Changing Cliches

[Roland_Deschain]

Unlike many other tutorials, this one will give ways to change cliches and make them a little more original and less cliche. This will be a four part series.

Part one: Hero cliches

Cliche 1: Spikey-haired kid with a sword: I've been seeing this less and less(thank god, I hate this one) but if you feel this is an unavoidable cliche, well, here are a few tips to improve on it:
*Make him a reluctant swordsman: Have the hero be a mage that is taught to use a sword because of family traditions. Just making him a pureclass fighter is pretty boring, especially if you have to play this character for the beginning segment of the game.
*Make the character's personality more unique than, say a Sora rip-off:
No matter what, heroes that claim to work for pure reasons and friendship and all that crap get old. Fast. Make the hero have a vice, like money, women, or alcohol. Everyone has problems, no one is "pure of heart," and we all give in to some temptation, be it as small as eating sugary food or as big as getting ****-faced drunk.
*No spikey hair: Just give the hero a normal hairstyle that a normal human is likely to have, not one that requires a massive amount of hair gel daily.

Cliche 2: "Chosen One:" This is a bit irritating, how so many heroes are part of a great prophecy, or somehow destined to save the world. Although I hate it personally, here are a couple ways to make this particular cliche more unique:
*Make the prophecy ambiguous: Prophecies are never lucid in the real world, reflect this in your game. The prophecy should point to more than one person, like maybe the main villain, perhaps?
*Make the VILLAIN the chosen one: How's that for a twist? A villain that's prophesied to bring order to the world, or chaos, or balance or what have you, a la Anikin from Star Wars, could make an interesting conflict. The hero would be more the antagonist, trying to stop the prophecy.

Cliche 3: The hero has a special weapon only he can use: The keyblade, for example, was a weapon that only the chosen wielder could use (agh, I need to stop referencing KH.). This is not as common as the rest, but I thought I'd add it, since ultimate weapons are like this too. One way to change this is given, I'm sure there are many others but, as I said, this isn't too common.
* The weapon, whatever it is, should have a drawback other weapons don't: Whether it drains your character's MP, HP, or has a mind of its own, the most interesting weapons are the ones with great power, but at a hefty cost. For an example, in DnD, my favorite weapon is Veshrak, the Deceiver. This dagger drains your character's soul with each swing and eventually could turn the wielder into a demon or a vampire. It also has a mighty enchantment that can kill any living thing. So, as you can see, it's power with a hefty cost.

Cliche 4: The hero's parents are dead: Difficult to change, but I never back down from a good challenge. Just ask Oblivion....... Anyway, in most games, one or both of the hero's parents are dead. Usually, they die in wars or saving the hero. Here are a few alternate deaths:
*The HERO killed his parents: This may make the hero seem evil, but hear me out. In one session of DnD, a vampire took control of one of our party members and forced him to kill his own family, one by one. It sucked for him, and the character vowed revenge. Now, that exact same situation might not be what you want, maybe the hero just gave the wrong information to a group of bandits or the main villain and that results in his parents' deaths, but it would still make a decent plot device....
*The hero's parent(s) abandoned him: Think Luke Skywalker's situation with his parents: his mother died in childbirth and his daddy left him and Leia, not even knowing they exist. I'm thinking more that the parent(s) put the kids up for adoption or something less dramatic. I mean, that happens all the time.
*Martyrdom: The parent(s) were martyrs, sacrificing themselves for the greater good. Why not, huh? Situations like this were frequent in medieval times.

Cliche 5: The hero is  under 18: What business does a kid fresh out of middle school have adventuring? Well....
*The hero's family are nomadic: Nomads were/are pretty common, so this would be one likely explanation.
*Military draft: One was considered an adult at a younger age back then, so a military draft would on occasion pick up some younger kids along with the seasoned fighters.
*The hero belongs to a serf family: Serfs often were assigned unfair tasks by their lords, so sending a younger serf in one's place to a war or on some other quest wasn't too uncommon.
*The hero ran away from home: Not everyone had a good childhood, and so the hero could have run from his alcoholic/abusive/neglecting parents and become a drifter.

