Dimension Wars

Hello. I started to write this story and I'm looking for feedback and criticism.

Twenty years ago Austin met seven droids. The droids were

bipedal, three fingered attached to a human like arm covered in

armor, their chests where shaped like a human even solid with the

legs attached to the sides, the feet looked like shoes, their heads

were just as tall as a human's and a little wider and the head came

down slightly to protect the neck. They stood exactly six feet tall ,were blue with a metalic luster, and they had round pure black

eyes. Austin had traveled to a dimension with two factions at war

that used machines that had no intellectial value worthy of speaking

of. He arrived on a planet in the Quinea system and followed the

battle and found a few androids that had survived relatively intact.

Four of the seven were found offline, fallen in the dark mud of a

swamp, and prey to the soil's suction. One was found fallen next to

the edge of a forest that was connect to an open plains. The final

two were found frozen in a position like they were crawling before

the permafrost had covered most of their fore arms and almost all of

their legs, a thin layer of ice had covered their exposed bodies that

had no covering back then and their black, red, blue, and yellow

coded wires could be seen. Purple wires came from their eyes and

connected directly to their motherboards. As they were activated

they mindlessly followed and obeyed their benefactor. The last thing

the droids remebered after gaining sentience was waking up one night

to a fire sitting on logs with trees spread out sparrinly around

them; other than that they had dim memories of their most recent

actions. Over time each one took a name for themselves, developed

their own identity, and customized their bodies. Sarge had gotten a

scratch across its left eye; Tech replaced its right arm for a wire

exposed hand and arm that could flip out for a plasma torch, Heavy

Metal's body was a darker color then its brethren, Rotor wore a

leather jacket and a World War 1 leather pilot hat, Short Circuit

wore brown unveral amor which made the android look like an organic

being (Univeral armor covers the body enterily and looks consistent

throughout, but is thin enouth to see through at the face and thin

enough to move at the joints but is thicker everywhere else.),

Clockwork had a camoflauge knapsack, and Gears forewent any modifications.

edited 16th Oct '11 6:33:51 AM by Philosopher

An epilogue happens at the end of a story. I think you meant prologue, if you're just starting. Aside from that, I have never seen any epilogue or prologue that resembles this one in the slightest.

To be frank, this is bloody awful. No one wants to see painstaking descriptions of droids so early in a story, it really isn't anything that would get a reader to keep wanting to read your story.

This is like the epitome of telling instead of showing. Literally nothing happens in this chunk of text, it's a recap of something that I had no prior reason to care about. I almost expected everything to be in bulletpoints.

Needs tons of work, aside from "arriving in a new dimension" I can't think of any way to salvage this. You should approach your concept from a totally different angle.

edited 15th Oct '11 10:26:18 PM by OuthouseInferno

Yes, I did mean prologue. Hmm, does the reader need to know the appearance of the characters in the beginning of the story?

Not really. While a couple of description would be good to mold a basic image (the frame, the color), going into detail slows down the narrative. Most books I read wait until Chapter Two or Chapter Three, when there's a break in the action, before describing beyond the basics, if at all. In general, the beginning should have a brisk pace, to hook the reader in.

And always keep in mind: Is the prologue needed? If it isn't, start with the actual story.

edited 16th Oct '11 7:00:24 AM by chihuahua0

Thank you. I'll keep this advice in mind when I go back over the prologue.

edited 16th Oct '11 7:15:22 AM by Philosopher

Ok, maybe chapter one will be decent.

Slasher 2 a humanoid machine with a canine like head and stood about six foot and eight

inches visited a dimension where a super computer hacked him, and changed his most basic

codes. He managed to escape but he now had to consume everything to survive because his

mind was hacked so began the fall of worlds as he consumed the world he warped to escape

the machine.

