(SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

Summary:

entity that appears in busses all around the world

(SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

Phantom8 20 Jul 2020 19:26

A humanoid entity that appears in busses all around the world, the entity feeds off of light and only appears if the brightness of the bus is exactly 10 watts

I moved and trimmed your thread summary, since it was taking up extra space in the main forum screen. Try to keep thread descriptions (the text in the little box under the thread title) and titles short so you don't crowd out other authors in the forum listing. ~Zyn

Seeking Greenlights: Yes

Page Type: SCP Article/ Parawatch article

Page Layout: Special containment procedures, description, discovery, test log, parawatch post

Elevator Pitch: The first part of the article goes as stated above, however the elevator pitch is the parawatch post in which a young member of the parawatch hub has an encounter with the creature, leading him to investigate, although he gets most of the information about the entity wrong he does eveal some details that are very useful to the foundation.

Central Narrative: The story focuses around the parawatch member going it alone to try to find and explain the entiy he encountered. However after no more reports of the entity are given, he believes he is seeing things. His mental state deteriorates throughout the article but when he believes he has completely lost his mind, he reencounters the entity and becomes confident in explaining it.

Hook/Attention-Grabber: The parawatch member reveals some very interesting and weird details about the entity while looking for it.

Additional Notes: Ive never written a parawatch type article so any kind of help regarding the writing would be greatly apreciated.

Last edited on 30 Jul 2020 18:34 by Phantom8 Show more

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

DianaBerry 21 Jul 2020 00:58

[Placeholder, will critique asap]

 ♥*♡Open Critique♥*♡

Hello! I agree with Cyber on the fact that this could probably work well as a parawatch tale. But as an SCP, I don't really see this working. Let's break it down.

The Anomaly:

So the anomaly itself really just seems to be a basic humanoid entity that's hard to contain. It doesn't do a lot, and Cyber kind of said the same thing. This doesn't mean you need to make your entity more dangerous, making it dangerous as an attempt for appeal probably won't get you anywhere. They mean that you need more of a hook to your anomaly. You could possibly make this work with the right story.

The Narrative:

Part of your listed narrative is the discovery of your SCP, and the rest of it is just your basic 'Foundation contains this' story. That sort of thing falls flat very quickly. As Cyber said, this feels like it wouldn't be interesting to read, and it feels like nothing really happens. There needs to be a more concrete story. Your story shouldn't be containing the SCP, your SCP is what you use to tell your story.

Think of it like this. Think of a book you like. Think of one in the general fiction genre. Imagine the entire 400 page book is just the same detail repeated over and over again. No emotions to feel, no story to indulge in, no characters to get hooked to, no development or story arcs, no themes, nothing. That would be one boring story.

Now I know SCP articles are much shorter, but my point still stands. Books and short stories alike all have stories, right? Tales on the site have stories. Well SCPs are the same way. They are short stories, just in specific format. You need characters, how they interact with each other, emotions for your audience to feel, a plot to follow. What is the overall theme? The overall takeaway?

Overall, I'm not a big fan of this idea because it's rather flat, is basic monster that results in death, and has no strong narrative. If you pursue this idea, I suggest making it a parawatch tale instead of an SCP. For more information on narrative, check out this guide and this guide.

Hope I could help! Good luck!

Last edited on 21 Jul 2020 23:43 by DianaBerry Show more

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

cybersqyd 21 Jul 2020 12:30

[+] Open for crit

I'm really not sure about this; the style feels a lot more reminiscent of a creepypasta than a SCP to the point where I could imagine this as a dope Parawatch thing with multiple updates from a single main character.

My real concern is that 'gradually figuring out what an anomaly is' like this is generally not something the SCP format is great at doing: it's hard to have interesting ConProcs/a Description that doesn't give the game away while revealing enough to get a reader on board.

Beyond this, I'm just, not sure it'd be an interesting SCP to read? There's like, a generic 'learning how to contain this' story but there's no real stakes to the learning and nothing really like, happens? It kinda feels like part of the problem is the entity doesn't really get the chance to do much beyond sit around looking weird: it doesn't kill folk or attack, or try to breach containment, or plead with the foundation or anything; so it just feels, like a very passive story? It doesn't help that the Foundation apparently doesn't really do much beyond changing the brightness on the bus?

