The “Machine” That Made Gentle Novels Suck vol. 1 : Debuting – Newbie Contest

Like novels the major source of our seasonal garbage is the guys and harems this is a series I'll be explaining why this is so why light novels are rigged to be against innovating this week we'll discuss better origin in how you become a light novel author in the first place there are two major ways to become.

Enlightenable author the xinjin show or newbie contest and web novel today we'll be discussing the Newbie contest first please subscribe to see the rest of the series as they come out to begin with every light no company runs their own contest mostly annually but some also do it.

Semi-annually where hundreds if not thousands of Applied novels are submitted these novels will go through three or four level of judges each level of Judges having increased experience and importance with the final round judges often being the professional editors and perhaps one or.

Two popular authors under the label from there the top 10 or so will get to be published and the other officially debuted with the top winner awarded 3 million yen the second place 1 million and so forth so far so fair right the best guy wins but wait that doesn't explain why they're writings themselves are bad.

Disclaimer first I am not saying everyone who got in through this method is bad but we're talking here is why the system itself doesn't work firstly light novel contest limits the page numbers you are allowed to submit to between 80 to 150 pages on Microsoft Word which usually translates to 200 to 300.

Pages on book of course this is understandable you would want someone to submit a gazillion pages the problem is set Beyond these 150 Pages nothing matters your story doesn't conclude in 150 Pages you want more space to explore themes and characters.

I miss the part where that's my problem maybe you say that's also fair but here's the issue what are you supposed to do once you enter into the company and become a professional writer what will the company expect of you then just more 80 Pages manuscripts no if you heard of any light novels in.

Recent memory I'll bet that 99.9999999 of them are series long running so basically you were hired for your ability to run 50 meter sprint but you'll be expected to run a marathon maybe even a triathlon see the problem now it's why you can easily see that so many.

Light novels even one with initially unique Concepts thought the cliches relatively quickly because in contests long-term planning ability isn't only unhealthful it's considered a liability you are expected to rush your character relationships developments and arcs to get it over within 150 pages.

Put in all your best cards then not have anything left over for the future or actually you're expected to do it in lesson 150. I have been told that judges especially once in the first two rounds of the contest considering they are non-professionals assigned dozens of manuscripts to grade.

Actively dislikes longer manuscripts just for the fact that they are more TTM to them and since these judges aren't professionals fully Affiliated to the publisher they do not care if the story they are reading will make a long-term successful series or not so they're literally grading the.

Manuscript with a tldr mindset because of this there are many unofficial limitations to what you can do in a contest you're not allowed to have more than five main characters you're not allowed to do the expositions any foreshadowings symbolisms and subtext will just be ignored so they're pretty much a waste.

Of precious page space and you might not even be allowed to introduce Concepts that judges aren't already familiar with in a way it's understandable because that makes it easier to create the book as a standalone within 150 pages but at the same time the limitations can be quite suffocating and sometimes.

Downright unreasonable because one it automatically locks you from writing certain genres and two because this point wouldn't hamper an actual long-running Theory and in fact you can see that many successful stories are successful exactly because they're allowed to go against these restrictions.

That is why you can see that new fresh ideas and unique settings hardly ever get a platform on light novels I have talked to many companies writing teachers and even people who had history of winning the contest about this and they will be upfront that following trend is a very big factor in grading so even for stories that abide by the.

Trends luck can play a huge role in whether or not using theme and to even try to break away from that may very well be self-sabotage not to mention since each company has their own individual contest every year this is where it also gets messy not only that this means there will be dozens of books going around every year.

With the label contest winner on them which kind of devalues the title of the winner itself it also lessens The credibility that the winner will actually make a promising writer in the long run like imagine if each movie studio hosts their own Oscars would you think that's trustworthy then would you even care.

And on the other side too considering like no others even debuted one are just Freelancers not tied down to the company itself mean that it is common wear instead of staying and producing a series for the publisher the contest winner can simply just walk away with the price money.

Which certainly isn't helping when the field of light novel authors has a high turnover rate where most even series writers tend to not continue writing for longer than 5 years especially when you also look at the results there is a vast variety of genres and type of stories that can win the contest.

But when you look at the Publisher's monthly catalogs most of them are still oversaturated with the same old Power fantasy is the cars and harems so the results speak to itself if the contests The post-purpose is to get the outstanding writers that will help right for the company for a long time.

Then it has spectacularly failed so how did this system came to be well it's from the regular novel contest which is the Boomer father of the light novel contest and Lionel companies tend to be subsidiary of printing or media giant so you put two and two together though in standard novels case this.

Selection method is actually effective that is because for one standard nodes usually not only have twice Thrice or quadruple the text count of light novel as you can see here but they're meant to actually be a one-off unlike the long-running nature of light novels.

But hey this is Japan using a boomer error long oscillate method that has proven to fail after 20 years is kinda what they do in every industry anyway in fact if you point out to any popular light novel with big anime adaptations these days the amount of titles that came from contest winner is stunningly.

Low with almost everyone coming from web novels instead so again all the more proof to show how the system failed to actually get good riders or writers with anything power at all we'll discuss that later in an episode about post debut career so now that we see how the contest.

System is rigged to refuse unique writers and stories while promoting the same old same old ideas next week we'll be looking at the wealth novel the other major recruitment method and spoilers it's not actually any better please subscribe to see it next time share this video to any friends who.

Might also be interested thank you for watching and see you next time

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