The first place to go was a barren light gray planet riddled with craters and pocketed

with small holes and seemed to glow from the light of the system's star. Slasher 2

pierced the surface of the world with his arms. The immediate area of around him started

to turn into a purplish metal with a metalic luster. The purple color seemed to spread

in all directions and spread like water across the soil. Mountains, valleys, craters,

and everything else were consumed by the spreading invader; the atmosphere was sucked in

by the metal. The planet began t crack and revirbrate until it broke and shattered into

small shards and head into space. Slasher 2 stood on the last piece of purple land that

measured ten feet long and graually got narrower as it desended until it stopped; that

was the last piece of the planet. He looked up into the black of space broken only by

stars to see stars suddenly stop shining. An evil smile worked its way onto Slasher 2's

otherwise emotionless face, “How I love time travel.” The shards could be seen going

into what appeared to be still black holes.. Sending something back millions of years

ago to see the results now was a very good benefit to time travel. Most worlds were

barren of life, but those that did harbor it found its self in a waking nightmare.

The shards glowed as they entered atmospheres. Shards hit the surface of rocky

planets and hovered in the air on gaseous planets, on the gaseous planets the atmosphere

was slowly sucked in by the shards on the worlds. On the terrestrial planets the metal

crashed into the surface and began to spread like water. When a creature enountered the

unusual substance those who touched it found the metal racing up their limbs and covering

their bodies making the animal look like a purple statue. The metal would move on and a

time later the statue would start to disolve back into the mass of purple material. When

it met the oceans the seas receaded, bullets did nothing, and plasma, nuklear, photon,

and netreunal weapons did massive destruction to the intruder; unfortuately there was too

much of the metal and there is only so much damage you can do without wiping yourself out.

The others of Slasher 2's race, the Metaloids, came across the voids that were the

result of his handywork. The machine who found out had was named Beast and it looked

like a monster with a short wide head, with thin arms that ended in sickles, and its body

was thick at front and thinner in the back, its hind legs were thick, and had three

toes. The two toes in front formed a v shape and a third in the back, Beast told the

other Metaloids of Slasher 2’s doing. Slasher 2’s species looked upon him with distaste

of what crime he had committed and judging the best way to fix him or punish him. At the

headquarters on Mars; a three story building with with steel pillars holding an awning

made of a light black material. What few windows it possesed were scratched to such a

degree by the rust storms that once couldn't see out of them. The inside was designed

akin to a hockey stadium but slightly smaller and it had significantly less seats

surrounding the pit. the machines assembled to decide Slasher 2's punishment. Austin

feeling pretty rotten about Slasher 2 doing this and Austin being one of the people who

created him looked down in the middle of the pit. Metal Donkey Kong sadly watched the

spectacle down in the arena.

Austin leaned on the railing,“What would have made you do this?”

Metal Donkey Kong adjusted its arms on the rails, “I cannot think of anything short of me

dying or unable to leave the dimension.”

“I see your point.”, Austin shifted his weight uneasily, “This is the first time anyone

has consumed a universe. Correct!”

“Correct or the first we know about” replied Metal Donkey Kong with a combination of certainty and uneasiness in his voice.

Slasher 2 was seated in a chair attached to the floor by a single metal pipe. Straps of

an unknown material was strapped across his neck, wists, and ankles. John a human

looking Metaloid and Splicer a human skeleton in a hazmat suite looking machine were

going to be the ones to adminster the verdict as soon as the hearing began.

Slasher 2 ripped his arm from his restraint and slammed his fist into the hazmat

suite metaloid and Splicer backwards staggered from the punch before falling back. John

jumped at Slasher 2's unrestrained arm. The other arm came up with enough to shatter

bone only to make John stagger back. Austin watched the events unfold in a daze. MDK

while forming a sword and shield jumped down and ran as fast as he could to help restrain

the dangerous Metaloid. Slasher 2's legs thinned in order to slide out of the leg

restraints and then reformed. A large stalagtite shaped metal projectile came for

Slasher 2. He ran and slid at the last moment in order to avoid it, John saw and braced

for for the projectile. Slasher 2 picked himself up to see a cloud surround a glass like

sphere joining the fray. This was beginning to be too much, Slasher 2 opened a wormhole

and left the scene.

None of the machines made a move to retrieve Slasher 2.

