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[Ares]

Alright, I wasn't going to do this, but the curiosity is killing me.

My story slowly croaked and now I'm down to just 1 writer, besides myself. For the life of me, I can't figure out why? I'm not sure if it was me and the way I'm doing things, or something else. All the characters starting were great. Most of my writers were pretty good too. Then slowly, one by one, they ran off.

I'm not looking for a writing critique, per say, just an overall opp of the story. Is there some obvious, glaring thing I missed? If it's me, I'll fix it. If that's just the way it works sometimes, I'll try again, no big deal.

http://www.storycrafter.com/story/index.php?storyid=4197

Many thanks, in advance, for any info you can throw at me!

[Scattercat]

Honestly, other than a small typo, I didn't see anything egregiously wrong with the game.

I will say that I didn't feel much urge to join up, primarily because it felt a bit too... open, I guess? I didn't see any sign of a specific plot being in mind, or any kind of detail as to exactly what was happening specifically to my character, to give me some guidance on how to build an appropriate/interesting personality to insert. Not seeing the acts, I can't say how that played out in the story, but if you've got a plot in mind, it never hurts to let people know about it in advance.

Really, the big problem is that online games are very prone to players just wandering off once they lose interest. It's a combination of many factors, among them:

1) Internet people aren't the same as real people.
  - That is, without faces and real-life interaction, it's a lot easier to just ignore your online friends. Just don't visit the site any longer and poof! They're gone, like magic. Your real life friends can show up at your door. Internet friends - many of whose real names you don't even know - are dust in the wind.

2) Online games are "always on."
  - Unlike tabletop sessions, which happen once a week (depending) for a few hours, online games are always there. Every time you log on, you check and see if there are new posts and if you have to write a response. Eventually, once the "shiny new" feeling wears off, it starts to feel a lot like work, an obligation that you have rather than some fun in which you are participating.

3) Writing is hard.
  - No, seriously. Writing takes mental effort, especially creative writing. I mean, this is not a case of just editing down some papers. If you're not great at writing, then it's hard work just getting up to the bar. If you have skill, then perfectionism and the flood/drought dynamic start wearing you down. Again, once that "shiny new" feeling wears off, the effort can, in weaker moments, seem to outweigh the reward.

4) "Shiny new" doesn't last.
  - Mentioned this a couple of times so far. It goes for everything, really; the initial excitement is high, and then after a while the reality sets in and the sparkle is gone. Its power is particularly potent in play-by-post games, however, because they tend to be verrrrry slloooowwww, leaving lots of room for impatience to set in. Everyone posts like mad at the start, and then people start spending more time on their normal activities (or on other new games) and the rate slows, which discourages the other players and makes them even slower to update, until the death spiral ends with the GM sitting all alone. In the dark. With wolves outside.