A new way to tell stories
Fantassist
So what is Fantassist?
Fantassist is a platform that allows writers to construct open world stories. The open world story is a unique new medium that allows readers to interactively explore written universes with total freedom. Imagine a novel where you (the reader) can truly dive into the world: you can go anywhere you wish, do anything you want, and explore to your heart's content.
This is impossible in conventional storytelling, where the reader follows one narrative from beginning to end. Nothing the reader does can change anything. The outcome is fixed and fate is decided. Even in a branching plot tree, like a choose-your-own adventure story, the reader is still tied to making only a few critical decisions. Sure, they can take part in the adventure of the story, but they can't truly explore everything the world has to offer.
Fantassist is a platform that allows writers to construct open world stories. The open world story is a unique new medium that allows readers to interactively explore written universes with total freedom. Imagine a novel where you (the reader) can truly dive into the world: you can go anywhere you wish, do anything you want, and explore to your heart's content.
This is impossible in conventional storytelling, where the reader follows one narrative from beginning to end. Nothing the reader does can change anything. The outcome is fixed and fate is decided. Even in a branching plot tree, like a choose-your-own adventure story, the reader is still tied to making only a few critical decisions. Sure, they can take part in the adventure of the story, but they can't truly explore everything the world has to offer.
Limitless Possibility
Fantassist's Open World Story model allows readers to explore far beyond the strict confines of conventional stories. Now, readers can forge their own path as they truly immerse themselves in complex and vibrant worlds.
Complexity and Nuance like Never Before
This one's for the writers: rethink plot! Rethink character development! With our system, your story can evolve and change as the reader makes both big and small decisions. Imagine if your characters actually develop based on the experiences the reader puts them through! Maybe a character slowly builds resentment towards the reader as the reader makes morally questionable decisions, causing them to eventually lash out during the story's climax! Maybe the reader's band of misfit heroes slowly loses faith in the reader's leadership after they demonstrate rash immaturity. With Fantassist, your interactive stories can be complex and nuanced with conflicting motives and shifting allegiances... just like the real world.
Illustration Integration
Artwork can be seamlessly integrated into Fantassist stories to make them even more alive. However, this is completely optional and totally customizable. Some stories can have custom artwork on every page, while others may have none at all. The only required illustration is the actual map which the reader will use to explore. This graphic can be very complex or very simple.
A Brave New World
The Fantassist platform allows writers and readers alike easy access to a totally new paradigm of storytelling. The Fantassist platform itself isn't revolutionary... it's the endless possibilities of what you can create with it. By writing for Fantassist or reading stories with it, you are a pioneer into an entirely new genre of niche entertainment. Because the platform is brand new, you are free to be truly innovative.
Easy to Get Started
While the platform is totally new, we will be providing extensive documentation and resources to help writers get creating! Fallen World's Traveler, our own Fantassist story, serves as a starting point for other writers to expand upon. It will be released as a totally open-resource story, meaning that any aspiring Fantassist writer can freely use what we've created for their own projects!
The conventional story
Crafting an Experience
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In a conventional story, events are organized (for the most part) sequentially. There is one narrative path, with a beginning, middle, and end.
Most novels, movies, TV shows, and other narrative-based-entertainment are examples of the conventional story. The main limitation of conventional stories is that they're "single use." No matter how many times you read a book, it contains the same story with the same ending. No matter how many times you watch a movie or TV show, it contains the same story with the same ending. At Eyesight, we refer to conventional storytelling as crafting an experience, because the writer is creating a singular experience and communicating that experience to the reader. |
In a conventional story, the plot flows sequentially in one direction
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The plot tree
Crafting an Adventure
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Many readers and writers alike find the conventional story restrictive. After all, when a reader opens a book or watches a movie, they're hurtling down a fixed path towards an inevitable finish-line. Nothing they do has any impact on experience.
Enter the plot tree, more commonly called the "Choose Your Own Adventure" (CYOA) model. In this model, the story is organized into a series of concurrent narrative paths connected by choices from the reader! This creates a branching "tree" of different possible stories leading to different possible endings. By allowing the reader to make choices, a whole new world of imaginative possibilities is available to uncover. The reader can more easily immerse themselves in the story, because they can truly become a character rather than watch characters act out the story. The story becomes a true adventure rather than the illusion of one. Plot trees have always existed, but became much more mainstream with the release of "Choose Your Own Adventure" books. The model has also been applied to story based videogames, i.e. Undertale. Netflix's Black Mirror: Bandersnatch pioneered this form of storytelling into movies and TV. But even the longest, most complicated plot tree is still the sum of its parts. While there are many paths to choose from, the reader is limited to travelling down the path of their selection. You can visualize this limitation by thinking about how the plot can only flow in one direction: forward. There is no "lateral" movement that allows the reader to have freedom. |
In a plot tree, each choice leads to a different branch of the tree, towards one of many endings.
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Fantassist: the open world story
Crafting a Universe
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It's time to break free.
Go anywhere. Do anything. Create everything! The open world narrative allows writers to create entire universes for readers to explore. The Fantassist model is based on the plot tree model. Imagine an array of miniature plot-trees arranged on a two-dimensional surface. The reader can visit each point on the array, and follow the minature plot tree available at that location. Each singular location is called an Event and the arrangement of each event forms the Map. But a bunch of mini plot-trees arranged in columns and rows isn't very exciting. It's how these Events interact with each other using Connections that create rich, dynamic, complex stories. Fantassist's Connections system is a way of crafting a narrative from something that isn't inherently linear. (like a book or movie) In this case, that non-linear format is the Map. |
In an open world story, each event is a location that the reader can travel between. The ultimate freedom!
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The map image for Fallen World's Traveller, Fantassist's first story created by Eyesight Technologies!