Puzzle Agent Novel

[StrongBrush1]

Pardon the Pun, but I had a "Novel" Idea. Why not take Telltale's next game and turn it into one of those crime Novels? So I got to work today and cranked out the first chapter of What I call "SCOGGINS: A Mystery Novel based on the Game 'Puzzle Agent.'" Here's a look at what to expect:

Chapter One

"It was a very normal day in Washington, DC. The Potomac River was running out into the icy Atlantic, the national Memorials were drawing thousands of tourists, and there was absolutely nothing happening in the J. Edgar Hoover building, the home of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. It was enough to make a man go insane.

Nelson Tethers was located in department Z9: the department of Puzzle Investigation. It was the most criminally boring job in the world. Every time that Nelson tried to get a case, the FBI told him the same thing: no.

Nelson, in a case of extreme boredom, had fallen asleep on his desk. His mind had a habit of playing tricks on him. In a moment of randomness, a strange someone, or something, had strolled into Nelson's office. He couldn't tell, since they were dressed in a astronaut's suit.

Nelson was pondering who this was, when the figure picked up a pencil and scrawled out a message in his crossword puzzle. Nelson was terrible at reading upside down, so he was trying to figure out what the paper said.

Suddenly, the figure slowly, but surely, lifted up his visor, revealing some thing so horrible, it caused Nelson to scream at the top of his lungs.

Then, he woke up, still screaming. He noticed that there was nobody there, but he had ripped his crossword puzzle to pieces. He put it back together, which revealed that there, in fact, was something written on it: the word “Scoggins.” Nelson paused. What could it mean?

Suddenly, the phone had rung, which surprised Nelson. They told him that he had received a case. The eraser company that had supplied erasers to the White House had suddenly stopped their shipment of erasers. The other divisions of the FBI had been assigned to question the halt, but all they were given as replies were mysterious puzzles, which made no sense to them.

They were sending Nelson to investigate this mysterious and abrupt cancellation. He was excited to be out in the field again, but he was shocked when they told him the location of his next assignment: Scoggins, Minnesota.

Nelson's head was filled with questions as he headed to Dulles International. What had happened at the eraser factory? What was with the puzzles that would be involved? Who was the mysterious man who had alarmed him about his mission? And would he get a decent meal on the flight? Little did he know that the truth was going to come up to him and put a gun straight to his pale temple."

Be honest about my writing and please respond. I'll finish it after the game is released.

[Strong Max]

I like how chapter one is out before the game is, now THAT's showmanship.

[RingmasterJ5]

Nice! I can't wait for the next chapter. Once the whole book is out, I hope to use it to introduce more of my family to TTG.

[StrongBrush1]

Thank you for your support. And @ RingmasterJ5, I'll need to get permission to release it. But once I do, I'll make at LEAST a million copies.

[RingmasterJ5]

Originally Posted by StrongBrush1

Thank you for your support. And @ RingmasterJ5, I'll need to get permission to release it. But once I do, I'll make at LEAST a million copies.

Oh, I didn't mean as an actual, store-bought book, I was just going to print out the pages and put them in a binder. But, if TTG lets you, a "real" book would be awesome(possibly even bundled with a download code for the game).

[BoneFreak]

No one reads books these days. If you want to compel an audience, make a MOVIE. But TBH, that would be better and more ass-kicking.

[Strong Max]

Originally Posted by BoneFreak

No one reads books these days. If you want to compel an audience, make a MOVIE. But TBH, that would be better and more ass-kicking.

Nah, movies are old-school. Make it a video game!

[StrongBrush1]

Originally Posted by Strong Max

Nah, movies are old-school. Make it a video game!

THERE'S ALREADY A GAME. THAT'S WHAT THIS IS BASED OFF OF.

Yes, you discovered it. I cannot hide any longer. I am... CAPTAIN OBVIOUS!

[tabstis]

Originally Posted by StrongBrush1

Yes, you discovered it. I cannot hide any longer. I am... CAPTAIN OBVIOUS!

No...you don't say

[RingmasterJ5]

If you could, I would like to see the original "Hidden People" story as a prologue. If TTG ever lets you make it an actual book(which probably has no chance of ever happening), it would help people get into the story easier.

[StrongBrush1]

Second Chapter is done. Here:

Chapter Two

Nelson had a decent flight, but the work wasn't even about to begin. He arrived and rented a snowmobile to help him get around. After searching around town, he had no idea where his hotel was, so he asked for directions.

The man he talked to was an old local named Bjorn. The directions he gave to Nelson led Nelson right back to where he was. It then suddenly occurred to Nelson that he was standing in front of the hotel. He went inside without another word, because it was below freezing and he didn't want to get frostbite.

The hotel was nice, comfortable and heated, the only three things that Nelson cared about. The lady, at the counter was named Martha, who invited Nelson to stay a while and have some hot dish. Martha was a nice lady, with ginger hair and rounded glasses, who seemed like a cooperative woman.

Nelson sat down at the table next to the only other patron in the hotel, a seemingly disturbed man named Bo. Bo had long, twisted hair, and his eyes were wide open, red and bulging as if he had not closed them in years, nor slept a wink. Needless to say, he was in bad shape. Nelson tired to sit away from Bo without looking at him, which was difficult with such a small table.

Martha gave Nelson his room key and a map of the town. Nelson had nothing else to do, so he decided to head down the eraser factory. He was nervous about heading over, because Martha had told him about the factory's foreman, Issac Davner, who had reportedly died in an accident at the factory, although nobody had known for sure if he had survived the accident.