I don't think this is unsalvageable so much as it just needs you to figure out how to do something interesting with it to really make a reader care about what's happening: like, if you want the entity to disappear at the end, it has to mean something: be sad, cos we liked it; or be happy, cos it was scary; or something.

Last edited on 21 Jul 2020 12:30 by cybersqyd Show more

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

Phantom8 21 Jul 2020 15:03

Thanks cybersqyd your critique has helped me view this concept in a new light.

It kinda feels like part of the problem is the entity doesn't really get the chance to do much beyond sit around looking weird: it doesn't kill folk or attack, or try to breach containment, or plead with the foundation or anything; so it just feels, like a very passive story?

So what im getting is that I should make the entity have more damaging abilties? I was thinking maybe after some exposure (maybe 20 minutes) people started feeling weaker and weaker as the entity drains people of their energy to sustain itself and after multiple encounters with the entity subjects evetually turn into a second instance of the SCP giving the foundation even more trouble as they try to keep the entity away from other people.

Ill try to brainstorm some ideas for the entity, again, thanks for your crit

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

cybersqyd 23 Jul 2020 08:21

So what im getting is that I should make the entity have more damaging abilties?

Not really: it's not that the entity has to hurt folk so much as the entity should be more involved in the story than just, lurking on a bus. It being hostile would be a way to give this some conflict; but you can really tell an emotional story with a heavy focus on the Foundation's treatment of it where it not being hostile is part of the way the story works.

The new story focus feels…iffy; like, making it dangerous isn't a terrible idea but the story still feels very passive: it's a sequence of events that happen, not like, an arc that escalates; with characters and like, just making this focussed on containment doesn't feel like it's the most interesting thing to happen here?

At the end of the day: you're just trying to tell an interesting story about a weird thing: it's up to you to really try and figure out why it's interesting: what about this idea is interesting to you? And, in turn, how can you show that off?

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

cybersqyd 13 Aug 2020 12:16

The parawatch member reveals some very interesting and weird details about the entity while looking for it

So, like, what are these details? Why do they matter to a reader?

Making this a parawatch piece isn't a bad idea, it's just, you have to actually have things happen! People have to explore the SCP and then something should happen (not necessarily them dying or getting hurt!) and then they should react somehow. You have like, this researcher tracking the SCP down but like, why are they so invested in it? What do they do to track it down? How do they get from a to b to c? How should a reader feel about all this?

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

Phantom8 13 Aug 2020 19:16

Hi again cyber! Thank you for your crit.

So my idea for the details that the parawatch member uncovers and the story in general is that he first reveals how to make the entity appear after searching fo it for a long time how ever when he posts his findings on the site but people can get the creature to appear, he is labeled as a fraud. This makes him mad so he is determined to prove to everyone that the creature exists. This is when the foundation steps in by closely monitoring the protagonist but not stopping him completely as they believe that he can provide useful info if given more time. When the protagonist encounters the entity again, he starts testing it to find out why it disappears by exposing it to different things like more people, different vehicles and locations and brightness. After he finds out light is the necesary thing to get the entity to spawn he posts his findings on parawtch.

This time people near his location report seeing the entity after following the members instructions. This is when the foundation believes its time to intervene and they track everyone who has been in contact with the entity, interview them, amnesticize them, delete the post and contain the entity. The document will end with the foundation testing to see if the parawatch member's findings are correct.

The other ending idea I have is the foundation using the parawatch member to help them contain the entity as he knows how to and then either amnesticizing him or hiring him to work at the foundation.

Again thanks for the crit, its greatly appreciated.

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

cybersqyd 19 Aug 2020 08:37

Okay so first off: while this might work as a parawatch thing, the important aspects of parawatch is a) the foundation aren't involved and b) it's always extremely ambiguous as to whether there was something actually anomalous going on

Moving past my concerns that you aren't representing parawatch well here; the actual story feels…far too focussed on testing and stuff? Like, it's very much centred on what the anomaly does when really what you want to tell a story about here is how people react to the anomaly: like, yeah okay you've got this amateur researcher who's desperately trying to find out as much as he can about the anomaly but it feels like this very quickly covers that it's real and then…is just focussed on the mechanics of how it works rather than anything interesting about it?

