What are you reading?

[thepanda]

Without a foundation of "Character has binding to world"  or "cast has binding to character" it's really a bunch of irrelevant events.

True, unless those events are meant to highlight something about the displaced character or the worlds they visit. Tsubasa Reservoir Chronical was decent (up to the point I quit reading, anyway). Then again, I guess the cast does begin binding together so this probably falls under that second foundation.

As for Wanderer, well, it feels so much like a trollfic that I had to give it up after the interrogation/ torture scene. Honestly, it reminded me of a certain Magic Knight Rayearth fic from way back in the day where Cephiro was invaded by natzi.

*Goes searching. . .

Ah, yes, A Duet of Pigtails. -_-

[Brian]

Ah, yes, A Duet of Pigtails. -_-

You know, I never got to that point?  I saw Shampoo vilified (totally), to make Ranma emotionally vulnerable and remove Akane from the picture (and leave Ranma single), and then I saw Umi get the same treatment to make Hikaru emotionally vulnerable and remove whatshisface from the picture (and leave Hikaru single), and thought:

"Man.  This is painfully bad, watching the author(s?) butcher everything/one to get to their intended matchup.  Since it's abandoned anyway, I'll just stop here."

Naturally, milage varies, and all that.

[thepanda]

You know, I never got to that point?

Lucky you. Brain bleach cannot get that out of my head. -_-

Between Duet and a certain Sailor Moon torture fic (I read the MST3K of it from one of my favorite MSTers and still wanted to vomit) I firmly believe that bad fics stay with you far longer than good ones. -_-

[Brian]

Human nature is to remember negative things over positive one.

Remember those 'A's you got in grade school?  Or the time the teacher praised you especially for doing a good job?

Yeah, okay, now-- what about the time you spilled your milk in the cafeteria, or you got called into a parent-teacher-conference because you were late to class one time too many?

[Dracos]

Stargate is planet hopping, not dimension hopping.  Dimension hopping is just an expansion on the ancient Wagon Train concept (considering that Star Trek was originally pitched as 'Wagon Train: To the STARS!').  Admittedly, with AUs, you also have the potential to have character interactions where one character has considerably more experience than their counterpart, which should add an interesting element; it depends, I suppose, on if the goal is 'let's visit strange new dimensions!' or 'Man, that wish %$*@ed me up.  Now there's zentradi beach volleyball and Tesla Batteries!'.  Er, nevermind that last one.  I meant: 'Well, this is familiar, but different.  Now what?'

...yeah.  I think the closest thing I can think of is ... that CLAMP story -- Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles?

Heh, never read TSC.  Leapers?  Oh, Sliders kinda sorta?  Never watched far of it, being a TV show.

AUs are different, as it's instead about ripping away everything a character holds true with a taste of the familiar.  Dimension hopping isn't actually the same as Wagon Train.  In Wagon Trains, the cast brings their center with them.  Take Star Trek, the core crew and the ship are there in every adventure.  The social center of 'these are who the cast cares about' and their goals retain meaning (whether it is Travel to the Old West or Boldly Go Where No Man Has Gone Before).  Also, they tend to have intrinsic in them that problems they cause Can follow them.

Single person dimension hop fics don't really qualify as nobody besides that one guy is doing the hops and if they aren't going back?  Well, what does it matter?  Problems rarely are meaningfully able to follow (A lot of struggling often goes here), but are instead usually created out of whole cloth for the character (Wanderer is an example: Problem fitting in, Spirit torn asunder, Natives react hostile).  Like in Wanderer, there's the Rival character that bothered to get created: Well, she can't D-hop.  How is she ever able to be a rival again?  Instead, she's a perpetual unresolved plot thread.

Mmm, man I haven't heard of Duet of Pigtails in ages.  I remember liking it back in the day, and ended up hanging out with Rob following it, but lost  touch with him sometime during grad school.  Looks like his comic book company is still hanging around and got something out this year.  Ah, time passin' and all that, good on 'em actually getting something out.

