What makes a story...

[Wolf Kanno]

I was originally going to put this in the GFF forum but have come to the conclusion that the subject matter is too great to be relagated to just video games, let alone FF.

So the question is simple and I encourage that people use examples and be as specific as possible. Give positive and negative feedback about any medium.

What makes a story?

P.S. No smart-ass comments.

[Martyr]

You gotta have a character that the audience will care about.

That character has to have to deal with some kind of conflict.

The conflict creates the plot.

The plot is what makes the story until the conflict is resolved, at which point the story is, uh, dissolved. Done. Over. Finished. Ended. Terminated.

[blackmage_nuke]

P.S. No smart-ass comments.

Words

A cliff hanger with an open ending has good effect in stories

And if all else fails throwing ninjas in can make anything interesting

eg. the cow sitting by the wet road when a car drove past and water splashed everywhere as the cow got soaked.
"mooo" went the cow and went back to sleep
"stupid cow" went the driver

now with a little change to the italicised words

the ninja sitting by the wet road when a car drove past and water splashed everywhere as the ninja dodged all the water droplets
"BAKA!!" went the ninja and threw shurikens at the car.
"Splat" went the driver

[Griff]

Well first off let me say that smart-ass comments are what I do best. So I just have to say an author makes a story.

Otherwise character development is a key point that many stories miss. Start out with knowing what a character hates, fears, and desires and move on from there.
(P.S. A published author once told me that)

[Quindiana Jones]

This does.

[Wolf Kanno]

Perhaps I'm being a little too vague... Though Blackmage Nuke seems to have gotten the idea.

For me it depends on what type of story we are dealing with. In a comedy, I don't usually care for an award winning plot, as long as the characters are interesting and the humor is the type I'm in the mood for.

I feel it depends on the general theme of the story and it's goals. What was the writer's original intention? Does the story explore it well? Do the characters work for the story or are they irrelevant?

My pet peeve's in story are forced relationships and potential being squandered. I also hate obnoxious characters that really don't do anything for the story, especially when the author decides that the story should focus on said character going about being obnoxious and makes the story nothing more than a premise to why this character is there being obnoxious... I'm looking at you Fushugi Yugi

When I emmerse myself in a fantasy or sci-fi story, I usually look to see if the author decided to be somewhat original or if I can just consider it Tolkein and Asimov fanfiction. Sci-Fi isn't so bad but fantasy stories really suffer from borrowing Tolkien to much. I don't ming borrowing ideas as long as you bring something new to the table with it.

Overall, if the story has a wonderful premise and intriguing plot, I want the cast to be interesting and fit well with it. If the story is more about characters than the actual plot. I want them to be deep and well thought out.

[Christmas]

Humour.

[Martyr]

People are more interested in people than anything else, and they only relate to the most realistic situations that people can get into, and so the best stories, in prose for novels and short story, are all entirely character based.
Never create a character like Superman, because nobody understands Superman. His problems aren't our problems, so we can't relate. The best character is a character that we can relate to. A mortal, normal, average joe.
Once the reader can understand and relate to a character, then that character is suddenly infinitely more interesting and intriguing, and so becomes the story.

This rule remains true whether you're writing Sci-Fi-Horror/Romance or Documentary Nonfiction.

Rule # 1: Have characters that we care about and relate to.

Next, the conflict must remain always. A big problem with amateur writing is that the conflict starts late or it finishes early, and this can never happen. In a story, the disaster starts immediately. In fact, one exercise is to start the story where you imagined the climactic moment to be, and then go from there. As long as there's incredible conflict and strife among the main characters who we relate to and care about, then the story is an incredible page turner.

Rule # 2: Maintain Conflict

And that's it. Those are the components of the plot, and plot is, basically, a synonym for story. These rules apply and work in all genres, and in all forms of communication from short short stories to feature films.

A good exercise for practicing this is to write a short, 2-4 pager about a nearly (but not quite) impossible event that happens to a normal person/group of persons, and then see how it plays out.
For example, off the top of my head here, a foreign exchange student who doesn't speak the language stumbles down an escalator and crashes into a security guard, who is having a really bad day. We understand everybody's stance, it's immediate conflict form the start, and it will end when the conflict is resolved, easily enough, and it can be any story.

[Blue Flame]

Romance, Vengance, Depression, Humour, Betrayal. Those I believe would make a good storyline.

[Clouded Sky]

I don't mind if the characters are a bit annoying, as long as they're well fleshed out and grouned. Personally, I enjoy characters I can relate. To a certain degree. I think that should always be a slight degree of realism to the characters, even if the setting is quite outlandish. I also enjoy when the themes of the story entertwine, or at least don't contradict themselves. I feel like that's happened several times, and I don't like it. If I was more awake, I'd go into more detail. I just finished a class where we explored this question.

Baa.

[NINJA_Ryu]

Dont have cliches!!!!

dont do the golden 3 (fantasy wise ) of elves, dwarves and humans!

or orcs, wizards, all powerful evil, etc. unless you can shake it up!!!

very important ^^^^^

[Azure Chrysanthemum]

It really depends on what's most important to the story. Is it a plot-centric story or a character-centric story? Both are written differently, and to be able to talk about either one needs to know what's important.

That's not to say that the other should suffer because the focus is on one, but knowing which of those two is central to the story goes a long way in being able to say what exactly makes the story.

[Citizen Bleys]

Embedded themes within the story improve it 100%, such as the "coffin money" in James Clavell's Tai-Pan or Kambei's "losing actions" in The Seven Samurai

[Martyr]

Embedded themes within the story improve it 100%, such as the "coffin money" in James Clavell's Tai-Pan or Kambei's "losing actions" in The Seven Samurai

Oh, right. Yeah.

Every story has a theme. If you don't have a theme, then you haven't written a story. Officially, without a theme, you've written an anecdote.

[Ki Ki]

Well I'm your average happy ending person. A story just doesn't make me feel good if it doesn't have a happy ending.
And in the case of a romance, if the heroine is completely helpless, it irritates me a little. >:O
But a happy ending is what makes a story for me.