure of the CYOA could be edited to have some final choices have three endings instead of two to accommodate more people, or some earlier choices could lead to an immediate ending instead of further branches to account for less people.
One pitfall of this format is that a lot of people would end up writing endings instead of getting to write decisions of their own. If this isn't something that's desirable, possibly each writer could be given both one decision node to write and one ending node. (This would leave one extra ending node, so someone would have to agree to write two.)
"I believe the choice is obvious," the rounded red and white duck says. "Two is a larger number than one! My calculations indicate that it is approximately 1.9999999999999 times as large, in fact! Therefore, I am clearly the superior Pokemon! No other considerations are necessary!"
You frown, brow furrowing in intense thought. "I don't know... you do cost 1,500 more coins than the original model. That's kind of a lot. I could get a Double-Team TM for that amount! I've heard that move is so broken that it's even banned in Uber tier - and they let you use Mewtwo in Uber tier! Freakin' Mewtwo!"
A much chunkier duck sitting on the game corner prize counter speaks up in a tinny mechanical voice. "Mewtwo is overrated. Pokemon with 'two' in their name are not necessarily stronger. Mew has 11.1 percent more base defense and special defense than Mewtwo in exchange for only 5.7% less hp, meaning she can last longer in combat. Just like how my battery can last longer than Porygon2's."
The Porygon2 produces a loud electronic buzz. "Congratulations! You have found the single specification where your inferior model has a very minor advantage. I exceed you in all other aspects. I have more base points in every statistic. I record video in 4K resolution with twice the frame rate as you. I have four times as much storage space-"
"Oh, cool, so you can know sixteen moves instead of four?" you ask.
"...no. But I can run the program Marill Kart World! Can the original Porygon run that program? No, it cannot!"
"Very few programs are exclusive to Porygon2. It is as if software developers are skeptical that many consumers will see value in this supposedly superior model."
As the two Pokemon continue to bicker, you slowly massage your forehead. Your headache from staring at Voltorb Flip for four hours straight threatens to mega-evolve into a migraine. Hopefully you won't lose focus and suddenly think something which would drastically re-contextualize your current decision if that was the only thought you could remember for some reason! A loud gurgle resounds from your stomach. That non-stop gaming has left you incredibly famished, and feel like you could eat absolutely anything right now.
"C'mon, hurry up and pick one already!" you hear the person behind you in line grumble.
>You decide to go with the original Porygon, and spend the leftover coins on buying some nice lemonade to go with your dinner tonight.
>Porygon2, I choose you!
Then writer two would be sent the lines "That non-stop gaming has left you incredibly famished, and feel like you could eat absolutely anything right now. "C'mon, hurry up and pick one already!" you hear the person behind you in line grumble.
>You decide to go with the original Porygon, and spend the leftover coins on buying some nice lemonade to go with your dinner tonight."
Writer three would be sent the lines "That non-stop gaming has left you incredibly famished, and feel like you could eat absolutely anything right now. "C'mon, hurry up and pick one already!" you hear the person behind you in line grumble.
>Porygon2, I choose you!"
Then those writers would extend the story and end their segment with another decision. Obviously, the number of threads would expand at an exponential rate so there'd probably at most be only three layers of this, with seven 'decision nodes' and eight 'ending nodes' where the next writer would be told to write an ending to the story. In case there aren't exactly 2^n - 1 writers signing up, the structure of the CYOA could be edited to have some final choices have three endings instead of two to accommodate more people, or some earlier choices could lead to an immediate ending instead of further branches to account for less people.
One pitfall of this format is that a lot of people would end up writing endings instead of getting to write decisions of their own. If this isn't something that's desirable, possibly each writer could be given both one decision node to write and one ending node. (This would leave one extra ending node, so someone would have to agree to write two.)
