Emily Lockwood in Halloween Horror - A Perilous CYOA (S2.4)
Added 2020-10-31 20:31:13 +0000 UTCThis is a choose your own adventure where you play as Emily Lockwood. Take Emily through a terrifying nightmare in which she has to survive Halloween while being hunted by a merciless killer. Emily's never been in more danger and it's up to you to lead her through it, if you fail there are dozens of endings each one different than the last. This is a special Halloween adventure and as such features some violent scenes, the type of which you would typically find in the horror genre.
It's Halloween! And it's a big night for Emily Lockwood. She'll be going to her very first party since returning from her perilous vacation. She doesn't know it yet but a lots changed since she's been away and going back to her old life might not be as easy as she hopes. The party is just the beginning though, someone has been waiting a long time to get their revenge on the girl detective, someone more sinister and psychotic than she's ever faced. Her most terrifying adventure yet will take her to her darkest depths, but will she able to survive the horror or will she end up as just another helpless victim? It's time to find out...
(Story Attached)
To see 'What Happened Next?' in four endings from this story click here - https://www.dropbox.com/s/n5saiuuwtqfeq5y/4.%20Halloween%20Horror%20-%20What%20Happened%20Next.pdf?dl=0
Comments
Thanks! Yea I'm surprised there aren't more peril CYOA's around, it seems to be a great format for our particular...proclivities. As for the length - holy smokes - that's much longer than I would have guessed. I think mine's going to end up being around 40,000, and even that feels really long. I don't know how you manage to write that much every few months.
Jack Rabbit
2020-11-14 17:18:45 +0000 UTCThanks so much for the feedback! Really glad you enjoyed the different structure of this one, I was really happy with how it turned out. I try to keep each one feeling fresh, I knew it might be a little jarring with the nightmare stuff and the glitchy text but it felt right for a more horror style of interactive adventure. The Tommy decision is something a few people have noted and I'll just say this is very early on in a long planned arc so I hope the next story makes their relationship feel a little more believable. This one came in at just over seventy five thousand words, I'd say around sixty is the right length for any CYOA, let me know how it goes! As a fan of these things there's not nearly enough of them out there.
Markus Jones
2020-11-14 15:59:34 +0000 UTCNow that I've finally had a chance to finish it, let me say great story. I think it's definiltely one of your best. It started off slowly, but everything after they got to the island was entertaining. I like that it was a little more serious than most of your other stories, and I liked that you changed the narrative structure up a bit. I also thought the use of code around when Emily hit her head was very creative. It definitely threw me off at first. I wasn't super thrilled with her being accepting of Tommy, since that seems pretty unrealistic given the circumstances, but I guess I'll just have to see where it goes. Overall great job and keep it up! I do have one question though: do you happen to know the approximate word count of this story? I only ask because I'm working on a CYOA of my own and I'm curious for reference.
Jack Rabbit
2020-11-14 15:20:25 +0000 UTCHey, thanks for the feedback. Always appreciate hearing what people think.
Markus Jones
2020-11-06 07:25:44 +0000 UTCAn interesting sequel but i think it went kinda all over the place in a way. The introduction was so great, each endings being more delightful than the last. But then it goes to a much more darker tone, making me avoid every ending possible because those violent resolutions werent exactly my thing. You also introduced many charaters, Emily's friends, rivals, Eliza, Jason and Stacy and it just didnt exactly went anywhere with them. Tommy was fine in this story but i feel him now being a good guy just felt so odd. It felt like you pulled a "13 reasons why season 3" twist and...eh. Last part with Riko was delightful andi wish she could be the main focus of a story one day because her endings, behavior, personnality are all perfect to me. It led to a nice clifthanger for sure. But the whole story was built up around this spooky serial killer and then...Riko's here. It had little to no connection to the overall narrative, even if it was indeed the best part. So hit and miss to me. Great opening and finale, but the overall story wasnt exactly cohesive nor were all the characters meaningful. Here's hoping Lynda and Riko and Eliza get more screen time in the future! By the way i still had a blast reading it despite everything!
thelamantin
2020-11-05 21:48:52 +0000 UTCYou’re welcome. Heh. That does make a lot of sense for Emily to be trusting. Most of her endings are her trusting people she really shouldn’t. And that does sound pretty interesting. Emily working with bad guys. Sure they may not be as bad as before. But they still are manipulative. And dating tommy is definitely a mistake for Emily. Especially if his core desires haven’t changed.
spyrocyndersam13
2020-11-03 02:21:10 +0000 UTCI don't know if anyone else has noticed the same problem, but I haven't been able to open any Twine-created stories (including this one) in Firefox since a recent update (versions 81 & 82). It works fine in other browsers though. I'm hoping it's something that Firefox will fix in a later update.
Jack Rabbit
2020-11-02 12:47:21 +0000 UTCHey, thanks for the detailed feedback, really enjoyed reading what stood out to you and im glad you liked it. Being sceptical of Tommy is totally justified and thats not something im going to ignore going forward, one of Emily's main character traits is that she's very open and trusting so I felt like it made sense for her character but there's a good chance that can be taken advantage of. I kind of see Riko and Tommy as being pretty similar in that they're neither 100% good or bad, they've both done bad things but have been shown by Emily that being straight out villains doesn't work so now theyre in a kind of a grey area. For Tommy especially I wouldnt exactly say he's a good guy now, he's still focused on getting the things that he wants he's just figured out it's easier to do that through altruism and being nice, his core desires haven't really changed much. Emily isn't perfect so dating Tommy could turn out to be a mistake but I hope in the long run her character flaws and the questionable morality of people around her makes for more interesting stories.
Markus Jones
2020-11-02 09:11:34 +0000 UTCI loved it! All the knockout endings were great. And while I'm not a fan of endings where Emily dies all the horror ones were unnerving. It was also nice to see how things have changed for Emily. Eliza being a good person. And of course the return of Riko! As for what I didn't like. Tommy. I REALLY find it hard to believe that he's a good guy now. He was the only one who wasn't tricked or threatened by Diana. He happily did those things. Not to mention how he saw and treated women for years. And he never once showed remorse for his actions. And he's supposed to have changed in a few months? Also I REALLY don't like Emily dating him. especially since he tried to kill her several times As for the ending. Things are pretty bad for Emily though not so bad since she has Riko. Also it was nice seeing her mom again. I'm excited for the next one ^^
spyrocyndersam13
2020-11-02 02:48:20 +0000 UTCThanks for posting this tonight! I've been looking forward to it. A welcome distraction after the Cyperpunk delay lol
Jack Rabbit
2020-10-31 21:28:58 +0000 UTCYay, it's out! And right at the perfect time!
bonesteoca
2020-10-31 20:38:47 +0000 UTC
