| 22/12/2013 So I've finally uploaded this story, even though I started writing it back in March or so, maybe even February. And no, it really did not take me 9-10 months to write the entire thing. More like 4-5. As I had mentioned back in January (check my entry for 6th January) I had gotten interested in the Jak and Daxter franchise of video games. So after watching the Let's Plays for games 1-3 and seeing all the cut scenes for Jak X, I was just so intrigued by the world the characters lived in and I loved the characters themselves...trouble is, the franchise was obviously Naughty Dog's first attempt at writing an actual story in video games (compared to the great story in The Last of Us) so it meant that certain dramatic twists had no bite, a few plotholes popped up, certain dialogue parts were just characters unnaturally expositing and possible points of contention between characters were never addressed. This meant I was delving into the Jak and Daxter fanficdom very quickly, as it's often other fans that can plug the gap when this happens. (I often find that limited volumes of fanfics indicate a well-written and completed story, meaning nothing more needs to be added.) Reading two stories in particular (Nightmares and Captive Voice) got my own plot-bunnies working and the story forming in my head refused to leave me alone; as I had found an hour or two spare at work some days, I started writing my own story. Most of the story I had written at home, writing a little every night before going to bed. I became even stricter with myself when it came to definitely writing something before bed as, at the same time, I was doing the Cisco Course, which consisted of a single 3-hour lesson in the week plus home-study time. As for the story itself, I found myself writing it as if it were my own creation, purely so that I would actually explain and develop the world. The reason I did this was that, I am aware that certain friends and family read these blogs of mine so I wanted to make sure this fanfic was inclusive, not alienating anyone that was unfamiliar with the Jak and Daxter mythos. The key inspiration of mine for this story was this: Baron Praxis' guards (or army) of Jak II became the Freedom League (or honoured police) in Jak 3, but no one in the game apparently has a problem with the fact that Jak himself had slaughtered dozens of them before Baron Praxis' defeat. So when I was thinking over reasons for this, I started thinking about Germany in the immediate post-war: how did they think and feel about enemies of the state suddenly being hailed as heroes? What was their reaction to finding out a relative had been a member of the Gestapo or Death's Heads? How did the former lower-ranking Nazi members themselves feel? How were the occupying forces regarded? In addition, I found it rather strange that Jak's angstier side just evaporated in the latter half of Jak 3. He didn't even mourn the death of his father, I mean...really? (I also found it rather odd that no one in-game had figured out Jak and Damas were father and son, even though I had figured that out pretty early. So part of my story is written with the implication that they had actually known before Damas died - whoops, spoilers!) So with that minor plot-point not fully explored, I found it rather annoying that the full ramifications of Jak's change in personality and his amoral actions were not properly considered and discussed. Thinking about it, all of that might have been a key reason for Jak 4 getting dropped when the developers realised they couldn't come up with a decent story. So what took me so long to load this thing up? Well, just the proper editing and formatting mainly. And then, some months ago, I had read the best Jak and Daxter fanfic ever and realised that my story just isn't as good. Ah well, I had fun writing it. |