You can probably tell how bad I am at this internet social media stuff. I forgot to title the last entry. Ha. And now I have the AIs trying to help me by making my posts more readable or engaging or something. I didn't click on it, to be honest.
I was going to post a photo of Pudding, my kitten, but I don't have any good ones saved conveniently. So I'll do it later. Or not. I don't rightly care. The cut that he laid into my hand is healing up just fine though. So that's nice.
At some point, I'll make an official website and move my blog posts there. But at that point, I doubt my blogs will really be about my daily thoughts and experiences and will probably mostly be ads and promos for my upcoming bullshit that I want you to buy.
I've been doing a bit of research and study about LitRPG, because the bits of research that I've been doing have led me to believe that it's probably a good genre for me to write in. It's obviously not the one that I would want, but that led me to another realization. I am not part of my target audience. I am a weirdo. Or I'm a normie. I'm not sure which. Normie is a crypto word, in case you're wondering.
The more I've read in the genre, the more I don't think it's something that I would like to read on my own. With the exception of Dungeon Crawler Carl. And I think the big difference there is that he has the sense to package the premise into a semi-plausible alien invasion, supposing the existence of an alien society with incredibly advanced technology that gets its thrills from enslaving people and watching them suffer. Honestly, it's quite genius.
It turns what is otherwise a very niche genre for people that prefer video games and anime to books, into something that can be enjoyed by almost everyone. I have to say almost everyone because some people just refuse to like it, and that's okay.
Just for me, without that extra layer of sci fi premise, this genre is...kind of stupid.
*he said, fully knowing that he is already writing in the genre and planning to do it more*
But it doesn't have to be.
I think this genre (no idea where it came from or how it started and don't care enough to research) has a lot of room for growth, even now. There is literally only one book series (that I found in the one day that I looked) that tries to make this genre appealing or even palatable. Our lord and savior Dungeon Crawler Carl. Yeah yeah, there are probably others, but I couldn't find them.
I think the appeal here is for people who want a fun, dirty adventure with an easy premise (being in a video game) and who benefit from having things explained directly to them rather than using the process of inference (what we in the writing world have been crowing about for ages, something called Show, Don't Tell). Again, this is not what I crave as a reader. Not by a long shot. I want something challenging and huge (why does that sound like a dildo?) that dares me to understand it through the eyes of a character.
I like sci fi and space opera. I like wonder. I like a mystery. I like reading that book that everyone gave up on and saying "That's a really awesome book, if you stick with it". I like a difficult concept that lingers with me and tickles my imagination for years after I read it. I like a story that blossoms into other stories in your mind. I like all that. So you can see why a genre about having things explained to you through the voice an omniscient AI game master would be really annoying to me. But again, it's not without merit.
What LitRPG makes me think of is the old pulp era sci fi serials. The ones from amazing stories that were short, simple and didn't have to challenge any notions. They just stuck out a hand and said "let's have fun together". And this is why I like this genre. Because it is dumb, simple fun that anyone (within reason) can access and enjoy without having to work much for it. I get it, to that degree.
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