Well, that's all for now. I might update this post later and add either more cliches or more alternate versions. I realize that some of my alternate cliches are cliches in themselves, but it's tough to change some cliches to anything besides less common cliches.

~~Roland_Deschain

[Dragoon de Sol]

I know a cliche for you. The mage is a young naive kid or an older man or a woman.

[Roland_Deschain]

Originally posted by Dragoon de Sol
I know a cliche for you. The mage is a young naive kid or an older man or a woman.

I'm kinda guilty of this myself...
Anyway, one way to change it: The mage looks and acts young, but is, in fact, older! The "young, naive kid" is really a 25 year old hotshot mage who was told to "act his age" by another mage. After making some childish reply, the other mage got pissed off and turned him into a kid.
As for the older man/woman thing, just drop the age a bit and you're golden. Remember: people didn't live to be 70 or 80 very often in medieval times, and in RPGs people that old should be either magical or not human.

[Archem]

Here's one that, while not generally seen as a cliché, could really prove awesome when worked around: Make the hero less than perfectly stable. Mebe I'm just fascinated with the human psyche and the causes for insanity, but the thought of a hero that has many mental quirks really gets me excited. Perhaps the hero has a split personality, or a demented imaginary "friend" that manifests itself in a physical form. Perhaps make the world around that the party perceives as real be some nightmarish perception that you only explain to be so at the end. There are so many ways that you can twist the story by making the hero an imbalanced individual. Everyone has a level of insanity, so why should every hero be perfectly unbreakable?

[Roland_Deschain]

Originally posted by Archem2
Here's one that, while not generally seen as a cliché, could really prove awesome when worked around: Make the hero less than perfectly stable. Mebe I'm just fascinated with the human psyche and the causes for insanity, but the thought of a hero that has many mental quirks really gets me excited. Perhaps the hero has a split personality, or a demented imaginary "friend" that manifests itself in a physical form. Perhaps make the world around that the party perceives as real be some nightmarish perception that you only explain to be so at the end. There are so many ways that you can twist the story by making the hero an imbalanced individual. Everyone has a level of insanity, so why should every hero be perfectly unbreakable?

Holy. Crap. That's a great idea, and I may end up using it.
Everybody, listen to Archem. He's a genius.

[cherko]

Originally posted by Archem2
Here's one that, while not generally seen as a cliché, could really prove awesome when worked around: Make the hero less than perfectly stable. Mebe I'm just fascinated with the human psyche and the causes for insanity, but the thought of a hero that has many mental quirks really gets me excited. Perhaps the hero has a split personality, or a demented imaginary "friend" that manifests itself in a physical form. Perhaps make the world around that the party perceives as real be some nightmarish perception that you only explain to be so at the end. There are so many ways that you can twist the story by making the hero an imbalanced individual. Everyone has a level of insanity, so why should every hero be perfectly unbreakable?

That is something I generally try to do. One of the characters for my now cancelled RPG was a young necromancer with an imaginary friend.

Nice tutorial. Keep telling us how to avoid common clichés, that is the hardest part.

However, I'd rather stick to using Cliché #3. A hero is supposed to be special.

[Roland_Deschain]

Originally posted by cherko
However, I'd rather stick to using Cliché #3. A hero is supposed to be special.

Yeah, I was referring to the hero being some kind of "chosen one." One thing I'd like to see more of is having the hero be the last of some race, or maybe having him be an experienced commander or even a noble. Or maybe the hero has some form of magic around him that allows him to defeat the supposedly unkillable main villain.
Also, how'd you do the accent over the e?

[Grandy]

Originally posted by Roland_Deschain

Originally posted by cherko
However, I'd rather stick to using Cliché #3. A hero is supposed to be special.

Yeah, I was referring to the hero being some kind of "chosen one." One thing I'd like to see more of is having the hero be the last of some race, or maybe having him be an experienced commander or even a noble. Or maybe the hero has some form of magic around him that allows him to defeat the supposedly unkillable main villain.
Also, how'd you do the accent over the e? [/B]

 Use a brazillian keyboard.