[Brian]

You know, I was totally fixating on the 'Planet of Hats' style adventures I would have expected that D-hopping would engender?  I can see how I missed the mark on this one. >.>

Sliders is a good call; that fits pretty well.  What I was going for with AU was 'D-hopping into an AU, with the canon characters (or at least some of them).  IIRC, Sliders started out as 'D-hopping for the lulz', and then quickly became, 'and now we are STUCK on this grand adventure D:'.  After a season or three, they introduced D-hopping alien invaders; this may speak to shifting content/genre to try to appeal to more viewers precisely because they realized the issues you mentioned.

I recall a lot of Sliders episodes much more fit into the Wagon Train: TO THE STARS! mold because the cast (and it was a cast, vs. that fic's 'One') would arrive on a world, and have x amount of time before their window of escape.  Sometimes they would have (and need to deal with) their analogs, and sometimes they didn't (hence my mention of AU).  Come to think of it, this is almost precisely the plot of Stargate: Galaxies.  Heh.

It seems that Wanderer misses all these marks.  Oh, well. :\

I keep looking for an opportunity to use my catchphrase of 'Beautiful disaster!' but I just can't see it applying; seems there's too much fail to search for the shine of awesome, based on your description.  A shame; the catchphrase will have to wait for a later day.

[Jason_Miao]

I can't recall many (any?) dimension hopping stories that actually work out alright at all. 

Classic science fiction, since the alternate realities are fitted to the story. 

I think that the difficulty in dimension hopping across anime series is that most are based on the one-central theme, and mashing two together doesn't really play well (although, that raises the question of whether you could work a Sideways story where everyone is supposed to keep their abilities secret.  e.g, KOR and Haruhi).

[Dracos]

Sliders actually has the cast grounded because the cast wants to get home.  To their home, specifically.  There's no nebulousness about this, so there's a center for the whole D-hopping adventure to work around and it can become a Wagon Train.

It wouldn't quite be the same if it was "Hey, here's our next leap time, whadyasay folks, should we go back home for the weekend?" or if there really was No Going Home.  In which case they become drifters who hopefully at least are looking for a port in the storm?  D-Hopping without a center is basically no different than a story about a cast in a Holodeck that decided to set it on random.

Oddly, the last couple chapters give a reason for Ranma(shapedEntity) to really want to hunt around dimensions.  It's not 'well, I'm here on another world away from everything I know, let's make the best of it (which it started with instead of being D-Hopping, and that was fine)', it's instead "Someone has ripped off a chunk of my soul.  I am going to get it back no matter what".

Planet of Hats *googles* Man, you Trope To Strong! =P

Jason:

Well, AU stories are not quite the same thing.  If you only go to one reality, it's not really a D-hopping story.  It's the same way really Spell Jammer and other 'Worlds with different physical laws in the same universe' aren't really, because they're related and you don't have to struggle for intrinsic relation.  If I punch a snarky guy in the nose, he can come after me for revenge, and it's not like I became totally unfollowable by leaping into elf-universe where that guy never existed.

[thepanda]

I think that the difficulty in dimension hopping across anime series is that most are based on the one-central theme, and mashing two together doesn't really play well

Eh, there are 3 ways these stories usually work.

1) The crossover universes are fundamentally similar enough that the characters don't break them (Street fighter x King of Fighters x Tekken x Dead or Alive)

2) A character falls into another character's world, but doesn't actively conflict with it. (People falling into the Pokemon world for example)

3)A character falls into another character's world-story and inherently conflicts with it (Any story where the author has to pick and choose which rules they want the crossover to follow, or come up with excuses why said character can/not do certain things in the world they find themselves in. Often leads to Magic A is Magic A and Our Tropes Are Different)

[Dracos]

Read some 'Shifts in life' (SHANNARO), which put in the plot: Hey Naruto starts using Kage Bunshin wisely (SHANNARO) early.  And also encounter Anko early, who decides to (SHANNARO)  train him.  Yeah, not really anything of interest.  Also, almost every Sakura mental line includes SHANNARO.\

Wave (SHANNARO) country and I was bored.  Not really worth reading, so no link.

