Story authors

Trying to figure out a movtivation for a character

Alright, so I;m still having trouble with my big project that I'm working on and I think I finally figured out the true problem is that my motivations for characters always head a bad direction. Allow me to explain:

So in the story the character is supposed to go from skinny to massive while also beginning to truly feel alive where they hadn't before. Though what leads them to the conclusion of weight gain?

If I laid this out by asking questions then what they want is to gain weight but what's standing in their way is the fear of judgement of others, through that the problem becomes if they are afraid of the judgement of others then what situation do they fall into to let them feel comfortable to begin gaining weight?

Though also, what led them to want to gain weight in the first place? Given their fear of reality already implies they must have existed in a place where fat wasn't that accepted and thus how did they discover fat being a nice thing?

To answer the question I of course looked to my own life and that's where I ran into issues. What led me to get into weight gain was an interest in it already but then I became more aware of being sexually attracted to it after going through something terrible and feeling like I'd never be able to feel sexual attraction and thus felt less human, but as I realized this was what I was into I felt more normal but still abnormal since no one else was into it.

Hence also why I felt the character wouldn't feel inclined to go for it once they realized this was it as I didn't feel like this was something to openly admit or go for or else people might hurt me emotionally or physically. So given all of that my life isn't the best inspiration for the character's motivations.

Still though I need to know for the story telling process: What leads the character to get into weight gain? What happens to have them get comfortable gaining weight after being afraid to do so because of others?

All I have so far is that my story will take the character to some strange location after they figure this out where their weight gain can happen and their weight may even come in handy for a few things. Through this they begin to accept themselves and even finally find a place to be themselves.

I do know that they can't get into weight gain because they've gained weight for some reason and begin to like it. Also, this story will mainly have the person gaining weight on their own and by themselves so the reason they do this can't really be that they got comfortable when someone else revealed they too were into it, it would work but not in this story where given the medium we can only really follow one character.

Any help is appreciated, thanks in advance.
4 years

Trying to figure out a movtivation for a character

Well, it's not so much why she's into it I;'m worried about it's how did she become introduced to it.

Though I'm also not sure about the kidnapping, though the suggestion is creative I will admit. Just not the type of story I write. I always like making my characters have agency in their gains and not being forced into this.

For example in my witches story I published here, while they have their kidnapped victim in the basement it is later revealed the door isn't locked and they could've gotten out at any time and yet they chose to eat the food and get fat.

You could argue the same for the Saw films and the characters are too stupid to realize the less painful method of breaking out of the traps Jigsaw set for them, but still even in the witches story I got out of the kidnapping scenarios rather quickly because I didn't like it. Just the being kidnapped part starts to remove agency on the character's part and makes me feel bad for them instead of excited about the weight gain, just my opinion and I do get turned on by force feeding strangely but it's complicated.

Now that you bring it up I was inspired in this story by American Psycho (mainly the film and the musical, but the novel too since they both came form that), basically the lead was supposed to go on a journey like Patrick Bateman does in that story. They start out being stuck in a job they dislike and feeling the world and people around them just aren't worth going through everyday with, then once another person at work shows them up and makes them feel inadequate they remain enraged even throughout their other engagements that evening. After leaving the club he finds a homeless guy that he decides to murder just to take out his aggression.

This eventually leads him to kill that annoying coworker which becomes the main part of the plot as he tries to remain innocent in the eyes of the law. I hate spoiling the story like this (skip to next paragraph if you'd rather), though in the end he discovers this is easier as no one else believes his coworker is dead and/or doesn't care, even the apartment the coworker used to own is now pristine and up for sale and thus leaving Patrick and the viewer to question if it all really happened.

(Spoiler over) So in my story I once had the idea of the lead gaining weight through vore and thus they'd first eat a homeless person and then their coworker and keep up the idea that they just disappeared. This didn't work because 1, everyone would notice her weight gain and 2, if people did ignore this then why would anyone think otherwise about the coworker because they'd never assume they were anything but missing.

Then the ending (I'll not reveal it here) was something that also got thrown off too for reasons, though admittedly that was the main thing I wanted. So I started focusing on making stories more about that kind of idea where the ending mind screws you or perhaps even the whole story does.

I will reveal one more thing to help, this is supposed to be a point and click adventure game, hence my focus on how do they do they begin to think of weight gain as the way to find themselves and how they escape the situation where they can't gain weight, because I'm thinking of these as more of a puzzle of some sort for the player to solve.

Though I'm concerned about the story and how the player knows they need to get to a better place to gain weight, which is where I'm having issues as my ideas would be a world where they feared oppression or something off of that. Also, how they'd discover the way to escape and know of it, which I can't think of anything for.

I did have one idea, that their interest in weight gain might come from a desire to be a human being if the lead is an android and thus this is a way to both feel more human and to actually feel something emotionally. Though still the lack of acceptance issue is there as why else would they go to the strange place to gain?

Another idea is that, perhaps they meet someone who is already fat and that's what convinces them to gain weight. Still, I feel though this removes the acceptance issue and thus means she wouldn't have any reason to go to the next location.

