is the genre @ least in part sci-fi?

Is this an enviromental message

So Far:

The story is a science fiction story which takes place after an environmental distaster. Microbes are released to help clean up the mess. There will not be a happy ending.

So Far:

The story is a science fiction story which takes place after an environmental distaster. Microbes are released to help clean up the mess. The protagonist must prevent a future environmental catastrophe, but there will not be a happy ending.

So Far:

The story is a science fiction story which takes place after an environmental distaster which has created a new world. Microbes are released to help clean up the mess which morph and react with the humans. Conscious human design of human genetic manipulation plays a factor in this story. The protagonist must prevent a future environmental catastrophe, but there will not be a happy ending.

- is it an unforseen accident that the microbes morph and react with the humans?

- do the humans initiate genetic manipulation on themselves in reaction to whatever the microbes did to them?

ok, so -- do the humans release the microbes with the direct intention of the microbes morphing and reacting with the humans?

does the human/microbe interaction have some unforseen effect that warrants human genetic manipulation to fix it?

- is the initial environmental disaster a man-made disaster?

- does the microbes' unforseen effect alter man's mind rather than man's non-brain body/phsiology?

- does the genetic manipulation change people right away, rather than a slow manipulation of the genes of the following generations?

all right damnit, let's get to the bottom of this:

- do the microbes make the afflicted humans insane?

- do the microbes make the afflicted humans vastly reduced in intelligence?

- is the 'end of rational man via genetic manipulation' a planned, intentional outcome?

- is the 'end of rational man via genetic manipulation' a step UP on the evolutionary ladder?

- is the antagonist a sentient being?

There have been no posts in a week, so I will wrap up this Story Game so I can talk a little bit about why the game interests me.


Essentially this is our story....


A man-made environmental disaster has poisoned the Earth's atmosphere and food supplies. The world has fallen into chaos as the future has become dark and hopeless.

Amidst the chaos, scientists have created a possible solution - a microbe that when morphed into the human body create an immunity to the toxins and give humans greater strength than ever before possible. One rogue scientist protests claiming that the effects could be harmful but he is ignored because the alternate is potentially death. The microbes are released and it seems to work. People become more healthy - healthier than ever before - but there is a side effect. Their conscious reasoning is disturbed effectively reducing their intelligence.

The powers that released this quickly realize this and set out to now destroy their ilfated creations with a solution that would create even more damage to the world.

The Rogue scientist resorts quickly to forming a series of genetic manipulations on himself and his followers which not only retains their consciousness, but makes them hyper aware - to the point of near insanity.

The three fractions - the microbed, the humans, and the scientists followers battle for the future of mankind. it does not have a happy ending.


- - - - -

It seems more of a pitch than a story. What I wrote above basically adds no or little information than had been established already by the questions... but here is the most interesting thing about the story....

...I didn't write it. I didn't even think it up.

Anytime someone asked a question which had an even number of words, I answered "No." Anytime someone asked a question which had an odd number of words, I answered "Yes." If the answer would negate an established fact, I had to answer "Maybe."

And from this randomly chosen facts - a story naturally started to form.

I totally removed my own personal inclinations from the story this way - at the same time I absolved the questioners the responsibility for owning their ideas. There were plenty of times where had I been writing this story I would have chosen the alternate answer - but quite often we choose things which restore balance while stories are mostly formed from imbalance. We will choose things which provide familiarity to us - yet sometimes exploring the unfamiliar will create a deeper choice.


This excercise is also enlightening in that you can see in action which types of questions end up moving a story forward. If you reread the thread, you discover that sometimes when something unexpected was approved, suddenly the adrenaline and momentum of the story picked up. You can also look at the result and ask yourself "What is missing from this story?" Those elements are usually the elements that you need to ask yourself about when writing your own stories.

Something about humans - we crave for information to link. Often when we meet people (at a party for example) we want to know "how do you know the host?" - if we hear an alarm and then see a guy running a minute later - our first thought might be "is he running from the alarm?"

So - stories should come naturally to us - but we also end up censoring our thoughts, trying to stay in our comfort zone. Next time you watch a Tarrantino movie notice that what he does constantly is very consciously make the uncomfortable and unexpected choice. He is very good at going where you do not want the story to go - yet you (if you like his work) love that it does go there because it has taken you out of the safety zone of your own consciousness - yet you are still physically in the safety of the theater.


If you'd like to read more about where inspiration for this story game comes from, I would recommend the book by Keith Johnstone called "Impro."

Thank you everyone playing along and letting me share some of my thoughts on writing.

Thanks, Mark

ah ha haaa!

wow. awesome.

and the game itself took the most unexpected turn....