On Mon, 29 May 2000, Travis Grant wrote:
Chapter One and beyond it will be six months after Phoenix Mountain and
the failed wedding attempt.
Don't tell us this here. Work chapter one in such a way that we should be
able to know this.
"" means a person talking
** means signs
() thoughs, memories
<> sounds
^^Scene effects
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(Untitled) Prologue
(Late night around a fire in the woods of backwoods china. We see two people
cooking on the fire. Ones old, bald, and fat in a dirty brown Gi and white
Bandana covering his head. The other is in his midteens in a red Chinese
shirt and Kung Fu pants with a black pigtail.)
Okay, first you give us a large legend, which promises to make the fic a
large morass of symbols. Then, you promptly ignore it. I'd suggest you
not use the symbols at all, except for the quotes (which is just proper
English), and perhaps the panda sign symbols.
Fix the capitalization. Only proper nouns and beginning of sentences
should be capitalized. For example, 'Bandana' is hardly correct.
'bandana' is better.
"Oyagi no baka! How could you get us cursed, you idiot. Just cause its a
training ground don't mean you don't listen to the guide."
"Ranma were you not willing to give your life for the Art"
"My life yes! My manhood is different entirely"
One punctuation symbol that is an integral part of the English language is
the comma. Without it, sentences can become ambiguous and while it is
possible for one to understand their meaning by context, they are annoying
to read.
For example, "My life, yes!" means an affirmation of life. "My, life
yes!" means that Ranma is expressing shock over a life yes (whatever that
might be). Granted, the first makes sense and the second doesn't. But
not placing commas at all just looks bad.
As a rule of thumb, when one pauses in speech, one should place a comma.
Of course, the rule of thumb for rules of thumb are that rules of thumb
are correct about 3/5 of the time, so you won't be completely correct even
then. Still, it beats your current lack of commas.
"This doesn't matter daugh ah son I have a way to cure you. I put my life in
grave danger(just one more panty for the master and I get my chose of scroll
s. hehheh Whats this a shadow uh "Mam I was just looking for my glasses
hehheh just look their on my face the whole time. Well bye. No <AH> I <WHAM>
wasn't <CRUNCH> stealing <RIP> your <SLASH> panties.") brrr(To think a woman
could hit with a bouken like that. To think I married her)facing great
odds(women chasing him each with blunt weapons and some not so blunt) to
gain this scroll.(Crouch of the Wild Tiger in front of Master Houpposai.
"Please I'm just one panty short great and powerful master of the grand
school of Anything Goes Martial Arts." "Sure Genma here is a scroll its of
no use to me. Now come here my little silky darlings let Happy rescue you.)
Ugh. Too much crammed, no descriptiveness, and put multiple people's
spoken text on one line.
I'm sorry. I'd go through the rest, but it's just too painful to read.
The rampant symbols, the bad formatting, the lack of punctuation...
Anyway, fix those up, and I'm sure that this will look much better.
-Natsume Ranma Ranma
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The sardines weren't worth the trouble. A few more shots, then
Ryoga-san would overheat and explode. Ducking around a corner,
I managed to lose him as I entered the ramshackle residence of
my Anime supplier.
One look at his face and I knew that I had been betrayed. "Tell me,"
I insisted. He refused, so I slammed him against the wall.
"Last chance. Where can Ranma-Ranma find good fanfics?"
"Try Jason Liao," he whispered, before he slumped to the floor.
I heard the sounds of a door splintering as I left through the
window, one step ahead of Tendo Heavy Industries...