At 8/12/07 02:37 AM, Phantom wrote:
A paragraph of anger venting.
Calm down Phantom. You're only partially correct to feel how you do. NarutoNinja's writing wasn't the best but it wasn't the worst. The spelling and grammar mistakes and the lack of substance are the only let downs. He makes some good use of language, though.
So, I doubt I'd have selected him as winner, sorry NarutoNinja. But I don't think we should be encouraging your writing as it currently is because, in complete honesty, it's not so good. You need to practice a lot more and learn how to make better use of linguistic features and all that jazz. There were some good parts, though; "A satisfying resistance." That really shows the character's feelings. I think that character's are your strong point but the story lacked any real drama or resolution. Nothing really happened.
I forget who wrote the screenplay but that was better. I didn't read it all but the person who wrote it does have a better grasp of language than NarutoNinja. Although, as far as creative writing goes for the purposes of being read, a screenplay clearly isn't the way to go. So the only real problem was the style of it.
Phantom, although you have good spelling and grammar, your story fealt clumsy as I read it. It's clear you haven't proof-read it because there are a number of errors but those aren't really the problem. It felt like I was dragging myself through it, to the end, and every sentence was another tough obstacle to get over. I'm sure you can do better but your story wasn't really so good either.
My winner would've been SouleMan. I would've liked to have said that a story could've won but none of them are really that good. SouleMan with his screenplay, though, has written clearly and professionally. Although it may not be the best medium for telling a written story, he has used it well and without any great flaws.
Having said that, it was clearly a tough choice. SouleMan, in a way, didn't really stand much of a chance for picking to write it as a screenplay. It's a less enjoyable form of writing and is generally an uncomplete version of a film. It would've been a tough choice between NarutoNinja and Phantom. I have to be honest and say that I didn't particularly enjoy either but NarutoNinja's story didn't feel like a chore to read as much as Phantom's, so I'd have swung a vote that way too.
I hope you all improve for next time and hopefully I'll be around to enter when that comes around too.
Congratulations to all of you and I hope you don't all see this post as uneccessary criticism and come to burn me at the stake. Please take what I've said as constructive because I only want you to do better in the future.
Peace and Love! =D