[Dracos]

Randomness:  Kenichi618's fics are 'favorited' like everywhere.  I'm kind of confused why.  Sure they're gigantic fics, but they're all sort of crummy SI fare near the start.  it's weird continually wandering across them.

[Jason_Miao]

I think that the difficulty in dimension hopping across anime series is that most are based on the one-central theme, and mashing two together doesn't really play well

Eh, there are 3 ways these stories usually work.

...

I don't usually see fighting game stories with characters bouncing between universes.  Granted, maybe that's because I don't read stories based on fighting games, but...

Anyway, if you're just talking about a straight up crossover, you're right, but that's not usually what I consider a dimension hopping story.  Basically, if it's a thin excuse used at the very beginning of a story to shove characters from one series into another, that's just a crossover.  If they're flipping back and forth more often ("Going to the Slayer's Dimension to pick up groceries."  "Don't forget the milk."), dimension hopping.

Read some 'Shifts in life' (SHANNARO)

Hey, I clicked that link today.  And you made it to Wave?  I think I made it to chapter 2 or 3.




http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5409165/1/Its_For_a_Good_Cause_I_Swear

A completely serious fic, with determination, teamwork, leadership, etc.  Really.

Starts a bit slow.

[thepanda]

Yeah, I was thinking more 'crossover' there.

And, wow, that's like the third author profile I've seen today that absurdly long. What hell is with the mini stories and super lists?

[Brian]

And, wow, that's like the third author profile I've seen today that absurdly long. What hell is with the mini stories and super lists?

Part of the 'fanfiction.net is a popularity contest!' thing some people have going on.  There's a mindset I've seen in users....  If it's one of the ones I'm thinking of:

• You'll note they also have favorites lists in the hundreds, ranging from 'decent' to 'WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS!?'
• They may not have written anything, and if they have it's either 'crack' or something like a 'highschool AU'.
• The authors they mention in their profiles have the same lists.
• Somewhere in the massive profile is something irritatingly moralistic, usually hinging on something that's either copy-pasted and rife with grammatical errors, or just factually inaccurate.

A big part of why I stopped trying to participate in that scene.

[Dracos]

I think that the difficulty in dimension hopping across anime series is that most are based on the one-central theme, and mashing two together doesn't really play well

Eh, there are 3 ways these stories usually work.

...

I don't usually see fighting game stories with characters bouncing between universes.  Granted, maybe that's because I don't read stories based on fighting games, but...

Anyway, if you're just talking about a straight up crossover, you're right, but that's not usually what I consider a dimension hopping story.  Basically, if it's a thin excuse used at the very beginning of a story to shove characters from one series into another, that's just a crossover.  If they're flipping back and forth more often ("Going to the Slayer's Dimension to pick up groceries."  "Don't forget the milk."), dimension hopping.

Read some 'Shifts in life' (SHANNARO)

Hey, I clicked that link today.  And you made it to Wave?  I think I made it to chapter 2 or 3.




http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5409165/1/Its_For_a_Good_Cause_I_Swear

A completely serious fic, with determination, teamwork, leadership, etc.  Really.

Starts a bit slow.

Mmm, I've seen that recc'd several times.  Had trouble getting over the beginning.  Namingly, Kakashi being unable to deliver a reasonable lie or just telling the truth.  I suppose I never read past chapter 1 though at that.

I am sometimes oddly tolerant.  How else would I have read so much terrible fanfiction to ECB back in the day.  Like the fic you linked, sometimes it's worth giving a couple chapters to see if it pulls out of a nose-dive.