My final project took the form of a CYOA, using just pictures to convey the story. The only text is the choices, which are simplistic. The drawings are simplistic and in comic form. My intention was to strip the narrative down to the bare essentials, to see if the reader can convey the basic story from the simplest images. Personally for me, it's sometimes hard to discern what's going on in a comic book with all the extraneous glitzy artistry, so by conveying the most simplistic image possible, hopefully the story speaks for itself.

I also tried to make the choices as true to the consequences as possible. Without giving too much away, I only put 2 arbitrary or unrealistic paths. Due to the nature of the story it should be somewhat obvious what path you should take. I won't give away the basic premis of the story, because I want a fresh reaction when I present on Thursday. Be on the look out for recurring "motifs", I'll ask if anyone notices any and what you think they mean.

Read more . . .

I have chosen to do the creative section for the final project, my idea being that I will create a choose your own adventure story that the class will act out on the day that we present our final projects. In order for it to be unique, I plan on giving the readers (in this case, the class) the option of creating their own choices at some parts in the story. In order for the CYOA to be as organized as possible though, I'm going to ask the class to be one whole coherent unit, as opposed to everyone in the class acting on their own.

I haven't decided a specific plot yet, but I'm working on it. Two ideas that I've come up in my head are that the story takes place on campus and that the protagonist is a student here, and the story would be through his/her eyes. The other idea is once again on campus, but the campus has been overtaken by zombies and the student is the only one left, as far as he knows.

For my final project, I was immediately drawn to the creative option. I would like to create a short choose your own adventure story that was not just designed to be read by children. I was thinking that instead of having just two options, the reader is given three or even four different choices on page options to go to from the current page they are reading. I also though it would be cool if instead of blindly making decisions, there would be riddles incorporated into the story that the reader would have to make decisions based off of, to give a sense that the reader is actually making decisions in the story. For my analysis of this story, I will map out all of the possible ending out comes as we did for the choose your own adventure assignment and also go into detail about the specifics of the endings and details in my story.

For my final project, I weighed the pros and cons of both the creative option and the analytical option. I finally settled on the creative option, not because I think we've exhausted our analytical approaches in the past, but because the creative option gives more leeway into what you can produce. I chose to produce a Choose your own adventure with purely pictures. The only text on the page will be the choices, and even those will be fairly simplistic. It garners quite a bit of dissection, to interpret the picture and subsequently the event it is describing. I'm by no means an artist, so this will also present quite a challenge to both me as the artist and the reader. I may incorporate snippets of actual pictures as elements of each picture. Specifically, I may draw a person, but not the chair they're sitting in, instead I might find a picture of a chair and implement that etc.. I'm not sold on what story I intend to follow, however I don't want it to be a run of the mill abducted-by-aliens-sort of story. I hope it turns out the way I'm imagining it to, and makes sense to the readers.

When I selected my book, I found myself torn between two intriguing-looking books. I eventually selected Escape From Tenopia since it allowed me to start out with aliens rather than having to search for the alien ending since they would all be alien endings. And I was right; they all were. All one of them.

Read more . . .

While reading my Choose Your Own Adventure Book, I was struck by the number of possible endings and how they greatly vary. Many of the endings given involved me being eaten by snakes or wolves, or burned at the stake. Others involved me meeting a family with whom I worked with for the rest of my life. Another ending was that I met a girl named Michelle, ran off with her, and find the "Forbidden Castle" where we live forever. These variations in resolution fluctuate depending upon the choices I, as the reader, make throughout the story. After reading "The Abominable Snowman" as well as "The Forbidden Castle" for my CYOA Forms of Narrative Project, I was intrigued by the idea of choosing how I want to proceed in a given narrative. I found a website online which calls itself "Choose Your Own Adventure," yet it has no affiliation with the books themselves. The warning at the beginning of the game reads, "This game is not suitable for children. Some story choices contain language and situations that some adults may find offensive. This story is written by visitors to the site, and is largely unmoderated.

Read more . . .

( I was having some trouble posting my image,  so i am leaving it out for now, but  I do have it completed. Still working on getting it on here.)

For this assignment I went with the reading "The Deadly Shadow". Although it didnt look like much from first apperances, from my experience back in the day of reading these things, the ones with the weirdest titles are usually winners. I was not disappointed.

The beautiful part to all CYOA is that your character could very well be in almost certain peril, and if you make the wrong decesion. Your character might die and you will be left having to go back and start again. This causes a dilemma, because no one really wants to waste time, so most people, i would assume try to think of the selection that will lead them to safety.  I am not one of those people, and try to put my character in as much risk as humanly possible. From my experience it usually will get you to the end no problem.

Read more . . .

For our choose your own adventure story project I read Mystery at Loch Ness, by Roy Wandelmaier.  The story starts off with you on a vacation in Scotland with your cousin Derek.  You and your cousin are quietly watching television at home when all of a sudden a breaking news report comes on about a missing person, Dr. Gregory, a scientist tracking the Loch Ness Monster has vanished without a trace from her campsite and must be found.  "'Loch Ness is only four miles from here,' says Derek, sipping his hot chocolate.  'I bet we could find Dr. Gregory.'"  With those fateful words you and Derek set out in the night on a trecherous rescue mission to find the good doctor, little do you know of the magical and potentially fatal journey you are about to embark on.

Read more . . .

When choosing The Circus, I had already noted both the short length, and the fact that it was labeled as number 1 in the Choose Your Own Adventure series. This was fairly unusual, since most of the other Choose Your Own Adventure books were longer, and the Abominable Snowman is usually labeled as first. The reasons for both of these became apparent as soon as I began reading the text. The Circus is apparently the first in a separate line of Choose Your Own Adventure books from the main line—one aimed at an even younger audience than the main line, which is already marketed towards young children. As such, the material within is even more family-friendly, the text is even larger, and there is far less content.

Read more . . .