“Aren't any of you going to stop him.”, Austin asked them

“It is none of our businesses if dimensions get destroyed.” replied Infinity a cloud of dust looking machine. “Fine, then I will do it by myself if I have to. I made the mess and its my

responsibility to clean it up.”, Austin told them; he suspected that the reason for none

of them wanting to take part in this had to be their experience when Metal Donkey Kong

went insane. Several of the handful of metaloids had been destroyed, but unlike Slasher

2 Metal Donkey Kong's rampage of destruction had been entirely in universe zero.

“Then I wish you the best of luck.” said Vindicator an insectoid looking machine with a

long head and wings.

Well, at least something happens. At the cost of an added descriptor tag after every other sentence, of course.

All of the other issues I had are still here.

Is there a way to fix the formatting so there isn't a line break after every line? It may make people more willing to read through it. The appearance of text can affect how people perceive it.

Yes. I'll fix that. So where do you draw the line of explaining and action? Or what are some suggestions that you have?

This part is out of order, but this is one of the action sequences that I have.

The wormhole opened and Slasher 2 casually stepped out and took a look around at the new environment; seeing if there were any hostile creatures. Out of the cold night air came seven bright glowing plasma balls bearing down on him. Slasher 2's metal melted a little when the plasma came near but heat dissipated quickly into the cold night air; and in retaliation he fired his finger tips like bullets and then reformed them to repeat the process. The bullets easily went through the brick walls, and some actually came inches from droid faces.

Austin rushed forward from his hiding place to tackle Slasher 2. The two bodies rolled as the droids kept firing; hitting both Slasher 2 and Austin, but hitting Austin less. Slasher 2 raised his fist and punched Austin in the face while the other had the three spikes pinning Austin to the ground as the spikes left his hand and pierced through Austin’s arms and torso; the blow from the punch knocked teeth out. Slasher 2 raised his fist again only to have it fall off as plasma flew off from where his elbow should have been. Looking behind him, Slasher 2 saw that Gears had been the one to have gotten the closest. Gears began to curse when Slasher 2 looked at him and swung his body back behind the safe brickwall and readied himself in case Slasher 2 came from the top or the sides. Slasher 2 swung the stump in an arc shape and making an arch shaped, thin piece of metal that cut through the brickwall went through Gear's lower torso. Gears fell to ground scared senseless until he heard a loud cha chink. Austin had torn himself out of Slasher 2's spikes and had hit the guy when he wasn't paying Austin any attention.

Slasher 2 laughed as his leg went straight up between Austin's legs. The pain was tremendous as Austin crumbled over in excruciating pain Slasher 2 kept laughing at the figure before him.

Sarge watched this and fired at the support structure of the water tower; he accessed the radio in his head, “Shoot the support structure out from under the tower; Heavy get Gears. Short, Rotor; give him cover fire."

What almost looked like a ghost moved quickly across the ground with the light of plasma outlining its silhouette in the night. Austin looked up to see his foe's head dissolve into a plasma ball: the head and arm grew back at tremendous speed and with what appeared to be anger. The pain receded as Metal Donkey Kong absorbed the electrical impulses

The siloute crouched next to Gears, “Come on.”

The figure took Gears arm and wrapped it around his shoulder while Gears obligingly obeyed. In the moonlight Gears could see Heavy Metal's face.. A loud creaking ripped through the night air Slasher 2 looked up while Austin began to lift himself off the ground and saw the water tower coming down. Heavy Heard the noise and began to run away from the brickwall not knowing where the tower was going to land. Slasher 2 turned back towards the most recent firer of plasma; that firer, Sarge, grinned wickedly as the tower came down and smashed Austin and Slasher 2 with a loud thud. Almost immediately after the sound had dissipated six spikes tour into the metal barrel and sliced through it like butter. Sarge frowned slightly, but was not surprised especially after what he had seen Austin do in the past. Austin lifted himself slowly out of the rubble and could see Slasher 2 casually walking toward Sarge. Sarge fired several shots at Slasher 2 as he slowly backed up watching Slasher 2 for any sudden movements would could spell disaster for the android. Austin grudgingly lifted himself up and ran at Slasher 2. Austin punched Slasher 2's melted abdomen. The horror on Slasher 2's face said everything; the look was of a being about to die.