So basically, if we could think of another reason to go to the next location then it doesn't matter if she feels accepted or not in the previous world, but she'd still need to have someway to discover weight gain and we'd need that way to be either temporary character or no one at all.
4 years

Trying to figure out a movtivation for a character

I hope that was okay to bring up, I'm not sure if I made a mistake back there, I tried to avoid mentioning American Psycho before for this reason. At least I didn't get into the worse parts, that would surely get me in trouble here.

shouldn't have brought up a lot of the things I did here. I'm sorry if that negatively affected anybody, I didn't mean to do that, sorry, I'll edit or delete my post if people would rather.
4 years

Trying to figure out a movtivation for a character

Ah, that IS the solution. She moves and then becomes interested in fat so the conflict with society doesn't exist and cause my dark thoughts to intervene.

This does still mean I have the issue of how she got to the strange place where my story takes place but I'm also thinking perhaps I don't have to explain that. One of my inspirations for the game is from the game Myst where the player character is supposed to actually be the player themselves, and they have no explanation of how they got to the age of Myst (ages are places in Myst) but later come to find out that it's because of interacting with the book of the age of Myst which linked them to it's world.

How they got the book is irrelevant but also revealed at the end of Riven where you return to the Star Fissure to get back home as that place works as a portal to the world beyond Myst such as the one you came from. Thus when Atrus tried to destroy the book by throwing it into the Star Fissure, he actually just sent it off to your world by accident.

So in my story we can use this concept, at the beginning the player and player character are inseparable and you interact with a teleporter by accident which warped you to the strange world, it is here you begin to have the character you're playing as fleshed out and eventually revealed to you.

My main idea is the lead character wants to discover themselves and they could easily become interested in weight gain by now being in this strange world and finding something which they begin to connect with. Which is basically how I discovered my own love for fat when I saw images of characters from shows I watched fattened up in fan art, so my character can do the same or similar.

Though then there's the idea of returning to the world she came from, which is where the conflict might introduce itself as she begins to think she'd never be able to go back like this, so the conflict in the story now becomes trying to figure out where to go instead as the teleporter can only take her to a location if she tells it the location.

This seems to have fixed all my issues and answered all my questions. She gets to the strange location by chance, and she becomes interested in weight gain because of something she sees there, and finally she doesn't have to worry about society if she is able to get away from it. Perfect! Thank you, I can finally do this, I think. Hopefully no other issues arise.
4 years

Trying to figure out a movtivation for a character

Well, I'm kinda back where I started after going for overhaul to actually get what I'm wanting form this.

I'm trying to make a point and click adventure with a fetish story going on within it but it goes deeper than that. I'm wanting something that has a story featuring characters going on personal journeys and coming out changed and not just fatter (like they become aware they were wrong in the end or something like that).

Not only that, I'm trying to make it be very Tim Burton inspired with elements of Kenji Eno (though the later is mainly puzzles as Kenji Eno was a game designer who made very surreal games which is nothing like Burton's work but that's what I'm trying to accomplish with this game). I'm just not sure what to do with it because I feel anything I could think of are either someone else's idea or just doesn't work together (an idea that doesn't work with the fat fetish element applied).

Then I'm trying to add puzzles and I feel that they'd all be the same (make food, unlock food container, or get out of room). Then there's also how I feel that the only ideas that work are the ones I don't like (they're gaining weight as punishment from someone else, they're trying to escape the weight gain, or the story around will have to contain characters dying or being chased by a monster or the lead being trapped in a room they have to escape).

I just don't know what to do.
4 years

Trying to figure out a movtivation for a character

I'm an idiot, I just figured it out. I came up with an idea that should work, I just need to put the puzzles in my story and we should be good.
4 years

Trying to figure out a movtivation for a character

I admit that I didn't read all of the previous posts on this topic, however I do have something to ad.
I have written over a hundred WG stories, posted on my old DA site. I deleted it earlier this year for personal reasons. That being said here are some of the reasons my characters gained weight:
Love, to please a spouse or significant other; job, caused gain, or gained to keep job; sexual fantasies i.e. feeder/feedee; disguise to go under cover; revenge, either gaining themselves or fattening another. These are just a few of my plots. I hope these help.
4 years

Trying to figure out a movtivation for a character

Thank you, I'm actually glad to have a list like this.

I do have one to add for others needing this help:
- sudden hunger or sudden weight (the character has no explanation of how they gained weight or are suddenly hungry and don't know why, this works best for a discovery towards the end of why that happened) (this one came to me in a dream once where the character in the dream had a sudden, unexplainable appetite and was following the only clue they had to find out why)

That's all I can add, but still I hope this helps others. I'm still trying to figure out my story but this should help me a lot actually.

Given the way my story is I can narrow down the options as well:
-revenge wouldn't work as we don't really have someone to take revenge against
-job causing the gain or gaining to keep the job doesn't work either only because I'm not sure this character even has a job
-disguise to go under cover could work but I'm not sure where we're going under cover yet
-sexual fantasies would be the easiest motive I could choose and I'm glad it is an option as this sounds like the kind of reason my character would go for
-pleasing a significant other doesn't quite work because I already know the lead wants it for themselves mainly
-love could work actually work as I'm working on the lead's lover also gaining weight and that makes the lead begin to want to do it too as they discover they like it through their love (I know these were supposed to be together but still)

Thank you, this is great to have a reference.
4 years