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VN element: Slice-of-life

Clephas

Entry posted by Clephas

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One of the single biggest elements of most VNs in existence is slice-of-life.  This entire post is based on this fact, and it isn't one that can seriously be argued against by anyone who has read more than a hundred VNs.

So what is slice-of-life?  With VNs, it is a type of scene where bits and pieces of daily life, without any particular conflict, are portrayed.  These can be humorous, mildly touching, or informative. 

So what is the value of slice-of-life as a tool for storytelling?  For one thing, it provides an opportunity to portray and develop the characters in their most 'natural' setting.  Do you want to know what a character is like in peaceful times?  Slice-of-life scenes are generally the tool used.  Do you want to slowly develop a mild romance between two characters?  Then slice-of-life is your friend. 

In this sense, slice-of-life is a highly valuable tool.  While extreme scenes, such as violent scenes or ones with psychological or intellectual conflict, are also valuable for developing characters and their relationships, it is the slice-of-life scenes that form the skeleton to which the conflict and/or drama adds flesh later on. 

However, the problem with slice-of-life is that it is basically an exclusion of extremity.  It is difficult - virtually impossible - to give flesh to a character with only slice-of-life.  For better or worse, people bare their true strength and value (or weakness and uselessness) in situations where they are being tested by circumstance or opposition (whether intense or mild).  This applies to VN characters, as well. 

Slice-of-life is your friend... unless that's all there is.  Sadly, a lot of writers make the mistake of thinking otherwise.  I can't count how many VNs I've experienced that make this mistake, to one extent or another.  Slice-of-life as a tool is a valuable friend and ally... but as the sole tool for constructing a story, it falls pathetically short all too often.

Edit: Understand, I came to these conclusions as a result of playing numerous VNs that made that particular mistake... and I'm including 'standard Vn romance' as slice-of-life.  Romance is something I'll touch on separately in the next entry.

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ChaosRaven

True words. Although I wouldn't call myself a particular fan of slice if life VN's, I do consider slice of life 'scenes' as very important for almost every VN. They are the calm breaks inbetween the action or more serious story parts of a VN, and essential to develop characters and relationships. Ideally, they happen in 'sine waves', iterating between story and slice of life parts. Though there's certainly still a lot to say about how to write actual good slice of life scenes... :sleep:

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Clephas
1 hour ago, ChaosRaven said:

True words. Although I wouldn't call myself a particular fan of slice if life VN's, I do consider slice of life 'scenes' as very important for almost every VN. They are the calm breaks inbetween the action or more serious story parts of a VN, and essential to develop characters and relationships. Ideally, they happen in 'sine waves', iterating between story and slice of life parts. Though there's certainly still a lot to say about how to write actual good slice of life scenes... :sleep:

A lot of the problem is that a lot of slice-of-life writers don't seem to understand that experiencing the daily life of a boring incompetent is... boring.

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Narcosis

I also agree on SoL being an important element in writing. The problem shows up, when writers can't really balance the contents of their story well enough. As @@RedK said, it's fine for SoL to make majority of the game's content, at least in terms of modern standards (although, I'd still digress - even moege or charage can be written differently - they don't particulary require SoL as sole supporting element), but things get different with story-centric prose. Whereas an average charage or moege can survive solely on influx of SoL elements, more active genres require action and catalysts for these to actually happen. Good prose tends to minimize SoL elements to brief periods between chapters or events, where the action unfolds and remain used solely as subtle character-building devices. It's said, that "real characters" gain soul only through "real ordeals" - obviously, SoL itself isn't enough to actually construct an interesting character with deep personality, unless you're planning to create the next generation of Mary Sue's.

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