“Aim for his abdomen!”, Austin shouted as the two began to trade blows.

Sarge nodded at the droids as they surged forward aiming at the abdomen. A few blast hit there to reveal a yellowish glowing material. Slasher 2 stretched his arm as he swung it behind him and apparently hitting something because there was a loud thud as something hit one of the brick walls while the other grabbed Austin's face. Once again Slasher 2's arm fell off as a plasma ball buzzed through it. The arm fell and sank throught the Earth as if the surface was snow. This battle was making this world too much trouble for what it was worth and whatever method they had used to track Slasher 2 down would likely locate Slasher 2 in this universe again. If it could locate him in other universes then....Slasher 2 would need to find out if that was the case before jumping to conclusions.

That action sequence was definitely a step up from the "story" sequences in terms of being followable but there's still problems.

There's like a single-digit number of pronouns. Try reading it out loud, it doesn't sound good if you have to say someone's name 5 times in 10 seconds. Definitely find a way to replace the repetition of names.

You still have the problem of having really short and choppy sentences. That makes it look simpleminded and stunted. Link them together.

I think you tried to switch viewpoints in the last paragraph, it was extremely hard to tell. I can't think of how to change this immediately but others probably can do it before I think of a way.

edited 21st Oct '11 11:59:19 AM by OuthouseInferno

The writing and sentence structure seem to be garbage. Did I even start to develop the characters yet?

If I did what were your thoughts on them? Is the plot decent and slightly original?

edited 22nd Oct '11 12:38:21 PM by Philosopher

Aside from designated "good guy" and "bad guy", there wasn't any character development.

I couldn't really draw a plot from it, it was more like a jumble of concepts and character designs.

Retry at prologue.

Twenty years ago Austin met seven androids. Austin had traveled to a universe with two factions at war one that used machines that had no intellectual value worthy of speaking of and another that used insectoids that had been breed for war. He arrived on a planet in the Quinea system and followed far behind much to his chagrin of the battles that were being waged on the planet.

He trudged through the thick mud and murky water as he continued on. The water was littered with the bodies of soldiers both organic and artificial and served as a reminder of the show he was missing. Ahead Austin could see a partially submerged android and looked in decent condition; coming up to it he could see that the thing might work as he got closer he tripped over an unseen obstacle. Underneath the thick plant infested water he could see that another Communist android had fallen and this one appeared to be struggling to get out near Austin's left was a water logged corpse of a univeral soldier. He pulled himself out walked over to where the machine laid hidden underwater and pulled it up. He flipped it over his shoulder and trudged over to the partially submerged droid and did likewise to it.

After trudging through the swamp for several hours Austin was greeted with the grand sight of land. On the shore two more androids were stuck in the suction of the dark mud. They seemed very pathetic especially since they were killing machines. Still Austin could use some companionship; so, he walked until he found a dry spot of soil that the pathetic machines would not get stuck in and ordered them to stay put. He went back and dug the other out of the mud trap and carried them over his should to the others. Austin gave the four androids a quick scan had the three working ones walk around and found that one's right leg was not working. He had the two workings ones carry the other two and watched as their four digit hands closed around the arms and heaved them. The group walked for the rest of the night the next day during which they had past into a forest, and well into the second night.

Austin was forced to stop because the robots' batteries were running very low the active ones sat on logs waiting for orders with the nonworking propped up beside them. The plasma weapons used by both sides had seared quite a few trees and it was only through the fortune of finding a working that was no longer being used by its owner that the group had the fire in front of them. Austin went up and placed his hand on the androids' internal batteries and they became charged. He squatted next to the nonworking one scraping heaps of mud and leaves out of unprotected body. Austin wondered why anyone would use just frames and not try to protect the hardware inside. It was nearly daybreak before the machine started to work again.

