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Post by Yoyti on Jan 22, 2013 8:18:10 GMT -5
I think Komori was more replying to the notion of NTWF-themed 'insanity' taking over, which is largely a collection of in-jokes that casual viewers wouldn't get. Yeah, I know, but I still feel very strongly about nonsensicallity. In that it doesn't exist! ;D  Still, I think we could do something along those lines. It's like we fall into the uncanny valley of storytelling. |
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Post by Komori on Jan 22, 2013 13:26:07 GMT -5
I think Komori was more replying to the notion of NTWF-themed 'insanity' taking over, which is largely a collection of in-jokes that casual viewers wouldn't get. Yeah, I know, but I still feel very strongly about nonsensicallity. In that it doesn't exist! ;D Still, I think we could do something along those lines. It's like we fall into the uncanny valley of storytelling. That's all well and good, but if Droplet doesn't think it follows a coherent storyline, or if she thinks the generally-skewed-young audience wouldn't understand it, it's not making it in the Times. Which sort of defeats the purpose, no? (And I still hold that shouting "space weasels and cheese!" isn't a very good story element.) |
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Post by Hannah Needle on Jan 22, 2013 13:39:31 GMT -5
We should do NTWF (Neopian-Times Weewoo Force) We can either have little Weewoos in superhero suits or neopets dressed up as Weewoos.
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Post by Jade on Jan 22, 2013 21:59:53 GMT -5
We should do NTWF (Neopian-Times Weewoo Force) We can either have little Weewoos in superhero suits or neopets dressed up as Weewoos. Super Heros might be fun, I always enjoyed reading the Team Squad Force comics =D I dunno how it would work with articles, but maybe with the comics something along the lines of "The artists are all going to be trading pets, so now the comics will be made by the new owners." Either something like Fish is going to own Komo and Family soon, so she'll make a Spooky comic in her own style and say that'll be how it is from now on. Or have new accounts or side accounts make this claim, and submit the comics, but the art/jokes are terrible xD |
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Post by Lizica on Jan 22, 2013 22:47:05 GMT -5
April Fool's. Yes. =D I like a few of the ideas so far, namely the idea of everyone jumbling up our thumbnails, titles, and descriptions. I also like the idea of telling stories in reverse, though that would run the risk of nullifying any jokes or suspense in the story itself. (Althouuugh...if we did that, we could claim that there was some kind of space-time disruption causing the disorder, which could potentially be kind of epic. xD) ((Yoyti, I think it would be doable for comics; you just have to shuffle the panels around.)) I had an idea a while back that I think would be difficult to do, but would be a ton of fun to read. You know how Bill Watterson often played with the style of Calvin and Hobbes and sometimes made the comic look "serious"? Using Mary Worth as a reference, I came up with this atrocity:  The text on the side reads: "If my Neopets characters were in a bad drama comic, Mary Worth would try to advise Lizica to stop being delusional by talking to her pet bird and dog. And then some handsome man would save Kanepleke-dog from getting run over or something, and they'd fall in love. Lizica learns that people are important, too, and therefore gives her delusion-inducing pets to an old man before moving to the country with her love interest, never to be seen in the comic strip again." Comics could use a more "serious" drawing style, and stories and articles could use archaic, inflated language, resulting in overall ridiculousness. ...Though again, it would probably be hard to do. ...While I'm throwing out ideas, there was an idea I liked from last year's brainstorming, where we each write an entry as if it's part of a series. (Random part threes with no explanation for how the heroes got there, etc.) In any case, looking forward to what happens this year! =D |
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Post by Yoyti on Jan 22, 2013 23:12:34 GMT -5
The question though, is whether something is a prank, or just an overarching theme. A thought has occurred to me that we make up a new holiday. Neopia specific, to help keep it hidden. And we pretend that this is the special issue in relation to that day. With articles like "What to do on Taelia day" or "An interview with Taelia on Taelia day". Stories would be Taelia related, and make reference to a day in her honor. Comics would be a bit harder to pull off, if only because the medium is more limited to what you can explicitly say. They would probably do what they already do on theme days, but more heavy handed. This prank may be a bit tough to pull off well, though. It's really an all-or-nothing, since if it's not done to just the right extent, it ceases to be a prank, and resembles more closely a great collab, with Taelia as the theme. (Note: Taelia is just a placeholder).
Reversing stories I'm not overly fond of either, for a similar reason. It was just a simple example of how stories can be unusual, but still make perfect sense. I would rather we set up a set of unusual axioms to base our stories around if we do something like that. Maybe the stories switch perspective, but we don't make it obvious which characters are telling which parts, or even give an alert if the story is switching perspective at all. But then, Komori makes a good point. It's risky unless we get a go-ahead from Droplet ahead of time.
