As usual, I am having trouble writing. Also having trouble with everything else, but that's an entirely different issue.
One thing that's particularly frustrating me is that I've spent so long being a pantser that I kinda don't know how to write any other way any more, and I had a project I wanted to do that really needs to be planned out pretty carefully before I can start writing it.
So I got to a certain point in the planning process and just...stopped.
Not because I didn't want to do the project anymore, but because I just couldn't go any further.
I needed to fully define the supporting characters and plan out their side stories, and....I just couldn't. When I tried, I'd just sit there, staring at my planning document for a while, then give up and do something else.
This happened over and over again until I eventually stopped even opening the file.
I don't know how to rewire my writing brain. I've been writing the same basic way since the 1990s. Admittedly, things have changed a little, in that now I write my ideas down rather than trusting that I'll remember them, but they're still pretty nebulous, especially as they progress; I might have a pretty strong outline for the opening, and a relatively well-defined idea of the early middle, but the "outlines" always eventually devolve into "not sure where it goes from there, but the good guys win in the end" territory. And sure, eventually I get near the vague parts and find myself writing a new partial outline, which then takes me through another section of the story, but it's still more pantsing than plotting, you know?
Which is fine if it's just silly fan fiction or a novel I don't ever intend to show to others.
It's a different issue entirely when it's the idea for a visual novel that would require me to hire artists and such in order for the final project to be completed. I can't waste my money and/or their time working on a project that can never go anywhere because I can't visualize the details of the story until I've worked on part of the story.
Admittedly, I wouldn't want to hire artists until I'd written a full draft of the script anyway, but if I can't ever start writing it, then it's still wrecked up. And because it's something more complicated than I usually attempt--even though each story is planned to be linear, with only flavor text different based on player choice, the idea is still to have each major NPC have their own line of (mostly optional) sidequests to give them each their own story--I can't just say "well, heck with it, I'll just start writing and hope for the best!" because the best is not what would happen if I do. It would just be my usual muddled mess.
It's very frustrating and I have no idea what I can possibly do about it.