“Twelve hours wasted on...”, Austin muttered under his breath as they proceed with two of the robots helping their companion by letting it lean on their shoulders.

Eventually the forest gave away to a giant sweeping plain; at the edge another one was found laying next to a tree with one of its hands melted and some of the wires melted on the ground near it.

“Please go get that communist android.”, Austin watched as the free armed robot went and slugged the robot over its shoulder.

Austin could see smoke and hear the screams of the wounded and dying a great distance off still, but he was close and this excited him a great deal. The group traveled for three hours and came upon the war torn battle field pocket with holes; Austin heard the coughing and the labored breathing of an univeral soldier turned to look and smiled as he watched the poor creature suffer. This was what he came to see and watch, but he also wanted the fun of watching the fighting. Austin ran towards the thin line of trees that the battle sounded like it was taking place in and could hear the sound of an ocean nearby as he closed the gap. Austin watched from behind a tree as Communist androids melted and fell to the ground and univeral soldiers were wounded, caught on fire, or died. He liked it when he saw several of univeral soldiers were hit in the face with plasma or when the plasma hit them in their abdomens and flames spouted from underneath their helmets as it melted through the thin material connecting their helments to the rest of their suites.

A tree fell and crushed univeral as well as the robots which did not even respond when they were flattened Austin smiled, “Pathetic machines.”

As he followed them Austin was nearly hit with plasma which did not please him and was ignored whenever a univeral soldier or a robot saw or approached him. Austin frowned when the sea came into view and he could see both groups piling into boats with the univeral soldiers leading; he looked and could not see his robots and after a quick search Austin ordered them to get him one of the boats. The androids led him onto one of the boats as others of their kind boarded.

The boat traveled East for over a week as it skimmed across the water and the further they went the colder it got. The only things of intersts that happened were some of the boats exploding, the curious exotic creatures the came up to investigate the boats, occasional bombardment, but other than that ice had been forming on every body on the ship. The ship suddenly jerked up and flew over and onto the giant iceberg. The outside hover propulsion systems pulled inside of it and the little ramp slid down. While Austin waited for the androids to depart he noticed the shore of the iceberg was packed with other of the small boats.

The ice ahead was spouting up like geysers and some both univeral and android were encased in ice after the explosions. Austin walked behind the communist army as it made its way slowly but surely forward. The wind swept snow of the blizzard later that day made it nearly impossible to see the robot army melting and Republic's insectoids catching fire and burning to death underneath their armor none the less he was enjoying the trip and the screams and chittering of the dying insects as they burned alive made it that much more enjoyable. On the fourth since their arrival a small fort or maybe a research outpost was spotted and drew the communist forces like a piece of vegetation draw in a swarm of locusts. There was a small resistance group that was quickly overran by the superior numbers of the mechanical army inside was a meat locker filled with various foreign fauna, the laboratory area was in ruins from the firefight and the pantry was nearly devoid of canned foods. As Austin left he caught a glimpse of someone that had frozen to death its tentacles and nose less face were black from frost bit.

“What a way to go.”, Austin muttered as he left.

The time spent exploring the place had cost him precious time and now the army was nowhere to be seen. Austin curled his hands into fist and shook them furiously as he paced around out of the corner of his eye he saw something. The androids from earlier that he had fixed were standing there waiting for his orders.

An idea struck, “Where did the others go?”

A monotone voice responded, “That way.”, the androids pointed in unison to a ridge off in the distance.

Austin and his companions trecked for almost a month following the footprints before they found any other signs. The snow had likely covered the rest of the evidence but in their pathway were two androids that were barely disconcernable from the rest of the bleak landscape Austin scraped the snow off to get a good look and saw them frozen their arms stretched out like they were crawling the permafrost had covered most of their fore arms and almost all of their legs, a thin layer of ice had also covered their exposed bodies. Austin thought about it for a few seconds about wether or not to take the two and decided to take them and to toss them if they were too much or if he didn't want to deal with them.

edited 4th Nov '11 8:25:05 PM by Philosopher