what is it called if the readers are able to push the story in a certain direction?

Kachowo

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Basically what is it called if the readers are able to push the story and make things happen in a story that's ongoing. I started a new story where one of the things is if the readers suggest something it'll happen no matter how non-sensical, like for example, mc eating a pop tart or gaining a robot arm through an accident that the gods helped make.
 

AYM

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Same. I was thinking about the choose-your-own-adventure books.
Choose your own adventure stories are different because the choices are pre-determined by the author. Readers can't directly influence these stories.
 

Anemic_Vampire

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Choose your own adventure stories are different because the choices are pre-determined by the author. Readers can't directly influence these stories.
Oh, you are right. Actually, I didn't think of that point. Back then, as a kid, I always dumbly assumed that I'm the one who's controlling the whole story, just like some video game. :blob_sweat:
 
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AYM

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Oh, you are right. Actually, I didn't think of that point. Back then, as a kid, I always dumbly assumed that I'm the one who's controlling the whole story, just like some video game :blob_sweat:
...But you don't control the whole story in a normal video game. You have as much control over a video game's story as you have over a choose your own adventure's story.
 

Anemic_Vampire

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...But you don't control the whole story in a normal video game. You have as much control over a video game's story as you have over a choose your own adventure's story.
I'm too speechless by my silliness to say something... Usually, I don't give some things too much deep thinking, that's why I didn't realise all these possibly obvious things. Thanks for correcting my way of thinking. :sweat_smile:
 
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J_Chemist

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There's in adventure book that does it very well but it's a PVP book. It might give you some inspiration. It's very minimal and isn't exactly a story per say, but it's a fun baseline if you learn from the fundamentals of it.

 

John_Owl

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Choose your own adventure stories are different because the choices are pre-determined by the author. Readers can't directly influence these stories.
like my story, Two Faces. I set the options in a poll, and the readers simply vote on which they want to happen. They're predetermined, but they still have some input. Poll-operated Reader-Interactive.
 

prognastat

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Well it depends on what you mean by pushed by the readers. Theres the choose your own adventure option where you have to write branching storylines and the reader picks where to go where the branches split. Or you have the one where it is not an individual reader that picks, but where your whole audience picks through things like voting in polls.

For the choose your own adventure route it can be very interesting encouraging your readers to explore more of your characters and world by re-reading and following different paths. The downside of course is except for your biggest fans that want to do this for everyone else it means despite writing more there is less for them to read.

As for the audience choosing the direction for the story as a whole it can be interesting, but I would avoid getting too granular with it. Like maybe they can pick some of the broader strokes, but I wouldn't recommend them choosing stuff at the end of every chapter and including a bunch of options the audience wants as it tends to cause a story to just lose all cohesiveness.
 
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