IF Seal: What if my game is too slow/quiet?
Hello, IF Seal, I have a question!
I really want to write an IF about this... Sci-Fi alien race I created. I'm a Linguist student and I made a whole language for this alien race with different types of dialects and accents and exceptions to the rules and everything just for fun. The alien race even has different physical regional variations. It's been a passion project/hobby for about a year or 2 now. So, to uh be quite honest, I just want to make a medium where I can share my little project.
The only thing is... I'm worried people won't want to read it. I mean, you'd play solely as this one alien race no one knows Anything about... And I'm also worried it'd be too... bland for readers. I also have the player character be set as human only (for right now), but I do want to provide them the option to play as my alien race, in case they're curious, but I can't seem to figure out a plot that would make both of those options possible.
I don't plan on any like magic fights or rebellions or super cool science stuff... It's literally just... a human exploring a planet that they have some knowledge about but not a whole lot and just... immersing themselves into a foreign environment and just... living and learning.
A lot of popular IFs I see and read all seem to be very actiony adventure orientated so I'm a bit nervous no one will want to read my story because it's like minimal romance, practically 0 epic cool fights and technology and magic, and just... vibes.
I'm also worried about choices being a problem. Obviously an IF needs choices, but I don't want them to feel arbitrary or just shoved in there just to have it. Since it's not a super action heavy super "important"/"world saving" plot, I feel like there won't be many choice options available or the readers will feel like the choices don't matter to the story.
Dear Linguistic Friend,
If it helps to hear it, this seal thinks your alien species and your conlang ideas sound like a lot of fun and I am sure that plenty of readers would think the same. It is easy at the early pre-writing stages of a project to get in our heads and wonder if the idea is any good... but to know how it will feel to write, you'll need to make a leap of faith.
And I think you may be ready to give it a try! You have done lots of preparation and you like the idea of exploring a planet, learning more about the species that lives there. So what I would say is: try writing something small in the setting, it doesn't have to be a pivotal moment or even something that ends up going into the finished game, but getting a feel for your MC and for the kinds of things you want them to do will improve your confidence by a great deal.
My instinct, which you are of course free to take or leave, is that it may be more manageable to start out with a human MC, figure out the storyline for them, and then perhaps move into an alien MC once you are feeling great about the game. That way is less risk of overloading yourself and you can zero in with laser focus on what you love about the game and setting.
Which leads to the next part of your question! If you love your game, and when you're talking about it and writing it you focus on showing off that love, players will have fun with it. There is space for contemplative, introspective, "quiet" games that do not have world-destroying stakes.
I would suggest having a think about the choices you want to offer the player, however. Choices do not have to vastly branch the plot (or involve perilous stakes) to be impactful. What is important to the MC regardless of player choice? What could the player define as something that's important to the MC? What feelings might they have about their situation, surroundings, or goals and so on? I made another post on this topic recently so this may be a useful one to have a look at.
Best of luck with your alien story, Linguistics Friend. Try writing something that you feel excited about, and the confidence will come!