I'm right now thinking of a seldom used NT loophole, but please correct me if I'm wrong. I believe we are aloud to have new worlds and universes, as well as alien species not present on the neopets site, so long as the aliens are decidedly not neopets themselves? Let's press that point, and introduce a new world. A new species. We'll write stories and draw comics about this new place with its strange inhabitants. Neopets, of course, will be much more prominent, as our protagonists trying to figure out what these aliens are up to. In a comic, someone steps off of a spaceship, saying how excited they are to see this new world, only to come face to face with a vicious monster. Articles tell you what to pack on your first trip there. And so on and so forth.
But here's the catch. We never say that this is something new on the site. This is all decidedly a fiction. It's the war of the worlds in Neopets (I'm not saying we should have a war, though. Just a comparison for the ultimate effect). We may even preface stories with disclaimers saying that they are largely fictionalized. We leave it ambiguous enough to imply that it might be based in fact, but we never say it outright. People get angry when we prank them. How do you think they'll feel when they find out that there was never even a prank!
(Of course, this course of action can be applied to most any prank).
I'm evil. ;D
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Post by Komori on Jan 23, 2013 13:26:59 GMT -5
The question though, is whether something is a prank, or just an overarching theme. A thought has occurred to me that we make up a new holiday. Neopia specific, to help keep it hidden. And we pretend that this is the special issue in relation to that day. With articles like "What to do on Taelia day" or "An interview with Taelia on Taelia day". Stories would be Taelia related, and make reference to a day in her honor. Comics would be a bit harder to pull off, if only because the medium is more limited to what you can explicitly say. They would probably do what they already do on theme days, but more heavy handed. This prank may be a bit tough to pull off well, though. It's really an all-or-nothing, since if it's not done to just the right extent, it ceases to be a prank, and resembles more closely a great collab, with Taelia as the theme. (Note: Taelia is just a placeholder). We've already done a couple of themed months before: Gypsy Month and Thieves Guild Month. We did months instead of specific days because Droplet already does us a kindness by holding our submissions for holidays and special issue numbers, and we didn't want to overstep that kindness by creating a whole new special day just for us NTWFers to take over the Times. That said, it would be fun to do another. Thieves Guild month was back in September of '11 (And Gypsy Month in September '08). Maybe we should organize another themed month for this September. |
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Post by Yoyti on Jan 23, 2013 13:42:52 GMT -5
Well, I'm not talking about a theme thing. I'm talking about faking that this is a special issue, a neopian holiday. The only problem is that of how to make it clear without being too obvious.
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Post by Chao on Jan 23, 2013 14:05:45 GMT -5
Okay, so the consensus seems to be:
We will have an April Fool (YAY ;D ) and it will be Easter issue (issue no. 588). After all, that's when 1st of April is and we can't help it that it's Easter, and seeing that most Easter issues feature enough 'normal' entries, there should be space enough for prank entries.
As for the theme, I agree with Yoyti that whatever we pick should be a prank and not something akin to Theme-Months done in previous years such as Thieves guild in 2011. Not that another grand collab like that wouldn't be great, but it's not a prank.
Just a note on the idea of pretending it to be a new special issue: Special issues always sport a background matching that issue's theme and Easter issue will already sport negg abundance background.
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Post by DanDan on Jan 23, 2013 19:56:40 GMT -5
I'm not sure if I'll try to get in this year's fool, because I alredy have an easter-comic in mind, but good luck everyone! I hope this year's prank will be as awesome as last year's one. xDD
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Post by Fang of the Dead on Jan 25, 2013 14:38:54 GMT -5
Well, if it's in an Easter issue, why don't we run a theme about the Negg Faerie's Neggs being poisoned by someone (Hubrid's ghost? Malkus Vile's mob? Who knows) and doing all kinds of nasty stuff to pets  |
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Post by Komori on Jan 26, 2013 0:40:33 GMT -5
Hmm, tying it into an Easter theme would be kind of fun...
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Post by Chao on Jan 26, 2013 11:26:54 GMT -5
How about we go for a "Mysterious Hubrid Nox Negg"?
We could have entries about where to find that negg, make it part of any section of the Negg Festival we like, involve the Real Negg Faerie, give this negg special powers including mention that it contains the essence of Hubrid Nox and could restore his life and whatever more we could think about.
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Post by Komori on Jan 26, 2013 16:52:26 GMT -5
Beh, we already did tons of stuff for Hubrid Nox this past October. He's already had his fifteen minutes. |
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Post by Chao on Jan 26, 2013 17:31:36 GMT -5
Feel free to suggest another Mysterious Something Negg then ^^
I only mentioned Hubrid Nox because of Fang's post above. The concept behind the Mysterious Something Negg would work just as well with Utility Fish (mentioned because of NT Editorial appearance lately), or Ellsworth (mentioned because of just closing Neopies), or Harry the Mutant Moehog (mentioned because I recently began playing at the Battledome).
It could even be an already exisiting negg and we simply claim that it has been given a major make-over including extra abilities.
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