WELCOME ONE AND ALL TO THE
EPIC CHARACTER CHALLENGE!!!
Fifth Ever Novel Competition
If you're looking for creative prompts, crazy roleplay, and CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT, you've certainly come to the right place! ...so...what the heck is this 'challenge'??? For the last few years, I have hosted an interesting challenge that gathers authors from all walks of life to throw their characters into a fun, explorative challenge to help writers dive deeper into the minds of their characters through story prompts, situations, and games that help flesh out character traits. Participants can sign up with their original characters from anything from a novel, book, short story, series, RPG, videogame, etc. but it could also just be a figment of the author's imagination without necessarily being attached to anything in particular. Check out this article for a brief overview of the challenge Check out previous yearsAbout This Year's Challenge
Tentatively scheduled to begin on Monday, May 20, 2024 and run for SIX weeks
first clue being revealed on Sunday, May 19, 2024
Each participant may enter UP TO THREE characters each to form a team! Any characters entered must be your own original creation. The characters chosen don't have to come from the same body of work. They can come from different fictional universes if you so desire, but please keep in mind that this may make things more difficult to keep track of when challenges arise.If you only want to enter one character, feel free!
Author Melissa de la Cruz might enter Mal, Daughter of Maleficent, even though the characters were somewhat developed from a fanfic of sorts.
Feeling fun? Enter two characters!
Videogame creator Satoshi Tajiri may enter Ash Ketchum and Pikachu[, both from the same body of work.
Wanna really shake things up? Throw three characters in there!
Author Charles Dickens could enter Oliver Twist, Ebenezer Scrooge, and Nicholas Nickleby, even though they are not from the same bodies of work.
BUT, NO MORE THAN THAT!
Sound Interesting???
Let's answer a few more of your questions, shall we?
What do I need?Firstly, you must have at least one character; any human, alien, monster, robot, animal, or other being for that matter who can at least move, communicate, and have somewhat of a personality. They can be a hero, a villain, or a neutral character. Any age. Genre doesn’t matter. Your character can come from any setting; sci-fi, fantasy, realistic, historical, horror, children’s, YA, action, drama, educational, romance, none or all of the above! The story form doesn’t matter either. Whether your character is from a comic, a picture book, a novel, a verbal folktale, a movie, a show, a game, or even a stage play it can be counted (so long as the entrant is your own truthful and original creation).
Secondly, it would help if you had a profile picture for your character. Either you can draw/model them, or you can have somebody else do it (I am going to see if I can do it some and also try to draft some other artists to volunteer because I’m really busy lol) You can also use google images or clipart, or avatar creator sites too (I’ve posted a few below)
www.thispersondoesnotexist.com is a strange (and a tad bit creepy) site that auto-generates a new image every time you reload the page. These images look like real people, but, as the site mentions, none of these persons exist in real life! It splices pics of real humans together with various randomized elements. AI is super crazy!
www.artbreeder.com makes you create an account. I haven’t personally done much with it, but other writing sites suggest this (and the examples look pretty neat).
Dress up games, doll makers and character creators with the avatar-maker tag. meiker.io has a whole lot of different kind of makers from elves, to kids, to adults, to humans and animals. Even anime and all kinds of different styles. It appears that users are able to design and publish their own creator tools on here, so I’m sure you should be able to find a good maker to customize your character with!
www.heroforge.com lets you paint, change poses, add weapons, and everything else. You may see that it seems only to be a fantasy thing, but there are lots of modern outfits, props, and gear including guns, motorcycles, and more! This is meant to make and order your own custom miniature D&D game piece, but you can use screenshots to make this the profile pic of your character!
Your character(s) will go through everything from party games (think Two Truths and a Lie, Never Have I Ever, Truth or Dare) to school days (think short essays, field day, pop quiz) to daunting scenarios and Battle Arenas to test their true strengths. Throw some Mystery Mayhem into the mix along with several other PLOT TWISTs along the way, and we’ll be learning about each character’s personality in no time! (don’t worry folks. we’re keeping it pg-13! so if some of your characters are children, they won’t be left out.)
After this Novel Competition, no matter where you rank, everyone should be able to walk away thinking in their everyday life “that’s something so-and-so would do!” or, “wow, that’s whateverhisnameis’s favorite food!” or, “if whatsherface was here, she would never tolerate such nonsense.”
Want some examples? Here are a few characters of various species and ages with well-known personalities spanning across all genres and story forms:
Sonic The Hedgehog
Belle (from Beauty and the Beast)
Gaston (from Beauty and the Beast)
Alice (in Wonderland)
The Mad Hatter
Willy Wonka
Arthur (from the books and television series by Marc Brown)
Loki
Thor
Peter Pan
Tinker Bell
Tigger the Tiger (from Winnie the Pooh)
Eeyore (from Winnie the Pooh)
The Seven Dwarves (each of their names are self-explanatory :laughing: )
When you think of these guys, certain words come to mind. Some are tricky and cunning, some are curious and sweet, some are arrogant and boastful, some are shy, some are sassy, and some are just flat out crazy. Some are energetic while others are sluggish. Some have a smart brain while others have a smart mouth. Usually, across the movies, books, shows etc. in which they appear, no matter which writer, animation style, or actors portray them, their personality is typically consistent. No matter what, remember this: characters aren’t characters unless they have some character!
For the last couple of years, I've been theming the event. This year, the theme is:
LOST, FOUND, and BOUND!!!
You can take this into consideration when choosing your character(s) OR NOT! This doesn't mean it will be all about being stranded on an island or held captive by prisoners lol, but, however this theme inspires you, have at it! If you pick a character or crew that in no way relates to the theme, not to worry! Your character(s) will still have a wonderful part to play in our epic show.READY TO JOIN IN???
Sign-Ups are OFFICIALLY CLOSED but feel free to observe the madness!
Sign into World Anvil or Create a Free Account through my affiliate link.<3
If you'd rather not, feel free to join the Infinite Imaginations Discord server and witness the awesomeness there. :)
If you'd rather not, feel free to join the Infinite Imaginations Discord server and witness the awesomeness there. :)