Following this, the endings are just 'the foundation swoop in and fix everything' and like. iunno, neither particularly compelling to me? They don't really round out the story so much as have a deus ex machina swoop in and go 'shits sorted now'.

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

Phantom8 21 Jul 2020 16:25

Major edit: I will be changing the story and adding a secondary effect to the entity which makes it deadly after long exposure, this will change the way the article plays out and I will be adding addendums about the casualties and incidents after the foundation discovers the entity's secondary effect.

The secondary effect is that after repeated encounters with the entity the D class starts to feel weaker and weaker and in the following days turns into a secondary instance of the SCP with the same capabilities. This means that the radius in which people are affected greatly increases and as the foundation try to find out how to stop this more casualties happen. The foundation then rushes to move the entity away from any site or humans before the radius becomes to large to contain. This ends with the loss of many lives and the sacrifice of the main researcher who after all his colleagues have turned is the only hope for stopping the entity

Last edited on 21 Jul 2020 16:28 by Phantom8 Show more

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

Phantom8 27 Jul 2020 17:47

Major edit 2: I have completely scrapped the idea of the entity duplicating and turning people exposed to it into a copy of itself. I instead want the main focus of the story to be on the researcher that first encountered the entity, he believes that he is just tired and needs some rest when he first encounters the entity, but after he keeps encountering it he thinks he has gone insane, after telling other researchers to investigate the place where the anomaly appeared or even the bus itself and not finding clues, the researcher accepts the fact that he has gone insane, until one of his colleagues reports the same encounter he decides he will find the entity by himself in order to prove that him and his colleague arent going crazy.

I want to add several addendums in which the researcher is describing his experiences with the entity and what he has done to try and find it with the climax being that after many months of testing and experiments he finally gets the entity to manifest in a controlled place. After that the researcher would do multiple tests with the entity and eventually would know how it acts.

if anyone could tell me what they think of this edit I would be eternally grateful.

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

Phantom8 28 Jul 2020 04:21

Major edit 3: Im really sorry about so many edits I just want my article to be as best as it can be. After having multiple crits about my concept, the most consitent thing in them is that it could fit better in the parawatch hub, so that is what im going to do, a parawatch article/story. Major changes will have to be made to the draft but I will continue to update the thread as more edits are made.

Re: (SEEKING GREENLIGHT) The figure in the bus seat

The Pighead 13 Aug 2020 21:21

OK, OK, OK, Pighead is back from vacation, so let's critique. Here's my thoughts on this idea.

Elevator Pitch : So… I will be honest, I'm not really a fan of it. The creature is pretty uninteresting, we don't know about its abilities or its story or why and how it is able to do what it do. Why the entity only appears on buses? Why it feeds off light? Where does it come from? I have too many questions about that and we know really little about that, so it's already not a good point.

Central Narrative : The big part. And I'm extremely hesitant about that, I don't know. I don't feel it hooks me enough into the story.

And… you know what? In fact, I know what is the problem for this one and why I don't feel hooked into. It's because you plan to make it a SCP article. And not only I don't have anything to say about that, but I also feel that the only part of your pitch who interests me is the Parawatch forum post. So, here's a thing that I can recommand you :

Scrap everything and just keep the Parawatch forum post, make it a full-length Parawatch GoI Format. I'm not fully comfortable with the "person slowly loses his mind" part, but for the rest, I think you can do a pretty good story if you focalize yourself on the story of this Parawatch member. A story about a person who find an entity, is unsure if it was real and have a sort of mental/emotional "journey" about his feelings towards this event and all that stuff (except the "losing his mind" part) can be pretty interesting, especially when we know that this is not a theme we see in Parawatch stories.

So, no greenlight but think about what I've said in this review and if you think that interesting, feel free to go on this way (I think it could be more interesting than your current idea). That's all for me, Pighead Out, good luck.