Posts on Current Forum | Archived Posts
|
|
|
||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
| Frequently Asked Forum Questions | |
|||
|
||||
|
|
|||
| ||||
| ||||
| ||||
| Search Older Posts on This Forum: Posts on Current Forum | Archived Posts | ||||
| ||||
| ||||
| ||||
| Re: Enkidu flames and kudos HERE, please. | |
| Posted By: Tarrsk <tarrsk@musician.org> | Date: 5/17/04 3:26 a.m. |
In Response To: Re: Enkidu flames and kudos HERE, please. (Rams) : I am not complaining about the content or saying they were poorly written,
It never was implied that Bungie made this. So it had a bungie.org URL. That just means that Louis Wu is in on whatever it is. Any belief that it came from Bungie (and I'll be the first to admit that I spent most of the terminals believing that Bungie did indeed make them) came ENTIRELY from those of us reading them. Anton and Louis said nothing either way. : All very good things that I have zero problem with. Hey this fan fiction did
Yes, there was. Willing suspension of disbelief by the audience was a crucial part of telling this story. Sure, it's an unconventional mode of storytelling, but what's wrong with that? : So in order for this to work the fans had to believe it was from Bungie? WOW
No, the story would have stood on its own perfectly well without the ambiguous mode of presentation. However, as I stated repeatedly in my earlier post (this part of which you seemed to have ignored entirely, I might add), the impact of the story on the readers was GREATLY enhanced by making its source ambiguous. The point of fanfic is to re-immerse the reader in the subject universe. The Enkidu terminals did so more effectively than any fanfic I've ever seen. Period. Look, sometimes the WAY a story is told is as important as the plot/ characters/ settings of the story itself. Star Wars is ridiculous as a script on paper, but fill it with a fascinating "old universe" art design and the most amazing special effects of the time, and you get the most beloved science fiction film of the last fifty years. Halo makes for mediocre-to-decent reading on paper ("The Flood"), but is another experience entirely when you are placed within the armor of the Master Chief in the game. In the same way, leaving the source of Enkidu unclear, revealing information in fits and bursts, allowed Enkidu to transcend normal definitions of "fan fiction." Simply put: Alone, the Enkidu story would be in the upper echelon of online fan fiction. Paired with its unconventional method of storytelling, it reaches another level entirely. : I agree with the Bungie part, I really do. But what this has done is hurt
Nobody was "lied to." Neither Louis nor the author EVER explicitely said "this is official stuff." Of course it's "ok" for a site to mislead its fans every once in a while. For God's sake, we have an entire holiday dedicated to the damn thing- and I don't remember you raising any similar fuss when Louis posted fake Halo PC screenshots on April Fools last year. I mean, he even explicitely stated "this is NOT an April Fools prank" in his newspost! That's definitely lying, none of this "lying by omission" implication bullcrap. : Well that's you but certainly not everyone feels that way which is why I like
You're free to express your opinions on this matter, like anyone else. As am I. I still don't understand why you keep talking about the "fun of the storyline" when you haven't even read the thing, though. Not that it matters. : Again that is something that could have been done from a honest upfront
An "upfront" approach would have been simpler, sure. No confusion, no fruitless searching through the web for the keys to minor hints and clues. And we as a community would have been worse off for it. You simply aren't understanding. For those of us who enjoyed the Enkidu Terminals, the "dishonesty" of the whole thing was what made it so damn great. The Marathon story page was founded on the willingness of the intellectually-inclined to scour the internet and their libraries for tiny scraps of information that may or may not have any relevance whatsoever. There is an excitement to research, and the Enkidu Terminals brought that from Marathon into Halo. Who cares if, ultimately, we won't see Enkidu in Halo 2? Seeing Enkidu in the Enkidu Terminals was enough. : The difference here is the others were upfront about what they were. You
First of all, HBo specifically states on the bottom of the page that they are unaffiliated with Bungie. That means they have leave to post whatever the hell they want. Secondly, the Enkidu updates in the daily news were never written in the same way as the other posts. Louis is always VERY careful to be explicit in differentiating between Bungie-confirmed official news and various speculative bits. The Enkidu terminals were distinctly of the latter variety. Again, if we, the fans, decided to perceive that as a hint that they were official, that's our own damn fault. They could just as easily have gone the other way. Lastly, RvB don't leave their origins ambiguous because that's not an integral part of the RvB storyline. Hypothetically speaking, if it were, I would be thrilled. The idea of Cortana letters arriving in full video feed is something that just sets off the ol' "omg RAWK!!!" alarm bells in my head. I guess a fundamental difference between us is that, whereas you choose to interpret this as an insult to the readers of HBO, I see it as a gift, and as a work of art. Ah well. So it goes, as Vonnegut would say. | |
|
| Replies: |
The HBO Forum Archive is maintained with WebBBS 4.33. |