When Nelson arrived at the factory, he was greeted by the local law enforcement, Sheriff Bahg. The sheriff told Nelson that the guards had not figured out the time of the accident, although the third guard reported that he heard heard a loud explosion about one hour before he left. From the information he received, Nelson figured out that the guard had worked from 1 PM to 9 PM, which placed the time of the accident at about 8 PM.

The sheriff was impressed, but Nelson was confused. There were icicles hanging from the roof. If the incident had taken place at that time, wouldn't they be on the ground? The thought toyed with his mind.
The sheriff invited Nelson to the Moose Ear Diner to have some lunch. Nelson was hungry, so he accepted without thinking twice. Once the sheriff left, Nelson Took some notes:

“The locals seem nice and cooperative. The Nice old lady at the inn has me set for all the hot dish I can eat, the local sheriff seems to be working with me, and the old man named Bjorn has been of some help. The only problems I've had is with a local man named Bo, who seems to be always thinking about puzzles and talking about 'whispers.' So far I've seen a few suspicious things. I've seen a fence outside the inn that's covered in tiny bite marks, and the plant is closed with a hand-made lock, which means that it wasn't an official's decision. The lock was also missing a large gear, which means that there's no getting inside the plant until I find it. Will provide further notes later on. Tethers out.”

[MalkyTop]

I was actually wondering if I could somehow write some sort of fanfiction of this, even if it's only a one-shot...

I'm not sure if trying to adapt a video game to novel works very well. Usually, it comes off as unnecessary. And with this type of game, where none of the audience knows any answers to most of the mysteries we'd like solved, I'd think eventually you'd have to do some wild guessing. Without the puzzles, actually, this game is much shorter, so it probably wouldn't work out well as a book, unless you found some way to really drag it out...and considering the Grickle style and how usually everybody looks the same, it can be hard to describe the people in an interesting way as well.

I don't want to be mean, but I think your writing style is bland. In a narrative sense, you are setting the 'camera' very very far away from Nelson in a sort of '3rd person omniscient' kind of way, but you're writing in a more 'closed' mindset, so that any information we get is from Nelson, but delivered in a way that is 'he said she said' and so on. You could put more of Nelson's voice into the narrative so that it's more interesting, since you can't really write about what other people are thinking.

I'm also wondering about the dialogue, as in, it seems to not be in here. Dialogue and little conversations can really show the personalities of various characters. No dialogue seems strange and also a little boring.

Another thing to think about is small details. It's just another thing to draw the reader in. I've noticed in the second chapter, there seemed to be a lot that was just, well, missing. For one thing, Martha wanted him to stay and eat some hot dish, but where is it afterwards? There's no mention of Nelson eating it or even him noting that he liked or hated it. And wouldn't it make sense for her to give him the room key first before giving him some hot dish? I would assume she didn't just have tons of bowls on hand. It's not a fast food restaurant.

I know a lot of other people have said this tons of times, but there's a reason: Show, don't tell. If you just tell the audience what is what, then you just come off as listing a bunch of facts. It's much more interesting to imply or suggest about a person. For instance, you say Martha seemed to be cooperative? So show it! (Best way is through dialogue.) Bo needs to be crazy? You could have mentioned him twitching, whipping his head around to look at things nobody else could see, or even shared a little of his mutterings about puzzles and whispers and so on. At the end, with Nelson's recap, he mentioned the fence with scratch marks, but you never even mentioned it in the beginning. And I'm pretty sure that the fact that Bjorn just sent him around in a huge circle would have been somewhat annoying to him, but he doesn't show it.

And on the subject of that, you don't seem to be able to peg down Nelson's personality well. With no dialogue, he seems quiet and passive, both of which he's definitely not, and his puzzle genius seems to be more of second-hand gossip by way of narration. You tell us he found a puzzle, you tell us he solved it, and that's that. I sort of pegged Nelson as the type that was well content with his position at work but also very curious and eager to investigate anything mysterious. (Which is why I think he was willing to go up to Bo at first - crazy muttering guys are mysterious) He tries approaching a lot of life the way he does puzzles, but he's not impersonal, instead, very friendly. He's observant and down-to-earth. He can tell when he's in over his head and gets suitably afraid, (chainsaw-wielding women? Little red men? Puzzle Investigators aren't well-equipped for that sort of thing!) but he has a sense of duty and attempts to follow through with his job.

Also, I can't help but think you could have made some wry jokes about the government considering they have a department in 'Puzzle Investigations'. But yeah.

...Uh, sorry about all the criticism...I don't want to look like a jerk...but those are all the things I noticed about your writing.

[koiboi59]

definetly some dialog, and a first person view is needed. if you want to make it a book, include actual puzzles. maybe some illustrations, and a little more suspense, draw things out, write how he was feeling when the figure came in. you also skipped some things but this is your first draft so don't take it to hard. these are just things to consider. i love the idea of it being a book, but to be honest its kind of hard to do. most of the plot is visual things.

when is chapter 3

[StrongBrush1]

I'm workin' on it, just keep your pants on

[StrongBrush1]

I have decided to resurrect this thread. I'm working on the novel as we speak.

[koiboi59]

im tellin you, make a live action home made movie. people do it with dangeresqu all the time. it just doesn't work well as a novel (theres to much visual stuff you can't describe. plus its a good video project for school (if u have those). but if ur really sticking to this, go with first person view. its much better.

this thread has inspired me to write a season 3 novel

[koiboi59]

what do you mean season 3?

[tabstis]

Originally Posted by koiboi59

what do you mean season 3?

No more questions! Just run! RUN! EVERYBODY OUT!