 Bécàüsê wè úsé ït ã lõt

[cherko]

Originally posted by Roland_Deschain

Originally posted by cherko
However, I'd rather stick to using Cliché #3. A hero is supposed to be special.

Yeah, I was referring to the hero being some kind of "chosen one." One thing I'd like to see more of is having the hero be the last of some race, or maybe having him be an experienced commander or even a noble. Or maybe the hero has some form of magic around him that allows him to defeat the supposedly unkillable main villain.
Also, how'd you do the accent over the e? [/B]

Cliché #3 was the one about weapons being usable only by one character. This is something I'd rather stick to. The whole prophecy thingy is way overused, but the hero should still be special in some way. In my cancelled RPG, the hero was... The last survivor of some race.

Take my latest storyline for an example; (I'm skipping a lot of details because they aren't done yet) The hero is cursed and goes to see a shaman to get the curse lifted. The shaman can trace the curse back thirteen lives, that the thirteen previous incarnations of the hero have all carried the curse. To find out how he got cursed in the first place, the hero seeks the Fountain of Memory. He drinks from the water and relives his past thirteen lives again, and discovers that he and the villain are bound by fate and have unknowingly been killing each other for centuries in different lives. With the information he gained through the fountain, he must break that loop, lift the curse and also stop the villain's plans.

OK, it'll be better than it sounds, all the details aren't in place yet but you get the point, it's an example of a story where no one but the hero can do the job that needs to be done.

I got buttons on my keyboard that lets me use stuff like é, å, ö, ï and such.

[Roland_Deschain]

Ah, right. I have poor vision, my bad. Well, like I said about weapons, it's one of the less-used ones, I just didn't like KH's keyblade thing.

Also, in slightly more relevant news: I'll post updates once a week.

[cherko]

Bah, no comment on the storyline?  

Bah, no "XD" smilie?

[Roland_Deschain]

Or that works too. As for the storyline comment: It sounds really good, but the last boss fight will be odd if you can't kill the guy....
0_o
Also, I dislike the XD smiley.  

[Phayre]

Aw, jeez, now I want an XD smiley. Poop.
I like your ideas, cherko! It sounds rather like a story CLAMP would spin up. Of course, the hero would be a dark emo prettyboy just barely over the male line, but....
I think the "under 18" thing is because people find it easier to imagine a runaway kid rather than someone trying to get started in their own independent life. My game steers away from that, even criticizing the younger characters for going out on an adventure at such a young age. In commercial games, it's used to hit the correct target audience. I mean, as a 10 year old playing Pokemon, it was cool to know that the trainer character was my age. Plus, younger characters have more things they can learn about life, at least people like to think so. Your stereotypical RPG older-character is the wise one, who if anything learns to trust younger folks. I greatly dislike the younger RPG heroes.... but I can see why they're done as often as they are.
Good job, by the way.

[cherko]

Originally posted by Roland_Deschain
Or that works too. As for the storyline comment: It sounds really good, but the last boss fight will be odd if you can't kill the guy....
0_o

Well, the hero has to use some kind of super sexy special awesome ultra magic sword to kill him  

Originally poster by Phayre
I like your ideas, cherko! It sounds rather like a story CLAMP would spin up. Of course, the hero would be a dark emo prettyboy just barely over the male line, but....

I don't know who this "CLAMP" is, but anyway, the plan is that every incarnation of the hero will be a different age. Maybe he will also be female in some of his incarnations. Hmm, I don't know how reincarnation works. Should find out. *swallows knife*
His skills will be determined by his actions in his previous life.

What I like about this story is that experiencing thirteen lives of pain just to win the game is totally much more than any hero has ever done before.

Anyway, gonna stop stealing Mr. Deschain's thread now. Keep up the good tutorial.

[Roland_Deschain]

CLAMP is a group of manga-making women who like men of questionable gender......

And as for the under 18 bit, I recently learned that the age where one is considered an adult was 15-16 in the middle ages. So, yeah, that kinda makes sense now.