Violet dawn

A good way to drive replayability to your game is to open up its game engine. Jedi Knight attracted much attention for the mods it permitted. Microsoft's Dungeon Siege, a so-so WinXP effort that doesn't even work from Windows 7 on, acquired a Warriors of Destiny mod which revived the original game's sales singlehandedly. So! let's talk the fantasy world of print.

Last year on RoyalRoad, I read a few "guilty pleasures", some perhaps more guilty than pleasant; one to which I've alluded was by BlueFishCake / JL Williams. The series is... sigh... "SexySpaceBabes". Here's GoodReads on all that.

In this world, branching from about AD 2020 here, Earth has been conquered - mostly - by seven-to-eight-foot purple space orks called Shil'vati. The soldiers are female. Shil'vati males exist, and some have even come along for the ride; but these are small, slight, and outnumbered. The title, in short, is an irony: the SSBs are us. How does BlueFishCake work out the sociology? ... he really doesn't. The reader doesn't suspend disbelief so much as hang it.

I'd have tiptoed away from all that, nice Catholic boy as I am, excepting that I've lately stumbled into Reddit (sigh again), and ... uhhh... wtf. There's more fanfic here than I've found in major published authors. Not all the SSB authors are even XY men, witness "HollowShel".

And some of these stories deserve respect. I'll single out CokeSamurai's "In For a Penny". This one delivers reasonable characters, reasonable interactions, and deep psychology. It is so notable that "Sol" took time to review this one, despite that it is a fanfic. Sol does point out its flaws, such as the character Valran isn't needed; but there's nothing here an editor couldn't cure, and it seems criminal CokeSamurai hasn't found a publisher for whatever else he's doing.

So although I've cast some shade on Mr Williams' oeuvre, I have to grant to the man some credit for worldbuilding and inspiration. And more credit for his generosity and humility. Take note Anne McCaffery.